Slovenly Muse

One of the best examples of this is "Shameless." The young actors have all grown so much that the opening credits sequence is a major trip down memory lane. And as much as I love the credits, the show AND the actors have changed so much that it doesn't really feel all that applicable anymore.

Ha! Yeah, that was a great fake-out. Actually, I called that Major was a hallucination the second he showed back up at her door saying he didn't want to go home after all, but I wasn't sure until she cuddled up to him on the bed. The fact that no one else was ever in those scenes helped as well. But Johnny Frost I was totally blindsided by! And then, when it turned out Frost was a hallucination, I thought that maybe the Major stuff was a fake-fake-out, and that since Frost wasn't real, Major WAS! And then they got me again when it turned out I'd been right the first time. Damn, show! You're good! As great as it was to see Blaine back in the morgue (though not in the way I'd prefer), I am definitely getting worried about what it means for Ravi that Blaine knows he's working on a cure for something that Blaine is making a fortune from. At first, I kind of appreciated the inversion of the old trope (or not so old, if you ask The Flash) of the hero having to hide his secret identity from his girlfriend for her "protection" or because she "couldn't handle it," even though his guy friends seem to handle it just fine. But now I realize that I hate that trope for reasons other than its blatant misogyny, like the fact that it is very frustrating from a storytelling perspective! Just tell Major already! He is NOT safer or healthier not knowing! Gah! The dramatic irony runs amok on this show. So many characters should be looking out for each other, but so few of them have enough info to actually do that effectively (or know that they should), and the tension is getting delicious!

You're exactly right. And unfortunately I'm finding a lot of this season to be basically good, as long as you don't put much thought into it. At least previous seasons, while slow-moving, were fairly tightly-plotted. This one is a mess of shrugged shoulders and random coincidences putting people where they need to be for whatever story they're telling. Whether it's illogically slow-acting poison, or the mild inconvenience of slavery, or Lancel "unburdening himself" apparently only when it's convenient for Littlefinger, or the North claiming to "remember" and then going "La-la-la-la I can't hear you" when Sansa is abused, or people showing up at the right place at the right time just because... I find myself quite often this season thinking "Hang on, does that actually make sense? Ah, whatever, don't think about it too much." Which is awful, because I love shows that I can trust to be WORTH thinking about. Other great dramas on right now are so rewarding to think about, and pick apart and find all the layers of complexity you missed before, and this show used to be one of them! When you pick apart this season so far, all you find are details that have been swept under the rug. Major plots don't hold up to scrutiny. I hope it can all come together at the end, but I am not impressed so far. Thank god Hannibal is coming back soon.

Of course I don't believe that everything has to be female-centric, or that women should never have supporting roles in men's stories. Especially on a show like this with such a huge cast and such a variety of stories to tell. I just think that when portraying the sort of dehumanizing and brutal violence against women that our modern society is still combating, the writers have a responsibility to connect that violence with the basic humanity and personhood of the woman it happens to, or else it is only misogyny-as-entertainment, which is problematic. The writers on this show are trying, but not always succeeding to do this. They could be doing better, and with a topic important enough to powerfully affect the lives of women today, they SHOULD be doing better. They need to worry less about displaying boobs and more about displaying personhood, is what I'm saying. And I'm in favour of boobs!

