#lincoln having an actual storyline (and SURVIVING)

[yiangchen]

t100 is one of those shows that should have only had 3 seasons...but like in an alternate universe where s3 was good and lincoln didn't die you know...

[disturbingstar]

The walking dead trivia

• The blinks of the actors who play the walkers are edited out using vfx.

• Melissa McBride was offered the role of Carol Peletier without an audition after Frank Darabont was impressed by her performance in his film The Mist (2007).

• In an interview Robert Kirkman claimed Norman Reedus (Daryl) originally auditioned for the part of Merle Dixon. He was rejected, but his audition so intrigued the producers that they created the part of Daryl just for him.

• Ross Marquand (Aaron) previously auditioned for the role of Gareth.

• Laurie Holden originally auditioned for the role of Lori Grimes, before she was offered the role of Andrea Harrison.

• In the Season 5 premiere, No Sanctuary (2014), when the Terminites were slicing throats, the main cast members were not told about the prosthetic necks and fake blood that would ooze through the trowel in front of them. So their reactions at having their "throats" cut were real.

• The extras who play walkers have to go through "walker school" to learn how to walk and move like walkers.

• Morgan was the first character to use the term "Walkers" as reference to zombies.

• For Season 3, the make-up team used darker skin tones for the walkers to show further decay as time had progressed.

• In 2018 a new AMC policy was announced that allows both The Walking Dead (2010) and Fear the Walking Dead (2015) to use the "F" word twice per season.

• The storyline of Connie's disappearance in season 10 was written so Lauren Ridloff could go and film Eternals (2021).

• In the entire series, Andrew Lincoln, Jon Bernthal, and Sarah Wayne Callies are the only cast members to have been credited alongside images of themselves in the opening credits. This occurred in the first two seasons only.

• From season to season, the opening titles "decompose" more and more.

• In 2019 at Walker Stalker Con Matthew Lillard revealed that he auditioned for Negan and went down to the final two before losing the role to Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

• The horse seen in the pilot, Days Gone Bye (2010), is the same horse used in Survival of the Dead (2009).

• All of Carol's children are played by actual siblings. Sophia, who turns and is shot by Rick is played by Madison Lintz. Younger Henry is played by Macsen Lintz, and older Henry is played by Matt Lintz.

• When Andrea was killed off, her storylines from the original comic books were transferred to Michonne. As a result, Michonne's storyline was transferred to Carol.

(All trivia is from IMDb)

[666prophet]

Fallout S1:E2 - The Target

More world building and starting the main storyline. To the general audience it might be a win. For the more knowledgeable and Fallout fans it’s a bit rough in my opinion. It’s zany and fun but over all light on moving along the story. Kinda feels more like a filler.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Spoilers and Deep Dive~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ok so we meet presumably the Enclave. Interesting that they are heavy on laser weapons since historically/canonically they were more fans of plasma weapons. We got a blink-and-you-miss tease of a super mutant. Obligatory dog insertion, although it’s funny they went with a Belgian Malinois to avoid the Dogmeat call back. Dr. Wilzig, I hope, has nothing to do with the FEV or I’m gonna flip shit. Storm troopers have better aim than that turret from 6ft away.

How the fuck did Maximus attach himself to Titus’ armor? Also cool I guess the vertibird just fucked off back to base? So no one is gonna call it a yao guai? Ok cool. Titus has a flashlight on his helmet and refuses to turn it on when exploring a dark cave? Got it. Titus has to be the most baby-back bitch made knight in BoS history. You ran screaming from a yao guai while in power armor. Then apparently died?!?!? That wasn’t a plot death at all 🙄. Also that yao guai went blow for blow with Titus but then went down with two shots to the head? I mean I have to give them credit for bringing back the 10mm pistol from Fallout 1 &2, but I don’t remember it being that strong.

The moron guy scene is just stupid and pointless. Unless you are trying to make survivors out to be idiots. The writers seem to not be able to make up their minds to whether power armor is a hulking heavy suit or just cool lightweight semi tough thing you wear. Maximus either has no idea or no care about using too much power and needing a new core to power it. The chicken fucker scene is just…😐. It also shows more of this thing of Maximus trying to be the new fighter for justice of the Wasteland. McScuse me! When did Tony Stark work on T60s? There is a jetpack for T60s in Fallout 4 but that’s a big loud heavy thing that takes actual fuel. Not some wrist jet things.

So I have A LOT to say about Filly. First off wow it’s amazing how many old Fords, Chevys, and Lincoln’s were just all around this one area. Also who the fuck brought all these Cessnas and 747s? Not a single in universe version of car or motorcycle is present. Like you guys didn’t even try to make things seem canon. Another interesting thing of note is there are no animals/bugs. No wild dogs, bloat flies, bloodbugs, mole rats, radscorpions, giant ants, iguanas, radstags or even deathclaws. We saw one yao guai, one brahmin, one radroach and the dogs from the Enclave site(including CX404). There were the goats but canonically the only goat like things that survived were bighorners and they are in the Mojave. Another curious thing is that they are no other ghouls next to The Ghoul (Goggins), not even feral ghouls or glowing ones. Now Ma June says "your kind isn’t welcome here", perpetuating the canonically held dislike/distrust of ghouls. So wouldn’t that make a ghoul armed to the teeth sitting in the middle of Filly kinda conspicuous?

Now onto the shoot out and fight with “Knight Titus”. Time for nerdy gun shit. Someone aims their PPSh, how they got a Russian submachine gun who knows. The PPSh was the basis for the styling of the combat shotguns in Fallout 3 & 4, but it was never a full gun in those games. We see our first instance of a pipe weapon which is nice. Now The Ghouls’ shotgun has never been seen in canon and is based on an MTs255 a Russian revolver based shotgun. The pistol used by Maximus is some weird Desert Eagle that’s never been in canon. Which is funny because you could have just used a Desert Eagle which was already in Fallout 1

The robot foot things is 100% tv show fabricated. Which I’m amazed that Ma June can even move so easily after being shot…in the knee….on her dominant leg. The reviving of CX404 was a nice touch. Seeing as we can all agree killing a dog is a no-no. Although she did attack The Ghoul about 20min ago, so I don’t understand why she would be so keen on tagging along with him. The ripper vibroblade being foldable is new and kind of odd seeing as that would compromise its strength. Lucy also amazingly gets over her crisis of faith over cutting a man’s head off quite quickly. Seeing as two days ago she wasn’t too keen on violence.

||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

This one was definitely a miss for me. It wasn’t terrible and not one thing made it bad. It was a lot of little things that just kinda rubbed me the wrong way. Making it feel more like a wacky silly filler episode. Which doesn’t bode well seeing as this is the second episode in the series.

Final Score - 5/10

[us3rnam3-r3dact3d]

Spotify Wrapped Associations

Now that I've gotten through what I think is all of the asks about my Spotify top 100, I thought I'd give you guys a short little playlist of the songs I actually associate with the Redacted boys.

Cigarette Ahegao | Penelope Scott

Gavin. 100% Gavin. The absolute revulsion to the expectations that are placed on him. The total rejection of what he’s been told he is. What he’s been told all of the people like him are. He went to D.A.M.N and D.A.M.N told him what he was and that he had no chance of escaping that.

So everyone I love is stuck / Because this that, the other, and the state fucked up/ We covered it in a class I’m about to fail

Hey incels, just have sex (duh) / Trash on the walls / And trash on the floor / Liquid eyeliner stuck to the door / Screwing everything up and doing everything wrong / In my defense I wasn't supposed to be around this long, so...

Someday, I'll have my own life / I'll leave this all behind

Saint Bernard and Saint Bernard 2 | Lincoln

Like I mentioned in the request about it, these two songs mark the difference between Sam’s relationship with Alexis and his relationship with Darlin’. I just wanted to show off the difference in the lyrics. Seriously, if you love Saint Bernard please listen to 2. It’s so good.

Tell me where I came from, what I will always be / Just a spoiled little kid who went to Catholic school

Vs.

To tell me where I came from / What I thought I could be / As a spoiled little kid / About to leave Catholic school

I said make me love myself so that I might love you / Don't make me a liar, 'cause I swear to god / When I said it I thought it was true

Vs.

Or please make me love myself / So that I might love you / Or make me a liar / 'Cause I swore to God / Back when swearing / Just felt like the truth

Arsonist’s Lullaby | Hozier

Not to lean into cliches but this song belongs to Damien. Barely controlled anger, a power that he just contains. A thirst. Damien could have turned out so much darker. We’ve seen that. He refuses to tame his anger for the comfort of those around him, but that anger belongs to him. He won’t let it off it’s leash.

When I was a child, I'd sit for hours / Staring into open flame / Something in it had a power / Could barely tear my eyes away

All you have is your fire / And the place you need to reach / Don't you ever tame your demons / But always keep 'em on a leash

Graveyard’s Full | the Growlers

Bracium. At its core, this song is about the human instinct to survive no matter what it costs, up to and including the destruction of their own planet. Bracium’s storyline involves a shift in the balance of nature, a movement among the forces of the world that turns that balance on its head. And if it’s not addressed soon, his graveyard will be very full indeed.

The graveyard’s full / We’re running out of earth / But we can use the bones / To build another church / Thick walls made of men / Whose souls have come and went

Class of 2013- Audiotree Live | Mitski

We hear a lot of David’s dad and their relationship, but we don’t hear much about his mom. I think that’s interesting, and I think that somewhere in David there is a deep curiosity- maybe loss, maybe anger. I listen to this version of the song so much because of how Mitski’s voice breaks, how you can feel it, the reverberation of her voice off of her rib cage. I think that’s the kind of grief that David has when he stops trying to control these uncontrollable emotions. Or more actually- when he fails at controlling them.

Mom, would you wash my back? / This once, and then we can forget / And I'll leave what I'm chasing / For the other girls to pursue

Mom, am I still young? / Can I dream for a few months more?

Cherry Wine | Hozier

(Once again I’ll mention that I don’t like using love songs that use pronouns for the role the listener is assumed into, but the parallels in this song are excellent and I’m just going to ignore it and so should you)

Vincent. This song is about loving someone desperately with limited time. Honestly, I’m going to let the lyrics speak for themselves with this one.

And it's worth it, it's divine / I have this some of the time.

The way [they] show(s) me I'm [theirs] and [they’re] mine / Open hand or closed fist would be fine / The blood is rare and sweet as cherry wine.

I Bet on Losing Dogs | Mitski

Ivan. Doomed love. And a love he knows is doomed. He knows as he acts on it that the love he has is loosing. And he can’t help it. He can never help it. Plus, the repetition to the point of insanity of Ivan’s pet name really drives home the hopelessness for the both of them.

My baby, my baby / You're my baby, say it to me / Baby, my baby / Tell your baby that I'm your baby

I wanna feel it / I bet on losing dogs / I always want you when I'm finally fine

Someone to watch me die / Someone to watch me die / I bet on losing dogs

I Was an Island | A.W.

And finally, a song for a listener character. Darlin’. This is a sappy love song for a loner finally accepting love because of the right person. It’s the sort of love song I think Darlin’ deserves.

I was a fighter and I was so brave / But I lowered my sword when you held me and swore / You'd stay, stay, stay

I was a wolf, dear, apart from the pack /But you answered my cry in the dead of the night / And told me that you had my back

I can't do this alone anymore / 'Cause I'm no good on my own anymore / What did I do to deserve this? / What did you do to me? / Baby, come back / You know I don't want to be free

[sometimesrosy]

hi rosie! I know it's been months since the 100 ended and I've seen lots of people talk about how they failed bellamy and clarke but I was wondering what you thought of raven and her storyline in s7. do you think it was good for her character and her story arc?

Ahh. Raven’s arc.

Yeah, so the problem with Raven’s arc is JR hasn’t known what to do with her since season 5. Season 4 was the last season with a good character arc for her, and even that one had a major character glitch as he tried to take her from the pragmatist who would blow up a bridge or dam or tell Clarke to kill Lxa while surrounded by her armies, to a person who said “it’s not your blood that matters, it’s your heart.”  Which was one of the worst lines in this whole show. It’s not even funny like “we’re back bitches!” It’s just corny and soppy and dumb. Her character shift on science island always felt false to me. It should have been Bellamy who held Clarke in check with morality, since that had been HIS character arc. I thought it was a misstep then, and now knowing the entire narrative arc, I think it was where they started to go wrong with Raven. Until then she was my third favorite character after Clarke and Bellamy.

I ALWAYS had a problem with this, but I was giving them the benefit of the doubt that they could pull it out. Season 5 was the least bad for her, with her sacrifice for spacekru on the ship, but honestly I didn’t think they went far enough with that. I feel like they should have explored her feelings of guilt more at not being able to get her friends home, or leaving Clarke behind alone.  And there was great potential in the scene where she and Clarke took McCreary down using her own body as the weapon (especially for a character whose body was always in pain and whose body had failed her... idk that’s quite some symbolism there,) but instead they chose to retreat and turn her back into the judgmental shrew that told Bellamy he shouldn’t have saved the slaves, and told Clarke she was the one who said whether everyone lived or died.

So like. She never addressed with Clarke what happened with Finn at his death. The blame she put on Clarke, when SHE wanted to instigate a war that would have had them all exterminated, including Finn. For some reason, the genius couldn’t connect those dots that her plan would have caused all of her people to massacred? I mean, it’s normal for her to have that failure in such a time of high emotion, but six years later, she still thinks Clarke was wrong to do what she did? No. Plot hole. Forgetting all the times that she enabled Clarke’s plans, or eagerly set about torturing and killing (remember SHE’S the one who electrified Lincoln without a BIT of the remorse that Clarke and Bellamy had,) is a failure of character.

Also, she never addressed the FACT that she wanted to trade Murphy to the grounders for Finn’s life and have him tortured to death in place of her boyfriend who was a literal mass murderer, AND she blamed Murphy for Finn’s actions when Murphy was the one trying to stop him the whole time. And THIS is a plot hole for a character arc and narrative line that was about Raven having learning about forgiveness and morality and leadership and sacrifice and hard decisions, and making judgments on Murphy, who frankly has been one of the most moral characters of the show since season 2. His morality might not be the SAME as everyone else’s, but it was the most firm.  So, this narrative arc again did not go FAR enough. 

In season 5, I figured that they would make up for the s5 scanty Raven storyline with a stronger s6 one.. That didn’t happen. I thought maybe it was because her love interest left, so she took on his judgmental role, but it didn’t work well. I also thought that part of the problem was that it would make her into too big of a character and they needed to keep the focus on the main characters, Clarke and Bellamy. But from s5-7 MURPHY got a large role, too, that brought a thorough narrative arc and finished out his character journey. So he got the focus that they never managed for Raven. I hear tell that Richard helped Murphy’s story in season 7, so that might be why. But idk. It shows that they were capable of finishing a character story with attention and detail, but they just failed with Raven. 

