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tacitcantos · 4 years

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After the cinematic atrocities that have been the new Star Wars movies it’s no surprise that The Mandalorian has been hailed as the first successful new Star Wars property in the Disney era. And it’s not hard to see why: its production values are stellar, its story simple but archetypal, and it fully embraces the grunge of the original trilogy. And while it is without a doubt better than the new movies… that doesn’t make it good.

A lot of you are no doubt going to disagree with me. And that’s understandable, because The Mandalorian isn’t bad exactly. It’s more that it’s not good, or as good as it could or should be. It’s a plodding and unimaginative series that meanders around flashing fanservice at the audience because it knows most of the audience will be pleased by any invocation of Star Wars iconography no matter how lacking in substance, a passable pastiche of Star Wars and various westerns, but not a particularly smart or good example of the genre, with little depth under the surface.

And it is a pastiche of westerns. From the twang of its music to the barren landscapes that fill it, The Mandalorian is firmly entrenched in the traditions and tropes of the western. Like all westerns its stakes are personal and its character iconic, lone gunslingers and dusty outlaws and unscrupulous criminals, and the plots of its various episodes vary from reminiscent to outright copying: the relationship between Mando and the young bounty hunter in episode 5 is extremely reminiscent of the one in Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, and episode 4 is a beat for beat remake of the Magnificent Seven.

It’s in comparison to the westerns it so clearly wants to ape that the problems with The Mandalorian become most visible. It draws on the atmosphere and tropes of the genre, but isn’t willing to put in the effort to make either successful on anything but the most superficial level.

The western and its tropes are relatively rigid because it’s been so extensively and exhaustively explored that to be successful any modern day western like The Mandalorian either needs to nail its beats and themes, deconstruct it, or bring something new to the conversation. And The Mandalorian does none of those things.

All the places The Mandalorian has problems or is unsuccessful are due to not not understanding its genre and its genre conventions. There’s four core, interconnected ones that permeate The Mandalorian:

The series has no clear thematic message. It’s not really trying to say anything; not about the warrior culture of the Mandalorians, not about bounty hunting, and not about the postwar status of the Star Wars galaxy. Worse, it has nothing to say about the themes of the western, the genre it’s firmly entrenched in.

Mando is a shallow and static character. There aren’t any real layers or complexities to explore. What you see on the surface is very much what you get, with no hidden depths or surprises. Static characters can be a powerful tool in the right hands: Clint Eastwood’s laconic gunslinger in A Fistful of Dollars and The Good The Bad and The Ugly is proof of that, but Mando is too jokey and fallible to have the gravitas of that kind of silent killer.

Its plot is impersonal and predictable. The plot of most of the episodes are a series of events with little to no character growth or thematic exploration. They’re simple and tend towards sloppiness, with predictable turns and twists which makes watching them cognitively unengaging.

There’s a far more interesting story to be told in this time period that The Mandalorian almost completely ignores. Post Imperial fall but before New Republic ascendancy is a setting that’s perfectly in keeping with the western and could lead to all kinds of interesting story possibilities. Story possibilities that The Mandalorian completely ignores, and ones that makes its own absence of message and character all the more glaring and conspicuous.

As I said before, each of these problems are sort of circular and feed into and make the others worse, but let’s try and tackle them one at a time anyway. Starting with...

1. The Series Has No Clear Thematic Message

Theme and message are key to any successful story. They’re the soul of a work, the underlying pattern that gives the events of a story meaning. A work needs a viewpoint, needs an idea it finds interesting to explore through its characters and plot, or the work has no deeper resonance and feels shallow and forgettable.

For example, Unforgiven is a movie with such a pointed message and theme that it single handedly revolutionized the entire western genre. It’s a movie that wants to show the difference in the appeal of bounty hunting vs the ugly reality, to deconstruct the glamour and tropes of the western, and how killing takes a toll on those that do it. It was such a thorough and brutal deconstruction of the genre that everyone western or neo western after Unforgiven is in conversation with it whether it wants to be or not.

The Mandalorian… it’s not that it needed to deconstruct the western genre in the way Unforgiven did exactly, but it did need to have something to say, some theme or viewpoint to express. And it really doesn’t.

Take Mando’s dislike of droids for example, and his perfunctory arc to overcome that dislike. What’s the narrative purpose? Obviously it’s initially meant to show that he was traumatized as a child by the death of his parents, but what does it say thematically? What does his learning to trust the IG droid say? If, for example, the show had an anti-warrior culture viewpoint, it could use the concept of a droid having choice instead of just doing what it’s programed to make Mando question his own Mandalorian training: did he truly have another option after his parents’ death? Was he indoctrinated? Taken advantage of? I’m not saying that the show specifically needed to have a pro or anti-warrior culture viewpoint, but it did need to have a viewpoint on something.

Not only because not having a message makes the show forgettable, but also because it has serious negative ramifications on the plot and pacing. It’s why The Mandalorian feels so listless much of the time. Because it has nowhere to go, it doesn’t care about getting there fast. There’s no burning message that the show’s creators want to impart to the audience, no topic it’s fascinated by, and so it tends to meander around pointlessly, its plots and characters empty vessels. None of them can mean anything, because The Mandalorian has no meaning. It’s just kind of… there, transposing fanservice for depth.

2. Mando is a Shallow Character

The problems with Mando as a character start in the first episode. The first episode of a series should introduce the main character, give the audience an idea of who he is and what he wants. A first episode doesn’t need to completely expose all of a main character’s layers, but it does need to define him clearly and make him a character the audience can identify with. Who is Mando? What does he want? To collect bounties, obviously, but why? Is it a drive for justice? Does he take pleasure in the hunt? Does it disgust him to have to deal with criminals?

The first episode of The Mandalorian completely punts on answering any of those basic questions. It’s 45 minutes long, but somehow doesn’t tell us anything about Mando besides the immediately obvious premise that he’s a bounty hunter and a Mandalorian.

A better structure would’ve, just as an example, followed Mando through a whole hunt. Maybe when he tries to leave the original planet with the blueface alien his ship is blown up or they’re stopped by a crime syndicate who wants the blueface alien for their own reason, and the rest of the episode is him trying to get off the planet with his bounty. You could punch up the character of blueface alien, start a dialogue between him and Mando that actually gives us an insight into his character. Maybe he lets the blueface alien go at the end because of the bond they’ve formed, maybe despite the bond he still hands him in because at his core he’s a bounty hunter through and through. Either option tells us something about him.

The only real emotional layer the episode reveals about Mando is in a scene where he visits his Mandalorian clan and it’s shown though flashback that his family was murdered when he was a child, and we can infer that he was taken in by the Mandalorians afterward, but again, we get no indication of how he feels about it.

What’s strange is that there’s a more interesting version of this scene in episode 3, where it’s revealed that only one Mandalorian can go above ground at a time. This is a potentially interesting idea: why was Mando chosen instead of the other Mandalorians? Does he feel a burden to represent his people? Is this his driving motivation? Does he feel like he’s not equal to the task? But there’s no followup to this scene to give us a hint to what Mando is thinking about it wasting a perfectly good opportunity to ground him as a character with a concrete motivation.

This whole scene could actually have created a potentially interesting conflict for Mando where he’s torn between saving baby Yoda from the imperials and not tarnishing Mandalorian reputation by betraying a client. Sadly absolutely nothing is done with this idea, as the rest of the Mandalorians seem entirely happy to cover for him when he tries to escape with baby Yoda.

And choosing to save baby Yoda is pretty much the last character growth Mando goes through for the season, besides some perfunctory getting over his dislike of droids in the finale. He’s a largely static character, unchanging and flat. As the series goes on he’s fleshed out a little, but only a little: who he is as a person is still shockingly vague and vacuous by the end of the season.

It’s one of the reasons the series a whole is really emotionally flat, without any ups or downs, triumphs or failures, joy or despair. For example, in the last episode when Mando sees the piled armor of the dead Mandalorians, did anyone feel that as a punch to the gut? Of course not, because we don’t really know who Mando is, don’t have any way into his head, don’t identify with him in the way that we do with the best fictional characters.

Static Characters and How to Write Them

Part of the reason Mando is a shallow character is because he’s a static character that doesn’t undergo any real change. Now, static characters aren’t inherently shallow ones: there are countless examples of iconic static characters in fiction, and especially westerns, but the rules for making a static main character effective are different than those for dynamic ones, and is in many ways harder: not changing or growing through the story can make them feel stale and lifeless, and makes for a passive and unengaging viewing experience on the part of the audience.

There are a few ways to make a static character compelling, but all require careful deployment of the character in coordination with the rest of the story. Here are a few, but notice how none of them really apply well to The Mandalorian:

One approach is to reveal different layers to the character throughout the story. Instead of changing they remain the same, but our understanding of them changes. This doesn’t really work with Mando though, because as we talked about, he’s not a complicated or complex character. What you see is very much what you get and there are no hidden layers beneath the surface one.

Another approach is to have the character growth heavy lifting taken on by another main character. It’s why the lone badass archetype is almost always accompanied by a more relatable secondary character. It’s an approach that’s effective because it lets the badass keep his mystique, while also letting the story reap the narrative benefits of having a character grow. The Mandalorian actually kind of does this by giving Mando baby Yoda at the end of the first episode, but the problem is that baby Yoda is just as static a character as Mando, even if he’s a much cuter one.

Yet another approach is to use the static character as a focal point for other more dynamic characters. They can become a mirror and contrast for those secondary characters and their growth. This requires a deep bench of characters though, and the only really recurring characters of note in The Mandalorian are ex rebel dropshock lady and discount Lando, neither of whose actor can portray anything resembling a human being, and both characters who are even shallower than Mando.

A final approach is for the static character to simply have overwhelming charisma or gravitas. Clint Eastwood’s unnamed gunslinger in the Dollars Trilogy is a perfect example of this kind of character; a figure of dread, more force of nature than person. Mando fails at that though, because he’s far too fallible and his badassness swings wildly from one episode to the other: sometimes he’s able to wipe the floor with dozens of battle droids, and other times he meets an ignoble defeat at the hands of Jawa’s, after which he throws a flamethrower temper tantrum at them.

Helmet Woes

Part of the shallowness and lack of gravitas of Mando’s character stems from the decision for him to never take his helmet off. Facial expressions are an undeniably massive part of human interaction and communication, and the primary way that most actors express their characters thoughts and emotions, which in turn is key to getting viewers to identify with and care about that character.

There are ways to make a faceless character work, but it requires skill on both the writing and acting side, skill The Mandalorian clearly doesn’t have. The dialogue often feels try hard, as though the writers feel the need to bludgeon the viewer to make up for Mando’s lack of facial expression, and often veers wildly from sullen to uncomfortably jokey and pedestrian.

There are a fair few movies and tv shows that have been able to make a faceless character work. V For Vendetta, for example, used strategic head tilting and theatrical body language to characterize V. An even more effective example is Boardwalk Empire’s Richard Harrow, who’s actor is able to use the half mask of the character’s face as a tool to make him by turns compelling, sympathetic, and chilling.

Both cases though require an actor who understands how to communicate solely through voice and physicality. And as likable and talented as he is, Pedro Pascal, who plays Mando, is not that actor. His vocal inflection is limited, his body language nearly nonexistent, and you can always tell he’s not entirely comfortable in the armor, that it’s not the second skin it really should be for a Mandalorian.

Just look at Mando’s default stance. Because of the bulkiness of the armors gauntlets, Pedro Pascal often walks or stands with his forearms rotated outward, giving him a strangely ballerina esque stance not at all evocative of a hardened and ruthless bounty hunter.

Even with an actor better suited to the physicality of the role though, the idea of a faceless main character will always be fundamentally mismatched in tone with the show as a whole. Face is personhood, and a faceless character should be an enigma: a lone bounty hunter who’s story is told through action and not words. The movies The Mandalorian should be emulating are of the kind Clint Eastwood’s Dollar trilogy exemplifies: archetypal stories imparted through visuals and largely bereft of dialogue.

