weathered1

I've got to echo everyone else's thoughts. This show, at least for me, has become decidedly meh. At best. While the episode wasn't bad, relatively speaking, I found myself just not caring about anything I was seeing. Connor has been one of my favorites since the show began, but the retread of the Robin issues, the fact that he was only allowed to be happy for approximately 2.4 seconds, and the utterly unpleasant feeling (it's actually more of a certainty) that the show will go the way of a predictable hookup (at least) with the utterly unnecessary, totally loathsome Becker, did not sit well with me. The one and only one thing I liked about his scenes tonight: Latham. April and Choi. Ye gods. It's not surprising at this point that the show took what was a bad idea in the first place and made it even worse. Hiding the relationship is so boring, and frankly, it makes both of them look bad. I fully despise April now, so I couldn't muster up any sympathy when bitchy Doris was being so flagrantly awful. Choi deserves so much better than this. The Dr. Charles plotline was decent, and I liked that Reese took action when she felt like he was making a huge mistake, and that Sharon delivered a heaping dose of the truth to him, but something about all of it just left me cold. The Maggie and Stohl story? I couldn't have cared less, which also describes how I felt about all of the patients. It all just seemed so paint-by-numbers and dull to me. Finally, Will and Natalie. I see the show has finally decided to just shove them together, so at least the obnoxious angst (at least in that respect) of their (alleged) mutual yearning is over. Even when both of them were being competent at their jobs - for once - I . . . just didn't care. I've watched this show since the pilot, and I feel like it's gone downhill to an extent that I can't ignore anymore. When it's gotten to a point where I'm just not interested in the characters, it may be time for me to find something else to watch. Maybe the next episode will be better, but if not, I think I'm done with this show.

I think it's a (somewhat) encouraging sign that the fall finale got a fair amount of media coverage - one would think that if the insider scuttlebutt is that the show is just about done, media outlets wouldn't have bothered to cover it. Plus, the ratings - though they could be better - have been holding pretty steady, and it seems like (at least to me) it's garnering more and more attention online each week. So. . . I'm going to be cautiously optimistic, too. Also, for what it's worth, I think 13 episode seasons might actually be good for a show like this - if they had to keep stretching out the stories for 22 or more episodes, the pacing and suspense could very well suffer. ETA: And Mike Vogel posted that he'll be doing press for the show during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Again, it's a small thing, but if the network had already decided it's done after the 13 episodes, I don't think this would be happening. So I think they've either decided to give it a renewal for another shorter season, or (more likely) they're going to increase its media presence and promotion and then see what the numbers look like for the last 4 episodes before the final decision is made.

You can add me to the show slaughterers, I'm afraid. Almost every single time I really like a new show, the networks seem all too happy to get rid of it with a quickness. I'm still holding out hope that this one hangs on, because it's (by the far) the most entertaining new fall show, imo. This is one of the very, very few shows where there isn't at least one character that I actively (and thoroughly) dislike. The team gels very well together, as does the intelligence side, and everyone is likable and has an important role to play. SEAL Team is just so impossibly dull that it sort of boggles the mind that they managed to make material that should've been consistently edge-of-your-seat-worthy into a weekly cure for insomnia. And Boreanaz....It's same old, same old with him - every character he plays might as well just be named Angel Booth, FBI Special Agent Vampire (with a soul).

According to Business Insider, The Brave is one of the seven most popular new shows of the fall: http://www.businessinsider.com/most-popular-new-tv-shows-this-fall-list-2017-10/#7-me-myself-and-i-cbs-92-million-total-viewers-1 I hope that's a good sign, because I find myself enjoying the show much more than I thought I would.

