[S05.E06: Exit Wounds]

On 6/5/2018 at 10:50 PM, Sakura12 said:

That's the thing with kids Clarke, you gotta watch them all times otherwise they will do something dumb. I wonder how long it will be before Octavia wants to kill Madi. Even if she doesn't want to be Commander, there are people that will want her to be. 

In a way it's kind of funny that maybe Clarke knows how Abby feels now. You try to be the adult, you try to make a plan, you try to keep your kid safe, and then your kid nukes the plan and says, "I did it because it was in your best interest!"

That said, I do appreciate that the episode was able to show us that Clarke did the smart thing and tried to get out of there before anyone figured out that Madi was a real night blood, and how that plan got foiled so that this much more interesting plot development could happen.

On 6/6/2018 at 7:57 AM, Gwen-Stacys said:

I'm getting more and more intrigued by what happened during the dark year. It seems to be what fundamentally changed Octavia and made her followers almost cultish in regards to them. Did someone mess with farm stations food supply, forcing Wonkru to turn cannibal during the wait to grow more food? Did Octavia feed them her baby? You've got me, show. I really wanna know....

I want to know too! (And I'm confused because I was originally willing to accept what we were shown as the explanation for why so many people were dead and everyone worshiped Octavia. I would have gone along with it without another mystery, but okay -- I'm hooked on this mystery.)

On 6/6/2018 at 8:40 AM, CooperTV said:

Well, the fandom thinks it's either a major, 1-year-long power outage or cannibalism. But knowing the show it's be some nonsense, like "We had to kill some elderly people, three of them, maybe, idk". I still firmly believe they're going to wight-wash Octavia in that "Dark Year" episode.

Slightly disagree. I think, knowing this show, it'll be something like "the ghosts of the people who first built the nuclear bombs downloaded themselves into the power grid and started taking over people's minds."

On 6/6/2018 at 5:14 PM, AudienceofOne said:

It wasn't who they were hooking up with that was random. It was the where and when that was random. 

 

This! Both of those incidents seems really inappropriately timed. I was really taken aback by it. Outside of that, I'm intrigued by the interest PrisonKru's leader is taking in Kane. Not sure where that plot line's headed.

[S02.E07: After]

Thanks to a shot that panned across a line of Aunts at the funeral, I've developed a new theory of who ends up as an Aunt. My new theory is: pious women who are post-menopausal and were not married at the time of the coup.

Re: how the rest of the world reacts to Gilead. I'm also curious about that, but I'll throw this in as well. America has a lot of weapons. Like, unusually a lot. It's not clear how much of that's left after that war that created Gilead, but even if everyone else in NATO got together and attacked... there's still a good chance we would lose. So, given that, and given how hesitant we all always are to intervene in human rights abuses if the countries in question aren't also actively attacking us... I'm not surprised if the outside world isn't doing much.

Also, FWIW, the point of the book originally was about how we look at these societies from the outside and decide it's wrong to judge them, and don't interfere.

On 5/30/2018 at 1:19 AM, Brn2bwild said:

There was much to like about this episode, but something didn't quite gel with me.  It felt like Moira's storyline should have had its own episode, and have been fleshed out more.  We should have heard about Odette before this episode.  We felt sympathy for Moira because we know Moira, but the discovery would have been much more impactful if we also knew Odette.

I was glad to see Emily and Janine "escape" the colonies, but in some ways, seeing them dumped back into the handmaid pool (and in the same location where they were before, no less) seemed to undercut the journey they were on in the colonies.

Yeah. I was sad about Odette, but I wish we had heard about her at some point before. I guess there's an argument that it would have made the flashbacks even more complicated than they already were, but, for all intents and purposes, it looked like June, Luke, and Moira were all hanging out together with nobody else in their social circle.

As far as resetting everything... I think that's going to be a problem for this show, especially if they're trying to stretch it out. I'm reading this book called Finite and Infinite Games, and basically, the main idea is that an infinite game is a game where the goal is to keep on playing, so you have to change the rules periodically to stop anyone from winning or reaching a definitive conclusion. I feel like that's the curse of open-ended TV shows like this -- viewers want to see the story advance, but the story can't advance to a point where it threatens to conclude, so something has to happen to reverse the advancement. I would personally prefer shows that know how many episodes they have from the beginning, but unless those shows are really short, that almost never happens.