But historical accuracy is a sketchy defense for the inclusion of sexualized violence on a fantasy show, and it's not really a defence at all for the WAY that this violence is portrayed, which is the root of the discussion. So "the way things would have been in Medieval Europe" is totally unrelated to the violence that is dramatized on this show. Mad Men is a great example of a show that portrayed the abysmal treatment of women, but never treated its women the way the male characters did. On Mad Men, horrible things happened to women, but the women's stories were told - they were written with nuance and complexity, and treated like people who lived in that time and endured that treatment, and used what little power they had to make the most of their circumstances. When a man abused a woman on Mad Men, it was HER story. On Game of Thrones, sexualized violence is not portrayed this way. Theon is a good example. The threat or act of rape, when used against a man, is monstrous. When used against a woman, it's par for the course. The women on the show are sometimes treated like props in the men's stories BY THE WRITERS, and not just by the characters. When Gilly is attacked, it's Sam's story, all about HIS reaction to it. When Shireen is threatened with being a human sacrifice, it's Stannis's story. When Sansa is raped by Ramsay, it's Ramsay and Theon's story. She's not the centre of it. Not just because she has no power herself, but because the focus has not been placed on her, but rather on the men who control her. Myrcella is basically being very politely held hostage in Dorne, and her life is in danger, but rather than seeing her shift her understanding as to her real situation and what it means, the story is all about Jaime. That's what the writers choose to focus on. And yes, there are storylines that are certainly driven by women, like Cersei, Olenna, Brienne, sometimes Dany... but this only creates the illusion of equality. The narrative balance is not equal. Women are more often written as devices to be abused and degraded to further a man's story than men are to further a woman's. That's a writing choice, a storytelling choice, and has nothing to do with historical accuracy. It is one thing for the MEN on Game of Thrones not to value the women or treat them like human beings (that's a reflection of the world they live in), but it's another thing for the 21st century writers to do so (that's a reflection of the world WE live in). Medieval Europe has nothing to do with it.

I actually think Jon did well leaving Ghost at The Wall. One of the major problems, possibly the biggest problem, with Jon's situation, is that he's announced a plan to harbour Wildlings, whom the majority of the Night's Watch hate and want to kill, and now he's going off in search of them and leaving his own people alone to stew in this new change. The possibilities of what he might be coming back TO when he returns with the Wildlings, are definitely worrying, and possibly where the most danger lies for him. Ghost is like an extension of Jon, in a way. His presence at The Wall is a reminder to the Night's Watch that Jon is still in control, and a way of keeping possible dissenters in line. Whether Jon chose to leave him, or Ghost chose to stay, almost doesn't matter. Jon needs a supporter at The Wall with a little more muscle than Sam. Great comments about slavery for Tyrion and Jorah being an "easy adventure." I forgot to mention this last night. I mean, if slavers in this world are so suggestible that they can be talked around to anything with minimal effort, then it's not really SLAVERY, is it? More like a very unpleasant form of travel. Tyrion and Jorah were captured by slavers who intended to mutilate and separate them, and all it takes is a few words to keep them firmly set on their desired course. Apart from a few little token resistances for dramatic effect, Tyrion and Jorah haven't actually been made to do anything they don't want to, and they haven't been prevented from doing what they DO want to! Is slavery on this continent equivalent to presenting your wrists for manacles and saying, "Mereen, please" with some whips and chains around you for show? Talk about a wasted opportunity for drama. Ugh. Every time someone does or doesn't get raped on their wedding night on this show, the same point comes up about how Medieval people wouldn't have considered it rape, so why do we? BECAUSE IT IS! Just because people back then wouldn't have used the word, doesn't mean that it was not what was happening. Just because it was "par for the course" doesn't mean it wasn't horrific and damaging and wrong. That's part of what these stories are showing us. It's also why the laws in our country have changed over time as women have gained rights, to prevent these sorts of brutal inhuman "traditions" from continuing. Just because women didn't have rights in Medieval times doesn't mean they weren't human beings who experienced pain and deserved to be treated like people. Saying that Sansa's situation would have been "commonplace" does nothing to give context to her suffering. Lots of terrible things have happened in the past. The Spanish Inquisition, or the Salem witch trials, for example, were not considered "wrong" when they happened, but with our modern view, we can look back and see that they SHOULD have been wrong. Hurting people that way and for those reasons was horrific and unjust, and we shudder to think of it ever happening again, no matter what people back then would have said about "the devil's influence" or "heresy." What is the point in arguing over whether or not the word "rape" would have been used back then? We can use it now, and accurately, to describe a practice that happened back then, and has since been criminalized because of how abusive and dehumanizing it was/is. Is Ramsay not such a bad guy after all, because he was acting within his legal rights as a husband? No! He did what he did because he WANTED to hurt her, because he is a MONSTER, and he took advantage of the law to let him do that without consequences, because the law was WRONG! Where is the point of contention in this? I honestly do not understand why this argument keeps happening, and what it even is! It's one thing to argue about whether a show is able to accurately portray a culture of misogyny without actually participating in the misogyny (see "Mad Men" for doing this well, and "The Sopranos" for doing this poorly), but splitting hairs about what would have been called "rape" in Medieval Europe is pointless. We know better.

