AudienceofOne

Meanwhile, this is an awesome fitting sendoff for Kane. The man who spaced people spacing himself to save them. Such an amazing bookended image, far more than Octavia skewering Blodreina (and far less contrived). Parts of this felt like old 100 and maybe that's because it had a parade of better actors in the people they've brought back - Indra, Kane, Lincoln, even Pike. Maybe it's because the writers know who these characters are and used to be, back when they were writing a show because they had something to say rather than because they want a paying job. Maybe it's just because Henry Ian Cusick has more gravitas in his little finger than half the current cast. But this scene was great, as was everything Indra.

I knew the minute Octavia took the glowing serum of character development that she'd end up in a battle with herself. So that was cliched and a bit annoying. But then they remembered that Lincoln existed and I actually teared up a little. But then I remembered that she took it to remember what happened in the anomaly but somehow just found herself or something and I'm not sure how those two things are related?? But the best thing about this episode?

She'd gone full zombie, which means there was no way back. She'd be like that forever. She was incapable of speaking again ever.

That was my problem with this episode. I realised that the COTW, 'Liv on Brains' thing is seen as such an integral part of the show by the writers that they're not going to ditch it for anything. But it means that Liv is stuck doing these cases instead of being actively involved in the overarching plot. Which worked until this season but now just makes her seem like an ongoing cameo.

While I hate the anomaly plot line with a passion, I frigging love Diyoza so much. She's just like "Yeah, I know this isn't real but I'm still going. See ya!" As for the rest, this is just Mount Weather to the point where we even have Jasper Jordan and his love for an insider that he wants to save. But in brighter news, Abby has scored herself a smoking toy boy.

Ravi and Liv on the same brain was the comedy I never knew I needed, even if Car Salesman brain was a little OTT. And Don E in love is just beautiful. I kind of love the little loser. As soon as Liv's father (who had never been mentioned and who I admit I didn't care about) was introduced, I knew he was going to be Beanpole Bob. But I didn't mind how this backstory played out. If you'd asked me, I would have said this kind of flashback was redundant at this stage but I feel like there's something here about her fathers' motives. I mean, he turned first so he knew what the drug and Utopium would do. Yet he still sold the drug. Did he want zombism to break out? Does he want it to spread? Why? Is this because of his addiction? Self-hatred? Because it makes him feel powerful?

That's like saying we're all inbred because we're all homosapiens It's a big difference if you have a very small, contained population trying to breed in a single recessive gene that produces one individual every decade or so.

No, inbreeding is a definite problem. I feel like they're going for some kind of Eugenics vibe here but it all just makes no damn sense. I mean, Eugenics also makes little sense for the same reason - i.e. inbreeding - but at least they have a large enough population that they could fool themselves otherwise. This society would be desperately trying to import genetic material, not kill off babies that don't have a trait that's incredibly rare.

I had completely forgotten it, as I did with most of the scenes from last season where Clarke was (IMHO) wildly out of character. I didn't mind Clarke's emotional progression in this - even if it was contingent on her believing that Josephine would ever honour any deal. Of course, once she rifled around in her memory files and realised she had evolved into a genocidal monster I guess she finally worked that out. As for Josephine's acting - being arch and flouncy doesn't make you a badass. It makes you a teenage girl who thinks pop stars are the same as ageless genocidal dictators. Her performance is painful to watch.

Oh good, a bottle episode with Clarke being forced to face a succession of the show's most annoying characters. The actress who plays Josephine is really bad. I found her acting nails on a chalkboard in the first episode and this was an entire episode of her monologuing. I found it painful.

I can believe that her mother would cut off and never speak to a man who had disappointed her, especially if she thought he wasn't good enough for her kids. But how he could be BOTH her and Evan's father makes little sense to me. I can't imagine her mother getting pregnant to a man twice when her children don't even know who he is. She's simply too much of a control freak for that.

What the Mum said made no sense. I thought when she talked about him "coming back" she meant when he came back to Seattle around the time Evan got hurt. I also thought she was implying it was him that saved Evan. But I always thought that Liv and Evan were several years apart. So if they had the same father then... ???

I realised today I'm mostly watching this show because I'm curious as to when and how we'll be introduced to this season's Lever of Ethical Quandary.

I found it interesting that this was the brain Liv hated the most, especially when she didn't seem that bad on it. It suggests she was fighting the brain from minute one, which begs the question why. And then we meet her Mum again and go: oh yeah, that's why. Judgemental perfectionist brain? This is a bit too close to home. They were assholes from scene 1 mostly. Well, maybe not Evan but his mother, yeah. I think it's a shame we didn't deal with this whole thing earlier but also that the scene wasn't about her relationship with her mother at all but about her new Plot Father.

Wow this episode was bad. What a pile of nonsense. Just aside from the utter gobbledygook about time dilation and anomalies and that weird scene with the tree sacrifice, this society continues to make zero sense. ZERO. And on top of all of that, the dialogue was bad. Really bad. This was a poorly-written episode from beginning to end. Oh and yeah the whole Dark Commander thing is an annoying retcon