Dianthus

I have yet to watch a single ep of this misbegotten "requel" and it doesn't seem like I'm missing much at all, except that I was watching the show with a friend, and we haven't been spending that time together. A & E really are the worst sort of hacks.

I got a text earlier from a OUaT watching friend, and I was, like, "oh yeah, that." So, you can see how excited I was for this whatever it is. Nothing I've read/heard about this has me feeling good about it. Haven't thought about Burn Notice in ages.

So I finally got to sit down yesterday and watch these last three episodes. Damn I'm glad I knew what I was in for from the start! I'll admit I got a little verklempt at the wedding. Too bad Regina and Zelena couldn't rise to the occasion. It wouldn't have been so bad if Regina wasn't always so f*cking smug about her magic. The Captain Charming bromance was cute, but CS would've meant a lot more to me. As others have said, they made such a big deal about getting the bean, and Hook using said bean, and Emma's flashes of memeory/ the pic of Hook as the book was burning, but then ignored it all entirely. WTF Show?!? A & E are even more delusional than I realized if they think they're going to attract a whole bunch of new viewers with a reboot, especially if they're going with what looks to be a retread of s1. Speaking of...I haven't really been rewatching the show (aside from the CS movie), so seeing s1 Henry again was really jolting. I'd forgotten just how young he was then. Also, wasn't the little girl supposed to have a perpetual spark of mischief in her eyes or some such nonsense. I didn't see any of that.

Which was/is completely nuts. A pirate captain doesn't trade away his ship/home/livelihood for you unless he's serious about you, especially if said ship is also his last physical link to his beloved elder brother.

I'm going with 'dread' myself. I couldn't believe this when I saw it on my Twitter feed. ETA: Typical. I'd like to be happy about this, but...

Today we went to the zoo. It's literally built into a mountainside, with mostly native birds and animals. The trail is steep in places, and not paved. It's been raining off and on here lately, so it was swampy in spots. Still, we survived it, and didn't wimp out on doing the whole thing (you can skip part of it if it gets to be too much). Pretty good, considering we live more or less at sea level. Tomorrow we're going to Cajas National Forest for the day.

Checking in from Cuenca, Ecuador. We did a bus tour of the city earlier, now we're holed up in our room due to rain. Taking lots of pix. Getting here was a trial. It's like we left our brains at home. Flew out of San Jose, many hours late. They originally sent us to gate two, but our plane left from gate nine(?), without us. We should've checked the departures board when it became clear that we were in the wrong place. Have spent more time in an airport over the last two days than in the whole rest of my life. Here's a tip, if you're thinking of Cuenca. They don't want you to put your used toilet paper in the bowl. You just put it in the trash. Not sure I'll be able to catch the show Sunday. We have a TV in our room, but neither of us could get it working. It'd probably be in Spanish anyway.

I may be a bit thin on the boards (but nowhere else...ba-dumb-bum) for the next couple of weeks as I'm leaving Wednesday for Ecuador. Not counting an hour or so in Ensenada, this will be my first time outside the states. I really should be packing, but you know how it is. Will check in if I'm able.

If they even put that much thought into it...Snow has a thing for bluebirds. The picture she put up in the mayor's office (that Bitchy Regina later torched) featured bluebirds.

I don't necessarily mind that Hook asked Henry to stand up with him, but he's a charismatic guy with all kinds of cool stories to tell and a confident leader of men, so you'd think in all this time he'd have made at least one friend who wasn't related to his fiancé. Did I mention how much I hate Regina? No? How remiss of me. Stupid bitch snipes at Hook for (quite reasonably) asking her bona fides before just handing over the magical McGuffin du jour. F*cking cow.

It just really hit me, after watching this, how small Hook's world has become. He's found his Happy Ending, so that's good, but he's lived his whole life (until recently) as part of a tight-knit group, and now the only one he can ask to be his best man is his soon-to-be stepson (who isn't actually a man quite yet). I mean, where the hell is Smee?

People like watching stories about...people; especially if those people are likeable/relatable. Plot, plot, plot isn't really about people. Sure, Emma and the gang are running around reacting to things and solving crises, but it's not nearly as satisfying as it could be, because they're not allowed to react to stuff in a relatable way. They're basically just pawns. The action figures almost seem redundant, since that's how A & E treat them anyway.

So I almost felt bad for Zelena by the end of it. When Reggie's all you've got, you are well and truly f*cked. My friend coined a new term For R & Z (Z & R?): they're "Narssisisters!" Colin's face is so delightfully expressive.

After catching up on the conversation, I just have to say that I find it very difficult to sympathize with those claiming Emma was acting selfishly in this ep when you've got a character like Regina around for comparison. For one thing, she's already saved Reggie's ungrateful ass multiple times. She also risked going full Dark One to save Robin at Regina's request, only for him to die anyway later on. Plus, Emma's now been punished multiple times for her "selfishness," most recently in the wish realm. One wonders if Reggie's hands were still covered in grit from crushing the hearts of Emma's parents.

It's weird, though, because Jane E. worked on BtVS and they did an episode (Tabula Rasa) about Willow doing a memory wipe on Tara to make her forget about an argument they had, which subsequently ended up affecting the whole gang, and led to Willow and Tara's break up. Angel and Buffy's night of passion was also statutory rape (and definitely a much older man[pire] with a teen), even as they made a big deal out of it being Buffy's birthday and she was supposedly (barely) legal. The Age of Consent differs from state to state (I think). In CA, that's 18, so she was still a year shy of that milestone.