Agent Carter S02E06-S02E07 Review: The Widow vs the Madame

Agent Carter, Season 2, Epsiode 6: Life of the Party

These two episodes came at around the same time, and I actually did a rough-bones review of it when it came out... so let me finish writing it, a good month after the episodes actually premiered. Whoops. By this point the second season has ended, and I'll be reviewing the rest of the episodes in the near future, before moving on to Daredevil's season two.

Anyway, this two-parter focuses more on Team Peggy recruiting Dottie Underwood, a.k.a. Black Widow I, back into the fold to combat the larger threat, Whitney Frost. It's all entertaining spy stuff, and it very much raises the stakes for the second half of the season. Agent Carter's second season has one of the most solid first halves, and Whitney Frost has been built up to be this interesting and formidable villain. So like any good work of fiction, they pit last season's villain against this new big bad. Except, y'know, Dottie's a rather colourful character herself, where she's got this... unhealthy, explicitly-ship-inducing interest in Peggy Carter, which is part of the reason why she's interested in helping.

At least they lampshade what a stupid and reckless idea it was to bring Dottie into the fold beyond 'let's do this for, uh, reasons' like they often do in Arrow, and Peggy's abdomen-impalement injury is a good enough reason as any. Plus there's the Suicide Squad collar on top of it all. And it is fun to have Jarvis and Dottie interact and try their level best to outsnark each other in that gala... even if we have some rather irritating-yet-funny Peggy-Sousa drama shoved in the middle of it all.

But really, Whitney Frost is still one of the most awesome characters in this season, easily outshining Dottie. Chadwick and the Council try to set up a trap for Whitney, and when she realizes she was betrayed by Chadwick, well, she uses her black-goop powers to eat Chadwick and half the council, who I have given up hope on being relevant in any way to the story. Vernon Masters is one of those spared, and he did get a bunch of buildup with Thompson throughout the episode so it's nice to have him grow somewhat as a character instead of just Corrupt FBI Man.

Thompson continues to be annoying, though at least he's showing visible reluctance at cooperating with Vernon. In his line of work, what can you do? He seems to be having some conflicts of interest as he overhears some sensitive stuff that Vernon and the other council members are saying, and I'm 100% sure he'll be redeemed at the end mostly because, y'know, we went through the 'is Thompson evil or just a dick' bit already.

It's a great episode, though. It moves the plot along, it's got this fun little moments both in the planning and execution of the plan, it proves that the main character can sit out most of the action while the secondaries have a time to shine, and Whitney Frost continues to be a fun and unique villain in the MCU.

Agent Carter, Season 2, Epsiode 7: Monsters

This episode followed up the previous one as a pretty strong installment, and brings Dottie and Frost facing off against each other. Dottie gets herself captured by Frost's forces, and I do like the scene where she gives these gory descriptions about the tortures she suffers daily to Vernon. There's definitely a nice callback (call-forward, in-universe) to the Avengers movie where Black Widow was being tied down to a chair and being absolutely nonchalant about torture. And then Frost comes in with her Zero Matter powers and puts the fear of god into Dottie. Because, y'know, metahuman powers are a bit more scary than something that you've grown desensitized to over the years. The image of the black goop running across Dottie really isn't that horrifying that I buy her breaking immediately, but Dottie's reactions certainly sells it.

Peggy, of course, does show a wee bit of attachment for Dottie (let the shipping bells ring) by refusing to blow the Suicide Squad necklace up, and there's a nice bit of ethical debate between the members of the team on just what action to take -- use the necklace to attempt to blow up Frost, while almost certainly killing Dottie who lest we forget is an assassin and a murderer -- or, um, do nothing. I would definitely blow up that necklace, but that's why I'm not a paragon of justice and ideals like Peggy Carter.

Dottie's status as a rogue agent gets solidified when Vernon enforces the fact that the Soviet will never accept her again, but her betrayal of the SSR this episode (and her subsequent murder-escape at the end of this) solidifies that she's not going onto the side of the angels either. She escapes to return another day, though unless she charges in like a wild card in the finale... not in this season, I think.

This episode is definitely a bit brought down by the rather odd love triangle between Peggy, Wilkes and Sousa, but at least the show (and Jarvis) is not beyond lampshading it, and Peggy herself seemed flabbergasted at the amount of attention she's been getting. Wilkes, I think, still is being somewhat forced into the plot. He still is more plot device than character, really, be it being Mr. Intangible or being Love Interest #2. Yeah, he gets to turn half-corporeal within Howard Stark's machine, and he gets fought over and kidnapped by Frost, but I still don't really care all that much about him to care that he's been kidnapped.

Also, Joseph "Blackwing" Manfredi has basically taken up spot as Whitney Frost's number two, driven by old love for her, and, well, Manfredi is a lot hammier, funnier and far more entertaining than Chadwick.

Sousa gets beaten up by Vernon's people. Thompson works with Vernon's people. I don't care either way -- I've grown somewhat attached to the two of them over the course of 20 episodes or however long Agent Carter has been, but they really haven't done much this time around.

Anna gets a whole lot of screentime here, though, and it's a great development from her scenes in previous episodes where she worries about Jarvis. Her conversation with Jarvis and her newfound concerns about the sheer reality of Jarvis' escapades with Agent Carter is a nice touch, and something that's wonderfully done -- Anna is both supportive and rightfully worried at the same time. Usually in superhero shows people generally lean way too much on either camp, almost to the exclusion of the other, but Anna strikes the perfect balance between the two. Of course, she immediately gets shot in the gut at the end of the episode because, uh, that's what works of fiction do. They make you get attached to minor characters and then they kill them off.

The jury's still out on whether Anna dies, but it's certainly a big escalating point in the story, and Anna certainly is disposable enough (unlike Peggy or Howard, who are both almost certainly alive by the time present-day MCU rolls around, or Jarvis, who will survive long enough to meet Kid!Tony) and would definitely strike a blow to the team. Hell, Jarvis's expressions of horror and panic alone made me well up a little -- James D'Arcy is a really great actor, I must say.

It's your requisite 'darkest moment' part of the plot, with Wilkes kidnapped, Anna possibly dead, the SSR team really reaching nowhere, Frost getting the lead, Vernon's people beating up Sousa, Thompson working with Vernon and Dottie escaping. It's not overdone, though, and if nothing it certainly makes the wait for the next episode a lot more exciting, if only to see if Anna survives.