So season 7 had Raven confronting her own leadership and putting her in Clarke’s place to face the judgment she put on Clarke. And...oh she was sad and felt guilt and had to face the repercussions of that. But... it didn’t go far enough. She was reunited with Clarke and was no longer angry at her, and they were a team again. But this wasn’t HER story arc. Her story arc just kind of went *sad trombone.*

I know she was the one who went into the anomaly and met with the sparkle aliens, but that just seemed so forced and fake. Yes, they built up the morality narrative, but... like. It should have been Clarke. Instead they turned her into the crazy vengeance lady, like Daenerys, even though her entire narrative was about her dealing with her pain and she kind of never killed anyone in vengeance? I mean she spent 6 years ALONE and she only wanted to kill herself? IDK. It doesn’t make sense that THIS was the end. She sent madi into battle too save Bellamy and that did make her crazy lady. She had her after death reckoning and we saw no crazy lady. 

Sorry, that went off into failure of Clarke’s story.

How did that affect Raven? I think that from about season 3, Raven was used as a substitute to fill in gaps where they lost characters, or moved characters around. Where they changed their narrative ideas, and they needed a narrative tool to do something, they would stick Raven in... because she was a strong character who was involved with all the other main characters (except maybe Octavia.) She became like a swiss army knife who would take the place of characters that were needed but didn’t fit. And that meant that HER character was not really consistent in the later half of the series.  And it feels WRONG. Someone’s judgy? Make it Raven. Someone’s empathetic? Make it Raven. Someone’s mean? Make it Raven. Someone’s righteous? Make it Raven. Someone’s a sister? Make it Raven. Someone’s a daughter? Make it Raven. Some main character needs a supporting character to prop them up? Make it Raven. They just moved her around to fit the other character’s stories. Even her big morality arc was to support Abby, Clarke, or Murphy. :/ THAT’S why it didn’t work when they made her the Clarke proxy in the transcendence narrative. Because she hadn’t actually worked through HER story, but through Abby’s Clarke’s and Murphy’s. Bleh.

And she also basically disappeared in a lot of season 7, too. Same as Octavia. Who had her story with Sky Ring and skyringkru, but then disappeared until she gave the inspiring peace speech with the goddamn petty, dumbass stupid grounders, whose main flaw FROM SEASON 1, is that they are too stupid to have survived this long. All they want to do is fight. And blame everyone else for what they did. And the eligius prisoners, and the brainless cult sheep. Honestly. 

And what do we have? The most unnuanced, flat character in the show. Sheidheda. Like there isn’t even any symbolism or archetypal energy in there. He’s just there to make them fight for NO FUCKING REASON. 

These are the characters who had decent story arcs that were resolved.

Murphy and Emori Diyoza Gabriel And Indra a bit. Better than most. 

Fucking DEV had a better character ending than Clarke, Bellamy, Raven, and Octavia. 

Actually, Mackson was satisfying, although skimpy. But then the characters didn’t have a really deep narrative line, so their ending was in keeping with their story. But it fit with their long term stated goals, what they wanted out of life. Just to be together in peace with maybe some chickens, by the shore, right? That was THEIR goal. The ending was theirs.

That was never what any of the other characters wanted. Or not ONLY. Do the right thing. Live a good life. Create a better society. Save humanity. Be good people. Live morally. 

nope. But it worked for Murphy’s ending too. He didn’t want to die alone. He died, with Emori. Then he came back and got to life his half life with his friends. 

I just can’t get over how they tossed the main story of being the good guys and saving humanity. I suppose there was always the question of whether they’d get a happy ending emotionally, but I never thought they’d destroy humanity, erase Bellamy and say Clarke was never the hero. 

I guess I needed to address the endings of the other characters to see how they all fit in with Raven’s. Because none of the characters stood on their own, so we have to see how they were woven together and compare and contrast.

Raven was my biggest disappointment as a character in this show from season 5 on. I kept waiting for her character arc to come together or get the attention Murphy got. She had the weight to be major character, but her story just wasn’t told. She became a supporting character and really lacked meaningful development. 

[someplace-that-is-else]

‘Until We Meet Again: The 100′s Final Season--Wasted Potential or A Fit Ending?’

Editor’s Note: Spoilers for the last season of The 100 as well as past seasons.

 I was surprised.

 In the closing hours of the sixth season of The 100, the CW announced that it would be getting a seventh season. They also announced that it would be the final season.

 What? FINAL season? Really?

 The fifth season was a great season for the show with the six-year time jump, ending in another time jump that spanned 125 years and a new planet. The sixth season was an intriguing new world and storyline. It had been a while since it went hardcore sci-fi…A.L.I.E. in the divisive third season…the sixth season did it with ripe possibilities, plot twists, and…as was usual for this show…actual death. Labeled Book 2, I had been curious to see where the creator Jason Rothenberg and the writers would take us given Book 1 took 5 seasons.

 But now? Would main characters Clarke and Bellamy (aka Bellarke) end the show together? Would humanity learn any better given they have survived at least TWO apocalypses? Would Octavia (my favorite character who had gone from the girl under the floor to Grounder to Skairippa to lethal Red Queen) get a happy ending?

 With 16 episodes announced, there was plenty of time. Plenty of time to close out the story. My co-worker who was a big fan of course was worried. She grew moreso the closer it got to the time when the CW usually promoted. And…NOTHING.

 A sign of things to come…or just paranoia?

What’s the Endgame?: The 100’s Serpentine Final Season Plot

 I’ll say this much. I was intrigued.

 At the end of last season, our main characters revealed to the people of the new planet Sanctum that the leaders they worshipped as gods were not. They used technology to transfer their consciousness into ‘willing’ people. After being that way for centuries, how would these people go on when their belief system had been revealed to be false? Some people were angry at being deceived. Others felt mad at Clarke and friends for revealing the truth, destroying their system of living.

 Meanwhile we had Clarke and the others still dealing with the truce between them and the Eligius prisoners that were part of their crew now. Their leader Diyoza was missing, leaving the Eligius adrift. And due to the end of Season Six, Clarke’s own crew were on a slippery slope, thinking her ‘daughter’ Madi was still the Commander.

 Four different factions. So many possibilities. They were possibilities that the writers appeared to want to touch on. And there was the question of…could they all get along? Be greater and better than the sum of their parts? Or was the last of humanity doomed to be in constant conflict?

 Then there was the disappearance of Bellamy…

  Ah! Bellamy. After being a co-leader with Clarke basically for most of the seasons, Bellamy found himself at the center of a new mystery. Moments after his sister Octavia disappeared into mist after being stabbed by new character Hope, Bellamy was full of questions about what had just happened. What he got was knocked out, dragged across the ground by people unseen, and then vanished into the Anomaly, a circle of light that was a mystery left over from last season.

 What followed was several different stories. There was Echo, Bellamy’s girlfriend, on the hunt for the vanished Bellamy. There was the mystery of what happened to Octavia. There’s Clarke and Friends chasing after her as well as getting to the bottom of the Bellamy mystery. Meanwhile, there was Madi left behind, dealing with her duty versus a desire for a normal life. There also was the growing tension between the Eligius prisoners and the natives of the new world.

 Because that was not enough, there were curveballs. Oh…that crazy Commander from the Flame, the symbol of the tribes united under Clarke? He possessed one of the last False Gods on this world. You had one of Clarke’s group Starscream-que Murphy and his lover Emori…also pretending to be Gods themselves due to a plot thread from last season. Diyoza and Octavia’s whereabouts revealed the origins of new character Hope���and a whole other world Bardo. And behind Bardo…was a loose plot thread that was seeded all the way back in Season Four. Oh, and did we mention there was a lot of time jumping, one prequel tale (aka a backdoor pilot), and world travelling a la SLIDERS.

 It was not unusual for The 100 to throw so many ideas at the audience. But so many ideas…INCLUDING THE KITCHEN SINK?  In the FINAL season?

 Yes, a few of the ideas were intriguing. On their own. But all of them…together?

 I could not begin to describe how many times I felt like I needed a cheat sheet to keep up with everything. And even then…there would be weeks where the viewers never saw a set of characters or a plotline. There was one case when one character was gone for weeks aka a long stretch of episodes. Worse given how important that character was to several characters, no one noticed they were missing.

 Or the time jumping. There would be a plotline with a plot twist. Then the show would jump back three months. Then it would move a few weeks ahead to show another angle. Or when it decided to explain the whereabouts of Bellamy, it chose an episode where time passed and then it jumped ahead to the present, picking up a storyline from another episode. It was the very definition of whiplash.

 At the start of the season, the writers pondered an interesting question. Was the last of humanity doomed to constant conflict…or could they be better than that? While the Bardo plot thread tapped into that theme, the show became style over substance. And that style…was smoke and mirrors. I thought that theme was being tackled with the four factions on Sanctum. Now? The writers gave up on it. Sadly.

 By the time the writers revealed the whereabouts of Bellamy, most of the season was over. Worry kicked in. Was there still time to resolve the characters’ stories…or would it be…a rushed ending?

 Speaking of which…

 The Girl Under the Floor: The 100 and Natural Ends

 Clarke. Octavia. Indra. Echo. Madi. Miller. The names go on and on.

 Throughout six seasons, viewers have gone through the highs and lows with these characters. Viewers saw Clarke kill her first love Finn. Viewers saw Indra take Octavia under her wing, giving her a mother figure that she missed in her own life. Viewers saw Madi lose her mind. The Conclave. Praimfaya. Mount Weather. A.L.I.E. Characters had been known to go through it on this show. Things happened. People changed.

 So near the end of The 100’s run, viewers wanted to know…how would their favorites end up?

 What they got…AGAIN…was smoke and mirrors.

 The writers appeared to be more focused on new characters than the characters that viewers had gotten to know over six seasons. In some cases, like Bardo native Levitt, it worked because he became involved with a character viewers cared about. In this case Octavia. Others like that Diyoza-lite chick had no connection to the faves, other than being annoying no matter how sympathetic she was written. Or worse, they were like Hope. A rapidly aged child of Diyoza, Hope was more whining annoying brat than a fighter like viewers expected her mother to be. Given more time, she might have become likable, but…there was no time.

And speaking of time…what of the old timers? The characters the audience cared about. So many characters have come and gone. Finn. Lincoln. Lexa. Jaha. Jasper. Clarke’s own mother Abby. Only a handful of the original 100 were left along with well developed supporting characters. With this being the last season, were they coming to a natural end?

 Octavia was being dealt with efficiently as the writers highlighted the fact that she was on a path to redemption after two seasons of darkness and introspective healing. But what about Clarke…THE MAIN CHARACTER? After doing what she had to do for her people, what would her happy ending be…at peace with Madi, finding a new love, and/or finding a way for all humanity to live peacefully in such a way that the sacrifices were worth it? Or what of Indra…what end does she deserve as a warrior? What of Madi…would she choose a normal teenager’s life or the life of being a commander of her warrior people?

 Off the top of my head, there were two characters who had quite a nice end. First there was Octavia. After the horrors she committed as The Red Queen and trying to make amends, she discovered redemption through the eyes of others who saw her through a different and fresh set of eyes. First, Hope who looked up to her as a mother figure. Then through the eyes of a complete stranger in Levitt who found her inspiring. She found the one thing that she had been looking for throughout the whole series: belonging and acceptance.

 The other character was Murphy. The cockroach. From the ‘Starscream’ of the group to showing some sense of right and wrong. And along with Emori, they were the ultimate scheme team. Slowly, but surely there was love. Posing as false gods presented a new challenge for them…what happens when a scheme team is given actual responsibilities for people. And through this challenge, the viewers learned exactly how much Murphy had grown through the series as well as explored layers to Emori that we did not even know she had.

 That was not the fate for all the characters we knew and loved.

  Madi started off alone in the series, discovering love through her motherly bond with Clarke. And the constant debate of teenage life vs leader life has been a constant with her a la BUFFY lite. She was finally given a taste of what it was like to be a teen…then the plot arc of the Bardo people ended that. Abruptly, I might add. In fact, her fate felt like shock value for value sake given some of the other stories for characters.

 Gaia appeared posed to be a long overdue love interest for Clarke. Not to mention that the writers were exploring more of her relationship with her mother Indra. Instead, she became the character who vanished for the majority of the episodes. Worse, NO ONE noticed she was gone.

 There were several more instances of this (can we talk about the fact that while Raven got moments, she did not really have ANY endgame developments?), it was the main narrative characters who appeared to get the worst of this.

 And nowhere was that clearer than with Bellamy Clarke.

  Bait and Switch, or the Strange Case of Bellamy Clarke

I had always heard that you could tell how a TV show felt about a character/actor by how they were written out of a show. A recent example that came to mind was Charisma Carpenter’s character Cordelia Chase during Season 4 of ANGEL by way of a coma when all fans knew she was the heart and soul of that show. 

Another example was the character of Professor Maxmillian Arturo (played with wit, humor, and intelligence by John Rhys-Davies) on the sci-fi show SLIDERS. Not only was he stabbed with a syringe that rendered him dumb, but he was shot and his body left on a planet that exploded. All IN THE SAME EPISODE. Yeah, no love lost between the actor and the people in charge during that show’s third season.

 Which brings us to Bellamy Clarke…

 Bellamy Clarke had been with The 100 since the beginning. A reckless bad boy except for when it came to his sister Octavia, Bellamy went from that to being a frenemy to other main character Clarke to being a good friend and co-leader (birthing the ship name Bellarke) to a capable leader in his own right. Along the way, he made so many mistakes. Bellamy clashed often with others. But he grew. And the time jump saw him get a capable girlfriend in Echo. His bigger drama would always be with his sister Octavia as they clashed as only siblings could clash, but there was always love there. So it made sense that he would want to know the mystery of Hope and how it tied into his sister turning into mist and vanishing.

 But…he vanished himself. For the first half of the season, the mystery of his kidnapping was a plot. And then…during a shootout involving Octavia, Bellamy appeared to be blown up in an explosion. Granted, The 100 did not shy away from killing off a main character (Lincoln, Lexa), but it was so jarring to see it happen.

Just as bad as seeing Bellamy later…as a disciple of the Big Bad on Bardo. After a bottle episode involving a man vs nature theme (a theme I do not like and did not like in this case). And time jumping. AGAIN. Can we say whiplash?

 And then…Bellamy was SHOT. BY CLARKE. Body…left…bleeding…on…the floor.

 Can we say DOUBLE whiplash?

