Kareny

Beautiful and haunting so far. I know there's probably no direct connection to Brit and Zal's The OA, but the "O A" graphics during the film linking Darby to Lee had to be deliberate. Zoomer is almost 6... and it's been 6 years since the events of The Silver Doe? The title seems to give it away that the death was a murder, but something tells me there's a lot more at play here. Glad we've got a few weeks to work through it - very much looking forward to the rest of this journey.

That's Rachel Brosnahan's real-life husband (Jason Ralph), so I think that's a good bet - surely they wouldn't have cast him in a throwaway role that never interacts with her.

To me, the thing that gets lost in all of this back and forth and comparing of facts and narratives, is that if you believe Dylan (which I do, and I think at this point anyone looking at the evidence objectively would have to), one thing is explicitly clear: Woody is lying, and has gone to great lengths to do so for years. He knows exactly what happened in the attic that day, same as she does, and yet he's ruined lives and relationships and careers just to keep lying and acting innocent. He was there. He knows exactly what he did. He's not an idiot. There's no way around it. You can't separate that from the art at this point.

If they were past the sourdough phase of the pandemic, every single one of those staffers should have had a surgical mask on. I know they're trying to make it watchable, but I can't watch without cringing at the poor and unrealistic infection control. "I assume the Go Team tested negative?" Even if they did, you still mask them in a hospital! Have these people never heard of asymptomatic carriers and poor PCR results? It's like they're all screenwriters and not healthcare workers or something...

Maryssa is free! Hallelujah. Two down, two to go.

I can only imagine how Maryssa feels. This is terrifying to follow from afar. This is going to end badly. I just hope that the kids aren't involved when it does.

Oh my god, f*ck her.

Yes, but David... most of them will pass.

I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt that maybe something was happening behind the scenes to manage the crazy, but it's been days. Just canceled my DVR series pass for this show. I'm out. It's gone from guilty pleasure train wreck to actually sickening. This is no longer entertaining, MTV.

I don't know why She swallowed the fly...

Ooh! I'll play. I think "University" was NYU - I can't remember the context, but they implied it was a private hospital associated with their public one, which would match for NYU/Bellevue. Based on that, I think "Baptist" is Presby, and Mount Zion is Sinai.

Funny enough, it's exactly the direction I expected from what was set up in those last few scenes of Part I. But seeing the characters reacting to it is better than I could have imagined. Can't wait to see the whole thing. Warning: There are lots of spoilers in the trailer, so if you don't want a lot of hints about the mythology and major changes for the characters - wait til March 22.

Okay, so, seems like Ophiuchus is most likely a separate character possessing Isobel. (Makes sense - the “fraudulent zodiac”, the thing that’s a part of them but still on the outside. Yep, I’m with them on this one.) Wonder if we’ve also seen them by another face... like maybe Wyatt, when he went off the rails? Or Noah, when he was hunting for Isobel? If Noah was Ophiuchus, that would be pretty messed up. Anyway, the “where is Ophiuchus” story is gearing up to have shades of Nasedo, but I’m already confident they’re going to do it better here. The de-aging wasn’t too distracting, and they nailed it with Michael. Baby Guerin was so huggable, you really can’t blame Alex.

I've been binging some of the old series on Hulu for the first time in years. Aside from missing the original music (stupid rights issues), in watching it again after so much time, it's clear that they plain ran out of story once they started having to answer actual questions. Once Tess shows up and the Smallville rip-off origin story kicks in and the writers start humoring the actors (oy), it's all downhill, with a few great character moments in between. RIP to Liz Parker's journal. That's what makes me so excited for this new retelling - the layers of mystery they've added like "who killed Rosa?" and "what happened to Michael's hand?" and "who is Ophiuchus?" and "what exactly is the military building on Foster Ranch?" and "why is Isobel blacking out?" and "what the hell with that creepy basement in Alex's cabin?" all are going to take time to answer, and that's time that can expand the story and not have to rely on cheap payoffs just to move episodes forward (i.e. "she's not Nasedo - OMG THERE WAS A FOURTH POD ALIEN!"). Getting to the actual origins of the aliens is naturally going to take longer this time around, which is perfect - it gives them more time to build and develop the explosive relationships between the characters, which is what always made this franchise work, and they aren't shying away from that element at all (helloooo, Malex).

One thing I'm reflecting on now that I've had a couple days to digest is this complicated dynamic between Alex, Kyle, and their dads. There's a clear consensus between them that Kyle's dad was the good one while Alex's was not, but you have Kyle's dad reaching out and being a father figure to Alex, and Alex's dad we know has been trying to loop Kyle into the alien investigation. It's like a weird father-son love rhombus and it definitely creates an interesting dynamic.

