#JTV 2x09

[mtvswatches]

Jane the Virgin 2x09 Chapter Thirty-One

Spoilers disclaimer (please read before sending messages or writing comments.)

Click here for previous recaps!

Stray thoughts

1) Okay, I really liked the exchange between little Jane and the little boy for two reasons. First, the fact that, even though Alba was teaching Jane a very dangerous lesson that perpetuates harmful stereotypes for both boys and girls, little Jane knew from the get-go that’s not a proper show of affection and she wouldn’t acknowledge it…

Second, the fact that the little boy taught Jane a far more valuable and realistic lesson…

If someone is mean to you and treats you poorly, they most definitely don’t secretly like you. On the contrary, they openly dislike you. Abuse and mistreatment should always be taken at face value.

I do wonder what connection the show will make between this flashback and the current storyline…

2) So…

Michael and Jane are not officially back together but it seems this episode is going in that direction… I’m actually curious to know how far into the show the love triangle will actually be over (personally, I’ll consider it over when  Jane has stuck to ONE of the love interests for at least 5 episodes in a row…)

3) Grandpa? Are we going to meet Rogelio’s FATHER?!

4) Ah, hell, what a way to tease me! He’s not coming… and now Rogelio says that she’s kind of depressed. I’m predicting they have split up.

5) YES!! This is way better than what I had expected!

Rogelio’s mom seems to believe that he will be devastated when he finds out, but if he is, I think it will only be momentary. I hope. I have a lot of faith in Rogelio. I think he will be thrilled.

6) Damn, Magda really did a good one on Petra. Things are not looking good for her…

7) “Great Books 105” sounds like such a boring class, tbh. Also, prediction: all the tall students? Basketball players who were probably promised a passing mark in Jane’s class without her knowledge, or something like that.

8) So… the students used to call the class Books for Ballers. I hope Jane finds a way to motivate them.

9) Michael might or might not be dating someone. So what? Xiomara looked at him as if he was cheating on Jane, but Jane was the one that dropped him like a hot potato TWICE to be with Rafael.

10) It’s really sweet that both Jane and Xiomara trust Rogelio to be able to handle the situation. I really, really hope he doesn’t disappoint me…

11) The whole baby-can’t-sleep plotline reminds me of the Mad About You live episode in which the two characters were trying to use one of these techniques to get baby Mabel to sleep on her own. It was a great episode, definitely groundbreaking, and I don’t think it receives enough recognition, probably because it was a 90s sitcom. Jane is, in fact, using the exact same technique they were trying out in that episode.

12) Shouldn’t they take the moron to a therapist or a psychologist to see if they can help her trigger some memories? Just telling her “please remember” shouldn’t have worked so easily…

13) Well… drawing parallels between Pride and Prejudice and basketball is a bit far-fetched, yet she seems to be making a connection with the students. But how are they expected to hand in a paper in their second class?

14) Rogelio… shame on you… you’re in show business, you should’ve read between the lines…

ROGELIO: My father is dying. XIOMARA: What do you mean? ROGELIO: I mean, think about it. He was too ill to travel. And I can't even bring him up to my mother without her changing the subject. Clearly, he is dying. JANE: Who is dying? XIOMARA: His dad. He thinks. ROGELIO: I'm not ready to lose him. But I must stay strong. I have to help my father achieve everything on his bucket list. I have to make sure he gets to see Bette Midler in concert. And Wicked on Broadway. He always wanted to vacation in Mykonos.

15) Good for you, Rogelio. He reacted really well. He was mostly surprised that he hadn’t realized sooner, and he didn’t understand why his mother thought he wouldn’t be able to handle it. So instead of freaking out about his dad being gay, he’s worried that his mom doesn’t trust him to act maturely in the face of a situation like this. YES YES YES. Rogelio, I fucking love you, you are truly the best fucking character in this show.

16) Oh, Mateo, ya nasty! What a bitch move!