You can see a more modern example of this approach to storytelling in 2015’s Fury Road which has minimal dialogue for the first third but still manages to tell its story effectively and compellingly. Or for an even more extreme example of this laconic approach, see Genndy Tartakovsky’s excellent series Primal, whose tale of a man and his dinosaur has no dialogue whatsoever.

But The Mandalorian isn’t willing to commit to that mode of storytelling. And that’s depressingly predictable: it’s a Disney property after all, and that means it needs to appeal to a broad audience, that it’s a cog in the endless intellectual property money machine. In that machine that kind of audience narrowing approach isn’t something they’re interested in.

So instead The Mandalorian as a whole tends to be pedestrian and safe, a show the whole family can watch together. Which would be fine, but that show is fundamentally at odds with the faceless main character The Mandalorian insists on. It’s another example of the show wanting to invoke the atmosphere of the western without willing to put in the effort to make it work.

3. Its Plot is Impersonal and Predictable.

Another place the show isn’t willing to put in the effort, or maybe simply isn’t talented enough to, is with its plot: both in the broader arc of the season and each episode. Just as with Mando’s shallowness as a character, right from its first episode the problems with the plot of The Mandalorian are glaring. The structure of the episode is innately flawed, disconnected and episodic without a clear through line.

An action sequence unrelated to the main plot at the beginning of a story to prove the main character is a badass is a perfectly serviceable trope, but The Mandolorian burns through ten of its 36 minutes on a hunt that has nothing to do with the main plot of the episode and the only information it imparts to us about Mando as a character is that he's a bounty hunter and a badass. The episode needed to be leaner, bereft of anything that didn’t move the plot forward or give us a reason to care about Mando.

The series is full of little slips and missed opportunities like that. The structure of the last two episodes, where Mando gathers a team to face the forces he’s been running from all season is far more boring than it needed to be. For a show about criminals and low-lifes and bounty hunters in the best tradition of the western, having Mando’s allies be completely trustworthy is a real lost opportunity.

A better structure would’ve had each member of the team have differing motivations and goals so that there’s an underlying tension to the episode. Will Cara go rogue at the chance to take out a high level former Imperial officer? How well reprogrammed is the IG droid? How trustworthy is Discount Lando? These are questions that are hinted at, but the show never makes credible enough to create any real tension. Cara doesn’t care about the Imperial aspect of the forces pretty much at all. And any hint the IG droid is even mildly untrustworthy is defanged by the montage that makes it clear he’s now his own person. Discount Lando decides not to double cross them as soon as it’s revealed he was going to, pricking any tension from that balloon before it has a chance to be inflated.

The episode that’s most illustrative of how weak the plots in The Mandalorian are though is episode 5, in which to pay for repairs to his ship Mando teams up with a younger bounty hunter to go after a high profile criminal.

This is a promising start. Pairing the older and more experience Mando with a cocky young gunslinger is a great way of exploring Mando’s character through contrast, since after all he must have once been something like the younger bounty hunter. How has he grown? How has bounty hunting changed him? How does bounty hunting change everyone who does it? What does it take to be a bounty hunter?

Your guess is as good as mine, because the episode goes on to explore exactly none of those questions. Mando and kid capture the bounty, the kid double crosses Mando, Mando kills him, and then him and baby Yoda jet off to the next planet. That may sound like an overly glib description of the plot, but that’s all there actually is in the episode. The plot of the episode is entirely impersonal. Things happen, but it means nothing from a character or thematic perspective.

Narrative Economy

Every beat in a story shouldn’t just push the plot forward, but also build character and theme. While not westerns, some of the best examples to illustrate this concept come from James Cameron’s early filmography before it started to become self indulgent and… blue. Aliens and Terminator 2 are both masterpieces of sparse and effective storytelling.

Take the yellow power loader from Aliens. Not only does it serve the plot purpose of allowing Rippley to battle the xenomorph queen at the end of the movie, but earlier in the movie it also serves as a character beat:

“I feel like kind of a fifth wheel around here, is there anything I can do?”

“I don’t know. Is there anything you can do?”

“Well I can drive that loader.”

This beat tells us something about Rippley; she doesn’t like feeling useless, and it’s also the first step in her arc of proving herself to the marines.

The Mandalorian is nowhere near as tight in its storytelling or plotting. The incident with the sand people halfway through episode 5 is bizarrely representative of so much about The Mandalorian.

This incident serves no plot purpose, the sand people don’t ever come back, and it tells us nothing about Mando. It’s a pointless aside that’s only there to provide fan service.

A better version of episode 5 would’ve seen some kind of bond be formed between Mando and the kid so that the kid’s betrayal and Mando having to kill him would’ve had some weight and meant something. Considering how extensively and blatantly the show cribs from westerns it’s bizarre they didn’t go this direction. The pairing of the old veteran gunslinger and the young brash one is a really common one in the genre, and best exemplified by the previously mentioned relationship in Unforgiven.

As we talked about, in Unforgiven the pairing of Clint Eastwood’s retired gunslinger and a fresh young bounty hunter is used to show the difference in the appeal of bounty hunting vs the ugly reality.

And the movie weaves that theme through its plot. For example, when Clint Eastwood and the young bounty hunter eventually catch up to the criminals they’re hunting the ensuing gunfight is anything but heroic. Morgan Freeman’s character shoots one of their targets through the gut, and both sides are left listening to him call out and beg for water as he slowly dies.

The experience so perturbs Morgan Freeman’s character that he abandons the chase. The shoot out thus both moves the plot forward, and reinforces its theme that killing is hard and unglamorous and takes a toll on those that do it.

4. The Post War Story the Mandalorian Could’ve Told

What’s frustrating about The Mandalorian is that there’s a far more interesting story to be told than the one we got onscreen, a way to recontextualize Star Wars iconography in a way that’s visceral and immediate and thought provoking and more in common with the westerns it wants to evoke. Werner Herzog’s speech in episode 7 really makes it clear what a missed opportunity the series is as a whole, and hints at what could’ve been:

“The empire improves every system it touches judged by any metric. Safety, prosperity, trade opportunity, peace. Compare imperial rule to what is happening now. Look outside. Is the world more peaceful since the revolution? I see nothing but death and chaos.”

Placing The Mandalorian in the post Return of the Jedi timeline opens a lot of fascinating story possibilities and perfectly sets the stage for it’s western setting of a lawless frontier where there’s no strong central authority. While the fall of the empire in Return of the Jedi is without a doubt a good thing for the universe on the whole, all revolutions are messy and any time a regime falls, good or bad, it creates a power vacuum.

A power vacuum that should be filled with crime syndicates armed with abandoned imperial equipment, planetary governments who are newly independent now they’re out from under imperial yoke and are looking to flex their muscle against their neighbors, new republic expeditionary forces looking to woo those same planetary governments into the new republic itself, and most importantly Imperial remnants. It’s simply a universal truth that large groups of heavily armed soldiers don’t simply pack up their things and go home when they’re newly disenfranchised.

And not just one Imperial remnant or two, but dozens, each with their own motivations. Much in the same way real world terrorists and revolutionary groups often hate each other as much as their designated enemy, all these imperial splinter groups should be infighting and scrabbling amongst themselves for resources and power.

Imagine how much story juice there is to be squeezed in exploring those splinter groups: one could’ve been led by a petty warlord who’s little more than a heavily armed bully interested in money and power, another a strict believer in the Imperial doctrine of stability before human rights and actively fighting against the New Republic, another still a decent person who now out from the militaristic drive of the empire is just trying to keep the planets under their protection safe from crime syndicates and upheaval.

And a bounty hunter is the perfect character to explore this story. With crime syndicates at such a high tide there’s plenty of bounty hunting to be had, and a fledgling new republic would no doubt be putting out hundreds of bounties on imperial war criminals and fleeing high level officers. And a Mandalorian specifically works perfectly: someone who’s largely impartial and uninterested in the greater politics of the galaxy, of the struggle between New Republic and Imperial remnants.

There Except Not

The Mandalorian vaguely gestures at some of these ideas, but it’s always in an undercooked way: the messiness of revolution exists only within a single line from Cara about leaving the New Republic and in Werner Herzog’s speech in episode 7. The concept of newly empowered crime syndicates is sort of there in episode 4 with the raiders preying on the local village with an AT-ST. But the raiders are a tiny outfit that apparently messes with a single isolated village and there’s no indication that the galaxy or even this part of space is suffering from them as a whole (or even that they’re a consequence of the post war status quo. For all we know it’s always been like this).

Infighting between Imperial splinter groups exists for all of the thirty seconds it takes Werner Herzog to die at the end of episode 7 so that the series can get a new big bad. It’s never explained and exits as swiftly as it’s introduced.

And all of this, all of the above, all the missed opportunity in The Mandalorian, hurt its story as a whole. Even just the concept of different Imperial splinter groups with differing motives could’ve been fodder for an episode or two of Mando using his cunning to pit them against each or double cross both, perfect for plot twists and reversals. Or for another example, take Cara’s reason for leaving the New Republic:

“And then when the imps were gone the politics started. We were peacekeepers. Protecting delegates, suppressing riots. Not what I signed up for.”

“How’d you end up here?”

“Let’s just call it an early retirement.”

This is a really interesting idea: the conflict and challenge in transitioning from fighting a pure evil like the empire to the much harder and less straightforward job of governance is a great arc Cara’s character could’ve explored and grown through throughout the series. But this snippet of dialogue is all there is of it in The Mandalorian, and she has essentially no other character growth or development.

There’s a really fascinating post war story to be told in The Mandalorian, in the power vacuum in an empire’s fall and the complexity of transitioning from rebellion to governance, a story that fit it’s western atmosphere and ambitions so much better than what’s there right now: but the show is completely uninterested in telling any of it.

Weaving those elements into its plot and characters and messages would have helped fill some of the emptiness at the core of the show. And that’s really one of the best ways to describe The Mandalorian. Yes, it’s pedestrian and badly paced, but more than anything it’s empty, a space western without anything to say.

#the mandalorian #star wars #mando #disney cannot star wars to save it's life

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beatriceeagle · 5 years

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Where do you think teen wolf jumped the shark? Also, non-specific, but do you have a favourite (and least favourite) TV finale? Thanks!

I heard a TV writer once discuss shark-jumping in terms of suspension of disbelief. “You get one buy,” is how he put it. On Psych, we’ll buy into the idea that Shawn does wacky hijinks in pursuit of convincing the police that he’s a psychic, because that is the show’s central premise. But if you try to add one more unbelievable thing on top of that (say, werewolves) the high-wire act fails. You’ve asked the audience to believe too many things, and now their faith in the show has collapsed.

But as even that writer acknowledged, it doesn’t usually work that cleanly. Shows rarely jump the shark all at once. Even seemingly obvious cases like, I don’t know, Bones, usually show some cracks in their foundations before they do whatever massive thing it is that completely fucks over their show. And often, it’s not a case of so much doing something that breaks the suspension of disbelief as it is breaking your contract with the audience. We agreed, implicitly, that we were going to be this kind of show—but now we’re this kind of show, instead.

The weird thing about that is that, in theory, that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. The Good Place broke its contract with its audience at the end of season one in a pretty major way: A lot of the twist of the first season of that show only works if you assume that it’s the kind of show that doesn’t have twists. (And despite it being one of the best first seasons of a comedy in years and years, I know people who felt betrayed by that twist!) Agents of SHIELD, as I wrote about earlier today, broke its contract with its audience massively at the end of its first season—it spent 18 episodes establishing a world, and character dynamics, and operating procedures, and then not gradually, but all at once, said, “Okay, none of that is what we’re doing anymore”—and became a much better show for it. Sometimes, you just have to say, “Screw the old world order,” and let people come along or not.

So anyway, when I ask, “When did Teen Wolf jump the shark?” I’m asking both, “When did it stop being the show it agreed to be at the outset?” and also, a little bit, “When did it get bad?” And there are two assumptions built into those questions: 1) That Teen Wolf at some point stopped being the show that viewers first signed on for, and 2) That Teen Wolf was ever good.

And, okay, I don’t think that Teen Wolf was a bad show, clearly, because I have watched seasons one through three… a lot. There is something compulsively watchable and fitfully well-observed, about that show. The scenes between Scott and his mom, or Stiles and his dad, or of just Allison, alone, are often shockingly well-observed on a human level. There is some great, almost melodic dialogue, performed by really good actors.

