The Walking Dead: Diverged (10x21)

I don't really know about this one. I liked it, but I found myself frustrated by it as well.

Cons:

For one thing, on a big-picture scale, what the heck is this season building to? Nothing, I guess. Everything's disjointed. Next week is the finale, and it's a Negan-centric episode. We've barely checked in with Negan for weeks. Which means, unless they pull something miraculous off in the one hour they have remaining, that we're going to be going into the hiatus before the final season with all of these threads still dangling. Maggie and the new characters she brought with her? We barely know them. Princess, Ezekiel, Eugene, and Yumiko? Who knows where they're at. Carol and Daryl's growing distance? Impossible to say. There is just so much material here, and none of it is building to anything at all.

And then to narrow in on this episode specifically, I want to praise a lot about it, but I will admit that The Walking Dead has a subtlety issue, in that it's... not subtle. I think some of the moments here could have spoken for themselves, rather than having everything spelled out for us. Most specifically with Carol and Jerry's conversation at the end. 'Twas just a bit too on the nose.

Grey's Anatomy: In My Life (17x09)

Ughhhh. I don't know how to talk about this episode. I'll do my best.

Cons:

See, I don't like Teddy. This episode doesn't change my mind. There's this awesome moment that I'll talk about later, where Amelia is tearing into Owen for not respecting Teddy's trauma. And like... good for her. I don't like Owen, either. And he certainly deserves to be put in his place. But Teddy and Allison were cheating. Teddy was the other woman. Adding in this history of having this woman be the "love of her life" when their relationship was built on sneaking around and lying to their friend? And this is before the trauma that supposedly justifies Teddy's lying? I just don't really buy it as a reason to totally forgive her and sympathize with her actions. If Teddy's treatment of Owen and Koracick is a trauma response, then... well, I'm sorry, but it doesn't just make it all suddenly okay. She still has to own up to it, and it's still completely fine if Owen never forgives her.

Also just... I really don't like it when shows do the whole idyllic flashbacks to a beloved person who has died. Allison seems absolutely perfect in every way, and Teddy's love for her is very cheesy and movie-esque... but I can't get over the infidelity thing. I really can't see past the harm they're doing to another human being, who doesn't even get to appear in Teddy's catatonic dreamscape. I also feel weird about appropriating the tragedy of 9/11 for this fictional character... for some reason it's hitting me in the wrong way, perhaps because I find it so hard to sympathize with Teddy.

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: The Star-Spangled Man (1x02)

Oh boy. Things are getting juicy.

Cons:

Can we be done with the joke of "wow, I'm surprised this incredibly strong fighter is a woman"? Like, at first it didn't bother me that Bucky thought the woman was a hostage, but then it turns out she's the head of the Flag-Smashers. That could be a commentary on Bucky's outdated way of thinking. But then later, during the fight, Sam says "that girl beat you up!" like a fun banter joke, and I'm just... sick of it. Sam, aren't you an Avenger? I know there's a dearth of ladies over there, but you've met Wanda, right? And Natasha? They were part of your little family unit along with Steve, weren't they? Jeez. You know there's no reason why a woman can't be a dangerous criminal just as much as a man. #feminism. (But in all seriousness, that was a disappointing joke.)

I will repeat my concerns from the first episode, about how we're positioning our good guys and our bad guys. See, the bad guys don't want to let the same people have the power, the way it all was before the snap (or the "blip", as I guess it's known). They want to redistribute power, to break down these harmful systems. And then you've got Sam, getting denied at the bank, being harassed by the cops, showing that he too is victimized in this current system. So... is the ultimate solution really supposed to be Sam-as-Captain-America, taking on the mantle of a system that has rejected and hurt him and other people like him, for as long as (and long before) there even was an America? I want them to take this to a different place, an unexpected one, but I'm nervous about the optics.

The Walking Dead: Splinter (10x20)

I keep coming back to the fact that this whole back half of the season has been a disjointed mess. What's it all building to? Anything at all?

Cons:

I want to tread lightly when talking about the character of Princess. I think the actor is doing a fantastic job, I find her compelling to watch... but on the flip side, I can't imagine that people who actually have various mental illnesses that include psychosis are thrilled with this representation. The violence, especially. I don't know. Maybe I'm treading too lightly. The episode explains that Princess isn't "crazy," that maybe her overactive imagination, her way of coping, is actually the only sane response to an insane world. But is that enough? Do I think this portrayal of a mentally ill woman in the apocalypse is being realistic about the challenges therein, or do I think some unfortunate stereotypes are being reinforced? It's unclear.