Half a continent. True. But considering how far others seem to have travelled in the same time-frame, calling this meeting "a surprise it happened so soon" is still silly. You're right, though, I wasn't considering the scale of the journey involved. But from a storytelling perspective, if not a geographical one, having Tyrion start his journey in episode one, then putting a pause button on his story while the writers find more excuses not to have him complete that journey, and finally achieve step one of his goal in episode seven, is glacial pacing. The real action of the storyline will (I assume) come as a result of their meeting. Why delay that? What purpose does all this filler serve? A good story doesn't need that. Get right to the good stuff and let it play out all season. Seeing multiple comments here expressing surprise that Tyrion and Dany met so soon is blowing my mind. The thing I really dislike about this show is how slowly everything moves. Storylines advance in maddeningly tiny increments from week to week, so that a large percentage of any given episode is spent "checking in" with characters and hinting at future events while waiting for something to actually happen. And I'm sure it's all been cut down a lot from the books, and that by book standards, plot developments are flying by, but I still can't shake my frustration that a show with SO MUCH story to tell can go to such lengths to tell so little of it in an hour! You're my new favourite.

You know your show is glacially-paced when a character begins a relatively short journey toward another character, suffers a bunch of bizarre and unnecessary delays to draw things out during which nothing much really happens, and finally meets up with her 7 episodes later (with three to go in the season), and your fans are saying they're surprised the meeting happened "so quickly." As much as I loved seeing Cersei hoisted by her own petard, shit just got real here! Now that Cersei has been imprisoned, there is no longer even the illusion of anyone or anything keeping the High Sparrow in check. The small council is as minuscule and ineffectual as Cersei could make it, the king is a helpless baby, and the only person who might actually care enough to lift a finger to help Cersei out of this situation, she has sent to Dorne. Apart from this being some rather glorious comeuppance for her, this means that King's Landing, the centre of power for the Seven Kingdoms, has been almost completely overthrown by religious fanatics. I'm enjoying Cersei's fate as much as the next girl, but the bigger picture here is really quite chilling. This is one genie that will not be going quietly back into the bottle! I really hope the Dorne stuff turns out to have more of a point to it than just an excuse to get Jaime out of King's Landing while all this shit goes down. Right now it is not feeling like it. Brienne and Sansa better rain bloody vengeance on the Boltons, or I will riot. I know this show doesn't let its characters ever be happy, but goddammit I need this one!

I LOVED this episode, for all the reasons elucidated above. This show never fails to push ahead with its story, even in flashback episodes, and there's no real sense that it they're making it up as they go along... Logan seems to really know where this is all going, and this season is taking off! My one question is, if Kali wanted Vanessa badly enough to have her sister burned alive and get the people of the village to push past the protection on the house to get to Vanessa... then why did she let Vanessa just walk away afterward? Why not take her while she was shocked and weak and in pain from having been branded, or wait for her outside the cottage and nab her when she tried to leave? Joan said the Nightcomers were all very aware of Vanessa's movements from the time she crossed into their land. So why go to all the trouble of removing all the protections between them and her, and then not use that window they created to make their move? From the way Kali demanded that Joan send Vanessa out to them, it sounded like their goal was to take physical possession of her and deliver her to their master. And then they enacted a plan to get to Vanessa, and it worked. So then why didn't they take her? Why just let her go? I just found it so perplexing at the end when she woke up alone in the cottage and then just walked out the door and away, while the narration reminds us that the Nightcomers will hunt her for the rest of her life. Didn't they just win? Where were they? I'm hoping this will be explained later on.