But also, I mean, it’s really silly. The first season is paced atrociously. There are all of these over-the-top cinematic sequences of lacrosse. The mythology is incoherent, even before they start piling stuff onto it. And it doesn’t seem to have a central theme until well into its third season, at which point its central theme is extremely ethically questionable.

But I think the thing is, that’s the show that viewers signed on for! They signed on for this silly, heartfelt, overly cinematic, occasionally weirdly insightful, sometimes very funny werewolf show, that couldn’t pace a 12-episode story arc to save its life. And there was no one moment where that show transitioned into being a different thing. It would be really easy to point to Allison’s death, but honestly, I think her death was fairly in keeping with the kind of show Teen Wolf had been up to that point; one thing that the show had always handled pretty well was teenage heartbreak, and although the ramifications of Allison’s death were handled weirdly, when they did pop up, they tended to be some of the better bits of late-season Teen Wolf.

I will say that season 3B was a huge tonal shift from previous seasons. It’s significantly darker than anything that came before it—not just at the end, but all the way through. It’s not really goofy the way that previous seasons were. On the other hand, 3B is a really good season of Teen Wolf. In many ways it’s the show firing at all cylinders. They’ve got their formula down. (Teen Wolf at its best is a villain + a secondary villain who’s hunting the main villain and making trouble for the good guys in the process + a handful of emotional throughlines.) They’ve got a genuine atmosphere going. They’ve got a tremendous central performance from Dylan O’Brien. And the plot completely tracks!

The problem is that 3B leads into season 4, which maintains the tonal shift—it is literally, physically darker, as all of the ensuing seasons are—but is also bad. There are moments of season 4 that I like, but it’s also the point in time when Teen Wolf gives up on the “two villains” model in favor of the “five hundred villains” model, and also introduces a bunch of new characters, which it is absolutely not capable of dealing with. Also, at around this point, Teen Wolf stopped plotting logically and started plotting thematically. What I mean is that, for instance, in season four, suddenly Lydia, Stiles, and Scott all have massive, encroaching financial issues. Of these, Stiles’ are the only ones that are connected to any previous plot point on the show itself. Lydia’s are, if I’m remembering correctly, introduced mid-season for like two episodes. But more to the point: These financial issues don’t go anywhere. There’s like a running bit with a duffel bag of money from the Hale vault, or whatever, but it’s ultimately meaningless, because the financial issues are not there to either move the plot forward or elucidate character. They’re supposed to be a thematic counterpoint to the hired assassins who have shown up in Beacon Hills.

That kind of theme-based plotting is a) not Teen Wolf, and b) completely outside of Teen Wolf’s skill set, and as soon as the show started working that way, it immediately became an incomprehensible mess. I reviewed every episode of season 5A, and I still could not tell you what the fuck was happening in that season.

But that can all be walked back. I’ve watched shows that got bad—sometimes in ways that made them feel completely unfamiliar to themselves—and then got good again. (For example, Community‘s season four finale is a shark-jumping moment if I’ve ever seen one, and season five, though it had Harmon back at the helm, still didn’t feel like Community in some vital way—but season six is my second-favorite season of the show, and keeps trying to sneak its way into being my favorite.) The moment that I think of as being the point of no return, for Teen Wolf, is when they wrote Kira off. When Allison died, at least it felt meaningful, and like it was part of the natural progression of the show saying something. When Derek and Isaac left, it was due to the actors understandably moving on, and came about in ways that felt like natural exit points for the characters. But Kira’s exit was just Teen Wolf flailing, getting rid of characters who felt like likeable, old-style Teen Wolf (and who the show had put three seasons of development into) while filling up the cast with a bunch of mostly bland next-generation people. After a season with no Danny and no Coach, writing Kira out was really Teen Wolf just intentionally burning its bridges.

And actually, if you go back, it all starts even earlier than 3B. I think the cracks in Teen Wolf’s foundation start in 3A (a season I’m generally fond of!) with the introduction of the capital-M Mythology: the True Alpha stuff, which ended up really fucking with its ethics and the way that Scott functioned on the show long-term; and also Lydia’s banshee stuff and the Nemeton stuff, which ended up just being incredibly confusing. Season 3B is remarkable, in hindsight, for how comparably well it deals with those elements, when they all ended up being a huge drag on the show, in the long run.

So my short answer is that Teen Wolf jumped the shark in season 4, but my longer answer is that it was a process, starting in season 3A, and not really ending until season 5.

My favorite TV finale is, I think, the Lost finale, although the Community finale is certainly high up there. (Controversial, I know, but I will stand by this opinion til the end of time.) My least favorite, though I know it’s practically a cliche, is the How I Met Your Mother finale. When my sister was helping me brainstorm to figure out my answer to this question, she noted that a unifying factor among many terrible series finales is that they undo major aspects of the show that preceded them, and she is completely correct. This is the same reason that, even though it’s unusual for people to stay with their high school sweethearts, Harry/Ginny and Ron/Hermione had to be together in the Harry Potter epilogue; if you want to make that point, you had a whole series to make it. Trying to be clever and pull a fast one with the ending is just irritating.

Send me meta prompts to distract me from my migraine!

#teen wolf #meta

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hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger · 5 years

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Spider-Man: Far From Home Thoughts Part 1 a.k.a. MCU Chapter 23

As I did for Homecoming I’m going to split my thoughts on the film up based on looking at it as a film unto itself/part of the MCU and then separately looking at it in terms of being an adaptation.

However in trying to write the former section I soon realized it was more practical to further partition coverage of the film.

Because MCU films can be looked at not merely as part of a film trilogy/quadrilogy (or as the latest chapter in a specific character’s arc) but as installments in the wider MCU story. Spider-Man: Far From Home is in essence simultaneously ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe Spider-Man 2′ and ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe Part 23′. And those two lenses do affect how you evaluate the film.

So as such I’m going to have three sections across...however many parts it takes. These posts are something of a stream of consciousness so I’m aiming for 3 parts but we’ll see what happens.

Let’s start with how this stacks up as the latest installment in the MCU Saga.

On a scale of Iron Man 3/The Dark World/Captain Marvel to Winter Soldier/Civil War/Endgame, Far From Home sits comfortably in a middling position, much like its predecessor.

Like Homecoming it’s a mostly entertaining time killer, decent popcorn fun...just not quite as high quality popcorn fun as say Avengers 2012 or Iron Man 2008.

Speaking of Iron Man his post-humorous presence in the film illustrative of a strength and weakness of the MCU’s narrative style, hence I’m going to talk a lot about it here.

Whilst the MCU is often touted (even by Disney themselves) as replicating the comic books’ shared cross continuity nature, in truth it doesn’t.

In Marvel comics one can mostly follow Iron Man or Spider-Man or Avengers runs on their own. The shared universe is there and comes into play at times, but really you don’t need to follow everything.

With the MCU, whilst a lot of the films are accessible you really couldn’t just watch the Iron Man Trilogy and call it a day because Tony’s arc plays out across other films too, it climaxes 5+ years after his last solo film. In essence the MCU is like a TV show wherein you get 2-3 episodes per year and the season finales are the Avengers movies.

This is relevant to Far From Home because, despite what anyone tells you, this is the start of Phase/Season 4 and it feels that way (it more or less states that to you at the start of the movie). As such the film acts as MCU Spider-Man 2 but also MCU Chapter 23/MCU Book 4 Chapter 1 and HAS to address the fallout of the last episode/chapter/season finale.

Thus Peter’s arc in FFH gets hijacked as a kind of Endgame/Tony Stark post-mortem...sorta. We’ll talk more about that in another post, but understand that in so far as Tony’s post-mortem does hijack the movie it undermines Peter’s personal narrative.

However, in regards to the post-Endgame state of affairs it is rather unsatisfying, almost disrespectful.

And by disrespectful I mean that as the Marvel Studios logo opens up we have a rendition of ‘I Will Always Love You’ (the Whitney Houston version I believe) over poorly picked out, low res stills of all Avengers who died or didn’t come back in Endgame; to the film’s credit it does look like something a high schooler would make. That is followed by the first of two clunky exposition drops played for laughs and repeating the unrequited romance joke between Betty and Jason from Homecoming, complete with a focus upon Jason’s bewilderment over now being older than his little brother. Oh and let’s not forget the gag about the high school band turning to dust and then reappearing in the middle of a basketball game to wacky effect. The film even makes a point of not addressing if the Avengers are even around as a team anymore, which is likely a meta commentary as well.

I’ll give the movie this, it made it’s intentions clear. It was not going to really treat the aftermath of the biggest MCU movie with much weight, it was going to be a superfluous, light, fluffy funfest. That’s a stupid direction to adopt after Endgame but at least it didn’t try to trick the viewers that it would be anything else.

Now in spite of that tone and approach the film could still explore how the post-Endgame world has changed. Maybe we won’t get anything dark or dramatic per se, but at least we’ll get some information right?

In fact, as much as I had disdain for this film going in, seeing the post-Endgame MCU was what I was really interested in. And the film delivered on that...initially...in the very same clunky exposition drop played for laughs.

We don’t talk about the blip again apart from 3 or 4 quick references, one of which explained who Mysterio was and why he could’ve duped Fury.

As for how this affected Peter, it didn’t. Many speculated Aunt May might’ve survived the blip but no, we’re told very explicitly she disappeared too.

This is very much a mixed bag for FFH as an MCU film and as a Spider-Man movie (yes I know I said I was separating those two things but it’s more efficient for this next part).

On the one hand for those who want to follow the broader MCU story FFH gives them answers but brief ones. It’s the equivalent to simply googling the answer to a murder mystery rather than experiencing the story unfold towards that answer. We had a huge opportunity to examine the ramifications of such a globally changing phenomenon but we simply acknowledge it happened and then press on as though it didn’t. The same opening exposition makes that clear too when it says that they’re moving on.

On the other hand were the film to properly explore the ramifications of the blip it would hijack the whole movie, even more than the Iron Man post-mortem already was.

On the other other hand having everyone of relevance to Peter’s life (sans Happy and Tony) die and come back, keeping them all ‘synched’ with him basically, is extremely convenient.

On the other other other hand it’d derail his narrative in a huge way if MJ or Ned or May (who’s still not ‘Aunt May’ btw because fuck this movie) were suddenly in their 20s.

On the other x4 hand the presence of such a massively fantastical event like death and resurrection (along with aliens and space technology) has already derailed the verisimilitude of his solo films which began by painting themselves as comparatively more down to Earth and ‘friendly neighbourhood’ even in spite of alien tech being repurposed. The same applies to having him go on international adventures; yet another inconsistency between this and the last Spidey movie.

So it’s very much a case of pick your poison.

Getting back to this film as a Tony Stark tribute, when viewed as part of the ongoing MCU saga it’s presence and handling succeeds more than it fails.

As I said Tony began the MCU and along with Cap was one of the twin pillars holding it up, so his death demands examination. On a metatextual level we need a film grieving Tony Stark before we can move on to the next step.

So in this regard the film giving so much attention to the hole left behind by him and how that’s really the impetus for the entire primary plot of the film is incredibly fitting.*

This applies to Mysterio in a sense.

I’ll talk more about his place when compared to certain other villains in a future instalment, but in the context of this movie his role as a kind of evil Iron Man/pretender to Iron Man’s throne works well. In fact he’s an exceptionally great villain...for Iron Man.** You see where I’m going with this, but that’s for another post.

Lets switch gears a little and discuss another wider MCU element, Nick Fury. At certain points of the film I felt Fury was out of character and a huge jerk. But twist at the end that it was actual Talos mitigated all that, it made sense. It also addressed another huge problem I was having with the movie up until that point, the absence of other heroes.

Like in the trailers the movie takes strides to address why Thor, Captain Marvel and Doctor Strange can’t help out against the Elementals. But of course this leaves the huge problem of literally everyone else. You could make a case for Falcon and Winter Soldier being of little use against such seemingly powerful foes like the Elementals, but what about Scarlet Witch, Black Panther, Valkyrie, etc? Thankfully the Talos reveal addresses this as Talos is ultimately not Nick Fury so wouldn’t have access to all those heroes.