I can see them wanting to do something of a dry run with a Lorna-type character so that they could see how this version of Riggs plays off of her, and it does lay the groundwork for the woman in whom Riggs will finally, seriously invest himself, because - as has been mentioned - the audience was able to see the kind of person who captures his attention. Is Palmer really their version of Lorna? That, I don't know. I honestly don't think they would've brought her onboard so early if that were the case, but . . . I've been wrong before. And, if I'm being honest, given their dedication to bringing the major movie characters to life in the show, I cannot fathom why they would just skip over Lorna. I think the reason we haven't seen her yet is because Riggs just isn't totally ready for her, at this point. However, if it winds up that they decide that Palmer is it for him - for whatever reason - then that's okay. It would boggle my mind that they went that route and I can't say that I would be thrilled, but ultimately, it could be worse.

This is where I land with this question, too. Cahill is totally and completely inappropriate as a love interest. Palmer is okay, in that she challenges Riggs and has led to him opening himself up a bit. I never looked at that relationship as an endgame kind of thing, though - it seemed like it was his first foray into another relationship after the loss of his wife, and he's still trying to heal and move forward, and she has helped him do that. I almost feel like she's served her purpose in that regard, at this point: he knows he can feel something for another woman and the world won't end, but he's still not ready for something truly serious. When he is, I still think Lorna needs to be brought into play. They've hit it out of the park in terms of the chemistry and relationships we've seen thus far that were hallmarks of the movies, and I don't see any reason to believe that the same wouldn't hold true for the show's version of the Lorna/Riggs dynamic.

I'm actually astounded at the depths to which this show has sunk. Olivia is pissed - pissed, she says - not because of the people who died, the turmoil in which the country was mired, or anything else - because her power was being thwarted. Oh, the horror. And to top it off, the scene in which she and Jake basically forced to Luna to kill herself was abhorrent. The thing is, I don't think the show will act as though Olivia has turned her back on her "white hat." I think it will spin this as Olivia in all her goodness and brilliance triumphing over evil. Oh, and I'm sure she and Jake will bond all over again by the roles both played in this grossness, so they'll more than likely be hitting the sheets again in the season premiere. Never mind that the evil plan, aka the conspiracy involving Luna and Cyrus, is ludicrous and nonsensical in every way, on every level. But no matter, because: "How does it feel to be the most powerful person in the world?" "Right. It feels right." Olivia Pope is a disgusting human being, but it's okay because she's powerful. Thus endeth the lesson, I guess.

The time jump did seem to be the on the clunky side. According to one article I read, they felt that they'd explored the characters so much that they needed a way to add more secrets into the mix, hence the 2 year jump. Which . . . it is what it is. A lot can happen in two years. Speaking of that, I'm another one who thoroughly enjoys the idea of Patterson/Roman. They'd complement one another pretty much perfectly. I like that they left things ambiguous where he's concerned, and I think it's a good sign that they've mentioned that very thing in interviews. It would be easy to fill in the two years' worth of blanks with Roman in such a way as to not make him a bad guy, and I dearly hope that they decide to do that. I think the character is fascinating (and very well played) and deserves better than to just be a villain. All of that said, I actually enjoyed this episode more than I expected to, and I'm interested to see what they do going forward.

I put off watching this because I read what happened and I dreaded seeing it. I was right to feel that way. What dreck. So a grown man obsesses over a woman's haircut, to the point that he questions a coworker about it and then the woman herself. Wow, I guess it's the haircut that launched the Manning/Halstead ship. How delightful. Or the opposite of that. I'd hoped that two unlikable characters would kind of cancel their odiousness out, yet the opposite happens: they just bring out the absolute worst in each other. Poor Nina. She has dreadful taste in men, obviously, but for that idiot to hurt her like that and to do it so blithely was just awful to watch. He crushed her - and just before a party she was looking forward to, to boot - and he didn't even seem to care. I'd found myself really hoping that would open the door for Nina/Connor, but with the entrance of Becker into the scene, I think my hopes have been pretty much dashed. Speaking of Becker, holy hell, what a ludicrously off-putting character - the constant bitch face and smirks, her overt, endless rudeness. I just cannot with this creature. She'd already overstayed her welcome about 15 seconds into her very first scene. Awful, just awful in every single way. And, gee, writers, what a great time to telegraph that you're chem-testing two characters: when he's just said "I love you" to his girlfriend who is undergoing a medical crisis. Ugh. So they break up Reese and Splendorkable with no fanfare whatsoever and dude is already dating another woman. Of course he is. Of course. Let's try to make him look bad so that her inevitably hooking up with Noah will be more palatable. The writers keep doing this kind of thing when they get determined to end (ridiculous) triangles, and throwing one character under the bus to try to facilitate a new pairing just doesn't work. Choi and April. Sigh. The kiss was decent, but he deserves so much better. When watching all of this, it almost felt like the writers were going out of their way to make me officially hate this show. I think they succeeded.