Egads, that final scene was the creepiest thing I've ever seen on television, and I'm a Hannibal fan! The baby was pretty awful, but I did appreciate that they didn't actually show the baby being killed. By the time we saw it, it wasn't a baby anymore; it was just a corpse. The fact that the prop baby was so obviously fake and the surreal creepiness of the dolls surrounding them made it easy to disconnect the scene from the idea of butchering a baby for real. I agree that Brona is being set up to become Elizabeth (from the book). I can easily see the story reaching the same resolution as it does in the book, but at the same time, enough wildcards have been thrown into the creation of Lily that pretty much anything could happen! Glad to see Dorian again, even if he is somewhat disconnected from everyone else's stories. I feel like the show has a plan for him that is not just decorative (they've done pretty well so far with everyone else), so I'm willing to wait it out and see where it all goes. I would like to see some more elements from the book come into his story though. So far, it's just the painting, and we haven't even seen that. But since Victor is getting his Elizabeth (and therefore drawing upon more context from his book), I wonder if Dorian will be getting his Basil, or Lord Henry. Something from the Wilde book that enriches the story and makes it about Dorian Gray specifically, and not just any spoiled beauty sleeping his way around London (Unless Angelique is going to be his Sibyl Vane... actually, now that I think about it, that could be interesting). Ethan, for example, is getting some great Wolfman context. Now that we have been shown what he is, the show is starting to delve into what it means to him and how it has affected him. But with Dorian, we haven't seen any of that. A viewer who'd never heard of werewolves could watch Ethan's story and interpret that he transforms into a monster and kills people without being aware or in control of it, and that he has some kind of connection to wolves and dogs. That's a great start. A viewer who'd never heard of Dorian Gray would, by this point, STILL have no idea what his situation is, other than he's a bored, jaded, rich beauty who looks at what is presumably a painting of something in a secret basement from time to time. Until they actually explain WHO he is and what kind of laws govern his existence, I'm afraid his story is going to continue to lack real substance. But I'm sure it's coming. This show actually does a pretty good job of juggling its characters and plotlines. The highlight, though, was Ethan and Lyle exchanging friendly flirtation while stealing priceless ancient artifacts from a poorly-guarded museum. I absolutely LOVED how warm and kind and charming Ethan was in response to Lyle's attraction, right from the start. How funny to see characters in a story set in Victorian London acting in a way that unfortunately strikes even our modern sensibilities as "progressive," and yet somehow doesn't seem anachronistic at all, just human. It's wonderful.

Awww, don't those two just have the sweetest meet-cute? So romantic. Super glad Trubel is back and will likely be sticking around next season (for at least part of the season if not the whole thing. Arcs are promising!) I'm glad they didn't just forget about her kidnapping by Agent Chavez and are actually intending to follow up on it! (Though I won't be counting my chickens, knowing this show!) Even though it seems like she was brought back for the sole purpose of killing Juliette so that Nick wouldn't have to, I think they've set her up to be put to good use next season. So that's a plus! I didn't have much of an emotional reaction to anything in this ep, probably because the show doesn't really establish the stakes in their battles. Why are the Royals so evil? What's so bad about them winning, and why should we be glad to see them lose? WHY is Diana so special, and what's so bad about her being raised by the Royals? And if it is so bad, then why did Adalind help the Royals to find her? Why should we care about any of this? It was just a mess. Not nearly as bad as the final scene with Nick and Juliette, though. That was so cringeworthy. Once again, they have no commitment on this character. She's evil, but really she regrets what she's done so deeply that she would rather die than have to live with it, but actually, no, she wants to keep doing evil things for no reason. If there was a real sense that she was being influenced by a bloodthirsty force greater than her (which they've suggested but never shown), that could have worked really well. But there's no indication that the real Juliette is fighting to overthrow evil Juliette, or that she's experiencing any real internal struggle about it. And that's not the actress's fault. The show could have easily used some kind of small special effect to cue a transition between good and bad Juliette if it wasn't coming through on acting alone. The writers just chose not to explain it at all. What a pathetic exit for a character that has been around long enough to deserve better. I hope she's really dead, because it would be one less ball for the writers to juggle, which might improve things in general, but I could easily see them bringing her back. If it weren't for Trubel, I would have jumped ship on this show long ago.