It also sets up for future films, implying the Kree/Skrull War is far from over and that we will soon be seeing S.W.O.R.D.

Really that’s all there is to say about the movie moving forward into the MCU.

We get answers but they’re underwhelming and unsatisfying whilst getting a movie grieving Tony Stark and making the audience feel his loss.

If only Spider-Man himself seemed to feel as upset...

*Too bad all the comedy and light teen drama crap undermines it.

**In fact the entire villainous crew and villain scheme revolves around Iron Man’s legacy. I guess that makes this film also a.k.a. Iron Man in Memoriam

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paperclipninja · 5 years

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Younger post-ep ramble 6x09

After the very public outing of Liza’s real age last week, it was no surprise that this week’s Younger episode, ‘Millennial’s Next Top Model’, was all about the fallout. In true Younger style we were treated to some unexpected twists and turns, saw Kelsey take control at work and in her personal life and welcomed back my #1 mega-villain who I hate-love fiercely, Quinn Tyler. This ep was written by Grant Sloss, who is responsible for a number of my favourite episodes and lot of my fave moments in the series and one thing I am always blown away by is his ability to craft character interactions in which the sentiment and emotion are really palpable (plus the one-liners are always top of the game) and we certainly saw a number of those this week. Even though Liza is 100% responsible for the position she now finds herself in, my heart went out to her this whole episode and Kelsey, Charles and Diana’s show of solidarity right from the get-go pretty much sums up everything I love about this show.

I need to say upfront that while I know this episode is all about Liza, it is hands down my favourite episode of Kelsey’s in the series. In a time of real pressure and stress, we see Kelsey step up in the role of publisher, starting with the damage control team meeting in her office. I have big feelings about this opening moment, in which Diana proves why she is an actual Queen who rises above past grievances and now offers unwavering support of Liza while continuing to have zero time for Zane’s bullshit (the ‘well mercifully they have a paywall now’ to Zane’s New York Magazine tidbit was all of the yes). We learn of the deal with Infinitely 21 (was it just me or did anyone else get heart flutters at the thought of Kelsey, Diana and Liza being their brilliant selves and brokering that arrangement? Just me? Cool) and I have spoken of my love for the way this show parodies real life things but this might take the cake. Alexa, what are synonyms for ‘forever’? I just adore that it is very clear that Kelsey is in charge and that Charles and Diana are offering up potential solutions (Diana’s ‘rest her a bit’ is so in character I cannot. Between that and Charles’ thoroughbred thighs from season 4 I fully expect her to have a couple of horses upstate somewhere called Charles and Liza by the end of this series), meanwhile Zane clearly still hasn’t caught on to the fact that these three are not going to throw Liza under a bus.

Enter Liza as he’s ending his tirade about her poisoning the company (and lbh, what he is saying isn’t actually ridiculous from a business p.o.v but he’s talking about the best friend, girlfriend and (old) maid of honour of the people in the room) and it’s awkward af and pretty awful and I want to climb through my screen, wrap Liza in a blanket and tell her it’s all going to be ok. Zane’s extreme over-estimation of his importance in Liza’s life continues when he tells her that what he’s saying can’t be personal because ‘I don’t know who you are’ (worth it for Charles’ ‘Zane’ reprimand though amirite) and as I said after last week’s episode, I can’t even count on one hand the number of interactions Zane and Liza have had so yes Zane, that is accurate and nothing to do with her age reveal. At least once he discovered that Kelsey has known about the lie he FINALLY has a reason to be hurt (maybe? Still a little fuzzy on this one) and look Zane saying they’re all insane might be somewhat accurate but everyone in that room loves Liza and I love all of them so I felt personally attacked tbh.

Keeping with the stellar guest star casting this season, Shelly Rozansky (played by Annaleigh Ashford) is every kind of irritating as brand rep of Infinitely 21. Kelsey and Liza’s meeting with her, in which Shelly explains that 'the tea’ is that their authentic brand cannot be associated with Millennial’s inauthentic one (I love the moral high ground re: brand but I’m pretty sure Millennial doesn’t have factory workers making less than a living wage so…) and this very real ramification of Liza’s lie paves the way for one of Liza’s best moments on the show to date.

Taking that tea of Shelly’s and throwing it in her face, Liza’s monologue that 'everyone is pretending to be younger’ reaches it’s climax with the zinger, 'Millennial is not an age, it’s an attitude and if you can’t sell that, we’ll go somewhere else’, and Kelsey’s look of pride, same girl SAME. One thing I have commented on in the past is that as a '26 year old’ Liza rarely, if ever, really stood up for herself. The few times we’ve seen her do so have been as the forty year old who takes no crap from anyone (David, Charles, Don) so I am here times a million for strong ass Liza to finally shed that guilt, know her worth and be able to show this side of herself now that the lie is no longer in play (I feel like Diana will dig this very much).

Turns out Shelly was quite into Liza’s feisty outburst too ('what you screamed at me today, justifiably, we’re still friends promise…it resonated’ = award winning line/delivery combo), as she calls to let Liza know they’re going to unfreeze the partnership and asks Liza to be the face (and legs) of Infinitely 21’s Spring campaign. This phone call takes place in a very delicious looking cupcake shop where Liza and Charles are playing cards with his daughters in an all round delightful family situation that gives us a glimpse of the Miller-Brooks dynamic and makes the point that after a pretty terrible day, Liza is grateful to have this in her life to counter all the drama. I am also pleased to see that Bianca and Nicole have been located (meanwhile Caitlin, Beth and all of Josh’s friends remain stuck in the Upside Down or have become bunker people or something equally ominous I fear).

I am very into a number of aspects of this entire scene: a) Charles eating candy just up and gets me for some reason. I don’t know why, I can’t explain it, but it’s akin to seeing him walking round barefoot, it confuses my brain but I’m pretty sure I like it; b) Bianca is clearly the fave child with her cute little, 'I won’t take your last bag of candy Liza’ (lol at Charles’ 'wow’ when Liza offers that up for the taking btw, he knows that’s a serious gamble) though I was 100% Nicole as a kid; c) those kids are so not sleeping after all that sugar so I hope they’re staying at Pauline’s, while Charles’ dad game is strong with the breakfast cupcakes and; d) Charles kissing Liza on the cheek as she takes Shelly’s call is so damn sweet (pun intended) and supportive and I love that Liza suggesting he go stand with the girls in case she starts crying again indicates she has been an open mess around him. It’s writing like this that I really appreciate when there is so much to fit into an episode, because it provides insight into the kind of relationship Liza and Charles have when there simply isn’t time to show it.

While Liza is drowning her sorrows in candy and cupcakes, Maggie is at the brilliantly cringy art exhibit, 'Masculinity Detox: A Softer Male Gaze’. Look I have to be honest, I was really happy to see Oded Fehr because he can play a skeeze with charm like no other, but I don’t know how I feel about this entire plot. I can only comment on it from a straight perspective, so I am aware that I’m not really in a position to express an opinion in relation to the impact of showing a gay character thinking it’s a good idea to sample a penis every ten years or so, but I certainly feel like it’s problematic. In relation to this character though, it is consistent with Maggie sleeping with Tommy Minetti (and his sister Tammy) as a result of Berlin’s 'Take my Breath Away’ (I don’t know why I remember that, I can’t remember what month it is yet this stuff is right there) and there is no denying that there were actual sparks between Maggie and Rafael in the loft, the palpable chemistry that Grant Sloss’ eps seem to draw out on full display.

Another dimension of Maggie that I love seeing emerge in this ep is that while she is usually a total badass in absolute control, every now and then we see that her judgement of character is just way off. There was Montana, those weirdo art collectors who actually collect artists and now this guy. I love that there’s a side of her that gets a bit blinded by flattery so she thinks 'what the hell?’ and the inevitable 'oh I CAN-NOT with this bullshit’ that follows, usually very publicly - Exhibit A: Maggie countering dirtbag Rafael’s, 'I’ll change you mind, I’m a flipper’ with a literal flip of the restaurant table once she realises she was simply another conquest. She seems so unflappable that these reminders that she’s fallible (I legit sometimes forget she’s not an actual super hero) are really great and maintains the 'flawed human’ aspect this show does so well. Honestly, other than Liza in a full tracksuit (sweat clothes?? I don’t know what it is in American but that cute pink sweat top and sweatpants combo) thinking they were being robbed and very confused by what had happened (so were we all lbh and Kinsey 9 LOL), it was Maggie equating sex with a man to being suffocated by a damp rug that was the highlight of this entire storyline for me. So damn funny.

Diana continues to have Liza’s back as she heads to the photo-shoot to steer her away from anything pleather (I may need a spin off of these two or some kind of one off special episode that’s just an elaborate Diana/Liza adventure, maybe rescuing Caitlin and co. from the bunker??), but not before we catch Kelsey still slaying it as a boss as she leaves a voicemail for the increasingly petulant Zane. Hearing her so firm and sure of herself is brilliant and the friendship vibe between Diana and Kelsey is peaking and I am loving every bit of it. I am so glad we heard Diana asking Kelsey how she took the lie, while Diana was able to forgive and move forward it would have been strange if we didn’t see her still processing some of it this week. Plus it’s Diana who points out that Zane’s tantrum is not because Liza is who he is upset with (and THANK YOU Kelsey for pointing out that Liza and Zane hardly know each other).

Rather than letting the whole Zane thing fester away, Kelsey continues to impressively show initiative by going to Zane’s and offering to cook dinner (which Zane knows is a lol and it’s not long before he’s cooking, so well played Kels) to give him the opportunity to ask anything he wants and she will answer honestly. Once a proper explanation of why Liza lied and why Kelsey kept it from him is given, Zane suddenly reverts back to being a rational human being which is a relief because he was fast becoming the worst (though his comment that they were all bad liars, what now?? Yes they be cray but their lying game is strong friend). I am not particularly invested in Kelsey and Zane as a pairing but I always appreciate good storytelling and writing, and revisiting the fact Zane told her he loved her in past tense was an example of both of these. In order for any kind of relationship between these two to progress believably this needed to be addressed and hearing Kelsey call Zane out on his shitty and manipulative behaviour was great, but even greater was seeing Kelsey drop her guard.

Opening up about being mad at herself too and that maybe if they were both more open about their feelings they wouldn’t have wasted so much time denying how they really felt; that she felt, no, feels, the same way, present tense; the resetting of the timer so she can finish what she was going to say instead of taking the option of backing out; the honest conversation…you know what all this is? Growth. Kelsey Lorraine Peters, I am just so damn proud of you because I am the first to admit that I was not sure this character could be redeemed for me after last season but here we are. The emotion for this whole scene, you could feel it and Zane’s, 'oh that timer was for food’ was fab, before he just casually drops in, ’ I love you, but stay out of my kitchen’. OK. Smitten mode activated.

Meanwhile, Diana is no doubt enjoying Shelly’s disbelief that she and Liza are almost the same age about as much as a root canal and Lauren appears with a 'bowflex for your face’ to combat the 5 o'clock jowls. Side note: Lauren and Liza really need to have a convo asap because I definitely feel like Lauren is not ok with the lie since it’s been revealed. Scene of the ep goes to Charles walking into the trailer (with flowers for Liza *swoon*) while Diana is flapping that contraption, before he slowly backs away and I tell you, I was howling so hard I almost ruptured something. Liza’s hideous romper/scooter combo is just no on many levels, she clearly feels super unnatural and the photographer snapping Charles and Liza, who are not expecting to be photographed while her being made up to look so young obviously makes them look very far apart in age and a bit awks means that yes, the daddy/daughter dance vibe is strong, though that line made me vom in my mouth a little bit.

Between shoots our extremely excellent villain Quinn pays Liza a visit to show her support and her well-polling glasses. Her real talk that the good news about the publishing reaction to Liza’s lie is that 'eight blocks outside of midtown, nobody cares’, is what we were all thinking and is def to be filed under 'G’ for Gold. So naturally Quinn drags her into a completely self-serving NY1 interview (bless Liza for thinking they wanted to interview her) and I freaking love Quinn, she’s such a delicious character coz she’s awful and funny and pretty and a total smart ass. I stan.