Legends of Tomorrow S01E08 Review: Cliche Storm

Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1, Episode 8: Night of the Hawks

Sometimes I have the feeling that this show could be so much better if it didn't try so hard to homage different periods in time and actually just tell a good time-travel superhero story. See, Legends of Tomorrow has a good concept, has a pretty good and already well-established cast, a fun script and a fuckton of CGI action goodness. The biggest problem, really, is that it treats its audience like idiots sometimes by just taking utterly daft and stupid decisions in their episode-to-episode plotting -- like their refusal to put Vandal Savage in a cage until they can deal with him and/or going back in time to Egypt prior to the time that he met Rip. Plus, again, insert rant about how the constant speeches about not changing the timeline because it's important ends up being redundant because guess what, they're fucking up the timeline every single episode. 

Like this one. While I can argue up a defense for most of the previous episodes, even that ADHD-driven Cold War Russia era two-parter, Night of the Hawks is one that is really, really hard to defend. It tries to steer the plot back in the direction of Vandal Savage after two filler episodes (post-apocalyptic Star City and Star Trek Space Pirates) but it feels even more like a filler than the actual filler episodes. 

They tackle the multiple social -isms of the fifties in this episode, and racism, sexism and anti-LGBT form the root of the several subplots that run throughout this episode. While they don't quite sink as low as Supergirl-level of whack-your-head-with-an-anvil level of unsubtlety, it's pretty unentertaining to watch, especially when they repeat 'hey, the fifties are bad for mixed-race couples, girls and gays' for the fourth time. It's not that portraying these events are bad at all, no -- more power to shows that tackle these kind of issues, but other than Jax standing up to racist bullies and some golden lines from Sara, the rest are handled rather... not badly, but just bland. Ray and Kendra haven't been the best-acted or the most interesting characters in the bunch, and the attempts to force them to a 'oh look we're totally married except we aren't' situation ends up being absolutely banal. Likewise, Sara's attempts to flirt with a woman in the fifties ended up feeling absolutely forced, not to mention an utter dick move to Sara's actual lover, Nyssa, who, by the way, is still pining for Sara back in 2016. All I'm saying is, y'know, when tackling social injustice as a topic, make it at least somewhat interesting instead of it feeling like an obligation.

The plot of this episode homages old horror films, which Jax pointed out and lampshaded at least twice. A small American town that looks peaceful, until the murders start happening. The main plot, really, is that Savage discovers another Nth Metal meteor, and ends up using it (and the guise of the local nice doctor) to create the CWverse iteration of the Manhawks, these insane bestial Hawkman/Hawkgirl knockoffs. Which ended up falling flat. I mean, yeah, the Manhawks were decent, scary-looking antagonists, and the random plot twist of Savage being Ray and Kendra's friendly neighbourhood creep is surprising, but they don't do much with it other than the same old song and dance of them trying to stab Savage with the knife, fail, knock him out of the window and then escape.

Plus, y'know, the subplots aren't even good. Ray and Kendra playing house ends up feeling like a big distraction, because, y'know, it is one. Sara and Jax's respective love interests are generic girls-of-the-week who have your generic sickeningly-sweet personality, with the teenage girl being at least somewhat relevant to the plot. Nurse Hottie doesn't have that excuse, and, again, is just another unneeded distraction. Though honestly the episode does wonders at not really delivering anything at all so it's probably just as well.

It's just flat. And dull. And you think they would give a wee bit more focus to the Nth Metal or whatever, but not even Savage himself made the episode's plot really compelling -- why was he playing mad scientist at all? Learning about the meteors? Building an army like the Russian Firestorms? It's never made clear, and he feels like just a flat, bland supervillain. Oh, monsters, ho hum. There isn't really even a big mystery regarding local monsters or whatever, so they're not even doing the homage right. The fact that they turned Jax into a Manhawk is immaterial -- of all the people in the crew, they're not going to take out the one that fusion-dances with another member, and certainly not so soon after Heat Wave leaves the show.

Oh, and Captain Cold totally didn't murder Heat Wave, yeah? As much as Jax tries to call him a murderer (and eat his own words) and everyone pretends Cold killed Heat Wave, but honestly does anyone believes that?

I think, from the title, this episode is meant to give Kendra some spotlight after being woefully underutilized beyond being yet another Berserker Girl (which we had tons of)... and... um... I honestly can't think of anything she does in this episode that develops her character. Her chemistry with Ray is laughably bad, and is it that much of an achievement that she's (gasp) actually competent and brave enough to try and dupe Vandal Savage to stab him? She's been fighting Vandal Savage since episode one with a goddamned mace, I think it's honestly disservice to the character that it's treated as this big character development, when it's not.

Thankfully, at the end Chronos shows up, says 'fuck you all' and shoots up the Waverider. We get an explanation to why Firestorm never does anything even though he/they is/are the most overpowered member of the team -- they'll blow the ship up if they merge inside it. And the Waverider ends up taking off leaving three of the team stranded in 1950. Hopefully this will lead to something better-executed, and hopefully Chronos himself grows a personality.

Overall, easily the weakest (and hopefully the only really bad) episode of Legends of Tomorrow so far.

The Walking Dead S02E11 Review: Jiminy Cricket

The Walking Dead, Season 2, Episode 11: Judge, Jury and Executioner

Well, there goes one of the main cast! Dale dies, and it's extremely sudden. Of course, this episode spends so much on Dale and the moral and ethical implications of whether to kill Randall or not. I felt that it went on for a fair bit too long -- not that I minded seeing Dale, but I really wished that he wasn't too preachy so the big heartfelt and tearful speech he gave at the end about how they had to hold on to their humanity would be more impactful instead of a regurgitation. 

I mean, yeah, that scene with Daryl was decent, showing two characters that seldom interacted, and Dale talking to Shane believing in the potential that even Shane can change his mind was well-acted, but those kinda were superfluous to the big 'gather everyone in the room' scene. Dale was great in that scene, though, and it gave people like Carol and Glenn something to do, expressing their opinions and whatnot. It's a great scene, and certainly stronger than all the talking scenes elsewhere in this episode.