In the same way that when Maggie showed up and mentioned a new group of baddies who want to hurt everyone, this particular group of people, wearing what looks like stormtrooper armor, is already kind of exhausting to me. See, I have this glimmer of interest. The man that Princess talks to mentions paperwork, and a process, and authority, and rank, and it seems like a more legit operation than really anything our characters have come across thus far. That could be really cool! I want to find out more! But remember when Eugene said he knew how to make a cure just to get Abraham and Rosita's protection? Or remember when a helicopter took Rick away and we never saw him again? There are all these tantalizing hints of a bigger, structural, scientific next step, people with a better grip on the situation than the characters we've been focused on... and we never get to actually see it. I want to see it. I want some follow-through, please and thanks.

Grey's Anatomy: It's All Too Much (17x08)

I don't know... this one kind of just rolled right over me. Not in a bad way, not in a good.

Cons:

DeLuca's death is stupid, and the legacy of it here is still stupid. They had so much they could have done with his character, and now having everyone go through their tepid, repetitive grief routine is just tiresome. They gave most of the grieving material to Teddy, who I hate, and to Bailey, who I love, but I don't really like the response they gave her. She decides to order an autopsy and do an M&M about DeLuca's death to make sure no mistakes were made, but Richard tells her she's causing harm to the living, that no mistakes were made. It was just a tragedy. I don't know... does this seem like something Bailey would do? It felt like a more transparent excuse than usual, to have two characters standing in a room yelling at each other.                                                 

And Teddy, with that whole thing where she keeps glimpsing DeLuca all over the place? It's really annoying and why would I connect with her grief over the loss of Andrew? There are other characters who I wanted to spend more time with. This was emphasized at the end when we had the memorial and we didn't get to hear what people were actually saying about DeLuca, because honestly most of these characters didn't have a personal connection with him... and the ones who did, didn't have a lot of screen time to deal with it. Then we end with Owen carrying Teddy home at the end... and the trailer showing a Teddy-centric episode next week... gah. No THANK you. I don't LIKE you, Teddy. Sorry not sorry.

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: New World Order (1x01)

Watching this show is going to be strange for me because I genuinely ship Bucky Barnes and Sam Wilson with one Steve Rogers... so basically I just want to watch them sitting around being sad about him being dead the whole time. But I'm open to the possibilities, here, I really am...

Cons:

Positioning the bad guys here as... well, as communists who want a world without borders, and then making them into terrorists... let's just say I'm side-eying this pretty hard. You have that twist at the end, where the United States brings forth a new symbolic hero, a new Captain America, and my brain immediately started spinning forward as to where this is going to go. See, we've got anarchist baddies who want to destroy all the flags on one side, then we've got this pretender to the throne on the other side. But the issue won't be that there's something inherently flawed with the whole concept of a militarized heroic folk legend for Americans to idealize... it'll be about how it's the wrong man carrying the shield. At some point, in a moment of triumph, Sam will take the mantle on for himself, and then we can safely and comfortably cheer as our hero takes down the big bad commies who don't love 'Murica enough. I want to be wrong. I want them to mix things up, to challenge things, but all I can see is that the ultimate heroic conclusion is going to be "government control of Captain America is Bad, but Captain America himself, and what he stands for, specifically America, is good."

The Walking Dead: One More (10x19)

This was all in all a good installment, certainly more invigorating than the first two episodes of 2021. But that doesn't mean it was perfect, by any means.

Cons:

So this is one of those episodes that is good enough that it could have been great, if not for some relatively small aspects that could have been easily fixed. The big one is that the character of Mays comes on too strong. I don't mean in the sense that he's antagonistic and mean and has this ugly outlook on the world. I was totally caught up in it when he sat down and ate the boar meat, when it was slowly revealed that the boar and the booze had been his, that he considered Gabriel and Aaron to be interlopers. Then, the moment with the gun, shooting it through the wall, realizing that Aaron was tied up on the other side... that was chilling.

And then, after a great deal of excellently paced buildup, we get... Russian Roulette? Really? That's so unsubtle and lame and played out. We get this speechifying about how the world is bad and people are bad, and then Gabriel and Aaron being like "no, we're good actually" and it was just... incredibly on the nose. We slipped right back into some of this show's most common issues, spelling out the messaging way too obviously. There's no room for nuance when you have characters start speaking out a fully realized moral debate like they're ancient Greek students of Socrates or something.

Grey's Anatomy: Helplessly Hoping (17x07)

What the heck did I just watch with my own two eyeballs? What the ever living fuck? Spoilers ahead, ye be warned.