Before we jump to the second part of the photo-shoot I have to say that the very obvious ploy to try and juxtapose Liza’s relationships with Charles and Josh felt like it was trying too hard and was mostly disappointing to me because it felt so forced. I want to be very clear that it has nothing to do with who I like Liza with romantically, it would have felt contrived regardless and was the only aspect of the episode that I felt could have been crafted with a little more nuance. Or maybe that was the point? Perhaps the obviousness was part of the humour of it *shrug emoji*

Either way, Liza is looking pretty exhausted when Josh turns up at the bar photo-shoot for reasons (whose name I am betting is Lauren Heller because there is no way he would just turn up and it is 100% in her wheelhouse to send him along after seeing the expressions on her face at the earlier shoot. I feel like this will def come out at some point and that really this whole shoot is serving to bring about stuff in future eps) and he doesn’t get to explain why he is there because he’s teasing Liza about being a model and I really do love their banter. Shelly has no idea what’s happening but she likes it and is thirsting pretty hard as she shakes his hand and I enjoyed hearing Liza talk about Josh as patient zero, her 'would you correct him?’ as she squeezed his cheeks made me smile. I know there have been a LOT of feelings about this scene expressed on social media, but I found the reminiscing, as Josh talked about how when he first met Liza he thought she was smart and sexy and he wanted to keep talking to her, really sweet (and quickly countered by his joking about being really drunk and it being dark).

I actually love this dynamic so much and if this show had moved these two properly into the friendzone I would be celebrating this as a pin-up example of how to show romantic-platonic relationship transition. I still may, because at this stage there is nothing to indicate that Liza is anything but committed to Charles and Josh gave no impression of pining for her IMO, but as an experienced TV connoisseur (aka obsessive tv show watcher) I am not naive enough to think that this interaction mightn’t be setting in motion a resurgence of the triangle. By the same token, I do not see any triangle in play at the moment and one thing this show does excel at is surprising us, so time will tell, but I am going to keep my faith in the writers to tell good, compelling stories that stay true to all the excellent characters and narratives they have in front of them, as they have done up until now.

While Liza’s colleagues aren’t going to throw her under a bus, Quinn is not only more than happy to, I’m pretty sure she’d drive the bus herself if it served her own self interest. Quinn saying that she found out about Liza’s lie the week before in The New Yorker article, ooomph, did you feel that? It was the wind being knocked out of all of us, along with poor Liza, as Quinn counters Liza’s suggestion that she knew the truth before she invested on live TV. It was evident fairly quickly that Quinn was using the interview as a campaign platform and Liza’s expression as Quinn betrays her so publicly is yet another credit to Sutton Foster’s incredible talent.

My Kelsey love was brought home this week when she met Quinn following the NY1 interview. She is unrelenting in her backing of Liza and unwavering in her stance to Quinn when she is asks her to fire Liza. From the moment she arrives Kelsey is so kick ass, she sees every one of Quinn’s attempts to bully her into getting what she wants and Kelsey’s, 'please don’t minimise the strength I bring to this meeting’ was such a hell yes moment. There is something so satisfying about seeing Quinn in a position where she needs something from Kelsey and Kelsey standing so firm. Kelsey’s 'are we done here?’ before walking away was such a power move and the transition into her own office the next day, with Charles reassuring her that she did the right thing, was wonderful. Seeing these two as equals, talking business with a bit of a mentor/mentee dynamic is a dream. It was on my season 6 wish list and I can’t wait to see more of it.

It is upon discovering that Audrey Colbert’s manuscript delivery cheque bounced and that Diana just heard one of the Jennifer’s, the sloppy one from publicity (this line, I swear and also I need to meet her), say her direct deposit didn’t go through that we discover Quinn has thrown the ultimate tantrum and pulled her funding and Mercurennial is broke.

Poor Liza feels that it’s all her fault, I’m sure partly because of the way her colleagues turn and look at her when she walks in the office and partly because it is, but Charles continues to play the role of ultimate supportive partner as they stroll down the street after work, pointing out that Liza attracted Quinn to the company in the first place (and we ALL know it was not the company she was attracted to). I am simple folk and Charles saying he’s spoken for as he put his arm around her made me melt into a puddle and if anyone is feeling concerned about Liza’s level of besotted, watch this final scene as Charles reassures her that, 'you know what’s great about the worst thing happening? There’s no place to go but up. Only good things ahead’. I may have actually died from the sweetness of the entire thing and Liza does exactly what any self respecting person would in that situation and kisses him before they walk off hand in hand. To live happily ever after…jokes LOL I mean it’s television and it turns out Infinitely 21 has the most efficient marketing team on the planet because their campaign is launched and whattya know, it looks as though Liza and her ex will be plastered all over the city.

File under 'O’ for OF COURSE.

#youngertv #younger tv #ramble #review #younger season 6 #6x09 #liza miller #charles brooks #diana trout #kelsey peters #team charles #tv

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eddycurrents · 5 years

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For the week of 27 May 2019

Quick Bits:

A Walk Through Hell #10 somehow gets even more disturbing as we’re shown some of McGregor’s past as he was abused and set up as a suicide. The horror that Garth Ennis, Goran Sudžuka, Ive Svorcina, and Rob Steen keep exploring in this series keeps getting more personal and seemingly has no limit to its depth.

| Published by AfterShock

Amazing Spider-Man #22 concludes (mostly) the “Hunted” arc as Kraven continues to try to convince Spider-Man that he’s a killer and to finally put Kraven out of his misery. It’s incredibly messed up logic, but Nick Spencer, Humberto Ramos, Victor Olazaba, Edgar Delgado, Erick Arciniega, and Joe Caramagna make it interesting. You could consider this end anti-climactic, especially after how long this has been, but I get the feeling we’ll be dealing with the ramifications for a while to come.

| Published by Marvel

Amber Blake #3 takes an interesting turn as an undercover operation into a modelling agency reveals that Amber’s childhood friend Amanda is still alive. The level of intrigue and twists in this story just keeps escalating, matching the density of the layouts and art from Butch Guice, Mike Perkins, and Dan Brown.

| Published by IDW

Angel #1 is incredible. Possibly even better than the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series and that has set a ridiculously high bar. Bryan Edward Hill, Gleb Melnikov, Gabriel Cassata, and Ed Dukeshire embrace the darker, moodier feel of Angel consistent with the different atmosphere that was present in the television series, while diving deep into building up his dark past and conflicted future. There’s a lot that is new to this interpretation, which just makes it more intriguing. And the art from Melnikov and Cassata is gorgeous.

| Published by BOOM! Studios

Ascender #2 advances the vamps’ plan to eradicate the remaining technology in the universe, as Andy is reunited with Bandit, and the vamps come to threaten him and his family. This remains an interesting new take on the Descender world from Jeff Lemire, Dustin Nguyen, and Steve Wands as we see more of what’s happened since the end of that series.

| Published by Image

Batman: Last Knight on Earth #1 is an interesting debut from Scott Snyder, Greg Capullo, Jonathan Glapion, FCO Plascencia, and Tom Napolitano. On its surface, it’s an “Old Man Bruce” story, as a previously comatose Bruce awakens in a dark and strange future. But this existence is weird and unreliable. Especially as Bruce awakens in a fiction at first, being told that he’s in Arkham and that all of his villains and time as Batman were fever dreams cooked up by a fractured mind. This may well be the best art ever from Capullo, Glapion, and Plascencia.

| Published by DC Comics / Black Label

Black Science #40 shows that the story still has some surprises in store as it rockets towards the end. Also some ridiculous jokes. Matteo Scalera and Moreno Dinisio continue to inventive as hell with the art.

| Published by Image / Giant Generator

Coda #12 is the explosive, brilliant conclusion to what has been on the best series of this year and last. Si Spurrier, Matías Bergara, Michael Doig, and Jim Campbell have delivered some stunning flights of imagination, tapping into some highly inventive nihilistic fantasy, presenting the final battle battle this issue, and, man, does it stick the landing. Phenomenal storytelling all around.

| Published by BOOM! Studios

Daredevil #6 begins “No Devils, Only God” in a New York City without Daredevil. Lalit Kumar Sharma, Jay Leisten, and Java Tartaglia come on for art duties for this arc and it’s an interesting shift. Sharma’s style reminds me a bit of Klaus Janson’s, but without the heavy inks and shadows.

| Published by Marvel

Detective Comics Annual #2 heads into Year Two territory as we get a new Reaper from Peter J. Tomasi, Travis Moore, Max Raynor, Tamra Bonvillain, Nick Filardi, and Rob Leigh. This is a nice use of the annual format, giving us a satisfying single issue story setting up a possible future arc.

| Published by DC Comics

The Forgotten Queen #4 brings an end to this excellent series exploring the history of Vexana, War-Monger, from Tini Howard, Amilcar Pinna, Ulises Arreola, and Jeff Powell. Very interesting depth added to the character and interesting hints as to what more might be coming, hopefully.

| Published by Valiant

Hellboy vs. Lobster Johnson: Ring of Death elaborates further on Hellboy’s time in Mexico making wrestling movies in a pair of tales from Mike Mignola, Chris Roberson, Mike Norton, Paul Grist, Dave Stewart, Bill Crabtree, and Clem Robins. Seeing a presentation of the movie Hellboy starred in is a real treat.

| Published by Dark Horse

Immortal Hulk #18 leans hard into the body horror aspect of the series, debuting both Betty’s full form as this new Harpy and in the Abomination. Joe Bennett, Ruy José, and Paul Mounts just nail this perfectly.

| Published by Marvel

Killer Groove #1 is a great first issue from Ollie Masters, Eoin Marron, Jordie Bellaire, and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou. It’s a taut crime drama mixing a never-was musician with the potential of life as a hitman, as he lucks into a kill during a chance encounter. Great art from Marron and Bellaire.

| Published by AfterShock

The Magnificent Ms. Marvel #3 advances the alien plot, sending Kamala and her parents off to Saffa to supposedly fulfill the role of their Destined One, saving the planet again. Saladin Ahmed, Minkyu Jung, Juan Vlasco, Ian Herring, and Joe Caramagna are doing some interesting world-building here, and ensuring that nothing is quite what it seems.

| Published by Marvel

Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt #5 is the beautiful conclusion to what has been a brilliant series from Kieron Gillen, Caspar Wijngaard, Mary Safro, and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou. It’s been a sequel, satire, criticism, and repudiation of Watchmen, but it’s also been an interesting mediation on “being better” while coming to terms with the nature of reality and learning to deal with the human element.

| Published by Dynamite

Queen of Bad Dreams #2 gets more into the grit of IJ Wei’s investigation into the escaped figment, delivering some great police procedural stuff. The artwork from Jordi Pérez and Dearbhla Kelly is wonderful. Reminding me a lot of some of the work from John Watkiss, particularly during a very impressive action sequence.

| Published by Vault

She Said Destroy #1 is an intriguing science fantasy debut from Joe Corallo, Liana Kangas, Rebecca Nalty, and Melanie Ujimori. It taps into Celtic mythology, presenting a war between Brigid and the Morrigan, but also appears to be telling a coming of age story with some members of the Morrigan’s flock as they try to combat Brigid’s oppression.

| Published by Vault

Star Wars #108 is essentially another one-shot in the 80th anniversary of Marvel celebration, with Matthew Rosenberg and a murderers’ row of new and old Star Wars artists delivering a tale set in the old Marvel continuity. While you’ll get more out of it if you’re familiar with the original series, with familiar faces like Valance Hunter, Domina Tagge, and Jaxxon, but it still works well on its own without having any foreknowledge of previous events.

| Published by Marvel

Stranger Things: Six #1 begins another prequel mini-series, this time introducing us to “Six” and looking into the experiments going on at the Hawkins Labs, from Jody Houser, Edgar Salazar, Keith Champagne, Marissa Louise, and Nate Piekos. I quite liked the first one that served as a view into the terror that Will went through during season one, but this one looks like it’ll be breaking some new ground. Very interested to see more of what happened earlier.