That said, though, Dale's death was random, sudden, and shocking for it. Is the death impactful? Not really, it felt random and out of nowhere. Was it shocking? Was it realistic? Probably so. Dale going off in a huff and ending up getting attacked by a walker -- and Dale is nowhere as powerful physically as the likes of Rick, Shane, Daryl or even Glenn. And, well, it's definitely sad. Dale was basically in tears when he left the group, going all "this group is broken" to Daryl, echoing their earlier conversation, and basically losing faith with the people he trusted, like Rick and Glenn, to not only side with him, but actually do the decent thing. And he died thinking that his friends have fallen from their humanity, not ever getting the chance of knowing that, hey, they ended up not killing Randall, even if it's only because Carl nosed in.

And it's a shame, really, how it really felt like he was going to make it. He didn't get bitten, and it's not until the end when the zombie tears poor Dale's guts out. It's a horrifying way as he just lay there gasping in pain, barely coherent as Andrea and Rick are just shouting for help, how easily the nicest guy in the show ends up dying for... not good reason. It's not even Shane going crazy and gunning Dale down like I thought he would. Dale going off and dying isn't even the direct consequence of Rick making a wrong choice or whatever. It's just sudden, and brutal. I mean, yes, Carl didn't kill the river zombie and that was the one that jumped Dale, but... yeah, honestly Carl could've told the adults that, y'know, there's a fucking zombie in the supposedly safe farm area.

Worth mentioning that Daryl certainly has grown to be a team player, so the bit with hallucinatory Merle ends up not panning out that much. While interrogating Randall he referred to Rick, Glenn and Hershel as 'my boys', he obeys Rick's orders unquestioningly whether it's to kill Randall or to drag him back, and his parting words to Dale as he aims his gun at the poor man's head to mercy-kill Dale is just sad. Also he's absolutely enraged when he hears about the story from Randall that his group raped a bunch of kids in front of their father.

Carl goes around and acts like a stupid, unsupervised kid... which, while horribly irritating, was at least done in a realistic manner. He's been through a gigantic ordeal, and of course he's going to try to ape his parents. He wants to try to kill a zombie like daddy, which is why he stole a gun and goes around looking for a walker. Throwing rocks to antagonize it and nearly getting bitten is dumb, though. The moment you see a walker, you should just, y'know, shoot the fucker in the head. Jumping around and trying to see the prisoner for himself... Being utterly rude to Carol is realistic, though I'm surprised Carol didn't just slap the rude fuck. The conversation with Rick was a bit weak, though Carl showing up at the end to stop Rick from executing Randall was... somewhat decent, showing that there's still a sliver of humanity left in Rick, even if that sliver is only so that his son doesn't see it. 

Thing is, kids need to make mistakes to learn from them. And shoving them all at once -- Carl learning about guns, Randall, the zombie and watching Rick about to execute someone and cheering him on -- is certainly easier to stomach than to have Annoying Carl be a constant presence over several episodes. And the kid losing hope of a better afterlife and whatnot would be a decent parallel to Dale's preaching about losing humanity.

Though honestly with all the antics that he's done, and with Lori not doing much other than laundry and cooking -- as she points out last episode -- it's just bad parenting to let Carl wander off so far into the forest.

There were a couple of scenes that felt off, though. Daryl torturing Randall felt rather unnecessary, and it should've really been done early on last episode if you want it at all. And vilifying Randall's buddies by telling us that they raped a bunch of teenage girls in front of their father seems to be a cheap way to make us root for Shane killing Randall so these fuckers don't get anywhere near the female characters we know and love. Granted, the debate ends up being gray -- Randall could be productive (like Daryl!) or he could escape, he could be an asset if they ever run across the Rape Gang, or he could rat the farm out to the Rape Gang. And besides, if they keep him prisoner, how long will they do that for? What about resources? If they let him off, he's going to definitely wander off back to his old camp. All that stuff.

Overall, though, the main meat is still the debate over whether to kill Randall's life. It's certainly gripping, and filled with a lot of great ideas, though I suspect if this was on repeat, it would definitely be a weaker episode thanks to how repetitive Dale felt. Watching it merely once makes for a decent entry. Shame Dale, y'know, died, so we didn't really get more of him. Without the conscience of the group, though, how long will they stick together remains to be seen. 

One Piece 820 Review: Endgame Options

One Piece, Chapter 820: Cat and Dog Have A History

Well, let's try to catch up on last week's manga reviews. Lord knows I've a crapton of outstanding ones. This chapter of One Piece doesn't really pick up on the big cliffhanger last episode that Jack was going to shoot Zou the giant elephant with cannons and shit -- in fact, the chapter ends exactly the same way, except this time Luffy and buddies are aware of the attack... which kind of ruins the momentum somewhat. Oh well. We get a crapton of information!

Also, last week's cover chapter had Franky snow-robo town that he hung out in during the timeskip, and this week's cover chapter had those tribal people that Chopper hung out with. Damned if I remember what any of them are called, though -- I mean, it's not like they're actual properly important characters like Dracule Mihawk or Emporio Ivankov.

This chapter starts off with some 'oh, you know so-and-so too, who is connected to Gol D. Roger's crew? How quaint!' in regards to Shanks, Tom, Rayleigh and Crocus. I did love that moment where Nekomamushi is all like 'oh, yeah, Crocus was looking for this one pirate crew' and Brook just interrupts him with a very deadpan and hilarious 'that would be me. We all died.' We also get some confirmation that while Inuarashi and Nekomamushi did sail with Roger's crew (in the capacity of crew boys a la KidBuggy/KidShanks), they did not reach Raftel. What they did, though, was also sail alongside Whitebeard's crew in the Moby Dick.

