Black Lightning, Season 2, Episode 3: Master Lowry
(Okay, I'm not going to type the whole ridiculously long title out in these things. It's tiring.)
And speaking of which, this episode is... it's not that great. It's not bad, by any means, but it's easily an episode that sort of jumps all over the place with its pacing, especially the back half of this episode. There are many subplots that happen in this episode -- Jefferson Pierce dealing with the kinda-douchey new princpal (but not really, it's just setup); Jefferson Pierce and Henderson trying to make up (but not really, they're still tsundere); a confrontation between Black Lightning and Painkiller (but not really, they just kind of talk a bit); Anissa still going around stealing stuff and this time teaming up with Gambi; Lynn being introduced to the possibly-psychotic dr. Jace; Jennifer suddenly going into an impromptu therapy session with a mind-reading metahuman we've never seen before; and Tobias Whale getting randomly arrested at the end of the episode without much buildup or warning.
Sure, that Tobias thing is probably just all part of his plan or something, all Loki-like, but the rest of the episode just feels bizarrely paced. A lot of the scenes seem to be just... events happening without any real sense of importance beyond the episode waving them in our faces and going "THIS IS IMPORTANT PAY ATTENTION". Like the principal or Lynn's new psycho-doctor coworker. It's like they want to show that things are happening, but don't want to overplay their hand. Which is sometimes a great literary tool in serialized writing... but only if the episode had a bigger plot that all of these smaller plotlines can piggyback on. And I don't really think this episode has that -- the characters just sort of jump around minor subplots in a bizarre montage of subplots that the show knows it's important to show, but not much else.
Like, the scenes are acted well, but at the same time, a lot of them are scenes we've seen before, and it's bizarre why this episode seem to want to cram so much yet tell so little. An entire episode could've been made out of focusing around Khalil while the Pierce family drama plays in the background. But no, Khalil gets put through the same "jump from one scene to the next" treatment as the rest of the character. Or maybe it's Jennifer with her parents randomly bringing in this random Charles-Xavier-esque therapist lady... but even that is treated as an afterthought, with Perina being introduced quite literally out of nowhere and having zero personality or characterization.
Overall, a pretty weak episode of Black Lightning, honestly, messy and cluttered. I don't mind an episode made up of smaller sub-plots, but none of the ones that take place in this episode are individually engaging enough to make me really care. No doubt new principal Lowry and dr. Psycho or whoever Lynn's new coworker is called are going to be huge players down the line, but this is a pretty poor attempt at introducing them.
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