| Published by Dark Horse

Superman: Leviathan Rising Special #1 is a tease for Event Leviathan, the next turn in the Superman series, the forthcoming Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen minis, and the upcoming Supergirl arc once she returns to Earth, but it also manages to tell a fairly entertaining story in its own right as Talia al Ghul kidnaps Clark Kent.

| Published by DC Comics

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #94 continues “City at War” as everything gets nastier and dirtier, and we still haven’t had a full-on incendiary spark yet to ignite even larger warfare. Dave Wachter and Ronda Pattison deliver some incredible artwork. Splinter is very chilling in this one.

| Published by IDW

Thor #13 will make you care about Cul Borson. At least, a little bit. Maybe. Jason Aaron, Mike del Mundo, Marco D’Alfonso, and Joe Sabino deliver on another single issue story broadening the bits and pieces of the War of the Realms.

| Published by Marvel

Transformers #6 takes a break from the ongoing narrative and gives us a look into the past friendship between Megatron and Orion Pax, from Brian Ruckley, Beth McGuire-Smith, and Tom B. Long. There are some interesting parallels between Megatron’s observations and the drifting apart of these two old friends.

| Published by IDW

Wolverine: The Long Night #5 concludes this adaptation of the podcast of the same name from Benjamin Percy, Marcio Takara, Matt Milla, and Joe Caramagna. This has been a mature, psychological thriller amidst all of the violence and darkness, with this final chapter delivering more twists even as it brings the answers.

| Published by Marvel

Other Highlights: Age of X-Man: X-Tremists #4, Bad Luck Chuck #3, Black Panther #12, Blossoms 666 #4, Catwoman Annual #1, Dark Red #3, Dead Kings #5, Delver #4, Dick Tracy Forever #2, Doctor Who: The Thirteenth Doctor #8, Dog Days of Summer #1, Fantastic Four #10, Fight Club 3 #5, Four Sisters 2: Hortense, Grand Abyss Hotel, KINO #16, Life on the Moon, Lumberjanes: Somewhere Green #1, Major X #4, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers #39, Princeless - Book 8: Princesses #3, Punk Mambo #2, Punks Not Dead: London Calling #4, Rick & Morty #50, Spawn #297, Star Trek: Year Five #2, Star Wars: Vader - Dark Visions #4, Superior Spider-Man #6, TMNT: Urban Legends #13, Thanos #2, Wailing Blade #1, War of the Realms: Giant-Man #2, War of the Realms: Spider-Man & The League of Realms #2, War of the Realms: War Scrolls #2, Wasted Space #10, X-23 #12, X-Men: Grand Design - X-Tinction #1

Recommended Collections: Death Orb - Volume 1, Dept. H Omnibus - Volume 1, The Goon: Bunch of Old Crap, Judge Dredd: Toxic, Punisher - Volume 2: War in Bagalia, Rick & Morty Presents - Volume 1, X-Force - Volume 1: Sins of the Past

For the week of 20 May 2019

Quick Bits:

Action Comics #1011 is the last stop before Event Leviathan starts in earnest and it raises more questions as to what’s going on. Brian Michael Bendis, Steve Epting, Brad Anderson, and Josh Reed have done a great job elevating tension through this lead-up and moving the pieces around the board.

| Published by DC Comics

Assassin Nation #3 is another brutal issue from Kyle Starks, Erica Henderson, and Deron Bennett. The body count remains high and we get more questions about who authorized the hit. There’s some hints that it may all just be misdirection.

| Published by Image / Skybound

Detective Comics #1004 gives us the life history of Astrid Arkham. It’s told largely in full page montages, really allowing Brad Walker, Andrew Hennessy, and Nathan Fairbairn to cut loose on the visuals.

| Published by DC Comics

Faithless #2 sees Faith go to a party, and then it gets weird. This feels like that Griffin Dunne film of him wandering around New York, only with more magic and gorgeous art from Maria Llovet.

| Published by BOOM! Studios

Ghost Tree #2 delivers well on the promise of the first issue, going further with Brandt’s conversations with the spirits around the ghost tree, and setting up the possibility of something horrible coming soon. More gorgeous artwork from Simon Gane, Ian Herring, and Becka Kinzie.

| Published by IDW

Incursion #4 is a fitting conclusion to this series bringing Gilad back to a regular status in the world of the living, with some interesting teases as to what might be further down the line, from Andy Diggle, Alex Paknadel, Doug Braithwaite, Diego Rodriguez, Leonardo Paciarotti, and Marshall Dillon.

| Published by Valiant

Justice League Dark #11 continues “Lords of Order” and keeps burning down the magical side of the DC Universe, while diving very deep into the back catalogue to build up the new. James Tynion IV is developing a very interesting structure for what might be coming.

| Published by DC Comics

Middlewest #7 shows the sheer devastation that Abel can unleash as his powers manifest, similar to the rage that his father has shown, and how his newfound “family” can also let him down horribly. Great work from Skottie Young, Jorge Corona, Jean-Francois Beaulieu, and Nate Piekos as the story seems to be headed for more dangerous waters.

| Published by Image

Star Wars: Age of Rebellion - Jabba the Hutt #1 is an entertaining little story of how Jabba manipulates others to accomplish his goals.

| Published by Marvel

Stone Star #3 gives us another surprise as Dail tries to save Kitzo from being eaten in the arena by Most-Maw. It’s very interesting how this series plays with elements of hero shooters and the designs for the characters and creatures by Max Dunbar are incredible.

| Published by Swords & Sassery

Other Highlights: A Shining Beacon, Age of X-Man: Amazing Nightcrawler #4, Animosity #21, Asgardians of the Galaxy #9, Avengers #19, Batgirl #35, Battlestar Galactica: Twilight Command #4, Bone Parish #9, Books of Magic #8, Clue: Candlestick #1, Cyber Force #10, Dial H for Hero #3, Doctor Strange #14, The Flash #71, Freedom Fighters #6, Gasolina #18, GI Joe: A Real American Hero #262, The Goon #2, Highwayman, Invader Zim #43, Invisible Kingdom #3, Martian Manhunter #5, Marvel Comics Presents #5, Mary Shelley: Monster Hunter #2, Miles Morales: Spider-Man #6, Monstress #22, Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur #43, Mr. & Mrs. X #11, Redneck #20, Riverdale Season 3 #3, Road of Bones #1, Rumble #12, Runaways #21, Shuri #8, The Silencer #17, Star Trek: Q Conflict #4, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge #2, Tony Stark: Iron Man #11, The Unstoppable Wasp #8, Venom #14, War of the Realms: Journey into Mystery #3, War of the Realms: New Agents of Atlas #2, War of the Realms: The Punisher #2, War of the Realms: Strikeforce - The Land of Giants #1, War of the Realms: Uncanny X-Men #2, The Warning #7, Welcome to Wanderland #4. Wolverine: Infinity Watch #4, Wonder Woman #71, X-Force #8

Recommended Collections: Black Badge - Volume 1, Black Magick, Cover - Volume 1, Buffy the Vampire Slayer - Volume 1, East of West - Volume 9, Fantastic Four - Volume 2: Mr. & Mrs. Grimm, Friendo - Volume 1, James Bond: Blackbox, Middlewest - Book 1, Planet Terry Complete Collection, Redlands - Volume 2, Summit - Volume 3: Truth & Consequences, Wayward - Book 3

d. emerson eddy thinks there should be more hours in the day.

#This Week in Comics

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fuckyeahjamieandclaire · 7 years

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It turns out love can conquer crow’s feet. Executive producer Maril Davis on the period drama’s decision to let love, not age lines, drive Claire and Jamie’s reunion arc despite a 20-year time jump.

There’s always been plenty to envy about Claire and Jamie, the star-crossed couple whose centuries-spanning romance propels the period drama Outlander. They’re capable, brave, and beautiful, blessed by an unbreakable bond, strong convictions, and even stronger sex drives. Since the series’ first season, their ear-pleasing accents, smoldering, soul-searching looks, telegenic love-making, and repeated rescues of each other’s lives have set a high standard, relationship-wise. But recent episodes of Outlander have introduced us to yet another quality we wish we had in common with Claire and Jamie: They’re almost immune to aging.

By their third seasons, many TV series settle into a rut—a familiar and welcome one, in the case of some comfort TV, but less so for hour-long dramas with fantasy elements, which traffic in twists and upheaval. But disrupting the status quo wasn’t a struggle for Outlander, an adaptation of Diana Gabaldon’s book series, which comprises eight novels (with a ninth on the way) and assorted shorter works. Through 37 episodes, the Starz series’ story is still closer to takeoff than landing, working through the third book in the sequence, 1993’s Voyager.

The events of Voyager dictated an unorthodox interlude for a program that’s centered on the interplay (and intercourse) between two charismatic and chemistry-laden leads: an extended separation and a mutual 20-year time jump. At the end of Season 2, the pregnant Claire (a 20th-century English nurse who in the first season accidentally slips into the past through, um, a mystical stone) and Jamie (her 18th-century, red-haired highlander lover) are forced to break up by the impending Battle of Culloden, at which Jamie, a Jacobite rebel, expects to be (and nearly is) killed.

To protect their soon-to-be-born daughter Brianna, Claire (played by Caitriona Balfe) returns to the 1940s. Believing that Jamie (played by Sam Heughan) did die, she does her best to move on, relocating to Boston, raising Brianna, becoming a doctor, and growing apart from her first husband, Frank, who’s caring and attentive but lacks Jamie’s highland lilt, kilt collection, and Men’s Health cover physique. Jamie, meanwhile, survives battle, torture, and imprisonment (nothing new for him), grows and shaves a big beard, fathers a son, pivots to printing and smuggling, and gets married again out of loneliness, all while carrying an eternal torch for Claire. Midway through the third season, after almost five episodes apart, they reunite in the mid-1760s, two decades older but no less in love—and, curiously, looking a lot like they did the last time they were together.

“I wanted to look—well, the same as when you last saw me,” Claire says with some trepidation during their first conversation, admitting that she’s dyed away the single gray streak that had appeared in her hair in earlier, Boston-centric scenes. Mission accomplished, Claire. Neither member of Outlander’s leading duo looks any worse for wear after 20 years of imprisonment, parenthood, and pining for lost love.

For Outlander’s creators, the time jump presented a production dilemma, not because of the story (which Gabaldon had already plotted out) or setting (most viewers aren’t well-versed in the intricacies of 1740s vs. 1760s style), but because of the actors’ appearances. In real life, a two-decade difference isn’t invisible, no matter how much St. Ives Oatmeal and Shea Butter Lotion you lather on because of Balfe.

Heughan, 37, and Balfe, 38, were both 34 when the series premiere aired in 2014, but their characters were considerably younger. “Jamie’s kind of early 20s, Claire is late 20s when it starts,” Outlander executive producer Maril Davis says by phone. Three years passed between Claire’s first time jump back to 1743 and the Battle of Culloden, which, Davis says, would put both of them in their “mid- to later-40s after the [20-year] time jump.” Although the creators talked about shortening the story’s time jump to reduce the need to alter the actors’ appearance, they found that they couldn’t do it without omitting too many plot points from the characters’ time apart.

Aware that the time jump was looming, the producers started doing screen tests last season with Balfe and Heughan, in consultation with head of hair and makeup Annie McEwan, who had worked on Season 4 of Game of Thrones before joining the Outlander crew. After experimenting with various looks, the creative team decided, essentially, that both Balfe and Heughan were too hot to convincingly tamper with by obscuring their actual features. “We have two actors who happen to be incredibly beautiful people,” Davis says. “It is hard to make them look bad, damn them.” Originally, the pair’s first post-reunion sex scene featured a reference to stretch marks, but the writers lost that line from the script, Davis says, when the makeup crew informed them that stretch marks “don't read very well on camera.”

Even apart from the specific challenge of wrinkling, graying, and thickening two age-resistant actors, the transition from 20s to 40s is a particularly tough one. “It's hard to make young people look incrementally older,” Davis says. “It's obviously a little easier—and I put ‘easier’ in quotes—if you're aging someone up from like 30 to 80. … With two actors who look so young anyways in their real life, we realized that we couldn't do major jumps without it looking fake, and also taking a lot of extra time in hair and makeup, as well as using a lot of extra prosthetics.”