I laughed SO HARD at the Chekov reference. That was the absolutely perfect touch when hiding a gun for later use. I can't fault Liv for not taking the shot. She didn't know Lowell had seen what she'd seen, and that he was going to do what he did. I don't believe she was intending to let Blaine just get away with it, but that she and Lowell (and hopefully Ravi) would make up another plan, a better plan, after Blaine left. Lowell jumping in like that was in no way part of her scenario, so I absolutely can't say that she LITERALLY traded Lowell's life for Blaine's. Liv was right. Even if she had killed Blaine, she wouldn't have made anything any better. He has underlings hungry (sorry!) to take his place, and Liv doesn't know enough about the extent of his operation to effectively dismantle it. Is Blaine even the top of the chain? We've never seen him report to anyone, but unless he figured out how to create a zombie outbreak all on his own, someone must have turned him, and someone must have a grander plan than he does. (Max Rager? How do they fit into this?) Killing Blaine would have only created temporary chaos, and the resulting disruptions to the "food chain" would have likely lead to even more violence and death. But it really SUCKS that Lowell is gone. Bradley James will be sorely missed from this show. Upside? Ravi is probably NOT turning into a zombie rat!

If we're talking about who is and is not redeemable, I think the main difference between Adalind and Juliette is that when Adalind did awful things to people, it was as a means to an end. She may have enjoyed it, but she was doing it for a purpose, to achieve something, or because she'd been coerced. She didn't rape Nick because she wanted to, or because it was the kind of thing she would normally have done on her own, but because she thought it was the only way to get her child back. What makes her "evil" is that she considered this to be an acceptable way to get what she wanted. Juliette set up Kelly to get murdered for no reason whatsoever. She gets nothing out of Kelly's death but the... satisfaction? I guess?... of knowing that Nick was in pain because of it. She has no goal, and no purpose to what she's doing. Hurting someone to further your own agenda is despicable, but it's at least something an audience can understand. Where Juliette is right now, there's just no way to connect to that. I would be less pissed that Kelly is gone if I thought her death would ultimately mean something or result in some real, lasting change. With this show though? I don't expect anything but business as usual by the time the next season starts. What a waste of a great character. Trubel is back, though, so I will be focusing on the positive as much as I can going in to next week. Because Trubel is back!

HA! It's hilarious, because you think you're joking. I've forgotten how much I enjoyed this season. I think I feel a rewatch coming on...

Yep, that was terrible. Really, really terrible. Not only did it lack cohesion, but even in the fragments of each individual storyline, it's like the writers just didn't know how to make the most of the drama/tension they were creating. Having Falcone, for example, tell Jim that even if he survived, he was out of the game, was so incredibly stupid because it immediately lowered the stakes of this battle RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF IT. That would have been a great conversation to have on the balcony afterward, for Jim to learn that it was all for naught, but receive his father's knife as a gesture of appreciation. Barbara's storyline was so glossed over and inscrutable last week so that they could go for the quick reveal this week that she had killed her parents... but really, if they hadn't held back, if they'd let us see how twisted and disturbed she became with the Ogre, then let us watch this "counselling" session IN FULL KNOWLEDGE of what she had done to her own parents and just waiting for the shoe to drop on the clueless and innocent Leslie, they could have wrung so much more tension and excitement from the plot. Same with, as has been mentioned, Catween being mentored by Fish. It makes perfect sense, actually, now that Catween has committed murder and is struggling to find her identity in the wake of it, Fish would be a very attractive mentor for her. But instead of exploring the interesting stories, they just skip all that good stuff and jump right to the meaningless violence. It's like they have great ideas, but no clue how to use them effectively. I tell you, the first villain that learns not to monologue and just DO the thing? Is going to own the freaking city.

So, that sighting of Tarth earlier on, that was for the purpose of having Brienne in our minds when Jaime was talking about the "woman he loves," right? I don't care either way if he loves her or not, but it seemed like a deliberate set-up by the writers to plant that idea. I hope it's going somewhere, because romantic or not, Jaime and Brienne are gold together. I hope this means there might be a reunion in their future! But on this show, probably not. Or at least, not for five or six more seasons, the way some of these plots are moving.