17) She failed the McBaskets dude and I’m sure she’ll suffer the consequences, although I really hope she doesn’t.

18) OMG Rogelio organized a super gay dinner and I’m loving it! And I 1000% believe THIS should be made into the official prayer before meals…

19) Oh, she didn’t want to tell Rogelio because she didn’t want it to be real, not because she didn’t trust Rogelio to react well. She’s just afraid about losing her life partner and being alone, which she’s never been before. But I really, really, really love the fact that NOT ONCE did she say anything even remotely discriminatory. No one did. This is how you do a “gay” storyline. Well done, show. Well done.

20) Petra and Rafael are bonding, and Petra actually gave Rafael some solid advice about his mother (although I would 100% support him not talking to her, ever.) And what do you know? They found evidence against Magda…

21) Good commentary…

NARRATOR: Oh, my God! This perfectly encapsulates what's wrong with higher education! Privileging athletics and alumni contributions over academic rigor!

And this is one of those times in which the narrator seems to be voicing exactly what Jane would think, and that’s why I sometimes feel the narrator might be her, you know?

19) Okay, this is where this storyline has taken us…

20) YES!!!

21) Uh-oh…

NARRATOR: It should be noted that these words will come back to haunt Petra. But you don't know that yet. Pretend you don't know that.

I’m actually not a fan of this… “foreshadowing”, for a lack of a better word. I think the phrase was ominous enough to require that type of meta-commentary, and it’s one of those instances in which it’s better to let the viewers make that connection when the time comes, you know? It kind of ruins the future reveal, in a way.

22) Are we back to this? OMG this fucking show and the constant and annoying back and forth! Can’t anyone be IN LOVE with the same person for more than two episodes straight? They fall in and out of love every other week! What type of people are these?!

It annoys me to no end, you have no idea.

23) Michael girlfriend confirmed, then.

24)

25) So, he turned her down? I think not showing at her house would’ve sent a better message. If he showed up, that means that he still cares. Also, when did he make time to meet a new person and start dating them,  being on the run and all of that?

26) Grandpa Gay!

27) OMG!

Why did she lie to Rogelio, though?

28) I’m zero invested in the storyline of Rafael and his mom. Meh. Rafael just doesn’t do anything for me. I couldn’t care less about him.

29) So, Mia isn’t Mutter, and then this happened…

Is Mutter Rafael’s mom…?

30) Okay, alright, show, color me mildly interested. You win.

31) My favorite part of this episode, as usual, was Rogelio’s storyline, but I’ll admit that the cliffhanger definitely grabbed my attention. I hope this leads to something interesting because Rafael usually bores the shit out of me.

32) Hope you enjoyed my recap, and, as usual, if you’ve got this far, thank you for reading! If you enjoy my recaps and my blog, please consider supporting it on ko-fi.Thanks!

[valeriemperez]

[1]I tried to send an ask yesterday but Tumblr must have eaten it or something..I just listened to the podcast and you bring up some interesting points, like the writers' possible sexism in not letting Kara be the subject of her love story and turning her into the object. Although it's interesting that they've done the same thing to Oliver, who is a man and was the object of Felicity's crush. It's also interesting how the audience reacted to Ol*city vs Kar*lsen. The former is/was a fan favorite

[2]while the latter wasn’t. Apart from the race issues, do you think it’s bc Kara is not “nerdy” enough to identify with? Or bc she’s the “powerful” one in the couple which makes James less of a “prize”? I also found out that there’s enough overlapping with O/F fans, Sp*llen fans and SB fans. It’s interesting that all those ships started out with a “nerdy” awkward woman who is more interested in the hero than he’s in her. That happens despite the “opposites do attract” parallels with O/F and WA

The interesting thing about Kara not being a nerd in the way that Felicity or any of the STEM girls are is that you’ll notice fans who want to pair her with Barry will act like she has “so much in common” with him even though she explicitly isn’t interested in science. So I don’t think it would stop people from identifying with her if they chose to.