Nami interrupts this bit of interconnecting with a question. What about that pre-established thing where the New World has three Log Pose routes which will converge at a point that we assumed was Raftel? Inuarashi reveals, that, well, it's not that the writer forgot about this plot point -- it's just that, well, the Straw Hats had, unbeknownst even to themselves, found a shortcut. The island at the end of the Log Pose route is supposed to reveal the existence of the Road Poneglyphs... which our heroes have learned about throughout the Zou arc. Plot progression and introdump in the same arc! At a first glance this might be similar to how Toriko is bullrushing through some of its subplots, but it's actually far better here -- the audience is far, far more invested in things like Big Mom, Sanji, Kaido, Jack, Wanokuni, the Shogun, Whitebeard Jr, Blackbeard, the Revolutionaries et cetera to really care about this bit of a plotline that everyone kinda forgot after Dressrosa, so yeah, it's a good thing that they didn't ignore it, but rather elegantly sidestepped it for a far more interesting option -- and, yes it's a fetch quest, but it's a fetch quest that involves the Yonkou.

Also, apparently Nekomamushi and Inuarashi is looking for an old acquaintance of theirs, Marco the Phoenix, a.k.a. Whitebeard's second in command. Luffy and the audience is made aware of a gigantic war that happened during the timeskip during the remnants of the Whitebeard pirates and the Blackbeard pirates, known as the Payback War... in which the big names like Marco went missing. Evidently the Whitebeard remnants are not completely destroyed, since we see Whitebeard Jr going around hunting for them, but apparently the ones that matter like Marco and Jozu and Vista are missing. The existence of a Payback War makes complete sense, because, y'know, Marco and company seem to be as hot-blooded as Ace and the rest are, so it wouldn't really make sense for them to let Blackbeard just run around becoming a Yonkou after he killed Whitebeard. 

We get some rather needless dialogue where Luffy brings... well, basically the ones that didn't go to Dressrosa off to save Sanji, which is cool. Zoro, Usopp, Franky and Robin (rather oddly since poneglyphs are involved in Big Mom's end) elect to go off with Law and the samurai to Wano. There was an annoying scene where Luffy seemed to want to defer to Kin'emon... don't ask permission from him, those are your crew members!

Then Jack attacks, of course. We get Luffy hearing the voice of someone (the elephant, no doubt). Also another point of discussion which may just be a joke is that Momonosuke claims to have met Roger himself. Everyone dismisses it as Momo making a stupid joke because of his age, but, y'know, One Piece. 

The Walking Dead S02E10 Review: For Want of a Wrench

The Walking Dead, Season 2, Episode 10: 18 Miles Out

Yeah, at this point I've kinda watched season two up to its end, but I'm just taking my time writing these reviews. I'm going to review this series at least until the end of season two -- we'll see if I continue reviewing it. It's not getting that much views, and it's far more interesting to review manga and superhero TV shows anyway for me. Not that Walking Dead isn't bad per se, I'm really enjoying it and I'm probably going to watch it up until season 6, but, well, I dunno if I'm going to continue to continue reviewing it episode by episode. I've got a lot on my plate and I'd rather continue talking about something I'm far more passionate and interested about.

Anyway, episode ten. It would be a far, far stronger episode if we didn't get the random in medias res opening that showed Shane, Rick and Randall being attacked by a swarm of zombies. It definitely dilutes the tension of the episode because we know whatever the hell happens, a zombie swarm is going to come around and we're going to see Shane in a buss and Randall crawling towards a knife. 

This episode is very neatly divided into two sub-plots. The one at the farm is, as ever, less interesting. We basically single out ever other person in the farm other than Andrea, Lori, Beth and Maggie sort of. Beth is suicidal, and we get an argument between the pro-life Lori and pro-choice Beth. There's some stupidity in the argument as Beth goes with the method of experimentation -- let Beth kill herself to see whether she really wants to kill herself -- and the fact that it actually worked instead of, y'know, Beth fucking bleeding to death... yeah, that bit was silly. I thought something along the lines of Andrea locking the two of them in the room, goading Beth to make a choice, and Beth not being able to do it would make for a far more impactful scene. Otherwise that suicide scene ended up really doing nothing for me. Also stupid is Maggie leaving Andrea to watch Beth. Seriously, Maggie? I thought you were far smarter than that.

What's far more interesting is Lori's argument with Andrea. The bit where Lori basically tells Andrea to go back and wash clothes, because 'the men have been working hard' -- yeah, T-Dog is totally a big fighter -- is obviously kind of shitty for her. Yes, Andrea's been kinda mopey since forever, she's borderline suicidal and maybe she shouldn't have left Beth and Mr. Knife to sort things out. But the thing is, Andrea's proven herself with a gun, even if it's just in front of Shane. She's not a burden to the group any more than Carol or T-Dog are. Andrea's counter-argument, mocking Lori for crashing her car, and then being absolutely (and rightfully) angry that Lori can afford to say everything's going to get better because her husband and child 'returned to life', and how she miraculously survived said car crash when Andrea lost her sister... that's some powerful moment.

But it's definitely the losing plot, because as interesting as it is, the Shane/Rick bit took priority.

We seem to have had a bit of a timeskip, considering Randall's all healed up -- enough to be limp-running away from the zombies anyway from what I thought was an amputated leg. We go straight to Shane and Rick confronting the fact that leaving Randall alive might bring his entire group down upon the farm. We get Shane and Rick confronting the revelation that Rick knew all along that Shane and Lori were fucking while he was 'dead'. The two fight it out, and there's not much to say about it other than it's brilliant. Shane's logical and pragmatic in most things, of course. He's just not really diplomatic, he's got insane tunnel-vision, and he's got this insane bit of entitlement where he thinks Lori and Carl 'belongs' to him or some bullshit like that. Whereas Rick is too much of an idealist, but he's the nice guy that's trying to do right by everyone. 

And then, y'know, the decision on whether to kill Randall turns to a fight involving a thrown wrench, and a swarm of zombie attacks! We get some awesome moments like that bit with the zombies dogpiling Rick and him shooting through one's mouth to aim at a different one, we've got Shane holding off an entire horde with a school bus's door... and really there's no predicting what's going to happen when Rick decides to bugger off with Randall. Considering Shane just tried to kill him, it could very well be the straw that breaks the camel's back and Rick decides to leave Shane at the mercy of the zombies (and Shane might survive even then) but considering this is Rick, who's perfectly willing to let loose someone who tried to kill him last episode... and, y'know, Rick ended up helping Shane with that utterly awesome car-vs-zombie action.

So yeah, Shane and Rick's conflict is great this episode. The suicide subplot is entirely uneven and went in all directions and didn't really feel satisfying, though, which brings this episode down somewhat. 