Ooh. Good theory. I'm convinced. OG viewers are primed to think Noah is a good guy because of Jesse, but he's no Adam Rodriguez, and he is a little too perfect to be true, what with all that sappy Land Before Time stuff and bringing her brothers coffee in the desert. Plus, he was just so calm with his search. Yep, Noah's definitely evil. I also expect that Izzy's history of blackouts will turn out to be about someone else (Noah? his allies?) controlling her alien powers for their own benefit. Leave it to Michael and Max to shoot themselves in the foot with their own paranoia and jumping to conclusions. I wonder when Noah came on the scene? Before or after high school?

Oh! Oh yeah! Hold up! Everything was going so fast I almost forgot this one: So, Kyle and Liz, who still hook up for funsies from time to time... share a half-sister? Yikes. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but...

I loved the Kyle/Alex stuff. The original series really took a long time to get around to bringing those two characters together, but it was so fantastic when they did. I like the fact that they're going more directly for that dynamic, and this new backstory with them being former besties and Valenti's mentorship of Alex when his father rejected him is great, great angsty Roswell stuff. This is truly the best Roswell fanfic ever - these vaguely recognizable beloved characters, but with heightened stakes and beautiful new actors. I'm eagerly looking forward to every new episode. Leave it to Max and Michael to be saving Izzy from herself. Also classic Roswell.

This is what made Original Flavor Roswell work, when it did - melodramatic aliens bringing the big feels. Not the details, not the high school genre, and definitely not the Antar/Kivar/Royal Four crap storylines. Sexy aliens who are emotionally overinvested in their relationships. YES. They're getting that part right. I just realized this week that Isabel is played by Christine Baranski's daughter, and now I can't unsee it.

No Kivar? I see no downside to this. I want to go back and reread the original books to refresh my memory - I still own them all, plus all the tie-in novels. Are they even still in print? (Or will they now be again, with this show coming out now?)

Of course that's a thing.

Still really loving this strange Roswell fanfic we're getting twenty years after the fact, especially the Michael/Alex shipping. I mean, who ever thought of that? Did they even have a shipper name back in the heyday? I feel like there were shipper names for everything back then - the fantasy threesomes had pages of shipper names, for god's sakes - but I can't remember Michael and Alex ever having a shipper name. Well, apparently they had a fandom, and it's the writing team for this new series. I'll take it, only because the actors have such great chemistry and I'm dying to know more about their backstory. RIP to my Candy heart (though, is there a shipper name for Michael/Alex/Maria as a threesome? Serious question.) There's also still enough of the original flavor Roswell to find here, between Michael and Isabel teaming up to keep Max in check, the Maria-Alex-Liz trio teaming up again, and lots of hot alien sex, which is apparently a lot safer now than it was back when it was on the WB. The added menace of Rosa's backstory and the more realistic threats to Liz's father are nice touches for upping the stakes. Overall, I said this elsewhere, but it's true - putting all fond memories aside, so far, objectively, this show is off to a much better start than WB Roswell. They seem to actually know where they're going, so hopefully we won't end up with exploding skin aliens again this time around and can actually get some consistent character development. Anyway. I'm stockpiling my nail polish remover bottles now - CW, don't you even think about canceling this.

On the more practical side, remember back in the day, how all the fans mailed Tabasco sauce bottles to the WB to save Roswell from cancellation? The showrunners are planning ahead this time. Either the series gets picked up, or they get a free lifetime supply of acetone, thanks to the anxious fans. It's a win-win situation! I'll start stockpiling my bottles now.

Wait, I'm not the only one with this theory??

I'm watching this a second time. God help me. Twenty years later, why do these horny, paranoid aliens still get to me so much? We need to be real about the fact that OG Roswell had one good season, and a lot of ups and downs afterwards. I think this reboot has a lot of potential. Even with the changes, a lot of things feel familiar, the Max/Liz connection feels even deeper and higher stakes, and Max is the same old asshole he always was. Even more so now that he has a big(ger), deep(er) dark(er) secret. Could the "voices" that Rosa and Mama Ortecho heard be alien-related? That would definitely elevate the stakes. Another bit that I think has flown under the radar is when Liz comments about Max wanting to be a writer and he looks surprised - "You remember that?" It seems like a throwaway, but could be significant given her memory wipe and the clues that she and Max had a closer relationship before the memory wipe. Like others have said, this could have been a fanfic back in the OG Roswell days, but it's just different enough, and the actors and writing seem skilled enough, that it justifies the reboot. There better be enough of an audience to sustain this on the CW now, because I'm dying to know where they're going with it. The original had wonderful characters, but abysmal plotting - let's be real - and so far this one feels like higher quality overall, at least to start out with. Dare I say they might even be able to do a better job with the source material? I hope I'm right.