And yet I think you’re onto something with Kara being the more powerful one in the relationship. She’s the superhero of the two, but she’s a woman, so they wound up bringing in a being as powerful as her. It reminds me a little of Wonder Woman, whose ship is sweet bean Steve Trevor… And yet in the comics they never reached the level of Clark/Lois or even Bruce/Selina, Wally/Linda and Barry/Iris. Instead they tried to play around and stick her with… You guessed it, Superman, who is as powerful as her.

As for Oliver/Felicity, part of the backlash towards the ship is from people who feel like she took over the show. And that’s possibly coming from the feeling that she’s the one who “pursued” him and it took work for him to fall for her, if that makes sense. Doesn’t make those feelings right, but it’s probably there.

Thanks for the feeback btw! Sorry I’m days late.

The part in 2x09 where Iris told Barry “I’m so happy for you….Truly” would have been a callback to when she was jealous of Barry and Linda’s relationship. But the writers never dove into that, because everyone was busy with their lives while it seemed like Iris was dealing with shit alone. Then again, I guess CP was happy about that, because she didn’t want women fighting over a man on the show.

I think it was a subtle callback, but I agree that the writers didn’t want to make it explicit because they were trying to give Iris a break from catfights haha. But it would have been nice to see Barry being there for Iris even when she wasn’t jealous, alas!

Do you think they could’ve had Barry and Patty break up in a way that would NOT have him looking like the bad guy IF he told her he was The Flash? I think he would have looked really bad if he went to E2 and kissed E2 Iris. It was clear that he was shocked the first time E2 Iris kissed him, but after that he was completely on board with kissing her and he didn’t seem to feel bad about it lol. Also, I think he would’ve done that whether he was dating Patty or not.

Honestly, no. Barry was already less invested in Patty, so any way they broke up was going to have to show that he was the “bad guy.” Not that I really think he was, he just wasn’t as serious about it as she was. The only way to have her leave him is for him to have actually been in love with her and her to decide she couldn’t handle his Flash life. And even though I thought it might go that route, because I was prepared for horrors, I’m so glad it never did. 

And I totally agree with you, he would have forgotten Patty’s name the second E2 Iris kissed him even if they were still together.

What is the exact breakdown of season a vs season b on the flash? Is it before the Christmas episode and then after it returns? Or the first 12, then the back 11? I’ve always wondered, lol

There isn’t a specific breakdown, because we are assigning those numbers and not the show or network. But the winter hiatus is what differentiates A from B, so technically 1-9 is A and 12- 23 is B.

WA being more popular than SB and B/P is what counts. It bothers me is that O/F are using trends to prove that their ship is “superior” though. Popular and good are not synonyms. They are not celebrating racism but they are blind to it. I remember a O/F stating that if WA fans are not sure their ship is endgame it’s bc they know they don’t have chemistry while the concerned WA fans were coming from a race standpoint and had already seen enough WoC getting screwed over for WW. It made me cringe.

Yeah, popular does not mean good and vice versa. That’s the thing, of course not everyone has to like WA or see the chemistry. But we know one of the reasons certain people struggle with it is precisely because they’re conditioned to not see a woman like Iris as inherently worthy of love. It’s sad but true, and there shouldn’t be a problem acknowledging that.

That google info that they have is dubious at best. I think downloads of Flash & ratings of Flash & Arrow would be much more accurate. These internet trend #s are too easily manipulated. Also, Flash is CW’s #1 show not in spite of Candice but in large part because of her. It needs to be characterized that way forcefully. W/out her & the Wests a lot of people would not have watched in the first place. Flash over indexes with African Americans. I bet much of that is the difference in ratings.

Even though Arrow appears to have a larger international fanbase, and thus their ships are more popular online, Flash is consistently in the top 5 or 10 of pirated shows. So yeah, we are winning in that regard. And it’s not just black viewers that Flash over-indexes with - it has more Latino viewers than any CW show other than JTV!