For Davis, a veteran of more explicitly sci-fi (and more makeup- and prosthetic-reliant) productions such as Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, Outlander’s understated approach to the aging process didn’t come intuitively. “There were some times that I said to our hair and makeup team, ‘Can we go farther? Because you can't read some of these lines that you're painting on camera,’” Davis says. “And they were horrified. They were like, ‘Are you kidding? Oh my god, we can't go any farther.’ It's interesting, because you also have to take the advice of people that have been in the business doing the hair and makeup a long time, knowing that they can only go so far until they feel uncomfortable because it doesn't look real anymore.”

In addition to the aging uncanny valley, there’s the time cost to the talent and crew to consider. A heavier hand on the cosmetic side—on top of the prosthetic flogging scars already applied to Heughan’s back in shirtless scenes for much of the series’ run—would mean much more time in makeup chairs, staring blankly into mirrors as fake years and real hours add up. Though according to Davis, Balfe and Heughan, who were frequently consulted, never expressed any reservations about hiding their youth under veneers of age. “They're both very game for whatever we want to do, and so this isn't a vanity thing,” she says. “Neither of them, I don't think, at any point has ever said, ‘I have to look good, so don't make me look too old.’”

This was a weighty decision, because the ramifications for the series could extend far into the future. Unlike some shows or movies that might insert a brief flash-forward in a single scene or episode, Outlander is committed to the time jump for the long term. Whatever aging the crew applied to Balfe and Heughan now would sentence them to the same look for years to come on a series that may still be relatively early in its run (which already has been renewed for a fourth season). That’s not only a nuisance, but potentially an acting inhibitor, as Davis says Heughan discovered while wearing his wild beard in the third season’s second episode. “If you have something on your face like that, sometimes it's a little harder to talk, you're more aware of it, it takes you out,” Davis says. “So all of these things are factors, and same with if we were getting into heavy prosthetics to make actors appear much older than they are.”

The end result of all the discussion and screen tests is a difference so subtle that you have to squint to see it—just like the new, older Jamie has to squint to see small text without wearing his reading glasses. Specs aside, he looks almost unchanged. “With Sam, we've kind of weathered him, adding more shading to his face,” Davis says. “We've got some lines that the hair and makeup department have put in themselves, and then greying at the temples for him, as well as with Caitriona. We realized because her skin is also so young that we'd have to sell a lot of it with the gray in her hair.” Of course, even that gray is gone now, at least temporarily, although Davis says its absence stems from an impulse to portray Claire’s humanizing insecurity, rather than a need to preserve the stars’ romance-novel looks (which she acknowledges are part of the show’s appeal). “So much of our talk about appearance is motivated from a character standpoint,” she says. “I don't think we ever go, ‘Oh my god, they have to look amazing because this show is trying to sell a fantasy element.’” But who’s to say that the mystical stones don’t have anti-aging effects?

In navigating the time jump, the producers’ overriding desire was to avoid distracting the audience by going overboard on aging. “You don't want to be taken out of the moment, sitting back watching at home,” Davis says. At times, though, the lack of aging is its own sort of distraction. My wife and I giggled through one supposed-to-be-tender scene as the script tried to sell us on these nearly identical-looking 30-something specimens as people pushing 50. “I don’t look like an old man?” Jamie asks self-consciously, shortly before exposing his still-chiseled chest. And Claire, after completely disrobing to reveal her youthful frame, tells an admiring Jamie, "You must really be losing your eyesight." Nobody’s buying it, guys.

The aging-related dialogue is less jarring when it alludes to the absurdity of the situation, as when Claire marvels to Jamie, “Most men in their 40s have started to go soft around the middle. You haven't a spare ounce on you,” or when she greets the family lawyer by exclaiming, “You look exactly the same!” (No Battlestar fat suits here.) In other scenes, though, the actors convincingly convey the passage of time through emotion, even though they both remain outwardly radiant. “We had so many discussions with Caitriona and Sam about this internal aging, because some of it, you are trying to sell this gravitas of 20 years of loss through their acting, which I think they do so well,” Davis says.

The best asset Outlander has in hand-waving its characters’ immutability is an audience that’s willing to suspend disbelief. “Let's be honest, we could've kept these two apart for a week and it would've seemed like an eternity,” Davis says. “I think for the fans it probably seemed like 100 years—for us as well. So I don't think we needed to add to that at all.”And if—like a lot of the Outlander faithful—you’re the sentimental type who doesn’t mind some soapiness, you’ll accept that love can conquer crow’s feet. “I think in a weird way, that 20 years just kind of faded away when they saw each other again,” Davis says. “In some ways, it was like so much time had passed, and in other ways it was like no time had passed at all because that love had never died.”

With the reunion episode’s semi-awkward aging exchanges behind it, Outlander soon stops dwelling on appearances: The following week, Jamie fireman’s carries a man from a burning building, and the week after that, not-so-newlyweds Claire and Jamie tear off their clothes and writhe around on the floor. Most Outlander watchers wouldn’t have it any other way.

Judging by the books (spoilers!), there’s still a chance that we’ll see an actually old-looking Claire and Jamie in future seasons. “If we're lucky enough to do all the books, they're in their 60s in the current books,” Davis says. “So we do want to also have somewhere to go, and we do need to use, as a base, our two actors, who are very young, and so we want to be with them on this journey.”

But based on this season, don’t be surprised if the 60-something couple doesn’t look a day over 45. “Time doesn’t matter, Sassenach,” Jamie says in Season 3’s sixth episode, using his pet name for Claire. “You will always be beautiful to me.” And also, most likely, to everyone watching at home.

#outlander #outlander starz #maril davis #caitriona balfe #sam heughan #jamie x claire #tv news #people: caitriona balfe #people: sam heughan #A. MALCOLM #3x06 #tv: s3 #queue

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8bitsupervillain · 6 years

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The Disappointments of 2017: Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony

Ha ha, wow this was a massive disappointment let me tell you. It is so very rare that I encounter the latest installment in a series that completely, and utterly retroactively kills a series for me. The last thing that did that was Burial At Sea part 2, but wow I did not expect it was going to be this game that made me re-experience that sheer gut-wrenching awfulness. Please be warned, there are spoilers after the break.

Before I get into my complaints I will now list for you the things I like about Danganronpa V3. The music is great, I adore just about every song that is in this game, Let's Killing is one of my favorite tracks with the Scrum Debate being a close second. I liked the twist when Kaede Akamatsu was revealed to be the killer in Case 1, it was effective. That's it.

Let me get this out of the way first, it is not entirely because of the plot twists of Trial 6 that caused this. It is but a major, major, MAJOR factor that led to this being such a vile and loathsome letdown. I started having some doubts about how this game was going to stick the landing as early as Case 3. Shinguji killing Yonaga, and Chabashira just so his dead sister he was in love with could have friends started to strain credibility.

Case 4 when Iruma gets killed with toilet paper in a virtual world and then it transpires that the "school" was in fact a rocket ship meant to take these sixteen kids AND ONLY these sixteen kids to a new world, added to the strain. Although I kind of took the notion of there being a virus from meteors to be a nice little nod to the Zero Escape series, even if it wasn't actually a reference.

Case 5 when Oma is somehow able to write a script for how to act like him for Momota, even down to how THE REST OF THE CAST WOULD RESPOND TO HIS STATEMENTS was what tipped this over the edge. It was fucking ridiculous and I hated damn near every aspect of this fucking case and EVERYTHING THAT FOLLOWS IT. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Let's rewind my complaints to when it transpires that Oma is in fact a secret traitor whose betraying everyone because of the notion that Earth is uninhabitable. Fine, whatever, people can be pointless dickheads at the best of times. Maybe he got his personality re-written with the flashback light, fine, that's fine. Why would the people of Earth go out of their way to hunt down the Ultimates when it's suggested that they're what would fundamentally save mankind? Why would they try to hunt them down to kill them? Why is this plot-point just a rehash of Hellstar Remina (a fascinating manga, it's worth checking out)? Did Oma somehow find out about the fact they're on the fifty-third Danganronpa season?

I hate it when stories try to pull the "everyone loves this character so you do as well" card. Despite everything the game tries to do I just cannot bring myself to care about Kirumi Tojo. She was a flat, uninteresting character, her being the secret prime minister really doesn't add much to her character because it's brought up roughly ten seconds before she dies anyway, and never gets into the ramifications of this plot development. I also felt that the game tried a bit too hard to get me to care about the fact that Yumeno and Chabishira were going through a rough patch and Yumeno was spending time with Yonaga. With the exception of the pivotal characters every other character felt flat and really underdeveloped. Amami could've been a decent character had he not died in the opening hours of the game, he could have been a decent posthumous character. Gokuhara was uninteresting and ridiculously one-note, and Hoshi was just an utter black hole of a character.

Even a fair amount of the characters who make to chapter five are uninteresting. K1-B0, despite being the hero of this story has pretty much no character until he becomes a danger to the rest of the cast in chapter 6. His plot reveal that he's basically the cameraman for the events adds nothing to his character. Harukawa is perhaps the single worst character in the entire game however, they basically play her as a Kirigiri type of character with absolutely none of the redeeming characteristics of such a character. It would've been more interesting if she actually did deal the fatal blow to Oma, but I guess she had to live for reasons.

Then of course we arrive at Chapter 6, the denouement to everything this game has been building up to. The interesting characters are dead, and we're left with what we have left. Saihara, Yumeno, Harukawa, K1-B0 and Shirogane. And of course Monokuma and the Monokubs. The chapter starts, and K1-B0 has started using his upgraded weapons that Iruma gave him (or had in her lab) and is now set to tear down the Ultimate's Academy. Fair enough, a final thing to drive forth the fact that the cast is in a bad-way and they'll all die unless they can solve the mystery. This is also unfortunately where the game decides to dive into batshit lunacy. As you're investigating to find out the truth about the Academy you find several clues about the whole "the class was shot off into space to save humanity" thing. You find the room where "the cryo-stasis pods for their journey are," and you find a document that puts forth the notion that Akamatsu has a near-identical twin sister who might be roaming the halls. This is all a smokescreen of course, because when it comes time for the trial it comes to light that his has all been an elaborate con.

The class was never shot into space, there was no viral outbreak, the Ultimates Academy was simply the latest group of teenagers for Danganronpa season number 53. Everything that has transpired has simply been a televised event and none of what happened was real. There's some revelations that the personalities of every single person taking part in the show has had their actual personalities over-written by the flashback lights that the cast has been routinely subjected to over the course of the game to "give them back their memories." Which is a lie, the personalites are apparently just something that Team Danganronpa have cooked up prior to the events of the game.

On the face of it I don't have a problem with the notion that the game was all a big ruse. It's the way the game conveys the twist and everything that happens in this trial that I find to be a huge slap in the face. There's a point around the end of chapter five where the game cuts away to some random person named Makoto. Makoto, you see is a bit of a lonely boy, he has seemingly no friends, his school life is in pieces, and it all seems gray and grim for him. But he has one thing that makes himself feel better: Danganronpa, the one thing that gives his life meaning. And this is you, the audience who buy and play these games, and it illustrates just how little they care about their actual audience who buy these games and play them.

The whole entire ending, the last two hours or so of this trash fire is more or less a prolonged "you need to get a life, Danganronpa is shit and bad and you're just as bad for liking it. Fuck you." The ending is a complete slap in the face and just utterly ruins and destroys everything this whole franchise had built up until now. It is a complete and utter insult, and frankly it killed this series for me. It rates up there in the pantheon of abysmal and shitty endings. For all the shit people like to throw at Bioware for Mass Effect 3's ending at least it never outright insulted you for liking the games up until that point.

The fact the game goes out of its way to invalidate the previous entries in the series is just disgusting. See Danganronpa 1, 2, Ultra Despair Girls, never actually happened in the universe of Danganronpa; they were merely seasons in the “Danganronpa show.” Any stakes the series could have been building up to is null and void after this revelation, and as such any investment on your part is simply a waste of time. Then there’s the fact that the game deliberately goes out of its way to point out several plot points that it will never bring up again is just a cherry on top for wasting everyone’s time.

