Big Bad Wolf

Kind of a messy episode. And if they were going to kill Dolls off, he should have been the focus of the episode, not a side character in an episode which focused on a seemingly 'filler' plotline of Waverly locked in a cage. Not great writing.

Enjoyable season opener. Very happy the show is back. But I must have missed something... Why was Doc's hand bandaged?

Ugh, this episode was such a mess, and contained so much Stupid. The low point of a season which has not been up to the promise of the first season as things stand anyway. And this show goes to the 'Rape' well FAR too often.

Is there anywhere Scully won't wear those stiletto heels? I mean, a pebbly beach...? Is this some in-joke I'm not up to speed on?

They need to fix Chloe being so irritating. Fast. I thought she was fascinated with the video of Lucifer at the end because he launched a 200 lb man 10 feet through a plate glass window with seemingly no effort. I wouldn't have thought it would take more than that to pique her interest.

I thought she swore in Arabic, or a related language. The guy didn't shoot Carrie because Allison was supposed to signal to him to shoot her by lighting a cigarette and she pointedly put them away. I'm under the impression that although Allison is 'owned' by the Russians, she also has a certain amount of importance and authority with them, so the sniper couldn't just take out Carrie on his own volition if Allison wasn't giving him the necessary signal. The wannabe jihadist looked appalled not to be going to Syria because he WANTED to go to Syria, to join the Caliphate and live under the strict Islamic law being practised by ISIS. That's what most of the people going to Syria want; they're not going there to train to be terrorists in order to come back to the West and commit atrocities (although many of them are fine committing atrocities in the region itself) - although I realise many in the West are under that false impression. Many of them are going because they want to adhere to the fundamentalist view of the Islamic religion practiced by ISIS; clearly he was supposed to be one of those, as indicated by him praying in the back of the van. (BTW, anyone who wants to really understand about ISIS in Iraq and Syria should read this: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/ ) I've no idea about Quinn, but I'm very relieved he's still ticking along. My principle thought on this episode: THANK GOD! At last somebody is on to Allison!

LOL What? Up until that point you thought he was a bit crap? Well, okay then.

Francis did lose Grambler in the book, but because he had to close it down because his mismanagement made it impossible to continue to keep it open. It wasn't lost to the Warleggans, though, as I recall, but it did have to be closed and Francis and his side of the family lost the income and became substantially poorer as a result. Francis did lose substantial sums to Sanson via gambling, though, , so there aren't really any changes made on the show that are of significance.

Thank you so much! I couldn't understand why Ross' high cards were all losers. So pleased to have an explanation that makes sense. But all this would still require additional screen time for these minor characters, no? Screen time which the writer didn't have available to her as she only had 8 episodes (8 hours if you watched the full UK version) to play with and two substantial books to adapt. I think plenty of assumptions could be made about why Keren made her choices and why Dwight made his. I never found anything confusing, and if I had to make my own assumptions about why certain characters did things, without having it all explained to me with additional scenes, I had no problem with that.

There was an awful lot of sea to keep an eye on. I'm assuming they weren't all looking at the same bit, but had a 'quadrant' each to monitor, or something to that effect. I'm sure that if one person would have done, one person would have been doing it.

It's only just started and has shown a total of four episodes. Give it a chance!

I'm sure he did realise it, but his decision to marry her was complex and largely to do with it being the honourable thing to do. At the time, either he married her, to preserve her honour and treat her with respect, he sent her home in disgrace, or he kept sleeping with her without marrying her and pretty much made her his whore. As Ross is an honourable man, only one choice in the circumstances. Ross explains his motives for marrying her fully in the next episode. This is definitely over-thinking that scene. No idea where you saw anything saying it's set in the 1810s. This season is set in the 1780s. Ross is about 27/8 when he marries Demelza, who is about 10 years younger than him. You could also get a marriage licence via Special Licence applied to from the bishop, if you had the cash to do it, which presumably Ross did. They can't have had the Banns read because then the upcoming marriage would have been public knowledge, which it clearly was not. I think in the book, the marriage was a couple of weeks after Ross and Demelza first slept together. Pretty sure him making the move at that point had zero to do with Demelza wearing his mother's old dress. He'd lost his mother many years ago; it was just an old dress. Why on earth is that 'ick'?

This is pretty pedantic. Obviously what he was scything (scything scene adapted directly from novel) was dependent at what time they were filming. They could hardly be expected to organise the whole shoot around making sure he could be scything at exactly the right time for this to be convincing to people who know far more about this kind of thing than 99.9% of viewers. Actually, the BBC did have an expert there when filming who showed Aidan the correct way to scythe, and Aidan was perfectly aware that he was doing it 'wrong' for the people who are bothered about this kind of thing, but he did it the way he did it to portray Ross's urge to take out his frustrations via his task. So, no, not a "budget" issue, an actor's choice 'issue'. Demelza isn't "crushed" by Elizabeth's comment; she's upset because she feels that after their night together, Ross is still hankering after Elizabeth, so she takes what remains of her self-respect and prepares to return home, even though that entails leaving behind the man she adores. Seems like quite a strong "spine" to me.

Yes, the green gown belonged to his mother. I have sympathy with people feeling some things need clarifying. The novels provide all the clarification one needs, but I appreciate people thinking one shouldn't have to read them to understand everything. The writer, Debbie Horsfield, just wasn't given enough episodes, IMO. She got them (Mammoth Screen - production company, BBC, PBS) to agree to increase to 8 from originally requested 6 to adapt the first two novels, but she needed 10 at least. So yes, things can seem rushed, but she's done the best she could with the run-time she had available to her, IMO. I also think things do seem to slow down a bit from here. Re. Ross marrying Demelza so quickly, yes, he did it to be honorable, but he also had genuine affection for Demelza, and, I think, liked sleeping with her. It wasn't all about being honorable. Ross explains his reasons in the next episode, which should help some.

I agree with MrsE that Turner does more than smoulder. I've seen other people say this (all he does is smoulder) when I've clearly seen a whole range of emotions presented, and wondered if I'm watching the same show. Maybe it's the intensity of his smoulder that causes people to block out anything else. Also, this was episode one: he's got a lot to feel miserable about - when he has cause to laugh and smile, he does (and it's wonderful). FWIW, I've read 7 of the books, and I think Aidan brings Ross to life very well. I find it kind of frustrating when I see people comparing this version to the 70s version, as if that is the template, or even the gold standard. This version has nothing to do with that version. That was one adaptation of the books (which went way OFF-book in a number of ways), and this version is a pretty close (often closer than the 70s version) new adaptation of the books. A lot of people who seem to like the 70s version better essentially seem to like that version better than the books. Well, okay, but this adaptation was never going to mimick the 70s version - that was never the intention. However, Elizabeth has been changed from the books in this version; she's much 'nicer', which I don't necessarily agree with as a choice (although it makes Ross look less idiotic for being obssessed with her, which I suspect was part of the reason for the change). With regard to the pacing, that is problematic for the first few episodes, where they try to stuff a lot in that happened over a number of years, and it can be difficult to understand how time is passing, but that sorts itself out in the second half of the season.