The Walking Dead S02E09 Review: Apocalyptic Amputation

The Walking Dead, Season 2, Episode 9: Triggerfinger

A bit of an uneven episode. The first half of this episode as just pure adrenaline, whether it was Lori's struggles with the car window zombie (who had a spectacular makeup job, by the way), or the tense shoot-off between Team Rick with the buddies of the two bar douchebags. Of course they're going to avenge their dead buddies, wouldn't you? One of them ends up falling and eaten by walkers, and the other is left behind with a spike stabbed through his leg, and Rick and Hershel, nice people that they are, amputated Randall, blindfolded him and brought him back to the farm. Stupidity? Yeah, as Shane pointed out, it's stupid to think that this won't end well for the rest of their small community.

We get some rather human moments as Glenn is just panicky and froze up at one point during the action, Hershel just going all 'too hell with it' and slicing the dude's leg off, Shane telling a determined Lori that 'Rick is back' in order to stop the pregnant woman from going all Resident Evil single-player mode... and then Shane just had to keep talking on and on and insisting that Lori and Shane had a 'thing' despite solid rebuffs from Lori. And their affair isn't even a secret anymore to Rick, so Shane doesn't have that wall to hide behind. And as Lori notes to Rick, and how Shane doesn't give a shit about Dale or Hershel, and how Shane lied to her this episode... Shane is unstable. He's the only pragmatic one in the group, but he's a borderline psychopath and he needs to go. This, plus the whole Randall thing, seems to be building up to a decent conflict. We'll see where this goes from there.

Daryl and Carol have a bit of an argument that's just honestly whatever. Glenn also had an idiotic argument with Maggie. Blaming the girl's love confession for you freezing up? Man, Glenn, and before this you were cool.

A bit of a shorter review, but then there really isn't much to say. A couple of action scenes (shot in the dark which is realistic and all but makes telling the action kinda hard at times) that resolve themselves, while building up for potentially larger ones. 

Legends of Tomorrow S01E07 Review: The IQ of Meat

Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1, Episode 7: Marooned

I honestly didn't think that Legends of Tomorrow would have time for too much filler episodes, but we had two in a row. Last episode just had a really cool cameo and backstory with the whole future Arrow thing. This one is just, well, Team Legends fighting Space Pirates in something that felt like it is one of the most basic filler plot in Star Trek or whatever.

The whole pirate takeover plot is really quite boring and basic. Jon Valor is a hammy enough villain and it had a sense of fun futuristic sci-fi feel that the previous 'time travelers in the past' couldn't quite muster, but again it's very basic. Add that to the still-irritating-but-not-quite-painful attempts at giving Ray and Kendra a romance (which actually panned out this episode?) is a very distracting and time consuming side plot.

It's just a little springboard to give Rip Hunter some backstory, though I am unconvinced that we needed a whole episode for this and couldn't have fit this in place of the high school teen drama on a spaceship we had last episode. Rip's backstory is interesting, of course. We see that his wife, Miranda, used to be a Time Master as well, and their affair led to Miranda sacrificing her career in the name of love. It helps to build Miranda up as an actual person we care about instead of her just being 'Rip's wife. Who died.' and nothing else. 

The other big focus is on Heat Wave, who I don't think would really get this much focus, but we build up on the friction between Rory and Snart that we got last episode. It doesn't matter, really, that the trigger for their conflict is really trivial -- Rory's just dumb enough to want to hang out with the biker gang of the future -- but Snart punching Rory at the end of the last episode, and how Snart overrode their original 'we're in it for the money' for Snart warming up to heroism and saving the world... Rory taking some time away from Snart really helped to kinda flesh the conflict out a bit, and it's Rip's stupid speech about how Rory's only brought along because he and Snart were a package deal and the 'IQ of meat' line finally tipped the scales.

I mean, it's not like Captain Cold and Heat Wave are joined at the hip -- we've seen Cold work with only his sister or with random goons in the Flash several times -- but it's a damning line that finally broke Heat Wave. And I really liked how we are never really sure whether Mick Rory has just gone to the dark side or is just doing some pretending-to-be-a-bad-guy-to-get-an-advantage thing to doublecross the pirates... and up to that moment when Heat Wave shows up on the Waverider with an army of pirates I was still half-expecting Heat Wave and Captain Cold to share a knowing nod and be all like 'yeah we just pulled a fast one over them' and then take out the goons. But no.

I am, of course, unconvinced that Captain Cold would kill Heat Wave, but it's a nice little cliffhanger and we don't find out what happened to poor Rory until next episode. 

We get some nice moments with Stein wanting to be space ranger (and actually beating a pirate goon the fuck up off-screen) and Sara sharing to Snart about the feeling of having died once, but overall the focus is still on Rip and the Rogues. There's a nice little speech as Cold tells Sara about his first meeting with Mick Rory as well. 

Also I kinda liked the free-for-all action scene on the corridors of the Waverider and Acheron in the climax. It's just a fun romp of an action scenes.

Alas, with Rip being the catalyst for Mick Rory's turn, and how he's just the biggest idiot in charging straight into the Acheron while everyone smells a trap, and for the umpteenth time separates Jax and Stein and renders Firestorm inert for a really good chunk of the episode, and generally is incompetent -- it's Stein and Gideon that really saved them all from being taken out by the pirates. Add that to several questionable decisions from past episodes, and I honestly think that this version of Rip Hunter might not be all that he's cracked up to be. 

It's still quite in the middling grounds, where I really like the good parts of the episode (Snart, Rory, Rip's backstory, the action scenes) but the weaker parts (filler villains, Rip's incompetence, weak romance scenes, inconsistent time travel rules) still dominate the episode enough to make this not quite as good as it could've been. 