 I was aware thanks to the co-worker who got me into The 100 that there was some off-camera drama going on. And because of that, the actor had asked for some personal leave time. So his filming was very, very limited. HOWEVER, I know enough after years of watching tv shows (the situation with the two actresses on THE GOOD WIFE for example) AND soaps to know two things. One…if a writer had an actor for a limited time, you wrote a complete arc. You also filmed as much as possible. And if you needed said actor back at the end of a show and was not sure if they would be available…go ahead and film a scene to insert in the last episode. It was what the fans that have followed a show for years deserves. PERIOD.

 Two…the fate of Bellamy could have been written better than that. In fact, the writers were better off having Bellamy die in the Bardo explosion while trying to save his sister. That at least was true to his character and his complete arc on the show. If they had to do the disciple arc at all, there had to be some conflict over his loyalty to Clarke or his loyalty to Bardo. Allow the other characters to be conflicted, something the writers normally did not shy away from. Show, don’t tell the struggle. If Clarke had to shoot Bellamy, it had to make sense.

 From what was shown, there was plenty of time for Clarke to get the book of Madi’s memories. There was time to just simply knock Bellamy out. And if Bellamy had to be shot, there was time to write in the fate of his body. To fans’ knowledge, Bellamy’s body was still laying there on the floor, bleeding out. To add insult to injury, FakeRussell…who was in the same scene…was in the next episode with no Bellamy mentions.

 So let’s review. Bellamy was blown up in one episode. Bellamy was left on a world to fight nature on another. Bellamy was turned into a brainless disciple on another episode. Finally, Bellamy was shot dead by his best friend (who happened to be his wife IRL. How meta.).

 Shows what the writers and creator feel about the actor, don’t you think?

 May We Meet Again…?

 Regardless of the management of the character of Bellamy, The 100 had another main character to deal with. Clarke Griffin had been the main protagonist since Episode 1. She had lost her first love, lost a great love, and made quite a lot of serious choices for someone so young. And given that the theme of the last season was about humanity and its way of living, it was a sure thing that Clarke would have to make another major decision. But…would Clarke get a happy ending?

 Well…this show would not be this show…and Clarke would not be Clarke if she wasn’t put through it. My problem was that up until the end, Clarke was basically a cameo in her own show. That itself was an oddity given that she was the one focused on the hunt for Bellamy.

 There was potential. From what to do about Madi to how she was coping with her mother’s death to some vibes between her and Gaia, Clarke had several things spinning in her orbit coming into the last season. And what was surprising was NONE of it was touched on. 

And then…Bellamy was shot by her and Madi turned up brain dead in the service of the Bardo arc.

 In the end, Clarke was with her friends. And she was happy. But…she was not with her daughter though Madi did wind up in a better place. She was not with anyone though a cameo from the actress who played Lexa in the early seasons was nice. And her mother’s death was not touched on…though that actress also made a cameo in the last episode.

 Does Clarke deserve a happy ending? Debatably yes. But this season a happy ending did not at all feel earned. And it would be one thing if there was another season. However, this was the LAST season. Worse, was the central theme of this last season…a main theme of the show itself…answered? Did humanity learn to be better, or would they stay in constant conflict?

 In the end…humanity DID learn to be better. Interestingly it took Octavia and Raven going to bat for humanity to make that happen. And that was after Clarke had again failed after making a near fatal decision for the rest of the group. After watching Clarke grow into a capable leader, I was saddened to see that in the end she felt like a footnote. As did Bellamy.

 Well…I guess I could look on the bright side…Octavia got a happy ending. And a complete arc. So did Murphy. Raven proved she was also an important character akin to the many times that Bonnie Bennett had to save all the characters on THE VAMPIRE DIARIES constantly, usually at great sacrifice to herself. But Clarke and Bellamy…the actual main characters…well…

 For a show to be told they got 16 episodes to wrap up plots that had been going on and characters that have been developed over 7 years, I would say it went out with a whimper. Given other shows with notice like HOW TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER and THE MAGICIANS went out with just about everything wrapped up fittingly and just about all characters serviced almost correctly if not outright perfectly, The 100’s last season looked like patchwork in comparison. Like the writers threw everything at the wall to see what would stick. Or worse…they got so distracted by what was shiny and new, they forgot about the characters that viewers cared about.

 In the end, I guess the last season was like a sandcastle. It looked nice, but once the waves come in, it went away. So much potential…washed back into nothing.

     #the100 #cw #bellarke #jasonrothenberg #octavia #finalseason #bellamy #clarke #sliders #charismacarpenter #angel #johnrhysdavies #arturo #starscream #buffy #whiplash #thevampirediaries #howtogetawaywithmurder #themagicians

[iamnotawomanimagod]

The 100 for the indepth ask thing!

Thank you, my friend!! Always happy to hear from you 🥰

Top 5 favourite characters:

1. Octavia

2. Murphy

3. Emori

4. Echo

5. Jasper

Other characters you like:

I will always have a lot of love in my heart for Monty, Raven, Lincoln, and Lexa. 

Least favourite characters:

Clarke, Bellamy, Kane, and Abby.  

OTPs: 

Linctavia and Memori 

NoTPs: 

Bellarke, Kabby, a handful of others that are more “meh” than outright “no.” 

Favourite friendships:

Jasper and Monty; Raven and Emori; Monty and Bellamy; Octavia, Jasper, and Monty; Indra and Octavia; Clarke and Roan; Raven and Echo. 

Favourite family: 

Spacekru! Forever! Although the Diyoza-Blakes give them a run for their money.

Favourite episodes: 

I’m a sucker for good standalones, even when the rest of the season sucks, or the episodes don’t make much thematic sense in context of the season/show. Fair warning. That being said: 

1x05, 1x08, 2x08, 2x12, 3x04, 4x07, 4x08, 4x10, 4x13*, 5x02, 5x11, and uhhh that’s when the show ended right**??

*For someone who hates s4, I sure do like a lot of individual episodes from it.

**There were storylines and moments I liked in s6 and s7, but no one episode stands out for me in either season.

Favourite season/book/movie:

Probably s2 or s5.

Favourite quotes:

Pretty much all the Trigedasleng lol.

“Yu gonplei ste odon.”

“Gomon gon oson.”

“Jus drein, jus daun.”

What a fun and silly conlang. 

Best musical moment:

I really love this moment, where Raven takes The Chip, and “Thousand Eyes” by Of Mouse and Men plays. Lindsey does such an incredible job portraying Raven’s sorrow, pain, and desperation. It’s so chilling when the music picks up and gets louder, and Raven slowly realizes that her pain is gone, and she looks up and sees ALIE for the first time. We as an audience realize how dangerous Raven will be, on ALIE’s side, but all Raven feels is wonder and relief. I think the song really captures that feeling so well, and the lyrics reflect Raven’s motivation: “I lie awake, and watch it all/it feels like a thousand eyes.” She’s under so much pressure, mostly internal, but also external, to help her friends and make sure people she cares about survives. I love this song and I’ll always associate it with this moment.

Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest:

 “You are wonkru, or you are the enemy of wonkru. Choose.”

Roan versus Lexa

Royal Memori Saving Everyone

When it really disappointed you:

Season 6. With the exceptions of Memori and my affection for Josephine, the season was a total flop for me. Season 7 just continued the downward spiral at an even faster rate. A few bright spots, but overall, just garbage. 

Saddest moment:

Woof. There’s several.

1. Lexa’s death, obvi

2. Jasper’s death

3. Lincoln’s death

4. Monty and Harper’s farewell videos

5. Emori’s death (only so low on the list because she came back) 

Most well done character death:

I got a lot of satisfaction out of Cage Wallace’s death. Lincoln deserved that vengeance.

In terms of emotional impact, I do think Jasper and Lexa’s death scenes were very well-done.

I know it’s messed up and I’m probably wrong, but god if I don’t love seeing Pike get run through with that sword.

Favourite guest star:

Alycia Debnam Carey put this show on the fucking map, and no one can truly argue otherwise. Without her, I doubt this show would’ve gone on for as long as it did. The show was carried by appearances and mentions of her right up until the very end. She even got the last word. Tell me of a more iconic guest star?? 

Favourite cast member:

I definitely really like Richard Harmon and Luisa d’Oliveria. I think they have the greatest chances of having truly successful careers out of everyone. 

Character you wish was still alive:

Jasper. :( 

One thing you hope really happens:

Well, it’s over. So nothing is going to happen again. I like the idea of some other pocket of humanity that decided not to transcend stumbling upon the Beachkru several years post-canon. And the aliens conveniently forget to actually make that sterile thing real. Humanity lives in, cultures continue to develop and grow, and there are lots of new generations to come! AKA the thing I wanted all along and really hoped they’d do, but they just kept destroying every society they met!!

Most shocking twist:

Finn’s death was really, truly so shocking to me. For one, Lexa’s death so greatly overshadowed it in fandom (at the time) that I managed to see it completely unspoiled. I also wasn’t into the BTS stuff at the time, so I didn’t know about any drama. It took me fully by surprise - I never expected the show to really kill another lead like that. 

When did you start watching/reading?:

It took me several tries to start this show. Getting through those first four episodes was a tough ask for me. By the time I finished what was available, s3 was over. So I technically joined fandom during the hiatus between s3 and s4.  

Best animal/creature:

God the animals in this show were silly. I liked those weird panther things.

Favourite location:

The dropship, Memori’s palace, Becca’s lab. 

Trope you wish they would stop using:

Listen. I loved the callbacks at first. I fucking ate them up. But at some point, this show became so self-referential that new plotlines ceased to exist. It became almost comical. How many times did these characters need to learn these lessons??

One thing this show/book/film does better than others:

The early camaraderie of The Hundred, and the way they worked sort of against the Establishment/Adults, was a lot of fun. Other shows have done it, but I think The 100 does it very well.

Funniest moments:

Unintentionally or intentionally, lmao?? Idk, there were a lot of quippy moments. Most of what Murphy said was hilarious.

Couple you would like to see:

I always wanted them to give Niytavia a shot, but they were cowards. 

Actor/Actress you want to join the cast:

I’m not super attached to any actors or actresses that would fit on this show. 

Favourite outfit:

Blodreina’s red cape, Emori’s royal Naming Day ‘fit, Murphy’s sleek black formal looks, Clarke’s soda can tab jacket, Raven’s red bomber jacket.

Favourite item:

When Clarke picks up a piece of Lexa’s throne and uses it as a walking stick when she’s alone post Praimfaya 2.0

Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?:

Nah.

What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in?:

I mean, I feel like Spacekru is the most obvious choice.

Most boring plotline:

When they spent several episodes rescuing Clarke from Josephine. Most of s4. The back half of s3. Most of s7.

Most laughably bad moment:

When Bellamy brought Clarke back to life by repeatedly punching her in the chest, and inside of her mind, Clarke threw an axe at Josephine’s face and Josie exploded into a bunch of shards of light.

When Clarke shot Bellamy over Madi’s sketchbook and left the sketchbook behind.

When Clarke and Bellamy took turns tying each other up and putting the people most important to one another in horrible situations and it was treated like a cute little bump in their timeless friendship. 

Best flashback/flashfoward if any:

I really love the Spacewalker reveal.

Most layered character:

Murphy came so far, and had so much development. I think Richard did a great job giving him a lot of depth and dimension. 

Most one dimensional character:

Clarke’s entire personality and arc didn’t change at all after the s2 finale. She was a loose cannon hell-bent on saving the people she loved, no matter what the cost. The most interesting things that happened to her were almost dying and actually dying, and the main reason for that is because it gave other characters and storylines more time to shine.

Scariest moment:

That fucking creepy cage creature on Nakara that attacked Raven’s face. Seeing it through the helmet was so terrifying. Another one is that scene in s2 when Lincoln is a reaper, and Octavia and Bellamy are trying to lure him into a trap in an old parking garage.

Grossest moment:

This show was remarkably gory for its network and time slot. I can think of several. I’d rather not dwell on them. 

Best looking male:

Lincoln is a babe.

Best looking female:

Gotta hand this one to Lexa

Who you’re crushing on (if any):

I mean, most of them. Half of why I watched was pure thirst. Emori, Murphy, Lexa, and Octavia all come to mind. Diyoza, too.

Favourite cast moment:

Idk I’m always partial to blooper reels.

Favourite transportation:

HELIOS. The most beautiful badass horse in the world. 

Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise):

I mean, most of the overhead shots are really pretty, but it’s also the same five locations in Vancouver, and that really starts to show at some point.

Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you:

I genuinely think we don’t have time for this. I have way too many to count. 

Best promo:

Nothing really comes to mind.

At what point did you fall in love with this show/book:

I was convinced to stick it out and see it through by 1x05. I truly thought it was something special by 2x08. I’ve gone up and down about it ever since.

Thanks again, Meghan!

Send Me a Fandom and I’ll Answer Some In-Depth Questions!

[girlobsessed21]

My thoughts on The 100 7x05

Hey, guys,

Sorry for not doing any comments on the last two episodes. I’ve been a little busy and I struggled to connect to the show, so it hindered my enjoyment, but it’s all better now. Liked episode 4 and 5 was even better, jampacked with info and it answered a lot of questions.

Welcome to Bardo

Badass Octavia is da bomb (people don’t say that anymore, right?). When she was captured in episode two, I thought she had lost her fighting spirit, but it’s back, bitches. Well, until she runs into an invisible wall trying to escape. She’s captured and transported to M-cap (whatever that means). Then we get a welcome little flashback to Lincoln but it’s obvious that Bellamy would be the hand reaching out. He’s her rock, like she’s expressed many times.

Unlike John Murphy who is not quite a friend, or family and definitely not a lover. Introducing so many new characters in the final season of a show is never a good idea, because this is the time to wrap up all the stories of the existing ones, but come on, who cannot love Levitt. Even when he first meets Octavia, he doesn’t want to hurt her. Jason, you better not harm one hair on this precious little puppy’s head!

As he binges The 100 through Octavia’s eyes, he starts rooting for her, and he actually gives a damn, unlike most people on this show. He understands her strengths and weaknesses and he makes her see it too. “You’re a warrior to be sure, but your heart is pure.” Wow, what an honest and beautiful line. (Scroll down for my shipping comments.)

So is O and Hope’s fleeting little reunion. It’s amazing to experience this deep loving side of Octavia after her darkness. She’s truly one of the most diverse and developed characters on the series. Now Hope and her resilience is quickly making it to the top as well.

While Hope is trying to send her back home, we learn that memory loss is due to the time dilation. One quick note on this, it’s not linear, there’s no easy equation to calculate it unless you’re Stephen Hawking or Einstein. I don’t think it’s constant either. 10 years on Skyring = 11 days on Bardo = a few minutes on Sanctum. In the current time, 5 years on Skyring = 1 day on Sanctum = 7 days on Bardo. So, it’s clear that the planets are moving, and other factors are playing into the phenomenon. It’s more important to understand the time relative to each planet.

Levitt was the one who tattooed Hope’s code onto O’s back, also the one who planted the note into Hope’s arm. Indeed the kind of man you want on the inside, he even accepts a blow to the face as thank you.