Though I think several of the contestants have good voices, this season has wound up being pretty "meh" for me. I think Hunter did all right with "With or Without You" - it was probably his best performance of the season, imo. I can't say a fan of the duet. At all. It was good to see Brennley going with an uptempo song, but . . . I didn't enjoy the performance. I don't know how one makes a fast song just seem to meander and drag on and on, but she managed to do that. Actually, I didn't like anything she did tonight. TSoul's rendition of Aretha's song was just not good. Even his adlibs sounded off to me. Jesse isn't bad, but I don't think his performances were anything to write home about. Chris' solo was great, but it was most definitely an obvious pandering move. Lauren. I'm torn about her. On one hand, she's very talented. On the other hand, she's so boring. It's always the same thing, and there isn't anything about her that differentiates from other country recording artists. Vanessa was just okay, and Aliyah was not, imo. I didn't like her performances tonight. For me, the final four would be Hunter, Chris, Brennley, and Lauren.

Because every evil deed ever always goes back to one or both of Olivia's parents. Always. Sigh. So, Jake - unrepentant serial killer Jake - thinks he has the right to look down on Abby? Seriously? Fitz - the same man who murdered a Supreme Court Justice and cost myriad soldiers their lives just so that he could get his side piece back - isn't taking kindly to what Abby did, even after convincing Olivia to forgive her? Please. For Abby's part, though she may have called herself evil, she seemed far more worried (at least to me) about people being mad at her; the very same people who are all murderers themselves. The President-Elect of the United States evidently has nothing better to do than focus on her (former) bed buddy. I could've sworn Olivia and Quinn have had that exact same conversation before; the one in which Liv yells in her face that she doesn't get to question Liv, Liv doesn't owe her any explanations, etc. It was just as boring and eye roll-inducing this time around. So the great sales pitch on getting a pardon for the wrongly accused and imprisoned man comes from . . . killer and torturer Quinn, who should be in a prison cell herself, but is instead speechifying at the President of the United States. Of course. I realized tonight just how far this show has sunk in my estimation when I didn't see any Olitz chemistry anymore. It was that intense dynamic between them and the fact that Olivia Pope was once such a strong, brilliant, fierce character that so thoroughly pulled me into this show way back when. Oh, how things have changed.