It mentions the notion that the personalities everyone has is in fact fake. Including Shirogane’s personality, the person the game assures you is the mastermind behind this particular game. It’s never elaborated on that she is in fact just a pawn in the greater scheme of things. Ha, whoops she’s dead now, smashed by a rock, oh well! It’s implied at the very start of the game that the kids used in the game were in fact actually kidnapped to be in Danganronpa V3. Whoops, the plot point’s been lost and will never be revisited.

This is all while the game is just throwing out its arm patting itself on the back for how brilliant and great the writing is. It’s annoying, and loathsome and a complete and utter insult to everyone who gave a shit about this series.

"It wasn't their intention, Kodaka said so." I don't care, I'm quits with this series after this game. What a shame.

#Danganronpa V3

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capsing · 7 years

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Since you are a writer and a very good writer ,Can you give us what do you think about how Snbvs and charinina will end ?

Hahaha omg thank you! What a delightful way to start my day.♥

I honestly have no clue!

But I would tell you how I wouldn’t want it to end, and why.

Currently, many believe either Charioce, Nina or both would die at the end of the show. Putting aside the fact that it would break my tender heart, because I’ve finally have a canon ship I love so much, I think it’d be cowardly. I already think they’re about to kill-off Rita, since they’re building up a romance between Kaiser and Jeanne, and killing off a character is a way of not dealing with its complications or the ramifications of their actions, if they’re too hard to swallow. In Rita’s case, they tried matching her up with Kaiser, but it seems they’re not following through on this, so if he’s with Jeanne and not with her they’d kill her off (I hope I’m wrong, because Rita adds much more to the story than being Kaiser’s potential love interest).

For example, Korra did that on season 4, with Asami’s father. He did too many bad things, so, since they couldn’t tie it up neatly, they killed him off in an “altruistic suicide”, as if to make up for all of his many, many wrong-doings.

With Amira, I think they killed her due to the “plot twist - she’s actually five!”

Charioce did many bad things. Killing him off like a martyr wouldn’t satisfy me, plot-wise. I want to see a solution when Charioce isn’t dead (but maybe is blinded in both eyes). I kind of don’t like the “healing” narrative going on in the show - I would’ve liked it much more if Mugaro would’ve stayed mute (but I understand that story-wise, it might’ve been a bit harder to tell - still, Mugaro could’ve had some telepathic capabilities evolving or something idk). But anyway, there’d need to be a dialogue about why Charioce did what he did, and him facing some sort of consequences for that (that aren’t death, because that’s not really a consequence, but a way to make the viewer feel “justice was served” and a sense of compilation, a catharsis).

As I’ve said before, I think this show has great writers, since every episode is full of surprises! And the characters are very consistent thus far.

What I hope for, though, is not using death as a cop-out. Deal with the issues you’ve brought up - Charioce is unjust? Sign a peace treaty. There’s a good setting for that - if Charioce would abdicate, and Jeanne and Kaiser would take the throne. Jeanne is loved by the people, a former saint, and is the mother of one of the Gods’ leaders. Kaiser has the social standing to make King, due to his family, had been a knight for the last decade, and has a kind and caring nature. Said Gods’ leader, Mugaro, has suffered from the pains of slavery, and is an important person for Azazel, who I think honestly loves Mugaro. Mugaro thinks of him as one of their most important persons. With Lucifer currently not in sight, that’s a good framework for a peace-treaty. We just need to get rid of Gabriel (who already has Sophiel undermining her), and voila, sustainable peace on Earth accomplished.

Charioce and Nina retreat to someplace and have adventures or a nice domestic life in a farm ♥

But with 12 more episodes to go, seriously anything can happen. Dragon mutiny. Mermaid revolution. Who knows!

Thanks for asking~!(✿´ ꒳ ` )♥

#asks #mystery anon #snb #shingeki no bahamut: virgin soul

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a-nerds-ponderings-blog · 7 years

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SUPERHERO LOW-DOWN

February 26 - March 12

SUPERGIRL

Season 2: Episode 14 - HOmecoming

When Jeremiah Danvers is rescued from Cadmus, Alex and Kara are thrilled to have their father back. The Danvers' arrange a family dinner to celebrate but things go awry when a suspicious Mon-El starts to question Jeremiah about his sudden return.

So how many people were actually surprised by the twist of this episode. Sadly they made it very obvious as to what was going to happen and we had to watch the Danvers girls get their hearts broken. This added to the buildup for next week’s episode when Jeremiah stole the files revealing the aliens on Earth. It was almost a lesson in; if it seems too good to be true, it probably is. That may be cynical a way of looking at the world, but in the world of television, it usually comes with a price. This episode helped to move the story along, but did not leave much for the audience to guess about.

Season 2: Episode 15 - Exodus

As Alex searches for Jeremiah and Kara investigates a series of alien kidnappings, the sisters realize they must break the rules to foil a new Cadmus plot. In an effort to get Snapper to run a story that would help her stop Cadmus, Kara agrees to set up an interview between Snapper and Supergirl.

Talk about the Danvers’ sisters justifying breaking the rules. But there seemed to be no consequences for Alex. It was almost as if it was expected and things were fine. Kara at least lost her job, but she seemed alright with that. So what message is this giving the audience? It is ok to break the rules so long as it’s for a good cause? Probably not a good thing for a superhero show to be portraying. Though having said that, what does Oliver do on a regular basis? The periodical round-up of aliens from Cadmus was heartbreaking to watch. It makes you think of another time when people of different race or ethnic background were segregated and persecuted for who they were. It was also heartbreaking with the Danvers’ sisters nearing the end, with the ship. It was hard to tell whether or not they would actually make it through. We have a week break until the next episode. All in all, this was a good way to push Cadmus’ portrayal of how far they would go. And it is also a bit of a reveal that Lena Luthor is quite possibly as innocent as she says she is, but there are those in Lex Corp who are not as loyal to her as we thought. That should come up in later episodes.

NEXT WEEK (1 week break)

Season 2: Episode 16 - Star-Crossed (Part 1)

A new villain comes to National City, putting Supergirl on high alert. Meanwhile, Winn's girlfriend, Lyra, gets Winn in trouble with the law. Maggie attempts to help Winn but old loyalties get in the way. The Music Meister attacks Supergirl.

THE FLASH

Season 3: Episode 14 - Attack on Central City

When Grodd and his army of gorillas bring the battle to Earth-1, The Flash and team must find a way to stop them before they destroy Central City. Gypsy returns to join the fight. Jesse Quick decides she wants to stay with Wally on Earth-1

It was really intriguing to see Harry and H.R. interacting, they really brought some comedy to the show. Seeing Gypsy again was great, especially her interactions with Cisco. Poor guy always goes for the bad girls. It will be interesting to have Jesse on the show again as a regular. As for the story, it was interesting, but didn’t really grab me. Some people adore the Grodd episodes, but they tend to bore me. It is just my opinion, but it seems for the time being, they have changed the future for Iris. Though, Barry’s decision not to check the timeline makes you wonder if they actually did it.

Season 3: Episode 15 - The Wrath of Savitar

While training with Barry, Wally starts to have visions of Savitar, which he hides from the team. A dangerous secret threatens Barry and Iris’ happiness.

Never Keep Secrets, especially in television. This episode demonstrates that several times, with the engagement, with Wally’s visions, and with the Philosopher’s stone. There is no point in keeping them because they always come out in the end. It almost becomes cringe-worthy to see a character hiding something from someone because it will all come out. Having said that, this was a great episode for development of Wally’s character, as well as for Julian. We learn of his fears of Savitar. Unknowingly, Wally makes such a sacrifice in releasing Savitar and we get a very emotional ending to this episode. The hardest person to see react was Joe. Here is hoping that things pick up.

NEXT WEEK

Season 3: Episode 16 - Into the Speed Force

Desperate to stop Savitar and save his friends, Barry turns to the speed force for answers. H.R. gives Jesse some advice

LEGENDS OF TOMORROW

Season 2: Episode 13 - Land of the Lost

After capturing Rip, he forces the Waverider to crash, leaving the Legends stuck 70 million years in the past. Ray leads Amaya and Nate to recover a vital piece of the ship. In an effort to get the “good” Rip back, Rory suggests they enter Rip’s mind, but what Sara and Jaxx discover in his subconscious is not pleasant and they must fight evil versions of themselves. Meanwhile, Nate and Amaya continue to get closer, but it could cause serious ramifications

Welcome to Jurassic Park… I mean welcome back Legends. It was interesting that we had two stories in one episode, with the trio out in the wild with dinosaurs, and then Sarah and the team working to bring back Rip’s mind. It was interesting to see Gideon as a human, and the way Rip portrayed everyone in his mind. It was a really well-done episode and a really great way to bring Rip back to the Waverider. We also get a glimpse into cause and effect with some of the legends. Some are insignificant to the timeline and that is why they were recruited, but others, such as Amaya, must return to their timelines in order to be the cause of important parts of history. This reminds us of the dangers of time travel. All in all, this was a great episode. It was very interested to see inside Rip’s mind, and the fabricated people he had wandering about. But it is good to have him back as Captain Hunter.

NEXT WEEK

Season 2: Episode 14 - Moonshot

When the Legends track Commander Steel to NASA Headquarters in 1970, they learn where Nate’s grandfather hid the last fragment of the Spear of Destiny. The team notices a time aberration during the Apollo 13 mission and believes that the Legion of Doom might be involved. As the Legends journey into space to intercept Apollo 13, the Waverider suffers massive internal damage and Ray’s life is left in jeopardy when he is stranded on the moon. Meanwhile, tension grows between Rip and Sara as to who is the leader of the team.

ARROW

season 5: Episode 15 - Fighting Fire With Fire

Oliver faces his biggest challenge yet as mayor. Felicity continues down her dark path with Helix. After Vigilante attacks Oliver while he’s acting as the mayor, Diggle leads the team in a mission to stop Vigilante once and for all.

So once again the Green Arrow has been thrown under the bus. But this was a good move on Oliver’s part. The speech he gave as mayor was really well-done and gave a good reason for covering up the Arrow’s murder of a detective. Felicity takes a turn to the “dark side” when she decides to join up with Helix, and isn’t very quiet about it. After the things she had done in the last few episodes, this turn was expected. The work she did with Thea and then the work in Russia, tells us that she is capable of some very dark things, and I think we are about to see a new side to Felicity’s character.

NEXT WEEK

Season 5: Episode 16 - Checkmate

Oliver gets closer to the truth about Prometheus. Meanwhile, Helix refuses to continue helping Felicity until she does a favor for them

LEGION

Season 1: Episode 4 - Chapter 4

David's in trouble, while his friends search for answers

Wow, talk about a trip into the psychology of memory. This show is somewhat difficult to follow at times, but as a psychology graduate, I find it rather fascinating. I wish I could jump into my memories and watch them unfold like they do here with David. It is interesting to see certain facts about his life change, like not having a dog, or is it Bennie or Lennie that is his friend. We learn a bit about David’s history and that he is not as innocent as we thought in the beginning. All of this, along with some fascinating characters, made this a very well-done episode.

Season 1: Episode 5 – Chapter 5

David faces a new threat

This show gets weirder and weirder, but in such an amazingly good way. We really start to see the blur between the mutant abilities and the schizophrenic symptoms in this episode. The idea that David is Benny, Lennie, King, and whatever that last one was, is extremely interesting, but creepy at the same time. It will be interesting to watch this season over again once it is finished. It will be interesting to see the things again once we know the answers. As I said, this is a weird show, but entertaining as hell.

NEXT WEEK

Season 1: Episode 6 – Chapter 6

David goes back to where it all started.

MARVEL’S IRON FIST

NEXT WEEK

Drops on Netflix March 17, 2016

Until next time...

Thanks for watching

#supergirl #the flash #legends of tomorrow #arrow #legion #marvels iron fist #dc comics #marvel comics #netflix #weekly review #nerd

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