Sheep-ish?

Thirty minutes on the clock and the trio gets led to a congregation to praise the shepherd. I never thought it was Anders, I do, however think it might be Cadogan. The Bordoan’s built the underground forest because they destroyed their planet. Ugh, what’s new? The shepherd herded his sheep from earth to Bardo via the stone. Cadogan and his second dawn cult?

Back to Clarke. So, after last episode I thought ‘the key to winning the last war’ line was an artifice for luring Clarke to disciples, but now it’s clearly true. They’ve located the key and they will win the last war. Levitt was interested in Clarke surviving the City of Light with the flame in her head, they probably assume she still has it. Cadogan burned Becca alive. Could it be because of the flame? Is this all because of that damn little chip that can’t seem to die?

Bellamy is not dead, I repeat, Bellamy is not dead! I believe that memory could be staged or implanted for a reason. Also, there’s no body, he jumped through the bridge. In the promo photos, he wears a ring but his actions towards Octavia seem a little cold and generic. On first watch, I thought it was bad acting but if he was programmed to do this, it makes sense.

Note the sequence of events. Octavia returned 7 days ago and was asked to talk her brother down, but we don’t see the actual scene. Instead we’re shown a memory. They could have implanted it to make her vulnerable and perhaps more susceptible to the procedure. I don’t know, but this theory could lead to Robot-sheep!Bellamy on Nakara, where he’ll encounter Clarke and the gang.

I have to be honest, I really don’t like this character arc for Bellamy. It’s unoriginal and a mime of Peeta’s storyline in Mockingjay. Sorry, but so far it feels like the writers were so over the show, they just wanted to get it done. And that attitude really bleeds into one’s creative concepts. I could be completely wrong, in fact, I hope I am.

Echo spins a Finn

My word, I lost the love of my life once, but I sure didn’t kill anyone. When Echo received that vision of Roan, I was hoping for some progression on her individual arc, they’ve made me care about her, and now we get the opposite. Why? One thing I have to admit, a killer performance from Tasya Teles! No pun intended.

Look, this show hasn’t explored Bellamy and Echo’s relationship enough to make her murder believable. It was the exact same thing with Finn. I wasn’t invested in Finn and Clarke’s connection, so his actions of killing a grounder tribe was more repulsive than understandable. Sure, Echo loves Bellamy and her sole purpose is to save him, but I’ve never truly witnessed their love for each other. They had one or two intimate scenes which cannot compel a deed like this. And in the process, she screwed Hope and Diyoza.

Anyway, I don’t think there’s any coming back from it. She murdered an innocent person in cold blood. That’s sure to open a door to the dark side.  Just look at Octavia after killing Pike and her actions were justified by jus drein jus daun.

Say Sanctum three times slowly and it sounds like… Sanctum

Blind faith

Look, I’m just gonna come out and say this song is getting old. Every episode featuring Sanctum is the exact same thing with different lines. Can we please move on from it, already? Yes, we know the COG want Russel dead, and the adjusters will go to extreme lengths to free Russel and the prisoners are background noise.

I did appreciate Nelson stepping in to try and save the girl, though. Still doesn’t save the fact that it’s repetitive. The Sanctum plotline is really struggling to take shape and I hope it happens soon. Dramatic eyeroll.

At least in the drought of a desert, you can always count on Murphy. “…I say we live and let die.” Typical cockroach line, right, but it’s ironic when he’s the one to step up, even if it is for Emori. Under the magnifying glass it’s the exact same plot as episode 1 and 3. He hesitates to take action, and eventually becomes the hero.

I mean, he saved that poor kid from being burned alive. Can you imagine sacrificing your own child in such a horrific away? Cults are beyond whacked, and, unfortunately, it’s reality that cult members are so blinded by their faith that they do not see rhyme or reason.

How did Murphy fail that test? I didn’t. When Trey named the four pillars, I thought, isn’t rejoice one of them? Surely, a cockroach would have smelled that trap a mile away.

Indra the great

Can we just give a massive round of applause to Adina Porter!!! That powerhouse walk vibrates strength and majesty, damn, she should be a false god, I wouldn’t dare threaten her with or without an army.

Three little words was all it took for her to recognize evil. “There’s a spider on your shoulder.” Smooth. Too bad she can’t kill him. Why not, how many of the faithful are left to cause an uproar? Wonkru doesn’t know it’s Sheidheda, they won’t care, the COG will fall in line and the prisoners will be happy as long as they get their compound. Sorry, I don’t get it and I don’t understand why she doesn’t tell anyone.  Someone please explain?

Granted, JR Bourne as Russel is way better, but I still don’t understand his actions. I hope they explore and explain him more, because he still feels flat unless he knows something of this final war. I’m hoping these two storylines align soon since it’s really driving a wedge between me and my love for the show.

Shipwreck

I’ll start with the easy stuff, Murphy, Emori and the perfect dress gets a heart eye emoji from me. They are so damn cute this season, can they please live happily ever after in the palace?

Octabriel vs Levittavia

Now, I enjoy Levitt fangirling over Octavia. I feel like he has a deep sense of her through her memories. If I have to root for an underdeveloped relationship, it will have to be one where the characters share thoughts and experiences even if it is through a sick, sci-fi procedure.

On the other hand, Gabriel and Octavia have immense chemistry, two seconds of them together bends my mouth into an “Aah, cute” pout. This will also add some approval and representation for mixed racial relationships.

I really don’t mind either way as long as they make me care through showing and not telling.

Bellarke

So, if my theory is correct, and Bellamy does end up on Nakara, Bellarke will encounter each other quite soon. Bellamy won’t be himself though, but he might pretend to be Bellamy to win Clarke’s co-operation. Is there hope for Bellarke yet?

Echo is now trotting a dangerous path and Bellamy might be pledged to a cause, so I doubt there will be a happy ending for Becho. Since 7x01 I’ve been thinking that the writers might want to develop something between Clarke and Gaia but if they are separated, is there enough time? Guess we’ll see.

This monster of a review is finally done… If you read through everything, you deserve a gold star! Let me know what you think, till we meet again…

[thisbluespirit]

James Maxwell TV/Film List

More of a guide than a recs list, because old tv/film depends so much on availability.  It’s also hard as there’s nothing surviving that’s really like SotT for him (his voice is always slightly different, too & rarely the grand one from SotT) - I found it hard to find where to start back in the day, so I hope this makes it easier.  However, I have starred my favourites (rated for JM content only). 

I’ve divided things into categories and @jurijurijurious​ (or anyone) can make up their own mind as to what to go for.  (Also @jurijurijurious I have NO idea what old telly you’ve already seen, so forgive me if I’m telling you things you already know.)

Where to find it:  Luckily in the UK, it’s not too bad!  Network Distributing are the DVD supplier to keep an eye on (they do great online sales), you can find secondhand things cheap on Amazon Marketplace & eBay, and several Freeview channels show old TV & film, especially Talking Pictures.  I’ll note if things are on YT or Daily Motion, but they come and go all the time, so it’s always worth searching.

***

Film serials (ITC mainly)

British TV made on film in the US mode with transatlantic cash, so generally pretty light,  episodic (continuity is almost unheard of) etc.  Some turn up on ITV3 & 4 on a regular basis (colour eps). 

*** Dangerman “A Date With Doris” (ITC 1964)  James Maxwell is a British spy friend of Drake’s (Patrick MacGoohan) called Peter who gets framed for murder.  Drake goes to Fake Cuba to rescue him by which time JM is dying from an infected wound and faints off every available surface, including the roof.  It’s great.  On YT.  (The boxset is v pricey if you just want 2 eps.)

“Fair Exchange” (ITC 1964) JM is a German spy friend of Drake’s called Pieter who helps him out on a case.  Not as gloriously hurt/comfort-y as the other, but it does have some excellent undercover dusting. (Why  Patrick MacGoohan has JM clones all called variations on Peter dotted around the globeis a mystery.)  On YT.

The Saint “The Inescapable Word” (ITC 1965) This is pretty terrible, but  entertaining and James Maxwell plays the world’s most hopeless former-cop-turned-security guard. With bonus collapsing.  On YT.

“The Art Collectors” (1967).  JM is the villain of the week.  It does include a v funny bit, though, where the Saint (Roger Moore) goes for JM’s fake hair (and who can blame him?  How often I have felt the same!)  This one’s in colour so should pop up on ITV3 or 4. 

The Champions “The Silent Enemy” (ITC 1968).  Surprisingly good JM content as the villain of the week who drugs sailors and steals their clothes before realising that maybe he should have worked out if he could operate a sub before he stole it.

The Protectors “The Bridge” (ITC 1974, 30 mins.)  Not worth seeking out on its own, but ITV4 seems fond of it and James Maxwell gets to do some angsting and wears purple, so it’s worth snagging if you can, but too slight otherwise.

*** Thriller “Good Salary, Prospects, Free Coffin” (ITC 1975; 1hr 10mins, I think).  James Maxwell moves in with Julian Glover and runs an overcomplicated murdery spy ring where they bicker a lot in between killing girls by advertisement and burying them in the back garden.  What could possibly go wrong??  Anyway, it’s solid gold cheese, has bonus Julian Glover and a lot of natty knitwear.  What more does an old telly fan want?  (tw: Keith Barron being inexplicably the very meanest Thriller boyfriend.)  On YT but tends to get taken down fast.

***

Films

Design for Loving (1962; comedy).  Can be rented from the BFI online for £3.50.  Isn’t that great or that bad (or that funny either), but does have JM as a dim layabout beatnik, which is atypical.

***The Traitors (1962).  This is a low-key little 1hr long spy B-movie, but it’s also thoughtful and ambiguous with a nice 60s soundtrack and location work (it’s a bit New Wave-ish) and the central duo of JM and Patrick Allen are sweet and it all winds up with James Maxwell going in the swimming pool. One of the things where JM is actually American. (Talking Pictures show this occasionally & it is out on DVD as an extra on The Wind of Change.)  The quality of the surviving film is not great, though.

***Girl on Approval (1962).  A Rachel Roberts kitchen sink drama about a couple fostering a difficult teenager.  It’s dated, but it’s also really interesting for a 1950s/60s slice of life (and very female-centric) & probably the only time on this list JM played an ordinary person.

***Otley (1969).  Comedy that’s generally dated surprisingly well & is good fun, starring Tom Courtenay +cameos from what seems like the whole of British TV.  JM is an incompetent red herring & there are more cardies and glasses as well as a random barometer. 

Old Vic/Royal Exchange group productions

(Surviving works made by the group that JM was involved in from drama school to his death, made by Michael Elliott or Casper Wrede.  I like them a lot mostly, but they are all slow and weird and earnest & not everybody’s cup of tea.)

Brand (BBC 1959).  The BBC recording of the 59 Company’s (the name they were then using) landmark production, starring Patrick MacGoohan.  This was a big deal in British theatre & launched the careers of everybody involved.  It’s very relentless and weird but interesting & I’m glad they decided it was important enough to save.  First fake beard alert of this post.  It won’t be the last.  On YT & there is a DVD, which is sometimes affordable and sometimes £500, depending on the time of day.

***Private Potter (1962).  The original TV play is lost and this film has an extraneous storyline, but otherwise has most of the TV cast & gives a pretty good idea of why as a claustrophobic talky TV piece it made such an impact.  Tom Courtenay is Private Potter, a soldier who claims to have had a vision of God during a mission & James Maxwell his CO who needs to decide what to do about this strange excuse for disobeying orders.  Tw: fake eyebrows (!) and moustaches.  Only available on YT.

[???]One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch (1970).  Again, no DVD release (no idea why), but it is on YT.  I haven’t seen this yet, but it’s another Casper Wrede effort starring Tom Courtenay and apparently JM is especially good in it.  (I’m just not good at watching long things on YT and keep hoping for a DVD or TV showing.)

Ransom (1974).  A more commercial effort starring Sean Connery & Ian McShane; it gets slated as not being a good action movie, but is clearly meant to be more thinky and political with the edge of a thriller. JM’s part isn’t large but Casper Wrede shoots his friend beautifully, & it’s a pretty decent film with nice cinematography, shot in Norway, as was One Day.  I liked it.

[I think this post might be the longest in the world, whoops.  Sorry!]

Cardboard TV (the best bit, obv)

One-off plays etc./mini-series

Out of the Unknown “The Dead Planet” Adaptation of an Asimov short story; this is very good for JM, but hard to get hold of unless you want the boxset.  I think someone has some of the eps on Daily Motion.  (His other OotU ep is sadly burninated.)

The Portrait of a Lady (BBC 1968).  Adaptation of the novel; JM is Gilbert Osmond, so it is great for JM in quantity and his performance, but depends how you feel about him being skeevy in truly appalling facial hair.  Do the bow ties and hand-holding make up for it?  but he’s in 5 whole episodes, and Suzanne Neve, faced with Richard Chamberlain, Edward Fox, and Ed Bishop as suitors, chooses instead to marry the worst possible James Maxwell.  Relatable. XD

***Dracula (ITV 1968, part of Mystery & Imagination).  JM is Dr Seward, fainty snowflake of vampire hunters, who falls over, sobs and can’t cope for most of the 1 hr 20 mins.  More facial hair, but not as offensive as last time.  Suzanne Neve is back again, although now JM is nice, she’s married Corin Redgrave, who’s more into Denholm Elliott. Anyway, I love this so much because it turned out that I love Dracula as well as shaky old TV with people I like in getting to fight vampires and all be shippy.  Good news - TP keep showing M&I, the DVD is out, and there are two versions of it up on YT.

The Prison (Armchair Cinema 1974).  This is the one with Lincoln in it, but it’s not that great & JM isn’t in it that much, so depends how curious you are for the modern AU!  (But my Euston films allergy is worse than my ITC allergy, and I watched this when very unwell, so I may have been unfair.)

Crown Court “Fitton vs. Pusey” (1973) - part of the Crown Court series, set in a town full of clones who all keep returning to court.  JM is on trial for his behaviour in (the Korean war?  I forget?) although he ought to be on trial for his terrible moustache.  It’s not that great, but it is nice JM content.  He probably did it, but for reasons, and he wibbles & panics whenever his wife leaves the courtroom.  Also on YT.

*** Raffles “The Amateur Cracksman” (ITV 1975) - He is Inspector Mckenzie in the Raffles pilot & is a lot of fun.  At one point when there was a Raffles fandom someone in it claimed he was too gay for Raffles, which I’m still laughing about, because Raffles.  Anyway, watch out if you try to get the DVD because it is NOT included in S1, whatever lies Amazon tells. It is up somewhere online, though, I think.

