wilnil

Yeah, as the episode went on, I became more and more convinced that Meek Howard's world isn't ours -- either that or his agency got all of its tech budget at its founding and is still running on that original equipment, including honest-to-god reel-to-reel tape recorders. But it's occurred to me that there's nothing to guarantee that either world is "ours." Howard "Prime's" world sounds like it's more politically & internationally unstable than ours. (The closed captions labeled Badass Howard as "Prime," and so does the show's website; I don't know if that might be a clue that his world is supposed to be the "real" one from our perspective.)

Yeah, that was a really convenient time to discover he could do that. Thing is, though, I'd figured Barry's connection to the speed force must somehow extend to protect the people he's trying to save; otherwise every time he yanked someone out of danger and sped off to deposit the person on the sidewalk, it would be a race to see whether the person would be killed by whiplash-induced broken neck or by the general crushing G-force from Barry's 0-to-400-in-half-a-second acceleration. So for that moment of rescue, we have to assume the would-be victim's body is sped up to match Barry. (At least if the show still wants to have some nodding acquaintance with the laws of physics.)

I'm already forgetting many of the details of the Season 1 finale, but IIRC, after Non's plan for world domination was thwarted, the Kryptonians and their allies among the prisoners reboarded the ship and went into suspended animation, with the new plan being to use some gizmo on board to wipe out humanity in revenge then fly off to another world where they'd be more appreciated. Supergirl and Jonn defeat Non, then she single-handedly lifts the ship into space to get the deadly gizmo out of range.

A couple of people have already suggested that a committee would be the most appropriately hellish supervisor for the Bad Place, but that might actually be the answer. IIRC, when Shawn is delivering his news at the beginning of the episode, he says that he himself is going to be promoted to the "High Council" or something like that.

This is definitely the season of Blowing Up Storyline Premises. Remember before the season premiere when a lot of us thought Michael's first reboot would occupy much (if not all) of this season? Instead, we had 802 reboots by the end of 2.03, Michael throwing in with Team Cockroach, Vicki's coup, now the official (and officially "successful") end of Michael's grand experiment, plus whatever's going to happen once Shawn and co. get wherever they're going and start to wonder what really happened. We definitely can't accuse Schur and his team of coasting here -- and it's a refreshing change from the average series.

A sad announcement I should make here as probably the most appropriate place (if there's anyplace appropriate for something like this): My mother, a dedicated TAR fan who posted on Previously as Sayla Vee and on other forums over the years as MaddieG, died a couple weeks ago at age 80 of respiratory complications. She was really looking forward to the TAR season premiering tonight -- and would've been happy that CBS is kicking it off in the Survivor time slot (she always insisted the network should've dedicated the same hour of its schedule for alternating seasons of the two shows).

This. I used to work in an office where I'd frequently pass by where the sales staff worked, and it seemed like they spent a fair amount of time in meetings that had a strong "pep rally" feel to them: "This is the new product, these are its selling points ... and here's why you wanna be selling them like hotcakes! Go team! Meet the goals -- no, beat the goals!" Now from my non-sales point of view, this sounded like pure rah-rah bullshit, but every time I've seen a sales department, I've seen something like this going on in it. It seems to be an expected part of the system, and if you can supply good rah-rah bullshit, you can probably go far. I think it's more that she's drawn to aggressive go-getters. Even when she left Axe Capital for a while, she didn't start working with, say, traumatized kids or even underachieving kids, she just found different powerful people as clients. Chuck is a guy from a rich and connected family who's tucked his money into a blind trust so he can tilt at corporate dragons in a high-profile, politically advantageous kind of way. Another go-getter, just more after the power than the money. (And from things I've read, it's apparently not at all hard to find type-A hardasses who secretly crave to be dominated.)

Maybe not at first. But perhaps his father left a note, mentioning his seeing Kate, mentioning Jack's brother, and speaking to what he now sees as the value of family. If so, why hell: in some time to come, the rest of Jack's ashes might finally be set free at the cabin. That and, since Jack's dad probably let a lot of his savings go into, um, liquid assets, the cabin also may have been a place the dad himself had inherited, say, from his own father, a brother, etc. In that case, Jack might see it as a family place rather than "my dad's cabin." Or maybe Jack just got a great bonus at work to help pay for the place -- or this vacation may not have anything to do with the cabin at all; the pics just suggested it to me.

The flashback scenes look like the vacation is in a rustic area -- I'm wondering if this will turn out to be the family cabin. The family is the same age as in the episode where Jack's father was dying, so maybe the surprise is that Jack has just found out he's inherited the cabin.

Thought about that too. Another explanation might be that he can be wounded (as when Lucifer stabbed him) but just can't die of any wound -- which sounds like it would suck to be him.

1989, IIRC.

On my OnDemand service (Comcast), things like the aftershow are often put under a show's season lists in a separate "Extras" list that you have to scroll down to find.

It may be that since really only their souls go to Hell, not their bodies with their infirmities (which end up in a grave), they're not blind in Hell.

Not entirely true -- lots of people would have seen her battling the Dominators last year, and the Earth-1 U.S. president honored her for it along with the other superheroes. It's her identity as Kara Danvers that no one there has ever heard of.

Also worth noting that Supergirl's ratings have fallen off this season to where the show is now in the middle of the pack among CW shows, and a couple weeks ago was tied with Legends at 0.5 for the 18-49 demo as the lowest rated among the DC-based shows. Not that it's in cancellation territory because of that, but it's no longer too hot to be exempt from being bumped for a few months by new entries to the network's lineup.