But... that's it exactly. She's NOT in control of herself. The real Juliette would never do these things. Something else is influencing her in a way that is just stronger than she is. Of course she can't just DECIDE to be in control again, that's how not being in control WORKS! Juliette is not Angelus in the Buffy plotline rip-off. She's Willow! Dark Willow who got a taste of power and was taken over by it. She wasn't a different person, she was just Willow under the influence of dark magic to the point where she was destructive and beyond reason. Eventually, her old self will find a foothold and fight back. A few months in the English countryside with Giles, and Juliette will be right as rain. Plus, I should also point out, while we're making Buffy comparisons, that Buffy didn't kill Angelus because he was evil beyond redemption. She killed him because he had caused an immediate threat to the safety of the entire world that only his blood could stop. What made it so affecting was that she never did give up on him, and still thought of him as the man she loved, and was forced to kill him to save the world, even while her allies were still scrambling for ways to return him to his former self. The multi-episode build-up to Buffy dealing with his change and becoming even remotely capable of killing him was affecting and hard-earned, and unfortunately, way beyond Grimm's capabilities. The hackneyed "Dark Willow" storyline is MUCH more comparable, and even then, somehow, this is so much worse.

I think Renard pretty much HAS to be Jack the Ripper at this point. Otherwise, why kill Henrietta? It's a radical departure from his usual M.O. of picking up seemingly defenseless wessen prostitutes off the street. He went to seek her out right after she talked with Renard and got agitated about what he was saying, like maybe she knew what was happening and might have been able to help him. The only way that makes sense is if Jack knew he needed to bump her off to keep her from loosening his grip on Renard. Plus it's the only "reasonable" (boy, a single set of quotation marks just doesn't seem enough, does it?) explanation for his blackouts and violent behaviour, insofar as they've been "subtly" worked into the story just in time for this development. I was all set to hate on Adalind full speed ahead, but I found myself enjoying her despite myself! Claire Coffee is a damn charismatic actress. I did get rather frustrated, however, with the extended recap of the season she gave to her dead mother. I was literally shouting at my TV, "We know! We just saw that happen! Why are you expositioning?!" But maybe it's just me. I can't stand it when shows have characters experience something, and then turn around and explain what they just experienced in excruciating detail to someone else as pointless filler. No way they're killing off Juliette. Or if they do, it won't be by making her so evil she needs to be taken out. I have a feeling they want us to feel heartbroken at how far she's fallen so that we'll be overjoyed when she's finally saved and returns to the Juliette we all know and... don't really care about at all. Or maybe that's just wishful thinking. I actually have ANOTHER problem with shows that have the "good guys" give up on seeing the humanity in their enemies and decide to just kill them so they don't have to deal with them anymore. As if "shoot at it until it stops bothering you" is an acceptable problem-solving strategy. I would have a big problem with Juliette, a character supposedly well liked by the others and under the influence of something potentially-reversible that was done to her without her consent, being murdered by her closest friends for being "evil."... But I don't see it happening, even though I've gotten on Grimm's case for that kind of lazy dubious morality before, because this show loves to tease big changes, but always seems to end up going back to the status quo before too long. Case in point: Last week, the destruction of the trailer looked like it was going to be a turning point. How was Nick going to solve cases and deal with new Wessen without the crutch of the unfailingly comprehensive books? What doors might this open up, story-wise? Well, the very next episode, here we are doing the exact same thing, poring over the same books for the same answers, just in a different setting. Nothing ever really changes on this show. Juliette will be back to normal too in no time. So, Rosalee gets the idea to call in Trubel? I knew there was a reason I liked her!

I think the fact that there is SO MUCH guesswork here about Barbara's motivations, reactions and feelings... all this speculation is a testament to how under-served her story has been. When your audience is working harder than your writers to explain what a character is likely feeling and why they've done what they've done, you have a major problem.