Bognor “Unbecoming Habits” (1981).  Some down marks for possibly the worst 80s theme & incidiental music ever, but fun & has been shown on Talking Pictures lately.  JM is an Abbot running a honey-making friary that is actually a hotbed of spies, murder, gay sex and squash playing.  This is the point at which he chooses to strip off on screen for the first time, because strong squash-playing abbots do that kind of thing apparently.

Guest of the week in ongoing series/serials

Since even series with a lot of continuity tended to write episodes as self-contained plays (like SotT), these are usually accessible on their own.

Manhunt “Death Wish” (1970).  This is one of the most serialised shows here, but this episode is still fairly contained.  WWII drama about three Resistance agents on the run across France.  JM is... a Nazi agent & former academic trying to break an old friend (one of the series’ three leads, Peter Barkworth) with kindness, possibly??  (Manhunt is very angry and psychological & dark and obv. comes with major WWII warnings (& more if you want to try the whole thing), but it’s also v good.)  Up on YT, I think.

Doomwatch “The Iron Doctor” (BBC S2 1971).  “Doomwatch” is the nickname of a gov’t dept led by Dr Spencer Quist that investigates new scientific projects for abuse/corruption/things that might cause fish to make men infertile etc. etc.  JM is a surgeon who comes to their attention because he’s a bit too in love with his computer for the comfort of one of his more junior colleagues.  (I think it’s perfectly comprehensible & a nice guest turn, but it is hard to get hold of outside of the series DVD.  Which, being a cult TV person, I loved a lot anyway, but YMMV!)

***Hadleigh “The Caper” (S3 1973).  Hadleigh is a very middle of the road show, but watchable enough (lead is Gerald Harper, who’s always entertaining) and this is pretty self-contained as it centres around an old con-man friend (JM) of Hadleigh’s manservant causing trouble by pretending to be Gerald Harper, for reasons.  JM seems to be having a ball.

Justice 2 episodes, S3 1974.  He guests twice as an opposing barrister & gets to be part of some nice showdown court scenes.  Again, a middle of the road drama, but stars Margaret Lockwood, who was still just as awesome in the 1970s as she was in the 1930s & 40s.  On YT.

Father Brown “The Curse of the Golden Cross” (1974).  JM is an American archaeologist getting death threats; stars Kenneth More as Father Brown.  Just a note, though, that 1970s TV adaptations tended to be really really faithful and this is one of the stories where Chesterton comes out with an anti-semitic moment...  (JM was unconscious for that bit and, frankly, I envied him.)  But otherwise lots of angsting in yet another fake moustache about someone trying to kill him.

The Hanged Man “The Bridge Maker” (1975).  Confession time, I have v little idea what this one was about apart from Ray Smith being an unlikely Eastern European dictator, as this whole series went over my head and was not really my thing.  (Ask @mariocki they’re cleverer than me and liked it & can probably explain the plot!)  I don’t know if it’s available anywhere off the DVD but on a JM scale it was v good/different as he was a coldly villainous head of security & it wouldn’t be too bad to watch alone, but there was an overarching plot going on somewhere.

Doctor Who “Underworld” (1978).  This is famously one of the worst serials in the whole of classic Who, but largely because of behind-the-scenes circumstances, not the guest cast.  There is some nice stuff, though, esp in Ep1 (JM is a near-immortal alien who’d like to lay down and die but still the Quest is the Quest as they say... a lot) & it’s bound to pop up on YT or Daily Motion.  The DVD has extras that include v v brief bits of JM speaking in his actual real accent (which he otherwise does in NONE of these) & making jokes in character.  Honestly, though, this is the only DW where the behind-the-scenes doc is genuinely the most exciting bit as they desperately invented whole new technologies & methods of working to bring us this serial, and then everybody wished they hadn’t.

*** Enemy at the Door “Treason” (LWT 1978).  This is a weird episode but I love it lots - from a (v v good) series about the occupation of the Channel Islands.  (So obv warnings for WWII & Nazis.)  JM is a visiting German Generalmajor, but he’s come for a very unusual reason - to ask for help from his brother-in-law, a blackballed British army officer (Joss Ackland).  It’s all weird and low key and JM is doomed and nevertheless probably my favourite thing of his that isn’t SotT.

* The Racing Game 2 eps (1979).  Adaptation of Dick Francis’s first Sid Halley novel Odds Against (ep1) + 5 original stories for the series.  This is an interesting one - JM plays Sid’s father-in-law & they have a lovely relationship that’s central to the book BUT Dick Francis loved this adaptation and Mike Gwilym who played Sid and was inspired to write a sequel Whip Hand, which he tied in with TV canon - and adopted at least three of the cast, including JM.  Which means that all the Sid & Charles fanfic is also JM fic by default and it’s quite impressive. (There’s not much but it’s GOOD.)  On YT.

Bergerac “Treasure Hunt” (1981).  Not a major role, but pretty nice & it’s one a Christmas ep of the detective show (also set on the Channel Islands) that involved Liza Goddard’s cat burglar, which was always the best bit of Bergerac.

His guest spots in Rumpole of the Bailey (1991) “Rumpole a la Carte” and Dr Finlay (1994) are both really just cameos, but both series come round on Freeview; the Rumpole one is funny and the Dr Finlay one his last screen appearance before his death the following year.

Not worth getting just for JM: Subway in the Sky; Bill Brand and Oppenheimer.

These films only have cameos but some quite fun ones and they come around on terrestrial TV: The Damned (1962), The Evil of Frankenstein (1964) & (more briefly) Far From the Madding Crowd (1967).  (I think his cameo in Connecting Doors must be at least recognisable as someone spotted him in it just based off my gifs, but it’s not come my way yet.)  I’ve never been able to get hold of any of his radio performances, not even the 1990s one.

ETA: I forgot The Power Game! This is the one surviving series where he occurs as a semi-regular (at least until halfway through S1 when he went off to the BBC to be in the now-burninated Hunchback of Notre Dame).  This isn’t standalone, but it’s a good series and it is on YT.  See how you go with crackly old TV before you brave it but it’s the snarkiest thing ever made about people making concrete and stabbing each other in the back.  JM is a civil servant who tries to run the National Export Board and is plagued by Patrick Wymark and Clifford Evans as warring businessmen.

***

[... Well, now I just feel scary.  0_o  In my defence, I have been stuck home bored & ill for years, and often unable to watch modern TV while trying to cheer myself up with James Maxwell, so I didn’t watch all of this at once.  It just... happened eventually after SotT. /waves hand 

But if anyone feels the need to unfriend my quietly at this point, I understand. /o\]

[piningbellarke]

my 7x01 takeaways

PROS

clarke keeping picasso is so wholesome i can’t believe they gave us that serotonin right off the bat 

everyone living in the same house is literally so domestic oh my GOD 

people are finally drinking their respect clarke juice and it’s about damn time. nobody questions her leadership once throughout this episode, even when she loses it at the end (more on that later)

along with respecting clarke, people are looking out for her. she gets asked several times if she’s okay, which isn’t something clarke gets asked nearly enough in the past 

indra! indra in grounder gear at a domestic picnic, indra snarking everyone in the house for food, indra protecting clarke from russell, indra being a prominent character after the grounders were sidelined last season. yes to all of it 

murphy showing genuine remorse for what happened to abby even when clarke forgives him. the growth that accountability shows for a character who has historically always done what he needs to survive and not felt bad about it 

jackson getting time to be rightfully upset about abby’s death. clarke isn’t the only one grieving, and it’s clear 

miller’s presence in general is a gift but specifically him being a badass and looking out for clarke and madi. very reminiscent of day trip when bellamy told clarke to keep him close, and i love it

the delinquent banter! god i hope they keep that up this season 

memori “you’re so hot right now” “stop i’m your sister” 

the return of princess mechanic 

how on earth does raven get hotter each season 

murphy calling raven miss morality hints at what the jroth said in that interview about raven being faced with her own impossible choice this season, which i’m really excited for. most of my gripes with season 6 look like they’re being addressed in season 7, and it’s a relief that those might be actual decisions instead of just bad writing. i still think this glosses over raven’s past decisions (like torturing lincoln), but i’m trying to stay positive in this section 

ROAN!!!! I MISSED HIM SO MUCH 

also i’m discovering that i almost enjoy echo’s character when she isn’t around characters that remind me of how terribly her s5/6 arc was written. hope and gabriel didn’t know echo on earth, and her dynamic with them doesn’t have the same glaring issues as spacekru or b.echo 

i’m going to make a whole different post about that echo/roan interaction because it gave my bellarke ass HOPE but also the feminist who wants echo to have a solid conclusion and some decent writing hope 

madi bringing up her birth mother was a wonderfully grounding moment 

so was the dynamic between gaia and indra! 

the overall theme of family, specifically parents and their children, was really interesting and (i think) promising for the rest of the season 

clarke going apeshit was hot as FUCK. i love the s1 energy of her yelling at a crowd. 

CONS

you know what goes here

okay but seriously i understand bob needing time off but i also wish we heard it from bob himself instead of jason. i’d feel a lot better about it that way. bellamy is a large part of why i watch the show so i know both the lack of content and the fandom negativity will weigh me down but i’m just going to cling to how good it’ll feel to see him on my screen when the time does come 

i have been over the flame storyline since season 3. while sheidheda is a loose end from season 6 they need to continue for a satisfying conclusion, i’d rather it have not happened at all. i cannot believe they just airdropped him into russell the moment i thought “oh i kinda like where they’re taking russell”

again i’m trying to be positive but i already don’t like where they’re taking jordan. he’s monty and harper’s kid. he’s not stupid. naive, yes! but some of his lines just came off as ignorant to me idk 

clarke forgetting that madi had a mother before her? you’re telling me she raised this kid for six years and just. forgets that she didn’t give birth to her. maybe i could’ve gotten with it if it was explicitly acknowledged that clarke was thinking about when the primes “killed” her, but if that was the intention it felt a bit buried in context 

overall, i think it really was a solid premiere. a LOT happened, but there are 15 more episodes to unravel it all. i think it makes sense for the premiere to be a bit crowded that way we aren’t blindsided when the information becomes relevant later in the season. 

[kombellarke]

Final Season Spec Game

I was tagged by @iishallbelieve Thanks babe! ❤️

1. Which character are you most excited to learn the endgame of: Bellamy, Clarke and Octavia for sure. I agree that they are the “Trinity” of the show and I’m curious about Octavia’s role with the Anomaly 

2. Which character are you most excited to learn the backstory of: I’m not sure what new characters we’ll be meeting but yeah Hope should have an interesting backstory 

3. One character who deserves a new look: Clarke Griffin! The murder gear has to go already. She looks beautiful in Josie’s clothes so let’s keep it that way

4. Two locations you want to revisit: Meh I’m actually into the new locations and planets more but I guess the Dropship and more of Alpha 

5. Three brotps you hope get more screentime: Murphamy, Clurphy, and Madi/Jordan 

6. Who will get the happiest ending: Clarke & Bellamy deserve it after everything they’ve been through so I’m putting it out in the universe. Them. 

7. Which minor or new characters you want to see more of: Gabriel is my new fav, so him. I want more of Diyoza too so bring her back please! 

8. Who will eventually snap Jordan out of the funk we see him in, at the end of 6x13: Hmm...Murphy is always a wild card, so maybe him? 

9. Who will be the first to tell Bellamy he can’t immediately run into the Anomaly after Octavia:  This is assuming Bellamy will take off into the Anomaly, which I don’t think he will. But probably Gabriel will stop him. 

10. To reference Monty’s ‘do better’ mantra: Bellamy and Clarke are the ones I think actually take that mantra seriously. Maybe Emori too. 

11. To say ‘go float yourself’: Ha. Any of the 100. Maybe Clarke again. 

12. Random object or prop you would bring back for Season 7 if you could: Clarke’s drawings from s5 bc I don’t feel like they were given enough attention. The Rover has sentimental value lmao. Lincoln’s notebook. 

13. Book One storyline/reference you want to see back for Season 7: Any reference to the delinquents would be awesome. I want them to address Clarke’s 2,199 radio calls again and what they meant. 

14. Dead character you would like mentioned: For the love of god - Wells! Also Lincoln, Harper and the original 100. 

15. How do you think Hope and Octavia know each other (from season 6): I think they were in the same timeline that Octavia got sent to when she entered the Anomaly but that’s all I got lmao 

16. How do you think it all will end?

Oof. There are so many possibilities. I’m leaning towards them going back in time before the nuclear apocalypse and saving Earth somehow. 

The show has mentioned peace a lot and being able to stop fighting for survival, so I think we’ll get that. Unfortunately, I think it will require a sacrifice so either Clarke or Clarke/Bellamy will die so the others can have peace :( 

Tagging: @talistheintrovert @shaeheda @carrieeve @selflessbellamy @eyessharpweaponshot @captaindaddykru @theatre-steph @lightcomingthroughthedarkness 

[neoraven]

What’s Joe Watching - May 2020

So, I have a bunch of free time, everyone has a bunch of free time, and this is some of the stuff I've been watching so far in 2020. This is mostly TV shows, I’m leaving out a few movies I watched only partially. I'm including some things that I bounced off and quit watching, but I fully reserve the right to go back to them a little later.

Justified - Pilot I intended to just watch the opening Tommy Buck scene, but I fucked up and saw the whole episode since everyone is so darn compelling. And every interaction with Dewey Crowe and Raylan is a treasure. It's amusing to see the Florida Crowe Clan brought up in the show's first 10 minutes or so. This episode is completely fantastic, but it also kinda made me realize how the whole first season is a pilot. Despite him looming over a few scenes, Raylan's father never even shows up. I don't think I'm going to do a full watch through the entire series, but this was extremely fun.

6 Underground - A Michael Bay Film I loved the action, and usage of Dave Franco (cough). As usual, the movie thinks it's way more clever than it actually is. I mostly enjoyed it, definitely has action a cut above the average Transformers movie. The characters don't live up to the likes of Pain & Gain or The Rock, though. Ryan Reynolds felt like way too much of a Deadpool-Mary Sue fantasy of a badass in 2020.

Tremors 1 and Tremors 2 Definitely started the sequel without knowing that Bacon was nowhere to be seen. That was okay though. These movies are fun, and at least early on, they manage to make each one different enough to hide the fact that they're losing recognizable faces with each movie.

The Rookie - Season 2 I'm going to tiptoe around and not spoil it out of abundance of caution, but the reveal was pretty thoroughly lame, expected, yet also seemed hurried and out of left field? It was all done pretty well, and the episodes were usually good, but I'm slightly dreading Season 3. Every character other than Nolan ended up in a pretty okay or even promising place, though, so they could just write their way out of it.

Kingsman: The Golden Circle This sequel has some great moments, but mostly suffers from the normal "too much more" problem that affects nearly all sequels.

Super Troopers 2 Still mostly funny! Even when retreading jokes from the old one. Full disclosure, I fell asleep before the big climax/finale, but It went off fine and everyone lived happily ever after anyways.