I try to stick with this show because I like many of the actors, but the writing is making that increasingly difficult - it is a disaster. First, Connor desperately tries to get help for Robin because he's seeing how quickly her mental state is deteriorating. Dr. Charles argues with him. Then Dr. Charles sees that Robin is in less than good shape mentally and takes some steps to get her help. (Should he have taken those exact steps? That's debatable.) Only now, Connor suddenly thinks, oh, it's not that bad. As others have pointed out, Robin is secondary at best in her own story. This immediately devolved into a pissing match between both men, and it's made neither of them come off particularly well. That final scene was extremely disturbing. I, too, fully expected Robin to jump. The focus on April with the baby and engagement stories served one purpose: to solidify in my mind that I find her quite unlikable. So of course they're saddling a character I actually like - Dr. Choi - with her. Of course they are. And his interest in her came from where, exactly? Oh, that's right: nowhere. They get rid of Jeff - a decent character and actor, both of whom deserved better - so we can see more of Noah who falls squarely into the "Ugh" category. Natalie is damn near unwatchable now. I looked at TD's reaction shots when the character was mostly in the background, and they were awful; almost every single time, her expression was either totally blank or full on judgmental/bitchy. Do I give Natalie the benefit of the doubt that she's not trying to interfere in Will's current relationship? No, I do not. I think she knows exactly what she's doing. For what it's worth, I think Will is equally as terrible. His response to seeing her haircut (and what is this: the guy notices the girl after she undergoes a faux-makeover? Is this some kind of teen romcom?) while sitting next to his girlfriend was, and I quote, "Woah." They're both gross. I'm still fully on Team Nina, though I have to wonder why she continues to put up with this garbage from her significant other. Once that implodes, which will undoubtedly be by the end of the season, I hope there's still a place for her on the show. With Choi now evidently embroiled with April (again, I say: ugh), that narrows down the potential love interests for Nina to . . . Rhodes. Isn't he pretty much it? (Not that I object. I think they're adorable and that would likely translate well to the screen, imo.) Finally, in regard to Jay, I didn't see anything remotely resembling any interest in Natalie from him (thank goodness). I'm not sure that we're in the clear as far as that goes, though, because as has been pointed out, the writers for Med evidently don't care about how out of character they portray individuals from other Chicago shows, and they certainly don't pay the slightest bit of attention to those characters' histories and stories. Would it be beyond Natalie to use Jay to make Will jealous? I don't think so, especially since there's obviously a reason the writers have dragged Jay into that mess. Given that he's supposed to be all about Erin, I can't see him going there, but would the writers have Natalie ask him out or plant a kiss on him or something? I wouldn't put it past them. Unfortunately.

Showing that every bit of this entire season could've been averted with the actions undertaken in about 45 seconds . . . well, if their intent was to show that these 13 episodes have been a waste of time for the viewers: mission accomplished, show.

To all of you talking about how this show keeps pushing storylines you dislike, you can add me to your ranks. I really don't understand what the thinking behind this is, with Manning, Manning/Halstead, Noah, and Robin. They are focusing on the worst and weakest aspects of the show, and it's really dragging it down, imo. Manning continues to be insufferable in every possible way, and Halstead sort of bounces between being a jerk, being oblivious, and being an oblivious jerk. These Jay/Natalie moments are giving me a bad feeling. Either they fully intend to go there (which I would hate) or they'll make it appear that they have, just so Halstead can make some sort of jealous scene (which Nina will undoubtedly witness). Speaking of Nina, I don't care how much they throw her under the bus, I will never, ever think she is in the wrong. Ever. I want her to dump the loser; I want her to stay on the show; and I want her to find an infinitely better love interest. The Robin story is just . . . not good. I can't fault the actors; it's the writing that is absolutely atrocious. The cancer family story - I agree that the entire family will need years of therapy after everything that happened.

The episode had its issues, as people have brilliantly covered already in this thread. I didn't mind them, though, because this show really has (had?) one hell of a cast. TOQ is perfection as Howard, Tawny Cypress and Edi Gathegi have done exceptionally well with their characters, and Ryan Eggold has been fantastic. I've truly been impressed by the latter and his ability to tackle everything from the emotional beats to action and everything in between. In fact, I'd say the one thing that I didn't like about the finale was how Tom was shuffled aside so it could be the Howard/Scottie show. Famke, from the very beginning of this show, has been really hit or miss for me - at times, she was really very good; at other times, her line readings came across quite stilted to me. Knowing that Christine Baranski was the first choice to play the character really makes me wish we could've seen that. I continue to be not be a fan of the assistant or the boytoy, and the "twist" of Howard being an evil mastermind and the boytoy being in on it were both entirely predictable. If this was the end of the show - and I truly hope it wasn't - I have to say that it would be really disappointing (to me) to bring this over to the mothership and have it focus on Red. I also kind of feel like that would be a slap in the face to the actors who have brought this story to life - their work made this story what it is, but most of them would likely disappear or be made into virtual wallpaper so that Red can figure out and rectify everything. All things being equal, I've found this show to be far more entertaining than the mothership has been in a very long time. I really hope this wasn't the last we see of the show and the characters, and I find the possibility of Tom Keen having to be, what, 3rd fiddle at best on the Red and Lizzie show to be disappointing in the extreme. The entire cast of this show - esp. Ryan Eggold - deserves far better than that, imo.