Really disagree with this. For one thing, I think the Barbara we saw last night was more like a caricature than she would have been had she had some more agency. For another, this show does not mirror life. There are shows that mirror life brilliantly, and they take the human condition as their starting point and build great drama around it. Shows like Mad Men, The Wire, Breaking Bad, even Game of Thrones do this. Gotham's starting point is "Batman." This show modifies the human condition to tell its story. It's purpose is entertainment, not realism. And to be most entertaining, it should mine its storylines for drama. Part of the reason Barbara's story was so disappointing is that drama-wise, she was not even the focus of her own plotline. ALL the most affecting, life-altering moments that Barbara experienced during her ordeal happened off-screen. I'm talking about the moment when she was forced to name someone to die in order to save her own life, and she named her parents. Holy shit! I would have LOVED to see her emotional reaction to hearing those words come out of her mouth. How about the drive to her parents' house? Sitting in a vehicle with a psychotic killer, searching desperately for a way out, praying that Jim or SOMEONE intervenes in time before her family is murdered because of her. THAT'S drama. How about watching her parents get murdered in front of her because of a choice she made? Hanging from her wrists all day is awful, but THESE are the moments that can break a person, that can twist a person into a cackling villain or a tormented vigilante. But we didn't get to see any of that, because ALL of the drama belonged to Jim, and his ridiculous and ultimately unimportant storyline of racing the clock to save Barbara (thanks, unbelievably convenient phone call!). We don't even get a sense of how she felt, and couldn't even say for sure if she was being affected by drugs or by emotions, and it was not the fault of the actress. And that's ultimately the problem. The women on this show aren't really treated like people, but like props in the male characters' storylines. I would be fine with Barbara's damselling if we actually got to see HER story. The male supporting characters are also flat, but at least they sometimes DO things, make choices that affect others. Kristin has no purpose other than to support Ed's story. Leslie has no purpose but to support Jim's. The are not characters in their own right. Even Fish is ultimately nothing but a stepping stone in Penguin's rise to power. She hasn't affected much real change on the show either, even when she WAS at the centre of things. Selina is slightly better, but even she doesn't tend to do much apart from show up sometimes and help Bruce with whatever HE'S up to. I know they're supporting characters, but still, contrast that with the number of male characters who get to take action on their own behalf and drive their own storylines. This show does have a LOT of weaknesses in its writing, but its treatment of its female characters is probably the most egregious.

This is it exactly. If Barbara was a real woman who had gone through this kind of ordeal, I would NEVER judge her or express disappointment that she wasn't able to resist her captor or make an effort to save herself. NEVER. But Barbara's not a real woman, she's a fictional character, and every aspect of her story, from her kidnapping to her choices to her FEELINGS about her situation, were planned out and written by a group of mostly men. They have chosen to write her as a damsel in distress who not only needs rescuing, but is helpless and impotent in absolutely every way, unable even to SAY anything that might buy her some time. She just caves to what he wants and sells out her own parents with barely a token resistance. This show is meant not to mirror the real world (hello bat costumes!), but to serve as entertainment. And there is something really unpleasant about the notion that people are "entertained" by watching helpless dimwitted women be overpowered and tortured until their man shows up to save them. Yes, Barbara has been written as AWFUL at everything throughout the season, but that is a choice the writers make and continue to make. This was yet another opportunity for her to be better, for her to be ENTERTAINING instead of just a failure. That's why it's so disappointing to see yet another opportunity wasted. Even if they have a plan for her, it better be damn good to make up for all this, and from their track record so far, I don't hold out much hope. Floor lamps, indeed.

Yeah. Her parents? Really? Not sending him right to Jim, who could have caught the guy? Or Falcone, the LAST guy to hold her hostage? What an utter waste of a storyline. As has been said: sexist and pathetic. Whatever they're planning to do with Barbara from here, I don't hold out much hope. I mean, she was defiant at first, sure, but she didn't even do or try anything to save herself, like play along to manipulate him, or grab one of the MANY potential weapons surrounding them when his back was turned. I'm trying to remember if there was a woman in this episode who actually did anything meaningful, and wasn't just hanging around to talk to/about her boyfriend, or be a prostitute... I guess the captain got one line at the end there, so that's something. Don't you just love it when the bad guys call you from their car phones at the exact moment they happen to be crossing the only bridge in town with train tracks at the same moment the only train just happens to be passing? Some would call it EXCRUCIATINGLY lazy writing, but I call it considerate villainy!