911 Lone Star - Season 1 This show was ridiculous for all the right reasons, and seemed to have the right mix of the Glee creative forces to make something goofy and fun. Really hopeful to see it picked up for a bigger and better second season.

Lincoln Rhyme The Hunt For The Bone Collector Did I like this show just because of the long, funny title? Probably. But it was still pretty fun. Parts of it felt like a movie length story stretched into a short season of TV, but the cases of the week helped with that, I guess. Despite the twist ending, I think this is going to end up a one and done show.

Mission Impossible 1 & 2 The first is such a great De Palma classic. I used to think of the second as "bad, but at least it's John Woo", but watching it this time it just felt bad period. I'm probably going to watch the rest soon, since the rest are extremely enjoyable.

Superstore - Season 5 Holy shit, this show was really funny, and the union storyline has been surprisingly good. I'm a little upset that real life circumstances are kind of boxing the show into a corner, between the season not being able to finish filming as well as it being America Ferrera's last on the show. However, I'm pretty confident the show will keep on being entertaining in some way. The Office survived Michael Scott's departure, obviously. That's an idea, Robert California buying Cloud 9 in season 6. Is The Blacklist still going?

This next group of things I started watching for some period of time, but walked away. I don't want to say they all completely fucking suck, though! I definitely might go back to them, but they're at least on a big pause.

The Great - Season 1 This just dropped on Hulu. It's really promising! It has Elle Fanning as the titular (Catherine) The Great, and Nicholas Hoult as her husband Peter. It's got a really weird vibe to it. One reviewer said it was more sketch comedy than historical epic. Peter came off as David Brent, but actually slaughtering people. It just hit a little too dark and uncomfortable type humor. I usually love that, and love the Office! But this just felt pushed a little far over the line for me to stay with. More uncomfortable than funny. But it's a really amazingly well made and clever idea for a show.

Tacoma FD - Season 1 - TruTV Looked like Super Troopers plus Reno 911 at first glance. But it just didn't really click. Actually, sitting here, I'm struggling to remember much about it.

Battlefield Earth (Rifftrax) Not sure why I'm including this on here, I've seen this (and the riff trax with it) a bunch of times. The movie was just too painful this time. Maybe I'm getting weaker in my old age to stand John Travolta's voice in this movie.

Mortal Kombat: Scorpion's Revenge This is an animated Mortal Kombat movie that I vaguely knew was R+ rated for violence. It was uncomfortably like what a 13 year old would consider cool gory violence. Like just cutting dozens of ninjas lengthwise and huge cartoon intestines sputtering everywhere. It was well animated and the action was fairly cool, but it was just gross to look at. I lasted long enough to briefly appreciate Joel McHale as Johnny Cage, though.

Brews Brothers - Season 1 - Netflix I don't have anything overwhelmingly bad to say about this one. The humor just didn't super click for me, and I bailed out fast. It's made by the gentlemen behind The League. I liked the title/pun/idea about two different brothers running a brewery together. It just kinda suffered from a bad cold opening of the first episode real bad.

Happy Endings - Season 1 Okay stop yelling at me for not liking this show. I gave it a shot based on the cast and rave reviews and loads of folks with good TV opinions trying to get it saved. The way the series starts just struck me way more sad than funny? I guess that's the point, and I'm not letting them get to the titular happy ending. But eh.

Okay, that's a lot of words, next up will be a bunch of shows I'm currently watching/enjoying/excited to finish! Or it will probably be so long that they will convert into completed shows!!! Who knows?

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball GT Retrospective (7/7)

[Note: I wrote this on January 16, 2013.  Originally, I had embedded a video of Goku Junior slapping his bare ass for like ten hours, but it’s down now :(   Such is life.)

Well, I know I said I finished watching Dragon Ball GT, but there's one last thing in the box set: Dragon Ball GT: The Movie

This actually isn't what it sounds like.  I'm pretty sure the "movie" was actually a TV special, and it didn't really have much at all to do with the characters or plotlines of GT.   Really, it's more of an epilogue tale of the future, set one hundred years after the events in Dragon Ball GT.   Of course, GT was set some forty years after the beginning of the first Dragon Ball storyline, so it seems like a jump too far.   From what I understand, the original plan was to wrap up the GT series with the end of the Baby Saga, but something happened and they ended up making another twenty-odd episodes.  In between all that, they had this GT special set up, probably as a final sendoff to all things Dragon Ball.   This was somewhat undermined by flashing a hundred years back for Super 17 and Shadow Dragon Sagas, but in the final episode of GT, they flashed forward yet again to tie the series finale with the special.   So, the premise of the special is pretty straightforward.  One hundred years after Baby's defeat, Goku and everyone else from Dragon Ball is dead.  The only one left is Pan, who's looking pretty spry for a a centenarian.  Actually, I'm not sure 100 years was the best time frame to use.   Goku's master, Master Roshi, was already three hundred years old when Dragon Ball started, and he survived all the way to the end of GT, never really aging much.  The implication was that his lifetime of martial arts training somehow allowed him to unnaturally extend his lifespan, but it was never actually explained.   Further, we never really found out what the lifespan of a Saiyan is.  Goku and Vegeta aged very little across the timeline of DBZ/DBGT, and Vegeta explained that Saiyans have a much longer physical prime than humans do.   Humans like.... Master Roshi?   I don't think anyone really put a lot of thought into this, probably because no one ever seriously planned to cover the world of DragonBall that far into the future.   Even if we knew how long Saiyans and humans can normally live in that universe, the Saiyan-human hybrid characters would still be an x-factor.   I guess what I'm trying to say here is that we really can't tell what keeps Granma Pan so fit.  Is it because she's one-quarter Saiyan?  Is it because of advances in that Earth's medical technology?  Is it because any human in that world could live past 100 with proper diet and exercise?   Or is she tapping into the same ki techniques that preserved Master Roshi for so long?   What I kind of dig about the special is that no one really knows, and we may never know.  The world of Goku and his friends is gone, lost forever like a forgotten dream.  Pan seems to be a minor celebrity in her own right, but it's because she's Pan, not so much because she was related to the mysterious Son Goku, daughter of the brilliant scientist Son Gohan, or the heir of the legendary world champion Mister Satan.  If she married, her husband is never seen or mentioned.   We have no idea if she had brothers or sisters.   She must have had at least one son or daughter, but the only reason we know this is because of her grandson, Goku Jr.  There's a melancholy to that.  Maybe some of these missing figures are still alive, but they're clearly not part of Pan's life anymore.   It's just her and her grandson living in Satan City.   Goku Jr. probaly knows the city was named to honor his ancestor's heroism at the Cell Games, but the information is meaningless to him.   It's ancient history, especially to a small boy.  Goku Jr. is the spitting image of his namesake, but this doesn't mean that much to him either.   He knows Goku was a great warrior, someone whom Pan respects tremendously, but he might as well be Abraham Lincoln.  He looks in the mirror and sees himself, not a cartoon character who could blow up entire planets with his fingers.   Pan tries to train Goku Jr, but he's kind of a klutz.  More to the point, he's timid and doesn't want to fight.   A bully named Puck takes a cool-looking novelty pen from him, and he just lets him keep it.   Pan gives him shit for not standing up for himself, but he doesn't see the big deal.   During this conversation she has a heart attack or something like that, and we cut to the hospital, where Pan is apparently in bad shape.  Goku desperately promises to train harder and fight anyone he has to if it means she'll pull through.   This is where Pan realizes she's been too hard on the boy.   I like this scene because it would have been too easy to forget that Pan was kind of a pushy jerk when she was a kid.   The adult Pan is still demanding and refuses to take crap from anyone, but she's been wanting Goku Jr. to be like her grandfather, and he has been all along. Son Goku wouldn't start a fight over a pen, no matter how many cool floaty things are inside it.  But he would go through anything to save Pan, and that's what Goku Jr. is determined to do, too.   When Pan takes a turn for the worse, Junior heads home, and notices a photo of Pan as a child, holding a Dragon Ball.  He flashes back to a time when Pan tried to tell him the story of the photo, but he was too preoccupied playing video games.   PAN: Hey, check this out.  It's a picture of me and my robot friend Giru.   And I had a dopey orange bandana, and I whined all the time, and Vegeta never got to do anything cool, and-- GOKU JR.: That sounds really boring, granma.  I'm gonna play more Super Mario World.   It's hard not to like Goku, Jr., is what I'm trying to say.   Anyway, Goku Jr. doesn't know the whole mythology of the Dragon Balls, but he does vaguely understand that they grant wishes, and the four-star ball was sort of a family heirloom, so he devises an ill-conceived plan to travel to Mount Paozu and search his ancestor's home for it.  A truck driver offers him a lift, but this is just a trick to get all the stuff in his giant backpack.   Evil Truck Driver is perhaps my new favorite GT character. GOKU JR.: So what's in this truck?   ETD: It's full of hamburgers, kid.  It's pretty awesome.   GOKU, JR.: Wow, you sure have a lot of food in the cab.   ETD: Yep.   I've got even more food in this bag here, too.   You want some?   GOKU JR.: Nah, I've got my own food in my backpack.   ETD: ... Really?    Uh... say, you want to hop out and take a whiz?   It's a long way to go.   GOKU JR.: Yeah, I guess I'd better.   I'll just leave my backpack stuffed with food in your truck filled with even more food.     ETD: Delicious.  Uh... I mean, scrumptious!  I mean!  I'm driving away and taking your food with me!  Ha ha ha! I feel really bad for whoever's expecting those hamburgers to arrive.   Actually, maybe he's not even a real truck driver.  He just stole the truck one day and he's been living off its cargo ever since.   Ironically, this turns into a lucky break for Goku, because he meets Puck while he walks to Mt.  Paozu on foot.  Puck had heard about Goku's plans before he left, and he was so impressed with his daring that he wants to tag along and watch when Goku is eaten by wild animals or bandits.  The thing is, Puck's a pretty fair outdoorsman, so as they get closer to their destination he's able to help Goku live off the land.  Along the way, Puck begins to bond with Goku Jr., and they have a few minor adventures.   Wolves attack them, but they're rescued by a woman with a shotgun who takes them to her home for the night.   Unfortunately, she turns out to be a witch or a demon or something.   Whatever she is, she eats people.  Goku Jr. is suspicious from the start (due to his past experience with Evil Truck Driver), so he and Puck manage to escape.   Their partnership comes to an end on a rickety bridge.   Goku Jr is afraid to cross until Puck proves it's sturdy enough.   Even so, the bridge nearly collapses, and Puck falls off in a failed attempt to rescue Goku.  Goku manages to climb back up on his own, and then he rescues a bearcub from one of the same demon bandits he escaped earlier.  In gratitude, the bear’s mother escorts Goku to his ancestor's home, but they're once again attacked by the bandits.   This time, they're joined by Lord Yao, their leader.   The mommy bear tries to fight him off so Goku can take her cub to safety, but she's hopelessly outmatched.   Worse, the baby bear slips away and tries to help, so Goku can't even save him.  Frustrated with his powerlessness, Goku Jr finally loses his shit and transforms into a Super Saiyan.  He clobbers Lord Yao and frightens his henchmen away.  When he reverts to normal, he has no memory of the battle, and believes the bears did all the work.   With all that out of the way, Goku Jr. locates the Four-Star Dragon Ball in the ruins of what was once his ancestor's childhood home.   This is really a melancholy scene.  The house belonged to Son Gohan, the kindly old man who adopted the elder Goku when his spaceship crashed on Earth.  When Dragon Ball begins, Goku leaves that home to begin his adventures, and aside from a couple of trips to pick up his things, he never really returns.   Now, some 140 years later, it's still standing, but derelict.  No one remembers the kindly old man who lived there, or how his compassion changed the universe for the better.  Someone must have left the four-star Dragon Ball there to honor his memory, but even the significance of that gesture is lost in the sands of time.   Goku Jr. doesn't understand how the Dragon Balls work, so he starts praying to the four-star ball, asking the Dragon to restore his grandmother's health and bring Puck back to life if at all possible.  When he gets no answer, he becomes upset, and then he notices the original Goku standing beside him.   He introduces himself as Goku Jr.'s great-great-grandfather, and explains that the Dragon Balls only work when you have all seven of them.   Nevertheless, he congratulates his descendant for his courage and strength, and then Pan and Puck arrive on the scene in an aircraft.   Apparently they didn't die after all.   The elder Goku disappears without a trace, and Goku Jr. is left with the lesson that his inner strength was what saved the day.     I'm not crazy about the ending of the story, since it's never explained how Puck survived his fall.   Pan's recovery is no big deal.   No one knew for sure whether she would live or die, so it's entirely plausible that she got better, went home, and realized where Goku Jr. must have gone.   But Puck fell off a bridge into a deep canyon.  Unless Pan swooped in and saved him in the nick of time, I don't see how else he would have survived.   Of course, some other superhuman resident of Mount Paozu might have stepped in, but the special seems to be built on the idea that the superheroics of old are no more.   Of course, based on the finale of Dragon Ball GT we might infer that Goku Jr.'s wish really was granted after all.   In the final episode of the series, Goku merges with the Dragon Balls as Shenron exiles himself from the earth.   So if the Four-Star Ball was sitting in his old house, it must have been Goku himself who put it there, because no one else would have had it.  And it's reasonable to assume he had the other six with him, so when Goku Jr. made his wish, he really did get it to work after all.   The implication is that Goku is the Dragon, and he's not too picky about the rules.  I think this is what Toei was going for, but they wanted to keep it ambiguous.  Maybe Goku did come back from death to grant his descendant's wish, or maybe Goku Jr. imagined the encounter, and Puck and Pan's survival was just a fortunate coincidence.   The next time we see these characters is in Episode 64 of the regular GT television series.  Goku Jr. has learned to harness and control his powers to become a talented martial artist.  He enters the World Tournament and faces one of Vegeta's descendants in the final round of the Junior Devision.  Pan is still in good health, and she meets Vegeta Jr.'s mother, indicating a friendly, if not close, relationship still exists between the two families.  The elder Goku reappears once again to watch the tournament finals, but Pan only glimpses him for a moment before he vanishes again. There's a bittersweetness to the special that really makes it worthwhile.   Beyond that, it's actually kind of boilerplate.  It reminds me a lot of the "Episode of Bardock" special that was recently produced.   In that, Goku's biological father Bardock miraculously survives the destruction of his home planet by getting thrown back in time, where he becomes the hero of the pre-Saiyan Planet Plant and turns Super Saiyan at the climactic moment.  It's not a bad story, it just doesn't have a whole lot else going for it other than being a callback/tribute to the main Dragon Ball storyline.   A lot of fun was had with these future scenarios, depicting heroes who would carry on after Goku: Future Trunks in his alternate timeline, Uub at the end of DBZ, Pan as the heir apparent in GT, and Goku Jr. in this special.  But none of these characters ever really goes anywhere new.  At best, they follow a path similar to the one charted by Goku and his contemporaries.  The moral is that the story is the same no matter who the main character is.  Goku Jr. barely knows the legend of his famous ancestor, but he carries on the tradition nevertheless.   That's the "hero's legacy".  Goku might be forgotten after a few generations, but the things he stood for, the causes he fought for, the example he set, those things are timeless.   And that brings us full circle, because I think the chief mistake of Dragon Ball GT was in trying to de-age Goku to artificially loop his character arc.   Toei wanted to make Goku his own successor, when they probably would have been better off making Pan the main character, having her own goofy adventures with Goku and Vegeta chilling out in the superhero retirement home.  Or they could have skipped ahead and made the series about this Goku Jr. kid, since he has the look they wanted without all the baggage.  GT ended with a ham-fisted morality play about how the Dragon Balls had been overused, which is humorous coming from a studio that couldn't let the Dragon Ball franchise end with dignity.  With the special, they kind of got it right, but only for a moment.