Seeing Natalie's endless parade of self-righteousness, hypocrisy, inappropriateness, and lack of professionalism, I'd almost wonder if they were making her look bad on purpose, but given their insistence on Manning/Halstead being twu wuv 4 eva, I think they truly don't understand what a horrible character she is. Her penchant for judging and then yelling at/scolding parents is ridiculous, inexcusable, and grating in the extreme. It's mind-boggling that people are evidently supposed to think that she's a good character and person. She's really and truly the opposite of that. That brief scene with Manning and Jay . . . wth? I'd be inclined to agree with the assessment that it was meant to show that she's all in-the-know when it comes to the Halstead family, but that moment ended with deliberate awkwardness, and I don't have the foggiest clue what that was supposed to signify. I'm sure the writers meant for people to look unfavorably on Nina being upset that her significant other/colleague hadn't bothered to tell her that his father had been dealing with a serious medical issue and had been treated and undergoing surgery for hours. No, just no. I don't doubt at all that they're trying to throw her under the bus a bit to make way for the inevitable Manning/Halstead waste of time, but sorry, show, it's not working. I'm team Nina and if anything, she deserves far better than Halstead. I'm heartened that Patti Murin is still working, and after the inevitable implosion of this relationship, I dearly hope that they keep her on (and even promote her to series regular). It's interesting to ponder who they'd put her with in the future - Choi is single now and it's looking like Rhodes could be single again soon (and that would give the show the added bonus of buzz re: a married couple playing a couple on the show). With this show, though, who knows. As far as Rhodes is concerned, I echo the comments from earlier in this thread about the lack of believability re: the strained dynamic between Conner and Dr. Charles. I also found it wholly unbelievable that the latter just blew off Conner's more than justified concerns about Robyn. I found every bit of that to be out of character and just plain nonsensical. To end this with some random thoughts: the story with Choi's patient was predictable in the extreme. I don't know why the show continues to try to make April's brother happen, but it's not working for me. I don't have strong feelings one way or the other about Reese's boyfriend, but for them to clearly set up that she breaks his heart in favor of April's brother is just . . . ugh.

Chalk me up as another one who thinks that research should be destroyed. Good for the show for the twist that Whitehall is a guy - I didn't see that coming. I'm finding the Howard/Tom scenes to be really enjoyable - the actors play very well off of each other. Adding Nez into that mix was a good move, imo, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of that. I'm not a fan of Scottie's assistant or the entire storyline with the male prostitute, and I continue to find Famke's work a little uneven, which is surprising. Overall, I thought it was an entertaining hour of television, especially if I didn't think too much about what was going on in terms of the timing of everything (as ottoDbusdriver detailed above). I do have to say that I found Liz's presence to be not just unnecessary, but detrimental to the momentum and flow of the scenes and the episode, as a whole. I confess that that's likely due at least in part to my dislike of the actress and her distinctly wooden nature, but she just doesn't play well off of anyone in scenes, and I've never wholly bought into the Tom/Liz dynamic (largely because of Boone's work, to be honest). If they need to keep Tom tied to the mothership, Agnes' existence does that. I know that mileage varies, but I hope that if this show gets another season, they sever his tie to Liz because I think all it does is hold the character back.