On 5/30/2018 at 1:54 AM, tennisgurl said:

So, I think I know how people in Gilead spend their time now that anything remotely fun or interesting has been banned: They practice complicated super Extra rituals for everything, and work on their call and response routines! I guess all that choreography takes up a lot of their spare time. And remember when your supposed to say whatever for any situation.

 

I thought the opening scene was way overdone, and that was one of the questions I asked myself while I was watching: When did they practice this? Did they all stand in a warehouse for a couple of hours while Aunt Lydia walked them through the whole thing, like, "When I say X, you all pull off your bee-keeper veils and hold them out to the side at a 90-degree angle?" And, if they did practice... did they practice just to perform this for themselves? There was no one else there. It was really weird.

On 5/30/2018 at 5:41 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

As always, whenever a handmaid is given something she's not allowed, I'm immediately suspicious that it's a set up but part of me loved that Serena brought June into her secret. Now they're in it together (at least for now). Two womenfolk reading and writing is scandalous enough, but secretly wielding power? SCANDALOUS!
 

I also liked that Serena brought June in on it -- and I can believe that she and June understand each other well enough at this point to have a temporary alliance where they work in their mutual interest. I was more surprised that she brought Nick into it because, why does she trust Nick? I guess she didn't have much of a choice.

 

On 5/30/2018 at 10:56 AM, AnswersWanted said:

 I was thinking Facebook or Instagram myself, just because Gilead tried to purge out all electronic and online advancements, at least allowing access to most people, from their area, I would assume that other governments have access to the Internet still and all it has to offer. 

Seeing that photo actually made me think about something I hadn't before, there would’ve been so much uploaded information before the fall of Gilead, people making videos on YouTube or Instagram or Snapchat,  how many might have run live streams through Facebook, how many horrible things were captured forever and uploaded for all to see? 

When was that exact moment Gilead cut the cord, both literally and figuratively, and sealed everyone out?

As far as where the Moira/Odette photo came from, I also wondered that, but I'm willing to handwave it as Luke getting access to his stuff after he reached Canada (which was closer to the early days of Gilead) or Moira getting access to her stuff online... but you raise an interesting question. Because, most of the popular Western social networks and cloud storage sites are owned by American companies. Some of them have officers in other countries, but it makes me wonder, not for the first time, what happened to the tech billionaires?

I've asked myself the same question about celebrities, and the answer I came up with in my head is that they were rich enough that the could get themselves out of the country as soon as trouble started, so maybe the super rich did the same thing... but I wonder.

And I wonder because celebrity and super intense capitalism are big features of American culture that you don't find to the same degree almost anywhere else, and that makes me think the process of overthrowing America and turning it into a theocracy would be different? It would need to overcome a bunch of rich people who didn't want to lose their business interests and wouldn't be served by a society where people sit around knitting and eating apples. And, I know it's not the point of the show, but I'm curious about how that happened.

On 5/30/2018 at 6:44 PM, Umbelina said:

Luke didn't really bother me last night.  Everyone faces grief and trauma differently, I didn't think that meant he didn't care.  He was kind to Moira bringing her the take out food.  Sometimes small gestures and the touch on the shoulder mean more to someone who is grieving than lots of words or tears.  Also, for the other poster that said this (?) Luke may be in a different stage of his PTSD up there, he's been there longer.

Luke also doesn't bother me. He's been on this hope-disappointment-fear-relief rollercoaster for a long time now. The reality of his situation, and the situation of most refugees, is that he can't do anything but wait. That's really painful, but it's real.

On 5/30/2018 at 11:15 PM, Souris said:

I spent the rest of the episode wondering if it was Rita (Serena's Martha) who was killed, until later when Serena said that Eden and Rita had gone to visit the family whose Martha had been killed. I think maybe they wanted us to wonder, because when June was crying to Nick about it, she just said "They killed HER."