Cons:

Okay, I'm going to go ahead and compare Grey's Anatomy to The Walking Dead real quick. Both are long-running shows with a large ensemble cast, and the cast grows, people leave, new characters are added, and we're meant to feel emotional attachments to new characters as well as to those few originals who are still sticking around. Oh, and main characters die on a semi-regular basis, for the drama of all of it.

Now, the thing is, Grey's is actually better than The Walking Dead at getting me to give a crap about new characters as they get folded into the show. So many of my favorites today weren't originally part of the show. Jo is a good example of this. Callie wasn't an original character, neither was Arizona, and I loved them. Link is a more recent fave. The list goes on. You know one character I particularly loved?

The Walking Dead: Find Me (10x18)

Ughhhh I just don't care.

Cons:

So, this is a persistent problem on this show, where all the pretty actors are wearing clothes that fit them and they've got their eyebrows sculpted, and even if they're not wearing makeup they still look pretty damn clean. I've sort of gotten used to it. It's the "shaved armpits while stranded on an island in Lost" phenomenon, and it's just the way things are. Maybe it was because Leah was being presented to us as a love interest for Daryl, and she was just so obviously gorgeous, but it stood out to me more than it normally would have.

And speaking of the love interest thing... god, can we just not? It was such a clumsy, unconvincing love story. Leah is all angry and pointing a weapon at him, then she lets him go, and then the next time he comes back she's like "oh, thanks for bringing the dog back" and they strike up this relationship, that got serious enough that Daryl was contemplating coming to live with her, and never going back to his old family? Yeesh, what a large gaping hole in our conception of his character. I'm not saying this for shipping reasons, but I've always seen Daryl as either gay or ace or, if he does have a relationship with a woman, that relationship being with Carol. There are so many different ways Daryl could go for me, and hooking up with random lady in cabin in the woods just... does not jive with how I picture him in my head!

The Walking Dead: Home Sweet Home (10x17)

Dang, it's been a while since I've written a review!

Cons:

So, the problem is, I don't care anymore and I don't think this show is particularly good anymore. A bummer, but there it is. Everything here feels like a retread of material we've already seen done over and over again. We've got so much of this show left to go, especially if you include spin-offs (which I really don't, you couldn't pay me to watch Fear or Beyond or whatever else they've got going), and I'm just dreading the months (years!) ahead where we go over and over the same well-trod ground.

Having Maggie back really shines a spotlight on how... uncomfortable and unnecessary Negan's "redemption" is. The problem is, we didn't see his redemption. We saw a man who murdered people and took pleasure in it, then we learned he's sad because dead wife, then we flash forward and he's friends with Judith and we're supposed to be cool with that? There's no complicated redemption arc here. Maggie is right to despise him and want nothing to do with him.

Doctor Who: Revolution of the Daleks (2021 New Years Special)

I honestly really loved that! Like, a lot!

Cons:

It wasn't perfect, however. Of course. A few little nitpicky things, and one or two bigger complaints:

So, the bad guy was a little too one-note evil capitalist/politician. Some of his lines made me roll my eyes, like "this is a PR nightmare" being his reaction when he learned that the Daleks were eating liquified humans. The irony of him suddenly being hailed as a hero worked okay, but he was maybe just a touch too cartoonish for my personal preference, in an episode that mostly managed to feel really grounded.

Sometimes the Dalek stories will touch on this "race purity" thing, and the Doctor will talk about how they are beings of hate, and it really feels like we're doing a Nazi allegory, but they don't quite... go somewhere with it? Like, we've got the Prime Minster character talking about protecting borders and increasing security, and then the Daleks who are trying to stamp out "impurities," right? And there's something there, it's not exactly the most subtle of story craft, I guess I just wish it felt more intentional. The Daleks have metaphorical resonance here, and I'm not sure it was totally utilized.

His Dark Materials: Æsahættr (2x07)

A lot of stuff happens in this episode, but in some moments it still feels a bit clunky. Not terrible, but still...

Cons:

To start with a small nitpick, last week I was complimenting the decision to have Mary Malone stay and help the kids, but this week we only get the briefest glimpse of her, as she drops the kids off back with a community of adults, and then continues on, immediately picking up with her book plot and seeking another window. This was fine, but it felt weird to include that detour and then go nowhere with it. It's almost just like the writers felt sorry for the kids and wanted to wrap up their story arc a bit, but honestly? Kids die in this story. Kids are orphaned and hurt and lonely and powerless. It's part of what makes the story so striking and frightening.