[sometimesrosy]

Thanks for being one of the last blogs left to discuss the show to the end. I understand the hurt and betrayal people feel right now. I feel it too, but as a new fan who binged 1-6 back in March, I keep thinking about the crazy moments that were reversed or resolved at the end of seasons. If it hadn't been for Jason's word of God post or the anon accounts, I would have scoffed at this "death", b/c it seemed like a setup. I may not like JR, but I need to see how he ends this before I criticize.

Yeah. I know exactly what you’re talking about.

I think in fandom, we have a hard time adjusting to the immediate storyline, and we forget the long term one. And this DOES seem like the story is not done. Usually when they die, it’s confirmed that they die. A hole in the head. That blank eye. Blown out into space. They die in someone’s arms. We see their last breaths. A dead body or grave. The light goes out. In this, we don’t see that. We see Clarke ripped away from the scene, her last sight the result of what she did.

No conclusion, no resolution, no CONFIRMATION-- in narrative anyway.

On social media we got goodbyes. But I have NEVER used social media as confirmation for canon. I can ONLY accept canon.

And canon is up in the air. It looks bad, I’m not gonna lie. But it isn’t confirmed, resolved, or concluded.

It’s the rumors that give us a “reason” for the lack of conclusion. And I can’t say that the rumors don’t explain it, because they do make sense.

But they’re still not canon. 

Bellamy also died at the end of season 1. But he didn’t die. Clarke died at the end of season 4... we saw her, remember? Covered with radiation sores and falling to the floor, but she survived. Not that B knew. Speaking of season 4, Octavia also died in season 4. We saw her fall from the cliff, stabbed, and B collapsed on finding out. Season 6 Clarke died again. We saw the lights go out that time. No one believed it. Bellamy died at the beginning of season 7 too. No one believed it.  Seems like we stopped believing when they die.

Within the show, they have the capability to save him. Bardo has a high level of tech, including medical tech, a disciple has his hand on Bellamy’s chest in the last scene, and they have immediate access to the medical labs by going through the anomaly. 

The only thing that makes everyone take it for certain is the social media. Even if it looks terribly damning, I can’t take that as evidence. 

STICK TO THE TEXT.

Yes, I am going to watch the next three episodes. I didn’t commit to all this hell to back out now. 

The hardest thing to understand right now, for me, is not that B died. I expected him to die. I think I had him (and Clarke) at a 90% or 95% chance of dying this season. It’s the WAY it happened, with that lack of resolution. And the splitting up of Bellarke. That Clarke did it. 

It seems to ruin the long term narrative of Clarke being the hero, Bellarke saving the world together, Bellamy saving Clarke while Clarke saves humanity, Bellamy’s character development and learning to let those he love make his own choices, Bellamy being a leader, Clarke understanding that some things are not worth it. 

Like, there are TWO options that make sense with all this...

Bellamy isn’t really dead and this is a fake out to raise tension... which makes sense with the narrative and the way the story has been told for 7 years.

OR

Bellamy is dead and JR totally betrayed his narrative, Bellamy, Clarke, Bob, and the audience because he’s a mother fucking egotistical jackass. because even if bob quit for health reasons he didn’t need to tank the story to write him out.

Now, there’s been a fandom narrative of JR being a fucking egotistical jackass who is taking vengeance on fandom and various actors. So that slides very neatly into what the antis believe.

But that narrative never really fit the story on screen. I mean, I think yeah he’s probably an egotistical jackass, but he always put the story before anyone else. It was HIS story and he wasn’t going to let anyone tell him what to write. And he would kill off characters and doom ships and let story lines fade off into oblivion for ONE narrative, and that’s what he just killed, or appeared to kill in the last episode. So why would he now sink it? IDK. it’s weird and it makes no sense.

DID he just give up in the last season because he moved on to the other pilot-- which has no guarantee of being picked up, and seemes to be waiting on how THIS story does? Why would he do that when his name will be based on THIS show. And when we have a glaring example of showrunners who did that with GOT and ended up LOSING huge deals for new shows because of the mess they made. That seems remarkably stupid to not learn the lesson and to go down the exact same path, even to having one love interest kill the other, who was one of the main heroes.

Isn’t that WEIRD? IS JR COMPLETELY STUPID? Despite years of evidence to the contrary where he seems pretty savvy? Could he possibly be using that fandom fear and belief to make everyone believe he killed off Bellamy for no reason? Would he USE a social media account to manipulate viewers into having emotional reactions to the story by lying??? WELL NO. He’s not lying. He says this was Bellamy’s death but he doesn’t say he stays dead, or that Bardo can’t bring him back. Remember season 2? Lincoln died and they brought him back. And when he thanks Bob for his 7 years, that also is not a lie. Bob gave him 7 years. We’ve seen Bellamy’s story for 7 years. Whether it ends here or continues for another three eps. It’s definitely implying that he’s not coming back, but it’s not lying if he does come back.

Well, I don’t know. Maybe JR is completely stupid. I’ll wait to see if he stick the landing, but my faith is low. It’s just all very weird and makes no sense in a story that has always made sense if you follow his storyline. And as a writer I just don’t know why you would tank your long term story three eps before you finish it up. And he DOES love to scare us and make us feel anguished and kill of our  mains and thinking ALL IS LOST before finding out that no indeed, all is not lost and our heroes can and do come back and reach victory.

THAT fits his story. But maybe he’s so desperate for us to believe it’s over that he’ll mislead us IRL to make us believe his plot twist in the narrative.

Can’t say I wouldnt prefer it to be a fake out, but if it is a fake out he’s still a HUGE fucking egotistical asshole. 

I just can’t believe it until I see the canon. I need to see the conclusion, because this seems like a total trashing of the story, and that just makes no sense for what we’ve seen for 7 years. Actually, when I think about all of this, it gives me a little faith in the story back. Not a lot, but a little. BECAUSE IT MAKES NO SENSE. It is PURELY the fandom narrative that JR is an egotistical jackass and doesn’t fit with the canon narrative. 

Listen, I don’t think I’ll ever get involved with a fandom again. it ruins the story. All this gossip and negativity and shipwars and harassment and I don’t even LIKE the behind the scenes tales of who did what to whom. I just want to watch the stories and enjoy what I enjoy. I wish we could talk about it all without creating this huge writhing mass of maggoty decay as so called fandom attempts to take apart everything good about a show we’re supposed to love.

[travllingbunny]

The 100:  6x09 What You Take With You

How amazing was this episode? It is, so far, one of the two best episodes of the season (alongside 6x07) and probably in my top 10 favorite The 100 episodes of all time.

It benefited from its focus on just three storylines and a limited number of characters, which allowed it to properly focus on the characters and their psychological and emotional journeys.

The title seems to be a reference to the Dagobah cave scene in The Empire Strikes Back, or rather, the dialogue right before it:

Luke: There is something not right here. I feel cold, death.

Yoda: That place… is strong with the dark side of the Force. A domain of evil it is. In you must go.

Luke: What’s in there?

Yoda: Only what you take with you.

Luke ends up having a hallucination of fighting Darth Vader in the cave and killing him, only to take off his helmet and see his own face, in possibly the most famous movie scene of a character confronting their “Shadow” self.

So, when the episode titles for season 6 of The 100 were released, it wasn’t hard to guess that this episode would contain scenes of a character “facing their demons” in a fantasy sequence (and which character it would be, especially as we had seen glimpses of Octavia fighting the Blodreina version of herself in the trailer). As a fan of psychological character exploration through trippy fantasy sequences, I had high expectations from this episode regarding Octavia’s story – and they were completely fulfilled and maybe exceeded. I wasn’t expecting to see Charles Pike in Octavia’s hallucination soul-searching, and his appearance and how he was used was brilliant.

The other two, equally important storylines, were:

the continuation of the saga about the Bellamy/Clarke relationship through the story about the fight between Josephine and Clarke for control of Clarke’s body, and Bellamy’s attempts to save Clarke from real and certain death;

and the conclusion of the opposite storyline - about Abby crossing a lot of ethical lines to work with the Primes and use bodysnatching to resurrect Kane in another body. This was the final death of Marcus Kane, a tragic end of Kabby romance, but it also a fitting ending for Kane, with him asserting his own integrity and morality by choosing to die and refuse to be complicit in the practices of the Primes, but to instead start a fight against them. It will also probably be the turning point in Abby’s character arc. The resolution of this storyline has caused a lot of controversy and anger, which I don’t understand, since Kane’s decision was obvious and in-character, so much that I predicted it last week, because it was the only thing that made sense narratively and for Kane’s characterization.

More thoughts under the cut.

Octavia vs Blodreina

The fact we still don’t know what happened to Diyoza or to Octavia in the Anomaly makes me think that this is a plot that will carry over to season 7, after the bodysnatching business is wrapped up. And the more they postpone the resolution, the more hopeful I am for Diyoza to survive season 6.

Choosing the angry, violent red box instead of the calm green box is such an Octavia thing to do. But maybe it was the right thing in this case, as it let her face her demons head on and figure things out for herself.

The red butterflies scene was one of the many callbacks to season 1.

Pike’s role made sense because Octavia’s descent into darkness was not just prompted by the trauma of Lincoln’s death at Pike’s hands, but also because it started when she decided to murder Pike for revenge, making herself judge, jury and executioner. That was the first time she committed actual murder, as opposed to killing people in fight. She probably thought at the time, as a big portion of the fandom did, that Pike was a bad guy and had it coming. But one could now say the same thing about Octavia herself, and she is obviously aware of it. If Pike deserved to die, doesn’t she, too? Using the same standards, shouldn’t she be murdered for revenge by someone like James (the Wonkru guy from 6x02, who lost his mother in the gorge and blames Octavia fori t)? In fact, Octavia tried to get him to kill her, because, on some level, she thought she deserved death, too, even while she was pretending that she didn’t feel any guilt and trying to justify all her actions. Why should Bellamy ever forgive her for throwing him into the fighting pit to die? I can see many similarities between Octavia and Pike: both of them are fighters by nature, both were driven by the desire to save and protect people, both were angry and traumatized by what had been done to their people, and both were also prone to black-and-white thinking and harsh judgment of their enemies. As Octavia’s mind version of Pike pointed out, we are products of what we have done, and what has been done to us. Pike is an embodiment of both for Octavia. And Pike himself was a product of what the Ice Nation under Queen Nia had done to him – killing almost all of the people he grew up with, many right in front of him (including 15 children), which made him go into the woods to fight for months. Pike started pre-emptively seeing Grounders as enemies even when they were not, and eventually, as a Chancellor, started acting as a dictator and hunting for traitors in his camp. Octavia started by proclaiming everyone (or almost everyone – Echo didn’t count) her people, One people, but that eventually turned into tyranny and seeing enemies in everyone who disagreed or refused to do everything she asked of them. Pike condemned Lincoln to death and execute him for the same reasons Octavia as Blodreina condemned Bellamy, Indra and Gaia to the fighting pit: to maintain authority and show that rebellion is not allowed and will be punished by death. We may not have seen this put into words, but Octavia’s vision of Blodreina in Pike’s role, condemning/executing Pike the way he had Lincoln, showed her realization about herself. „Pike“ even reminded Octavia that he was trying to earn his redemption by doing good when she killed him. Of course, since Pike was really an enbodiment of a part of Octavia’s own mind, it is really something she has been thinking about and that she’s telling herself. It’s a level of self-reflection that I never expected to see from Octavia of the earlier seasons, and shows how much she’s grown.

So does she deserve redemption? As „Pike“ pointed out, it is not about deserving. You just need to make the decision to go and do good, and not be Blodreina anymore, shown by her symbolic killing of „Blodreina“. She is still to actually start her redemption arc, but getting into the right frame of mind and realizing she wants to change and do better was the necessary first step.

Kane’s goodbye

I’ve already written quite a bit about Abby’s emotional and ethical downfall and the tragic development of the Kabby relationship in seasons 5-6 here and I predicted that the storyline would end with Kane’s death by his own choice (and that Henry Ian Cusick would return to play Kane in a vision for his last scene), even though I didn’t guess when or how it would happen.

Unlike some other fans, I find this to be a very fitting ending for Marcus Kane. I don’t think of what he did as suicide, but as a sacrifice, or, more than anything, a refusal to legitimize and benefit from an evil practice that involves brainwashing people so they could be lambs easily led to slaughter, and then murdering them as lesser and disposable, so you could prolong your own life. He couldn’t fight against it, speak against it, while being in a stolen body himself. (There is a reason why Gabriel is ashamed to admit to his followers that he lives in a host body.) Everything about it was wrong to him, and went against everything he believes in. (Meeting Gavin’s widow and realizing that the Primes are lying to their people also played a role. As Gabriel confirmed in this episode, and as Kane 2.0 and the other Primes, no doubt, are aware, there is no trace of the host mind after the transfer – unless the transfer fails.)

Indra has finally been woken up! But is she staying on the ship now, and if so, when do we see her again? I’m glad she got to say goodbye to her friend before his death. I like the fact that Indra pointed out that both the Arkers and the Grouders had some disturbing practices of their own, but Kane gave the logical answer (something I was hoping someone would point out at any point) – the fact we did bad things in the past, doesn’t mean we should let evil things happen. That’s not how morality (or common sense) works.