The DC Easter-Egg Column:

A couple fun and real obscure ones that I had to do some research in this episode:

• Eve Baxter, the Time Master that Team Legends rescues, shares her last name with Bonnie Baxter from the comics, who is Rip Hunter's love interest as opposed to Miranda Coburn in this continuity. 
• Jon Valor is otherwise known as the 'Black Pirate' in the DC comics, is an actual seafaring pirate from the 16th Century (as opposed to a space time pirate) who was involved in a couple of time-travel capers and his ghost would be a supporting character for one of the many Starmen. His comic-book counterpart is a fair bit more heroic than his live-action version.
• The code phrases that Rip uses to give Gideon commands are all based on Superman enemies (because Brandon Routh), and Rip also implies very strongly that these are actual threats out there. 'Imperiex Onslaught' is a reference to Imperiex and the Our Worlds at War crossover event. Kanjar Ro, likewise, is an alien villain that tangles with Superman a lot of times.
• The comic book that Stein reads, Rick Starr, is a somewhat obscure and old DC comic who I don't think is a part of the main universe.
• Acheron, the name of Eve's timeship, is the name of one of the rivers of hell from Greek mythology, but since we're talking about DC comics, Acheron is a minor demon enemy that fought Nightwing one time.

One Piece 819 Review: Jack is Back

One Piece, Chapter 819: Momonosuke Heir to the Kouzuki Clan

A huge chunk of the chapter is just telling us how the Minks and the Samurai want to fight back against Kaidou and the Shogun (who is either working together or forced to work for Kaidou). We get this moment where Luffy and Momonosuke forms an alliance, with Momonosuke finally growing out of the 'kid prince crybaby' theme that he's been portrayed as for a while. Don't care for Momo that much, but it's a nice scene nonetheless. Also, another big ally for Luffy.

I do love how throughout all this Law is miffed at how everyone just assumes he's going to help out with the big Pirate-Mink-Ninja alliance. 

Luffy's main priority at the point is still saving Sanji from Big Mom, though, so it's nice that that particular plot point -- which I'm frankly more interested in compared to all the Mink and Wanokuni stuff, simply because of how out of focus Sanji has been over the past year -- is being addressed.

And then Jack shows up with a massive fleet, Sheepshead is flayed apparently, and he just wants to launch a barrage to kill the giant elephant Zou itself. Well, we're going to deal with Jack sooner than I thought, after all! And here I was, thinking that Zou is just going to be an introdump and flashback arc... and, well, as awesome as Jack has been built up, it wouldn't be too remiss to have him fall to the newly-minted Pirate-Ninja-Mink alliance right now, especially with a good amount of powerhouses on the island right now -- if nothing else, Luffy, Zoro and Law would give Jack a fair amount of run for his money.

The only real bad thing from this chapter is that in dealing with Jack -- which I hope takes a while -- we're delaying Sanji's arc. But it's not a delay I really have a problem with.

The Walking Dead S02E08 Review: Bar Fight

The Walking Dead, Season 2, Episode 8: Nebraska

Definitely a slower episode than before, but despite this episode reverting back to being in "Talking Dead" form, it's a far stronger episode than the pre-barn ones. We get a fair amount of character moment as everyone just breaks down. Hershel has gone full broken as he just heads off to town and goes drinking and just utterly gives up hope in a nice broken speech. Carol likewise gives up hope, but goes around ripping apart the Cherokee roses. Carl is just sad but notes the necessity of Rick's actions. Daryl just sulks and refuses to help. Beth goes into a coma because fuck you that's why. Andrea and T-Dog don't like what they did, but recognize the necessity of it.

We get the requisite 'nope, the idealists are wrong' scene with Beth being attacked by her zombie mother, we get a funeral, we get Shane getting totally angry at a grieving Hershel for apparently keeping zombie!Sophia a secret and then at Rick for not seeing sense. Again, Shane does make good arguments but to answer his question -- he acts like such a gigantic ass to everyone that it's hard to get behind him. Charisma is as important as wisdom sometimes, in D&D terms. Dale, for one, is totally against Shane and I think a confrontation between the two with the gun on Shane's hands instead of Dale's won't be far off.

We also get a long discussion of hopelessness, an extension of Lori's "why we shouldn't bring a new lief into this crapshit world" argument a while back. It's a valid enough response, since, well, what are they going to do? There really isn't an objective, with there being no cure, no real sanctuary, zombies everywhere, people dying left and right, and even necessities like food, fuel and medicine will run out in time.

I am still confused of the timeline of events of episode one... how did Sophia have all the time to drop her doll, hide in that house that Daryl found, leave all her tracks, get bitten, have the time to get a fever and transform into a zombie, wrangled by Otis into the barn... all in the scope of time of the first episode? And honestly how did Maggie, Beth and whoever else was feeding crippled chickens not notice that their little zombie farm has a new addition -- a little girl, too, which would be quite distinct among a bunch of adults?

With that plot thread closed and buried (literally), though, what's next? I don't care that much about Beth's fever because, well, I don't even know she had a name until this episode. Lori went and got herself in a car accident which came out of nowhere and is utterly dumb -- Rick and Glenn were already going into town to bring Hershel back, is another voice really going to matter? Must be all the pregnancy hormones.

The main scene in this episode is the encounter with the two doucheholes that showed up in the bar. We get even more hope-dashing as Fort Benning is overrun with 'lamebrains', and after some discussion about the rumours on safe places, they decide they want to go with Team Rick back to the farm and generally be unpleasant. It's hard to really fault them for wanting to go all the way to survive, but pointing a gun? Good thing Rick has cowboy skills, and murders the two of them. In cold blood? In self-defense? It's definitely scarier and far more brutal than killing the barn zombies. Would Hershel drive Rick off the farm too in addition to insisting Shane leave?

Overall it's more talky scenes, but at least we have something different beyond "should we continue the search for Sophia".

Legends of Tomorrow S01E06 Review: Post Apocalyptic Bars, Bearded Green Arrow & High School Love Life

Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1, Episode 6: Star City 2046

Trying to get back into superhero shows! Let's catch up with these shows one by one. Legends of Tomorrow first, then Flash, Arrow and Agent Carter in that order.

The previous five episodes of Legends of Tomorrow have been sorely rooted in set pieces in the past, and this is the first episode to really explore the sci-fi time travel timey wimey concept and strand our heroes in Star City of 2046. There has been a crapton of DC-comics themed apocalyptic future stories featuring a successor to one of DC's big names. The Dark Knight Returns and Batman Beyond are probably two of the most well-known ones, though I know there are a lot more out there. And that's not to mention people who travel from the future to the past like your Reverse-Flashes and Abra Kadabras. So it's really exciting to have this episode travel to the future, a nice change of pace from the 'let's try our best not to change the past' vibe we've been having throughout the past five episodes. Even if the show and Team Legends flagrantly disobey and detonate nuclear bombs here and there.