Yeah, I was also confused about that. I think that particular scene might have been longer originally and then cut down, but I'm confused in general about what happened in that whole sequence with the Marthas.

On 5/31/2018 at 4:46 PM, DiabLOL said:

True but what I meant was is he connected to the internet? Is there even an internet?

North Korea has an internet that's really just a bunch of hand-picked pages, so I could see Gilead having something similar. It's an "internet" kind of, in that it functions well enough to let them do their work, but not the internet we know right now.

[S02.E06: First Blood]

I hope Fred's dead, mostly because it puts everyone in an interesting position if he is, but I think he'll survive.

Also, this is random, but for some reason I thought the Marthas were all called "Martha" instead of by their names. Now I'm realizing everybody calls Rita Rita, so maybe I imagined it?

ETA: I forgot. I'm not sure what to think about the scene where Serena's speaking on campus. When the scene starts, Fred makes a point of saying that what they most need right now is for their ideas to be part of mainstream conversation and legitimated. At the time, I thought, "Wow, if there was ever a case for why you should shout people down when they speak on campus, this is it" but when it escalated to somebody shooting her... I'm just not sure how to interpret it.

I'm also not sure I understand whether extremist beliefs slowly crept up on the culture without anyone knowing, or violently took over all of a sudden. This scene, and the scenes of protest in both seasons, seem to suggest that people noticed what was happening and pushed back against it. So why were the Serenas and Freds of the world so successful?

On 5/23/2018 at 11:21 AM, mamadrama said:

The inconsistency is getting to me, too, and some of the things just aren't making a lot of sense to me. Like when Nick said, "Maybe you should take her to a different kind of doctor." I mean, is Dude blind and deaf? Shouldn't he be kind of privy to the crazy-ass ways that the Handmaids (and women in general) get treated? ARE there any psychologists left? And what made him think they'd even CARE about June's mental health? That took me right out of the episode. I know that's kind of off topic and not what you said, but it was on my mind. :-)

I found that weird, too. And weird that he would even suggest it given that he seems (SEEMS) sympathetic to June's position. The way she's reacting psychologically is normal for the situation she's in, so, if they took her to a psychiatrist, the psychiatrist would be trying to convince her to be happier about her slavery, which seems like it's not a nice thing to do?

On 5/23/2018 at 8:27 PM, legxleg said:

The flashback where angry protestors were calling Serena Joy a Nazi rang a false note for me. As one of the earlier posters pointed out, Nazism is primarily associated with racial "purity" and racial genocide, and the show expects us to believe that Gilead is somehow race-blind.

Sometimes when people say "Nazi" they mean "fascist" and not "white supremacist" although the Nazis were obviously fascist white supremacists. However, I agree with what others have said about this show being weird about race and not mentioning racism.

On 5/23/2018 at 10:19 PM, rideashire said:

There's something that bugs me about this glory hole through the sheet sex business (something other than the obvious). Aren't the men just screwing themselves with that requirement? What man is going to say "I never want to see another naked woman in my life, not even my wife!" and then agree to this rule? I just find it odd that they'd go so far with married couples.

The men made the rules. They shot themselves in the foot with that one and I don't get why. Acceptable sacrifice for the greater goal, maybe? I don't know. Hmmm. Just seems odd. I'm over thinking this.

 

I don't get why either, but I guess, historically, this is a rule men have made for some reason at certain times. Thinking back to the incident where the other Commander got his hand cut off, it seems like some of these people are super into the religious aspect -- they might sincerely believe their own pleasure is wrong.

On 5/23/2018 at 10:26 PM, madpsych78 said:

I know everyone thinks he is a sick bastard, and he most definitely is. But there was nothing in it for him to give June a picture of Hannah, and even though she said she wanted him she was also concerned about the baby. Dude could have persisted but he backed down. And honestly, I think the ONLY reason he killed the wife of the guy who shot Serena was because Serena told him to "be a MAN!" He was doing what he thought it would take to show Serena that he could be what he wanted her to be.