A lot of exposition in this one, folks, and some of it was a bit overdone. Like, the performances are strong enough to bypass the worst of it, but when we finally get the "Eve" namedrop it's come after so much obvious buildup, and we still have Mrs. Coulter spelling it out for us: "she's going to doom us all, and we have to stop her from falling this time." Like, yeah, thanks, we got it.

His Dark Materials: Malice (2x06)

This was by no means a bad hour of television, but it felt like a lot of setup, a lot of spinning wheels, and maybe less of an epic feel than the same moments I remember from the book. Let's dive in.

Cons:

There are many ways in which it feels like the scope was shrunk down for the show, from what was portrayed in the books. Since this was filmed before COVID, I don't really understand why some of these limiting choices where made. In the books, when Will and Lyra are attacked by the child citizens of Cittagaze, it's a protracted chase sequence and they end up climbing a tower and the witches swoop in at the last possible second. Here, it's just the two sisters instead of a whole gang, and they scramble up to the roof, then the witches arrive. In the book, there are a dozen or so witches, and here we see three or four. In the book, Boreal's death comes at a campsite where Mrs. Coulter is staying with him in the nicest tent, and they are surrounded by a whole crew coming with them on the hunt for Lyra, thus showing the influence and power that Mrs. Coulter is giving up by abandoning her supposed protectors. Here, it's just the two of them. All of these things combined make the scope feel smaller, the world feel smaller, in a lot of ways.

And then on the flipside, the episode somewhat has the opposite problem as well. Instead of telling a focused, narrow story, we're spread far and wide, checking in with Lee and Jopari, with the witches, with Coulter and Boreal, Will and Lyra, and... the Magisterium. I want the Magisterium scenes to work for me, but they have consistently been the least interesting in the whole show. When they were drawing out the reveal of Lyra as "Eve" I was rolling my eyes, just waiting for them to get through all the slow, sonorous speechifying and back to the action.

Grey's Anatomy: No Time for Despair (17x06)

Do we think there's any universe in which Meredith dies from Covid? I mean, I want to say no, but I didn't think they'd ever kill Derek off either. It is a soap opera, after all.

Cons:

Something about the way doctors talk about the sex trafficker bad guy patient was just so over the top that I was waiting for a twist where it turns out he was innocent. I feel like we've seen the doctors treating despicable people before, and they had to grit their teeth and handle it. That's basically what happened here, but they were all so vociferous about how hard it was to do, and then we have Maggie's outburst where she talks about how black girls are more likely to be victims and less likely to be believed in situations like this. And like - no argument from me, of course, but I just felt like I've seen this show handle similar issues with smoother writing before.

I mean, Teddy still sucks, so what else is new. I don't mind at all that Owen is like "I never knew you" because that's what she deserves. However, one thing is kind of bugging me about their scene, and that's when Teddy says that Allison wasn't just her best friend, but that they were in love. Owen's reaction is to laugh hysterically and say that they named their daughter after a lie. Now... I don't quite remember. Does Owen know the whole story? Does he know that Allison had a girlfriend at the time, and therefore realize that Teddy is a serial cheater? Because to the untrained eye, it could look like Owen's "I don't know you at all" moment is in response to Teddy basically... coming out to him? Like, is Owen pissed that he didn't know Teddy was attracted to women? I don't know. I don't think that was the intent of the scene, but there were a lot of mixed signals and I was a little uncomfortable about the way the end result was presented. I still don't feel any sympathy for Teddy, really, given the situation as a whole.

His Dark Materials: The Scholar (2x05)

OOF. This was a good one. Maybe the best episode of the season thus far, even though my boy Lee was absent.

Cons:

Pacing-wise, there were a couple of wonky things in moments of tension here. I liked that the confrontation over the alethiometer was expanded, but while Lyra and Mrs. Coulter were having their confrontation, Will and Boreal kind of had to be in stasis, and it was a bit awkward.

Same with the moment when Lyra and Will see that Tullio has fallen to the spectres. The threat level there was sort of off, as the two sisters hugged him and cried. I remember from the book that the two younger siblings were pretty much fully feral and it felt like they might really attack and hurt Will and Lyra. And speaking of hurt Will, another thing I'm missing from the books is how badly Will is supposed to be doing, health-wise, because of his hand. In the book, there are constant reminders that he hasn't stopped bleeding, and he is in real pain all the time. That really upped the tension, as while they were working on their other goals, they also had this looming health threat slowing them down and causing added drama along the way. I haven't gotten that same sense from the show.

Grey's Anatomy: Fight the Power (17x05)

Oh, poor Bailey...