I knew the idea of Huck not being around anymore was too good to be true. Of course he survives after being shot multiple times, stuffed in a trunk, underwater, and then being exposed to the elements. Of course he survives just like a killer in one of those ridiculous horror movies. Of course. The scene with Olivia repeatedly slapping the crap out of the woman who used to be abused and then calling her worthless and threatening her? Was disgusting, as was Quinn threatening to kill Abby. This show's penchant for torture porn and brutal murder? Is sickening. The characters referring to anyone being a "white hat" and/or "gladiator" without even the slightest sense of irony is asinine and remarkably tone deaf. Jake and Charlie smiling at the end of Olivia's speechifying like they were so proud of her . . . oh, please. The President of the United States stopping what he's doing to go to the hospital while his former mistress grieves over the potential loss of her hitman? Olivia telling him it was selfish of Abby to tell him her secrets? And then Olivia's head not exploding from the hypocrisy? One torturer feeling bad that his fiancee - another torturer - is fawning all over yet another, uber crazy torturer? Oh, for the love of . . . And, yeah, Fitz is now the most likable person on this show. That sort of says it all. I really and truly do not understand how any of this is supposed to be entertaining.

I think both sides of the argument have merit, as does the middle ground. For me, what it boils down to is that, even with as often as Tate expressed his desire that she quit the job - either for her benefit, the baby's, or yes, even his own - she shut him down. On one hand, she was sticking up for herself, as she should've. On the other hand, even though they had the same conversation seemingly a thousand times, every time he brought up her job, she shut him out and didn't even listen to his POV. (And no, I'm not saying she should've given in and let him have his way, by any means.) To me, if he had really wanted to "control" her, he wouldn't have made the same plea (or demand, as some see it) umpteen times. He never gave her ultimatums or tried to exhibit control in any another way. Yes, he should've made his peace with her job a long, long time ago and if he couldn't have done that, he should've ended things. By the same token, if she'd actually listened to what he had to say (instead of tuning him out the second she heard him start to talk about her job) and had a substantive conversation with him about it where she stayed true to who she was but also didn't outright dismiss his concerns (as she was prone to do), then perhaps she could've put his mind at ease or they both could've decided that they shouldn't be together when all of this first began.

I see your point re: the immediate aftermath of the baby's death. Normally, I'd give April a pass on that. Given everything that's been talked about, though, I found it to be less her way of trying to keep the grief at bay, and more her staying true to her pattern of behavior where Tate was concerned (or a combination of the two). At the end of the day, it seems to me that all that matters to April are her feelings, her wants, and everything else is a ways down on her list of priorities. I wholeheartedly agree with your take on the actors. Every one you singled out is head and shoulders above the rest. I find Nick Gehlfuss to be wildly uneven in his performances, which is not good when so much of what his character says and does already makes him less than likable. Rachel DiPillo has had some good moments, but there's a lack of consistency there, too, imo. Torrey DeVitto is . . . wow. Again, when the show first started, I didn't think she was that bad, but her work has really gone downhill to the point where she's made Natalie virtually unwatchable for me. Making matters worse is that when she and Gehlfuss are in scenes together, they tend to bring out the worst in each other, which is something else that makes the Halstead/Manning thing disastrous.

I think the Tate/April relationship (such as it was) suffered both from uneven writing and inconsistent acting. I don't think Tate ever anticipated the ins and outs of being with someone in April's line of work, and he didn't particularly like it. When she got hurt, though, is when he actively wanted her to find something else. I didn't look at it as him wanting to control her; at first, he wanted to spend more time with her, then he wanted her to remove herself from what he saw as a dangerous situation. When TB entered the mix, he operated from (what I saw as) a place solely devoted to wanting to protect her and keep her safe and well. For her part, she tried to explain her POV to him a time or two, but she never seemed to take his concerns seriously and certainly wasn't ever willing to try to compromise (then and at points going forward). When the baby storyline started, she was all about it, even at the possible expense of her own health and heedless of Tate's concerns for her well-being. However, that quickly devolved to April acting in a way that was totally counter to that, especially given the serious issues that had already arisen: she took the unnecessary shifts, she didn't give a thought to her nutrition and how the lack thereof would impact the baby, etc. It's not as though anyone expected her to totally turn her life around, abandon her job and responsibilities, etc. It was the fact that after the initial high drama re: the baby, she never even stopped to consider other options or ramifications when she made those decisions. When she essentially blew off Tate's gesture of going across town to go to lunch with her, that was a symptom of the overall ginormous problem: for all the talk about how Tate always wanted to be in control, it was April who was in control of everything and never viewed Tate as an actual partner and never seemed to give much thought to his thoughts and feelings. That she didn't even let him know when she was first told about the baby's fate kind of said it all. So both were painted as being in the wrong at various points, in various ways, but again, that was due to the writing not being terribly consistent, and I'd also chalk it up to Yaya's performances - she very rarely seemed (to me, at any rate) to play it as though April really loved or respected Tate; all too often, she made April cold, uncompromising, exasperated, and as though Tate was talking to a brick wall when he tried to express his worries to her. Had she added more nuance into those scenes, it might have played differently. As it is, though, I'm joining the group who finds April to be self-centered to a fault. A big fault.