The black Green Arrow that appeared in the final scene of the previous episode is, as everyone expected, the CW-universe version of Connor Hawke, a.k.a. Green Arrow II, who took up the mantle of Green Arrow after Oliver's death (disappearance here). Now beyond the fact that Connor is the successor to the Green Arrow name, he really has not much in common with his comic-book counterpart. This version of Connor Hawke is really John Diggle Jr, a character which in present-day Arrow hasn't existed yet unless Lyla is (or will be) pregnant with a second baby we don't know of. Diggle Sr has apparently perished, and a gigantic uprising led by a new Deathstroke -- Grant Wilson, Slade Wilson's son -- basically tore down Star City into, well, a post-apocalyptic gang-ruled wasteland. We get hints of what happened, with some hints telling us that John Diggle died in the battle, Oliver's identity was outed and the Arrowcave attacked by an army, a repeat of the whole Mirakuru soldier uprising but far more successful...

Neither Connor nor Grant really had a chance to really shine with so many characters thrown into the mix, including an old, one-armed (but finally bearded!) Oliver Queen. Connor's got a couple of interesting lines, but is mostly a good-hearted if rather bland successor. He's likeable and that's about what you expect from the limited screentime the dude's got. Grant Wilson is basically, well, a generic psychopathic villain, who, while entertaining enough as a standalone villain, isn't really up to par with Arrow's Slade Wilson. It's your standard 'recruit the retired hero' affair with Oliver Queen, and Sara gets the spotlight as she chooses to fight for this future despite Rip insisting that this future is only a 'possible' one. 

I think that the shop's disregard of the whole 'damage to the timeline' thing is one of the biggest weakness, story-telling wise. It's all well and good and dramatic to, say, leave behind the Russian prison after killing the metahuman scientist and blowing up what amounts to a nuclear bomb, but are you seriously telling me that didn't leave a gigantic impact on history when episode two demonstrates that the innocuous act of talking to young Martin Stein for ten minutes very nearly annulled Stein's wedding had Rip Hunter not intervened?

And Rip somehow insisting that this particular future is not set in stone and hasn't settled down or whatever yet just sounds hollow in the face of Rip's own crusade to reverse the future where Vandal Savage kills his family. It's just odd... which futures are set in stone, and which aren't? I wished they took some time to really think out the rules of time travel and altering the timeline, instead of just bending the rules as they see fit. 

Another weakness of this episode, really, is how little Connor, Old!Oliver and Grant's relationships are established. We get hints here and there, but we don't really see them develop. I wished we had cut the inanely long and pointless high school drama on a spaceship bullshit with Jax, Ray, Kendra and Stein. While it's adorable to see Stein flip out thanks to his mental connection with Jax, and Stein absolutely failing to be an intel-gathering wingman... does anyone really want to see this as opposed to some development on this interesting future-Arrow setting in 2046? It's the same complaints I had with the Earth-2 two-parter from the Flash, except that we're almost certain to get some more information about Earth-2. Not so regarding this future Star City. 

And it's not like placing Jax, Ray and Kendra in a romantic triangle works at all. It isn't as random or egregious as Jay/Caitlin from the Flash, but romance only works if it's a natural extension of the characters' relationships, and there is none of that here. There is no prior romantic or attraction relationship between Jax and Kendra, or Ray and Kendra, unless you count Ray running around in Kendra's bloodstream zapping chunks of daggers as romantic. And the fact that Cisco is not mentioned, and several other characters acknowledge that Kendra is fresh off Carter's death turns this whole plot point into a tasteless affair.

Honestly, Ray's a big missed opportunity. You'd think he would be as emotional as Sara in seeing future Star City fucked up like it was, but he's far more concerned about the stupid high school plotline.

Meanwhile, while Sara is dealing throughout the episode with her 'I NEED TO SAVE MY FRIENDS DESPITE THIS BEING THE FUTURE' plotline which is... serviceable, if a bit dumb, Rip goes on with yet another variation of 'okay I'm done with you selfish fellows who don't listen to proper orders' and threatens to leave Sara stranded in 2046... despite him tottering about the importance of not messing with the timeline. Yeah.

Captain Cold and Heat Wave provide some much-needed fun. I thought Heat Wave randomly really, really wanting to be the gang boss of a motorcycle gang in a post-apocalyptic city is a bit odd and came out of nowhere, and it really could've used some buildup how much Heat Wave loved the anarchy and chaos that has enveloped future Star City... but the resulting drama, where Heat Wave gives in to his baser instinct whereas Captain Cold tries and fails to justify his newfound heroism with excuses of striking big and pride and whatnot is certainly entertaining. It's nice to see Heat Wave being developed as a character, and more importantly, to see Captain Cold and Heat Wave have a wedge driven in between them in ways that I don't think have received page-time in the comics. 

On the other side, though, it's a nice little break from the over-arching Vandal Savage plot, and neither Savage nor Chronos make an appearance here. The crisis is wholly limited to the future Arrow story, and it already feels lacking without having even more elements tacked onto it. Despite all my rantings, this episode is honestly really quite entertaining to watch, and once you get over the fact that Legends of Tomorrow prefers to sacrifice big logic questions regarding time travel in favour of a more entertaining episode-by-episode plot, it's a far more enjoyable show. As it is, it's a really fun trip-to-the-future in regards to the Arrow show, whilst expanding several characters -- most namely the Rogues. 

The DC Easter Egg Column:

Well, naturally there's a couple of Easter Eggs in this future Star City, and like the Earth-2 episodes it's easier to list them instead of awkwardly working them into prose.