Cons:

I want to be very careful and precise on how I talk about this, but I do think that the messaging in this episode was very blunt and somewhat poorly scripted. We had Bailey and Maggie talking about their experiences of being underestimated, of having to work twice as hard and become exceptional just to be considered worthy of notice. And then we had Jackson and Richard, spouting off statistics and talking about systemic racism. Both of these conversations were good, in that I agreed with the message and agree that it's an important one. But I can think of so many times during the course of this show when important messages were delivered through the heart and soul of the characters that we already knew and loved... as compared to this, which felt like our black faves delivering prepared remarks to us in a Very Special Episode. It wasn't godawful. It was just... not as smooth, not as personal, as I wanted it to be.

Fuck Teddy Altman. I feel like I need to say that every week. I'm so happy that Tom seems to be doing better, and that hopefully he's not on the verge of death, but Teddy's speech, talking about repairing their relationship, just made me mad, because what the fuck has she done to earn any measure of forgiveness at all? I want Tom to be okay. And I even want Owen to be okay, despite my general dislike of him. But at this point, I don't know that I'm ever going to be actively rooting for Teddy's happiness again.

His Dark Materials: Tower of the Angels (2x04)

Okay, yeah, things are really a-happening, aren't they??

Cons:

The witches are so far the weakest link for me this season. They're not bad, but just a little bland. They look cool, and I guess they are cool in what they get up to, but whenever the scene switches over to them I find myself underwhelmed. The puzzle pieces are moving towards each other, as the witches are going to go join Asriel, but I don't have a lot more to report than that.

This is the nitpicky-est of nitpicks, but the subtle knife didn't look how I imagined it in my head! I guess I heard 'knife' and thought 'dagger', so I expected the blade to be bigger, maybe? It's fine, it's not ruining the show for me or anything, but I thought I'd point it out.

Grey's Anatomy: You'll Never Walk Alone (17x04)

Awww George! That was the best possible answer as to who was waiting for Meredith in the pseudo-afterlife. It was so amazing seeing him!

Cons:

I thought Maggie's boyfriend's thing with his dad was a little unrealistic in how blunt it was? Like, he saw his dad on a Zoom call and was immediately like "here is the major family drama that we have, let me explain it to the viewer and then sign off the call." It might have just been an issue of clunky writing.

Okay, Jo and Jackson... tread very, very lightly. I don't mind a good old fashioned friends with benefits situation, but that never seems to go the way we want it to, and I'm not about Jo/Jackson as an actual romantic pairing. This show has convinced me of weirder, but at the moment I just don't want them to pair up because they both happen to be single. Also, any storyline that touches on Jo healing from Alex just gives me visceral flashbacks to how stupid Alex's exit from the show truly was. It's hard to see past that.

His Dark Materials: Theft (2x03)

 I love Lee Scoresby, y'all.

Cons:

This one was pretty light on the "cons" column! If I had to say anything, I'd say that having an episode without Magesterium politics made me realize how much those elements were clogging up the pacing.

Also, Lee Scoresby is amazing and I love him, but I thought the daddy issues angle was a little played out. If that's in the book, it must be a passing reference. I think Marisa Coulter and Lee Scoresby have enough going on with regards to caring for Lyra as a daughter despite not having raised her, without introducing the idea that they both had crappy fathers.

Oh, also, this is a minor detail, but in the book Lyra loses the alethiometer because "Latrom" is sitting in the back seat with her (he has a driver) and he picks it out of her bag. I liked that much better than Lyra getting out of the car in a panic and leaving the whole bag behind. That girl carried that thing around with her in the frozen wastelands and was obsessive about keeping it with her at all times. Seems like the kind of mistake Lyra wouldn't make. Trusting a stranger at the wrong moment in desperation? Sure. Leaving her bag in the car? Maybe not.

His Dark Materials: The Cave (2x02)

 Another solid outing!

Cons:

As with last week, I found the stuff with the Magesterium the least interesting. Mrs. Coulter is great, but it seems to me like we're padding some of the church politics stuff from the book, in order to check in with Coulter more frequently. Maybe I'm misremembering, but I don't think there was quite as much of this in the book. It's not bad, it's just not my favorite aspect.

Will going to the bank, and then to his... grandparents' house? Was kind of weird. I didn't hate it, honestly, but it was another situation where it felt like padding so that we got enough time with Will while Lyra was doing her business as well.

Pros:

Although I did notice some padding in this episode, even that padding wasn't a total loss, as I'm really enjoying the performances across the board! The actor playing Will is doing such a good job of toeing that line, of being a kid who had to grow up too fast, taking on responsibilities, while maintaining that fear and also that credulity that kids continue to have even as they age.