I wholeheartedly agree that Wheeler's suicide - while a powerful, well-done scene - would have resonated so much more if he hadn't been little more than wallpaper (relatively speaking) during his short tenure on the show. If he'd been truly featured, if we'd gotten to know him, if the show had given him the focus that would've enabled him to be an actual fully fleshed out character, then the storyline and its aftermath would've been a homerun, imo. For the most part, I thought the reactions of the various characters were handled well, especially Choi, the scenes with Rhodes and Reese, and the latter actually thinking to check in with Dr. Charles about how he was dealing with it. What was not handled well? Everything having to do with Manning. When the show first started, I didn't mind her. Now I can't stand her and how self-centered she is, and Torrey DeVitto's acting choices often (imo) leave a lot to be desired. As for the thing with Manning/Halstead, I think the show really miscalculated by putting him with the vastly superior Nina - she's a much better character than Manning, has more chemistry with him, and actually makes him likable. So going back to focusing on the decidedly ugh Manning/Halstead at the expense of the better pairing (and actress) is ill-advised, to say the least, and I'm not at all looking forward to it. (That was all just my opinion, of course.)

Good point. This one, though, with the gunshot (after he'd already been, um, questioned forcibly by Riggs), the fall off the cliff, and the plunge into the rushing water far, far below was a bit too far over the line into cartoon territory for me.

When a show has writing that is sometimes less than great, it really falls on the actors to make everything work, and the cast that's been assembled here is certainly up to the task. They not only had to not let down the fans of the movies, but they also had to connect with people who weren't familiar with the source material. The chemistry between all of this actors is top notch, and each and every one of them lends real humanity and genuine emotion and humor to their respective roles. I think the casting agent(s) did exceptionally well here. In the finale, the cast was once again in fine form, but the writing . . . was not. I didn't hate the episode, but I didn't like it all that much either. We did see the bond/partnership between Riggs and Murtaugh being strengthened, given the latter's decision to head to Mexico, too. Beyond that, I didn't like the predictability of Ronnie's involvement and sudden morphing into a cartoon villain. I wasn't a fan of how far over the line they had Riggs go. I outright hated the ridiculousness of Gideon surviving not only the gunshot but also the fall off the cliff. I also agree that it was choppy and disjointed. It was far from the show's best outing, but the season wildly exceeded my initial expectations and I expect the same to hold true next season.

When Olivia got in Vanessa's face with her long-winded spiel of self-righteousness, I was very much rooting for Vanessa to haul off and punch her. Olivia's delusions of grandeur - especially given all that she's done - are nauseating at this point. And to think I used to like the character. So we're supposed to root for Jake - a man who willingly targeted his wife by virtue of her last name and her family's bank account and connections, all the while screwing around on her, killing her father, then at a point when he got tired of pretending to care about her, proceeded to treat her with abject cruelty and blamed her for all of her/their problems (and sent her down the path toward alcoholism)? And he has the audacity to call her disgusting? Oh, but he's a good guy because he didn't actually kill the woman Papa Pope wanted him to kill. Gee, Jake's a real saint. I wonder if the writers really don't have a clue about what they've turned these characters into or if they simply don't care.