• Connor Hawke, in the comics, was actually the son of Oliver Queen, who took up the mantle of Green Arrow after Oliver's death. While Oliver does have a son in Arrow, the show has chosen to take a different route with Oliver's son being a successor of the Green Arrow mantle.
• Grant Wilson is the name of one of Slade's sons from the comics, otherwise known as the first villain to bear the name Ravager, which, like Grant Wilson here, dons a predominantly gray variant of Slade's Deathstroke costume. (The Arrowverse already had a version of Ravager with Isabel Rochev in Arrow's second season) Grant Wilson is honestly short-lived and died really quickly in one of the earlier issues of the first Teen Titans comic, and was more of a plot device to drive Slade and his other children on. 
• Oliver Queen missing an arm is reminiscent of what Future Oliver Queen looks like in The Dark Knight Returns. In the comics, present-day Roy Harper also has lost an arm courtesy of the villain Prometheus and replaced it with a bionic one. 
• Mick quotes Heath Ledger's Joker in his "I want to see the world burn" line. 
• A little internal reference is that Grant Wilson was defeated in the same way that Slade did at the climax of Arrow's second season -- with a bola arrow. 

One Piece 818 Review: X Marks Tha Spot

One Piece, Chapter 818: Within the Whale

I am so so so sorry, but real life is being a bitch. And while reading manga is easy enough on a phone, typing reviews is another thing especially when you're on a job with insane hours like mine. And I haven't watched a lot of last week's superhero TV shows, let alone this week's. So forgive me if these set of reviews are a bit shorter than the normal size.

A mega-Tokyo-Ghoul-RE review for the bombshells that are chapters 66 and 67 are coming tomorrow or the day after. Hopefully.

But here, have the Shonen Jump big three in bite-size format.

We get more Mink/Wano stuff revealed here and there, and holy shit Raizou's head is massive. Again, while the revelations and the tie-ins that the Wano and Mink tribes have gone so far back ago in time I've always found it rather difficult to really care about the Wano-kuni kingdom, even with the relevance they stuff into the Wano thing... so of course they drop two gigantic bombshells into it, two of which form the cliffhanger for this chapter. Namely, that Oden Kouzuki, Momonosuke's father and the apparently-late daimyo, was a member of Gol D. Roger's crew. And that Wanokuni is now under Kaidou's control.

And more importantly is more discussion about the endgame, and how the Straw Hats are supposed to find Raftel. There are four red poneglyphs, these 'Road Poneglyphs', which point to four locations. The point formed by the 'X' created by drawing these four locations on a map marks Raftel, all pirate treasure style. And, of course, while one of them is at Zou, the other two are on the hands of Big Mom and Kaidou, so we have an idea of what the endgame for the whole Yonkou/Raftel thing will be. That's another great tie-in, and tying in even more to make the Wano stuff relevant is that the Kouzuki clan are descended from the carvers that made the poneglyphs in the first place.

So yeah, good way to make the Yonkou and the big One Piece/Roger myth arcs all intertwine smoothly, and a great way to make Wanokuni relevant. I think despite the lack of action or big character moments aside from Sanji, the Zou arc has been the best at just dropping a crapton of new developments as far as the big myth plot arc goes. 

The Walking Dead S02E07 Review: They Found Sophia!

The Walking Dead, Season 2, Episode 7: Pretty Much Dead Already

Well that was gutwrenchingly depressing. It's a great moment for the show, that's for sure, a real emotional blow, and one that really hit the heroes in a way that this show has been able to excel at -- the simple feeling of just losing everything. After six episodes of Rick and Daryl building up hope at finding Sophia, after six episodes of slight clues and putting others in danger... Sophia has been dead all along, stuffed with the other zombies inside Hershel's barn. Dealing with Hershel's zombie barn alone seemed to be the focus of the episode, and I honestly didn't think we were going to see Sophia addressed at all. And the barn plot itself was great in and of itself... the additional bombshell of Sophia having died and zombified is just an additional WTF moment and a big gamechanger. 

And for all his bluster and all his far-too-happy-than-appropriate wanton shooting at the barn zombies (in front of their families, I might add), Shane's too much of a pussy to pull the trigger on Sophia, leading Rick to calmly just walk up and do the deed in what is one of the most memorable and strongest scenes of this series so far. Yes, it's a sucker punch, but man, what a sucker punch. It's a real strong showing that, hey, not even child characters are immune to death and horrific zombification. Or off-screen deaths. 

Shane's also a gigantic dick this episode, isn't he? I mean, yes, he's voting for pragmatism. That could be the right thing to do, even, abandoning a lost cause -- heartless as it sounds -- for survival. Forcing their right to bear arms and shoot the zombies dead in name of survival. But he didn't have to be such a huge dick about it. Picking a fight with Daryl and calling him a methed up piece of shit shit, when all Daryl wanted was to find Sophia? All but threatening to kill Dale if he tries anything funny? Confronting Lori about him being the son's father despite Lori's feelings about Rick vs Shane being clear as day? Breaking down the barn gates like a madman to execute all the zombies inside in front of Hershel -- who still views his wife and stepson as alive but sick? Callously shooting the zombie that Hershel was wrangling in the chest and stomach, and then headshotting it... okay, that bit was cool. But that is one cool moment among many assholish moments, and it's hard, really, for me to like Shane at all. Especially after that jackass confrontation with Dale. A great scene, to be sure, for both characters, but still, it doesn't do Shane any favours. 

But evidently some people in the group do admire Shane's style of leadership. Last episode we've got people training with guns with Shane, and Andrea definitely prefers Shane to Rick. If there should be a rift between Rick and Shane...

Though really, I do see the point of Shane rallying up the others to mercy-kill the zombies before they eventually break loose and murder everyone in the farm. And, well, when Hershel is recruiting Rick to wrangle up two zombies from the swamp to the barn, that's just, well, insane and I can't blame Shane for going really off the rocker at this point. Breaking the door open instead of leading Daryl, Andrea and Glenn to the second level and doing the deed from there would definitely be the better choice, really. 

Speaking of Glenn, he's got a lot more mileage this episode. Yes, the focus was more on Shane, Rick and Dale, but Glenn gets a fair amount of great moments with Maggie, a nice little buildup to being an official couple, and how their actions are mostly built upon not wanting the other person to be hurt. Also, Glenn got an egg hat this episode. That was funny.

But still, definitely a great episode. Not only for the big Sophia twist, but for everything involving the barn. Now I just wonder why no one in the Greene household mentioned the fact that they have Sophia in their freaking barn when they have been so hectic about finding the little girl... and the general fallout from this is going to be a big game-changer. Good, because this show really needs a kick to the arse to move forward.