Just saw this movie and absolutely loved it. I never really get scared by horror movies, but this one really got to me. I think because it became so clear so fast that the Babadook wasn't really a monster come in from the outside, it was a darkness inside Amelia herself that made her a danger to her own child. No wonder the kid was such a hellion; he's been watching this monster grow inside his mother for his entire life and waiting for it to take her over and destroy them both! That was the scary part, really. Knowing that the monster was inside her, and that the thing she was trying to protect her son from was really herself, and he would never be safe until she acknowledged it. The Babadook was REAL, not in the way that monsters are real in movies, but in the way that they are real in the world. That's what makes the movie truly scary - once you understand what the Babadook is, you can't retreat from the horror behind the usual "it's just a movie, it's not real." It was a psychological terror, rather than a supernatural one, and man, it got me good! That's why it ended up in the basement, with all of her husband's things. The Babadook wasn't a creature, really, it was a symbol of her grief and pain and bitterness over losing her husband. It was never going away. That's why "you can't get rid of the Babadook." She let it in, and until that point, it had been slowly growing and influencing her to resent her son to the point of (potentially) homicidal mania. (Which is why he was acting out so much - he could see it happening and was terrified of losing his mother to it. He was afraid both for her and of her, from minute one of the movie.) The only way to defeat it was to accept it, face it down, and refuse to let it be in control. It was never going away (that kind of grief never really does), but at least it could be locked away where it couldn't cause them any more pain. And once it lost its influence over her, she was able to really love her son for the first time. I found it very moving, and extremely well-balanced between the spine-tingling of the supernatural and the inescapable gut-punch of the psychological. And the kid who played Samuel was absolutely brilliant! He had exactly the right kind of alert wildness for a kid in Sam's situation, reading every minute clue of his mother's body language to shift his energy on a dime from protective to defensive and back again, depending on her moods. Not many child actors are up to that task. Essie Davis was fantastic. The writing and direction were superb. LOTS of people deserve awards for this movie.

Yeah! I mean, it seems to me, wouldn't the fact that he targets the loved ones of the cops investigating him actually make him EASIER to catch? I mean, you know exactly where he's heading, right? Did no one think to just hold a press conference and say "I will be out working tirelessly day and night to catch this killer. And while I am doing that, my dear, vulnerable, defenseless spouse will be all alone at home, at the following address, where there is definitely NOT a heavily-armed officer hiding in every cupboard, cabinet and some standing around holding vases of flowers in front of their faces all inconspicuous-like. And if my spouse looks at first like a mannequin in a bad wig, don't worry about it. It's just because our lighting is really bad." Just saying. If Jim HAD thought to warn Barbara about The Ogre, they'd have caught him by now. Because he went to meet Barbara in a public place TWICE. If she'd been under surveillance, or knew she should make a call if a stranger approached her, this whole thing would already be over. She took him back to HER place, for goodness sake. It would have been the top of the list of places to put under surveillance if she and Jim were still together (like The Ogre thought they were), but he went there anyway? I guess these Gotham cops just look for any excuse not to do their jobs. "Eh, I don't think I'll take this case. If I do, the killer will just walk right up to my front door, and then I might actually get an arrest under my belt. The guys would never let me live it down!"

OtterMommy, I hope Trubel does come back soon. She, at least, shook things up and made it interesting. I'm starting to feel like all this show has to offer is endless baby drama that it can neither explain nor resolve. Well, that and increasingly racist attempts to mine other cultures for folkloric monsters that Nick can defeat. I actually had high hopes about Juliette turning into a Hexenbiest, but that hasn't helped things at all. They could have made her a full-on villain to defeat, or a kick-ass new ally, or even a high-stakes victim in need of saving. ANY of those could have been interesting and engaging.... but this? What is this? She's enough like Juliette that we're supposed to feel bad for her? But we're NOT supposed to think she's really still herself because she's acting like a jerk? How has this changed her, really? She's not a good guy anymore, but not a bad guy either? And even when she seems to take charge of her transformation and says she wants to stay that way, we can't really believe her because it's in the context of this completely out-of-character behaviour that indicates she's not in control of herself, and so her statement is robbed of any impact. I don't get it! Are they just killing time waiting for something interesting to happen later? Dragging this storyline out is not doing it any favours! I can't even think about Adalind. I really feel like this season is just treading water until the finale. They set big things up to happen, and then somehow ended up not having enough story to fill a 22-episode season, despite the WotW stuff taking up most of the screentime. I'm reserving judgment of the season as a whole until it's over, but so far I am not optimistic.