Yeah, it was the Essex County social services office. Though only New Jerseyans are likely to know it, Essex is the NJ county whose seat is Newark, the state's largest city and one with a high poverty rate.

That article says Moriarty had written "a short novella that picked up the story and envisioned what happens next with the main characters," and that will be the basis of Kelley's screen adaptation.

My assumption was that in the 31st century, people always use utensils (set designers could have a lot of fun coming up with future food-serving techniques and utensils here), and eating with your hands is considered uncivilized.

@bara007, I think you're right on how Dirk became part of Wendimoor's mythology. This is how I interpret the "holistic" ability (repasting something I posted a while ago): Dirk and Bart are "holistically" connected to the world in such a way that problems that need solving come to detective Dirk arranged in a way that he can solve them, and people who need killing present themselves to assassin Bart in such a way that she can kill them almost effortlessly. So basically, fate/chance/life lead Dirk to go places, meet people etc. that in turn lead him to discoveries that, when he's made enough of them, fit together into the only possible solution to the mystery he's currently confronting.

Long post warning: In general, I really like this show, so my reaction to the lesser episodes hasn't been "I hate this," more like "that was less enjoyable than the better episodes were." So maybe take my view on things with a grain of salt (and note that I'm not very religious and some of these notions are more "pop theology" than anyone's idea of orthodoxy) ... Re Lucifer/Chloe, I honestly don't think the showrunners are so invested in the idea of shipping them as they are in what their relationship (whatever it is or becomes) will teach Lucifer. Because... I think they've dropped numerous clues that Goal One for the series is to explore the idea of free will as it relates to (Judeo-Christian) God's creation. As presented, no celestial being other than God himself, even Mom, has cared at all about humanity, and they've even expressed resentment over how much of God's attention has been focused on those pipsqueak mortals. God's endgame here seems to be to rub his celestial children's noses in earthly matters until they start to see that these lesser beings are also a key part of his creation. So maybe even Amenadiel or Lucifer getting tangled in a love triangle has a Purpose. No one, even the angels, knows what God's Plan is, and that's where I'm guessing the free will is going to come in: that the beauty of this creation is in how God has designed it so that its inhabitants, without even knowing God's intentions, choose a path that leads to the good outcome he desires. (See spoilerish note at end.) On the inconsistencies in how much power Lucifer and other angels have, remember that this isn't a "superhero" show where there's (supposed to be) some hand-wavey "scientific" explanation for their abilities with a consistent definition of those abilities and their limitations. What Lucifer, Amenadiel etc. can do are literally gifts from God, and "the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away." I imagine Lucy et al. could break down a barred steel door if it served the needs of Heaven for them to do it; if not, they're on their own with only their native strength available. Related: At some point I realized that the "rules" for how Lucifer's mortality around Chloe works also only makes sense if they're set by God's intent rather than physical laws. It looks to me that she doesn't have to be in the same room or even building to affect him; he becomes mortal whenever she's close enough to be able to catch him doing something angelic if she so chose (for example, she has to chase the poisoning professor far enough that she couldn't run back in time to see Lucifer wading through a roomful of poison gas before he can actually do that). I never read either of the graphic novel series that inspired the show, but I've read about them, and some of that seems to go in a similar direction on God's Plan etc.:

It is possible, based on how they handled the Season 1 visit to Earth-38 by Barry Allen. He crossed over by hitting a new top speed with the aid of some device, spent at least a couple days helping Kara, then went back to Earth-1 to discover that he'd returned at the same moment he'd left.

There's got to be something unusual with him -- for now, I'm guessing he's acting as an earthly agent for some celestial, such as a heavenly angel or one who fell with Lucifer and resents his now abandoning Hell. But the writers so far have confounded all my guesses on where they're going with the Sinnerman, though. Just in this episode, I started out thinking he was supernatural (knowing so much about Lucifer, and taunting him about not being able to find out his desires), then thinking the supernatural part was that he was possessing that particular man's body (I'm still keeping that as a possibility, actually), then thinking the guy was a patsy playing the part while the "real" Sinnerman stayed in the shadows, then I gave up guessing. Part of it was that the plot was well done in dodging the obvious cliches after the Sinnerman was captured: He didn't use the sharp item he'd palmed to pick the lock on the cuffs, or to stab a cop and flee, or to escape from the precinct, he just OMFG HE PUT OUT HIS OWN FRIGGING EYES! JUST TO TAUNT LUCIFER SOME MORE! THIS GUY IS HARDCORE!

While I was watching I was figuring Amenadiel was hiding in the office and was going to be discovered somehow by Maze (which I would've hated, since it's practically the Original Cliche). But afterward, I decided that he wasn't there at all, but that Linda was hoping he'd come back, and that's why she was surprised and awkward with Maze when she turned up at the door instead. I hope they go with Linda breaking it off with Amenadiel rather than hurt the Linda/Maze friendship, though.

I think the fuse box also might be the reason but not the cause: Upstairs fuse blows while Kate is, say, trying to curl/wave her hair; it takes long enough for Jack to get it fixed that Kate's forgotten she left the gizmo plugged in; it quietly overheats until suddenly someone notices the house is filling up with smoke; disaster ensues as Jack tries to make sure everyone is out of the house and is overcome by the smoke. Or not. But we know there's going to be something in that scenario that makes Kate blame herself.

I don't know enough about real-life foster child placements in NJ to know whether kids can actually be placed in counties outside their own, but in the This Is Us writers' room, apparently they can. I double-checked my recollection, and Randall definitely lives in Alpine. FWIW, Deja also was from Newark.