The show loves angst, so of course, Kane’s death had to be exactly like Jake Griffin’s death (which we saw in the flashbacks in 1x03), and Abby had to witness it. But, as Raven pointed out, it is better for her if she gets to say goodbye. (Raven would know, since she never got to say goodbye to Finn or Shaw. Or Sinclair.) Kabby has been one of my favorite ships on the show – because it is one of the very few romantic relationships that was well developed, way before Kane and Abby got together. Their chemistry was obvious since season 1. And while Greyston Holt did a great job playing Kane 2.0, it only made sense that Henry Ian Cusick return to play Kane in that last scene, when Kane appeared to Abby the way she saw him in her mind-eye - which also made him feel like real Kane to the audience.  The scene was truly beautiful and sad, with Abby’s heartbreak, and Indra and Raven reciting the Ark prayer (with Indra adding the Grounder “Your fight is over”). I don’t think that Kane would really do the same to bring Abby back – or that Abby would have done it if she had been in a healthier state of mind, but I can see why he told Abby that. While he disagreed with her decision and couldn’t accept it, he showed understanding, empathy and love to her, while urging her to let him go and continue her life.

All in all, considering the tricky actor availability situation due to Cusick’s role on another show, I think that the writing staff have found a good way to give Kane a proper sendoff, and make it meaningful and highly relevant to this season’s themes and main plot.

In a way, it’s more Abby’s tragedy than Kane’s – he made the decision that was the only right one, one of the most in-character things he’s ever done, but Abby is still lost and needs to let go off Kane, really recover from addiction, and find her own sense of morality again.

The Kane/Abby storyline and relationship this season is juxtaposed to the Josephine/Gabriel story – and the Clarke/Bellamy story. We have seen bodysnatching as something people (Gabriel, Russell and Simone with Josephine, Abby with Kane) resort to in order to resurrect someone they love. But while Josephine couldn’t be happier about it – because she’s selfish and, let’s say, morally challenged, Kane, with his deep sense of morality, could never accept that. We’ve also seen a storyline about Bellamy doing everything to save Clarke – but while all of those are motivated by love, the big difference between what Bellamy is doing and what Abby has done (and what Gabriel initially did when he resurrected Josephine, at the expense of 40+ of the people he had raised from embryos) is that Bellamy is fighting against an evil act, to right a wrong, as opposed to doing evil or enabling evil.

Bellarkephine

Bellarke has always been the central relationship on the show, but it’s never been as front and center as it is this season. In 6x07, Clarke gave up on living at the moment when Josephine managed to convince her that Bellamy had given up on her and moved on and that he and everyone are better off without her, and the last few been about Bellamy being willing to do everything to get Clarke back. The show is being really obvious about Bellamy’s and Clarke’s feelings for other other, even more so than it was in the previous seasons (and I happen to think it was already quite obvious). It’s not the first time that other characters have called out those two on their feelings for each other (from Lexa noticing in season 2 that Clarke cares for Bellamy and worries about him more than about her other people, to ALIE!Raven in season 3, taunting Bellamy over being more devoted to Clarke than his girlfriend Gina, to Octavia calling out Bellamy in season 5 and calling Clarke another traitor who he loves), but now it is an integral part of the main story, the way it was not before.

I’ll say one thing, though – while it is undeniable, seeing his behavior over the previous few episodes. that Bellamy cares for Clarke more than anyone else at this point, as Josephine points out (and that statement implies that he cares for her more than his girlfriend, Echo), I think one should be fair and acknowledge that Clarke is in danger of certain and definite death, after a definite and short period of time, while the others back in Sanctum are only in danger of potential death, so I don’t think it would be fair if they begrudged Bellamy going off to save Clarke.

This dynamic was weird, because Bellamy was simultaneously not fond of (to put it mildly) of Josephine, but was incredibly tender and caring with her body, because it was Clarke’s body, and Clarke is still in there somewhere. The way he gently wiped JoClarke’s black blood and put his own, so the Children of Gabriel wouldn’t know she was a Nightblood, reminds me of Bellamy cutting himself to fool the Ark guards, so they wouldn’t know the blood belonged to Octavia, when she would accidentally cut herself.

Josephine said that love was the reason why Sanctum would be destroyed – implying not just that her father put everything in danger for his love for her (by putting her in Clarke’s body), but also that Bellamy’s love for Clarke and his determination to save would be the cause of Sanctum’s destruction. It’s the 3rd time that the word “love” has been used on the show to describe Bellamy’s and Clarke’s feelings for each other: the first time was in season 2 when Clarke said she was being weak when she tried to keep Bellamy from going to Mount Weather, because love is weakness; the second time was in season 5, when Octavia called out Bellamy on pleading for the life of a traitor who you love; and this is the third time.

The moment when Bellamy looked at Clarkephine when he knew Clarke could hear him, and paused before saying “I won’t let you die”, was one of those moments where Bellamy or Clarke seem to want to say more, or are saying a lot more, through or instead of a statement like “Hurry” or “Don’t feel bad about leaving me here”. Those two have always had their own way of saying ILY.

Bellamy replying “Tell me about it” when Josephine called the “weird” relationship between him and Clarke “exhausting” has to be one of the best meta moments on the show.

(BTW, I don’t think Bellamy actually wanted to kill Clarke in 1x02 – the first moment he could have let her die, he saved her. But maybe she thought so, or maybe Josephine saw her memories and drew that conclusion. Also, the show Josie is misusing the word “genocide” and should look up the definition.)

But after a while, what was Josephine trying to taunt Bellamy, turned into Josephine being moved by Bellamy’s love for Clarke – not because she’s a compassionate person (she’s not), but because it reminds her of Gabriel’s love she had and lost. We got her explicit confirmation that she has really been in love with him, since they got to the planet (which may have been the first time they met). And while we know, from his reactions in 6x08, that he is still in love with her (but she may not know that), he has still been trying to kill her for the last 70 years – because she is a villain and is largely responsible for maintaining a terrible system of oppression and murder. This is the main difference between Gabriel/Josephine and Bellarke: Clarke is actually not a villain, she is a hero. Josephine is the villain that some of the characters and a part of the fandom imagines Clarke to be, because they are not paying attention to the actual story.

I love the fact that Clarke used the Morse code, for the second time, but now to both mock Josephine with “Boohoo” and try to make Bellamy laugh, while confirming that she was able to hear them both.

It’s really amazing just how Bellarke-heavy this episode was, even though Clarke and Bellamy weren’t able to directly interact most of the time – and haven’t been since 6x04. The one moment when they did get a chance to interact, for some 10 seconds, was when Clarke temporarily took control over her body because Josephine realized she sucked at defending herself and had to let Clarke do it. And it was amazing – the way Eliza changed her expression, voice and demeanor and the way she looked at Bellamy, the way Bellamy immediately knew she was Clarke, the chemistry that was suddenly there again in full force when it was Bellamy and Clarke interacting, rather than Bellamy and Josephine. Clarke is determined to never leave Bellamy again (as we saw in 5x13, when she was not willing to leave him behind even while they were seconds away from missiles hitting), but this time, he was right that literally staying there would have killed her, so she did the smart thing and sneaked him the keys – allowing him to save himself, while he let her go to save herself.

My judgement of the Children of Gabriel after 6x03 still stands: morally ambiguous group, the right goal, but too murder-happy.

Josephine may be a 200+ old narcissistic, evil Prime that I want to die, but her interactions with Clarke are really fun. It was great to see Clarke get the upper hand, at least for a while, and be in control again. And I loved the fact that Clarke rubbed it into Josephine’s face that she had stolen some skills from her – and calling her out on the irony of Josephine complaining about it, while living in Clarke’s stolen body.

I can’t wait to see Josephine and Gabriel reunited, and Octavia and Clarke and Bellamy reunited – but I’m also looking forward to more of the Clarke/Josephine fight for control in the mindspace.

Rating: 10/10

[immortalpramheda]

The 100 6x09 ‘What You Take With You’

Octavia doesn’t remember anything that happened in the anomaly, much to Gabriel’s disappointment. He’s been waiting for 150 years to find out what the anomaly actually is. Because Octavia is healed, clean and her hair is longer, he’s convinced that she was in there for a lot longer than a few seconds (I still really want to know how time works in there. Is it actually time travel or just somewhere where time moves differently?).

He makes up a serum of plants from around the anomaly that he calls Red Sun Toxin. Which seems to have a similar effect to what happens during the red sun by opening up a part of the mind that is being repressed. He hopes that it will help Octavia remember.

When she is under it’s influence, she has a choice. The green box, which will presumably show her what happened in the anomaly (we hear Diyoza’s voice coming from there). Or the red box, which is much more enticing to Octavia.

She’s surrounded by red radioactive butterflies, and then she’s taken back to the fighting pits. It seems that the red box forces her to face her demons, which is something that she has been wanting to avoid. A montage of the most traumatic events in her life flash by, Lincoln’s death, killing Pike, the Dark Year, Bellamy in the fighting pits. It’s all too overwhelming for her.

I was not expecting to see Pike so his appearance was a very welcome surprise! He’s a representation of her inner self because she hates him more than anyone else because he killed killed Lincoln. That’s when she feels like she, Octavia Blake, died. It was after that when she started on this downward spiral.

And it’s through Pike that she comes to the realisation that she hates herself. That’s what he represents in her mindspace, how much hatred she has towards herself and what she became. That’s why she’s been on this self destructive path. And it’s him who forces her to admit what it is that she really wants. Forgiveness? No. Deep down what she wants, and what she needs, is redemption.

Does she deserve redemption? It’s not about deserving it. It’s something that must be earned and the big question is, what is she willing to do to get it? She can’t go back and change things that happened, and as Pike says, doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is insanity. But it’s always possible to do better from now on. That’s what Pike was trying to do when she killed him. She rationalised it as justice when really it was cold blooded murder.

Bloodreina, the darkest version of herself, tells her that she did what she had to do to survive. That’s how she’s always justified what she did. That’s why she was so desperate to get to the last survivable place on Earth, because once they got there, then everything she did would have made sense.

Pike gets down on his knees, a parallel to the way that Lincoln died. It’s now that Octavia finally decides to slay her demons. Bloodreina is no more, signifying that part of her life is in the past and she’s ready to move onto the future.

This is what Octavia has been desperately needing to come to terms with to get out of this place. Since they got out of the bunker, she’s still been in that mindset of fighting to stay alive. Holding onto that persona because it was all she knew for 6 years and she didn’t know who she was without it. That’s her justification for burning the farm, she couldn’t bear the thought of not winning. But Wonkru was no more and she couldn’t bear to acknowledge that. I LOVED how this whole thing went down. She seemed stuck before but now she knows exactly what she wants and where she’s heading. And I’m looking forward to seeing Bellamy reunite with his sister, who is now on a journey back to her old self.

Josephine/Clarke and Bellamy’s journey this episode was fantastic! After she had a seizure, he just casually wiped the blood off her nose, and then cut himself and put his red blood on her forehead (similar to when he cut his arm so Octavia wouldn’t be caught) so no one would know she’s a Prime.

Being captured by the Children of Gabriel gave them some time to talk (and kinda bond?). Josie admits that she’s been in love with Gabriel for 236 years, the last 70 of which he’s been trying to kill her.

Clarke can hear them, meaning that there isn’t much time left. The barrier between their brains is getting weaker. She communicates in morse code again. Boo-hoo. Which was just perfect.

“I won’t let you die.” I think the way in which Bellamy said that brought up something in Josephine. Her expression changes, because I think she understands why Bellamy won’t give up on Clarke. Someone used to feel the same way about her - Gabriel couldn't let her die and spent 25 years trying to bring her back. That kind of love is something she has experienced, and something she wishes she still had.

She calls out his ‘weird’ relationship with Clarke. At first, they tried to kill each other, and then they became best friends, bonded by committing genocide together, locked each other up, left each other to die, her on Earth, him in the fighting pits. It’s exhausting, their relationship (loved how Josephine obviously knows how he feels about her, because it’s very similar to her relationship with Gabriel). Bellamy’s reaction to when she mentioned ‘love’, the way he turns away and doesn’t acknowledge it, was very telling.

CLARKE IS BACK!!! Josie gave up control so that Clarke could fight her way out when it was discovered that she’s a Nightblood. Bellamy immediately could tell by her mannerisms that she was back! Clarke didn’t want to leave Bellamy behind, she won’t do that again. But there’s no time and she quickly slips Bellamy the keys before running off.

Clarke is back in control and can now see Josephine, which means that there is really not much time before her brain completely deteriorates. Clarke refuses to give her back control, and has also stolen some skills, how to ride a motorbike and speak Mandarin. Clarke is back and it feels so good!

Before riding off, she sends a radio message to Gabriel, which is sucked up by anomaly and Gabriel hears it on a loop. This is going to be very interesting. He’ll be reunited with someone who he has a very long history with. I do think he’s most likely going to try to save Josie, he keeps staring at the photo of her so his feelings haven’t gone away. But I think he will do whatever it takes to give Clarke her body back because it’s the right thing to do.

Kane cannot get used to this new body. Despite his mind being intact, all of his scars, and the coalition brand, are gone. Those things were a part of who he was, his body was a part of him. Abby tries to help him make sense of it, but none of this feels right.

He meets Gavin’s wife, who believes that Gavin is still in there somewhere. They’re not, their minds are wiped. The people are lied to about their religion to get them to worship these false gods. This man had a life, a family, and now because of Kane it’s been taken away.

Indra is finally woken up!! Meeting her friend who now inhabits a different body was a little strange. But her friendship with Kane runs so deep and she is willing to do whatever he believes is right.

These people murder people and will continue doing so unless they do something to stop them. This guilt at taking this innocent mans life is tearing Kane apart. And so they come up with a plan to float the Nightblood. Make it so they can no longer create more hosts. And Kane knows what needs to be done to make sure that this horror does not continue.

I’ve never been a big Kane fan, or Abby fan, but this death scene was absolutely heartbreaking. It hit all the right emotional beats and was very true to who Kane was. And I’m so glad that Abby got to say a proper goodbye to him in his original body.

“This is how we get our humanity back.” This was Kane’s choice. He’s making sure they deserve to survive. His sacrifice will ensure that Abby, and everyone else, can make a better life for themselves. To give them the chance to do better.

Indra recites the 'Travelers Blessing’, an Ark tradition, one that she learnt from Kane. She adds in a little of her culture in at the end, ‘Yu gonplei ste odon’. At this point, I couldn’t stop crying. And to make this whole thing even more tragic, this is the same way that Abby’s husband died.

Kane wasn’t mad at Abby, he made that clear. He’s knows that if the roles were reversed he would have done anything to save her. But he can’t live with himself like this. A very noble send off, perfect for his character.

After the last episode, I was skeptical about Kane’s storyline from here on. I was weirded out by the new body and was worried it would continue on for the rest of the season. But I wouldn’t have wanted his journey to end any other way. If he’d just stayed cryo with an uncertain future, or died right after being unfrozen, then that would have been a very unsatisfying send off. He died on his own terms and made sure that everyone else deserved to survive. May we meet again.

Another great, and very emotional, episode. I can’t believe the season is nearly over and can’t wait to see what the remaining episodes have in store!