 

I think that's an interesting point. It seems like Serena would prefer to live in a world where she and June can be friends while she breeds June and steals her baby, and it seems like Fred would prefer to live in a world where the Handmaids are actually attracted to him and find him charming -- which is maybe why he goes through this ritual of getting them to dress up and go on fake dates to the brothel with him. He's sort of looking for a "girlfriend experience," and doing little favours for June is a way of getting there. Maybe.

On 5/26/2018 at 11:33 AM, PeanutnRufus said:

OK, I want to know why Nick requested a reassignment. Does he want to get away from June because it's all too painful now? Will he have to take the child-bride with him? And he did seem like he was in a hurry to get to the cars - and away from the building. However, if he knew that Pryce was about to get offed, why bother asking for the reassignment? He's clearly part of the Resistance as he got June TF out of there before (right)?

I'm not sure Nick's part of the resistance. He definitely seems like an Eye, but I noticed that the earlier episodes this season have been written in such a way that Nick could be with Mayday or he could not be with Mayday. Like, the big question at the end of last season was, is he putting her in a van that's taking her to the government or is he putting her in a van that's taking her to freedom? The answer was: a van that's taking her to the government. He told her it would be okay because he had advance knowledge that she wouldn't be executed.

Then, when she's on the run, he reveals that it was really hard for him to track her down. No one else she talks to has heard of Nick or seems to know whether he's supposed to go with her when she escapes. She angrily asks him at one point why he handed her over to Mayday when he didn't know anything about them, and he doesn't really say anything in response.

You can read it either way, but I have a bad feeling that Nick's ideal scenario is to find a way to keep June with him in Gilead, not to help her escape.

On 5/27/2018 at 4:13 AM, snowbryneich said:

Given June's situation is because she was an adultress despite Luke divorcing his first wife and marrying her I think the show has shown that marriage is for life in Gilead, whether you like it or not. (If there was a way out it seems like the Commander would have ditched Serena given he seems to hate her.) 

Sometimes people make an exception for death, though. Being widowed is different from being divorced, so Serena might be allowed to marry again.

[S36.E14: It is Game Time Kids]

Oh, man. I genuinely feel bad for Laurel. That's a lot to take in in a very short period of time: thinking it's out of your hands and you have to wait months to learn the result, hearing that they're reading the votes live, finding out you already lost, having to decide which of your closest allies you have to disappoint, having to keep that secret until the show... that would suck.

I was hoping Dom would put himself in the fire challenge for the drama, but he was probably smart not to. Going to the end with Wendell was not his preferred scenario, but it also wasn't the worst possible scenario (losing the fire challenge and getting knocked out of final three). He risked his second worst/best scenario in order to avoid the very worst one, and that makes sense.

My favourite moment was Angela saying she was happy to be part of a plan that wasn't against her. That's all we can really hope for.

[S02.E22: Chapter Thirty-Five: Brave New World]

On 5/18/2018 at 6:58 AM, dcalley said:

Josie: "Don't forget about Ethel Muggs, who's running as a third-party candidate."

Parties, in a high school election? Hmm. OK, let's say there were parties. There were three tickets plus Ethel (did she have a running mate?), so were two of the duos from the same party, or...? This is stupid and I laughed, both at the show and at myself for focusing on it. Mentioning parties was just so unnecessary! "Don't forget about Ethel!" There, was that so hard?

Yeah, that didn't make sense. On top of that, I thought it was setting us up for an outcome where all of the other characters drop out and Ethel is the president, which would have been an interesting turn of events, but no... Archie stays in by himself and wins. Speaking of which -- they all seemed to think you needed a running mate for this election (which I've never heard of in high school before, but I'm not American, so whatever, maybe it's real) -- why did Archie suddenly NOT need a running mate after Veronica dropped out?

On 5/18/2018 at 8:01 PM, the-grey-lady said:

Trying to parse FP's logic here.

"We're moving to Toledo! I won't identify my son in a body bag!"

[a few days later]

"All hail my son, the new leader of a violent gang!"

Um, what?

I 100% thought his plan this episode was to ditch his son in Riverdale and go to Toledo himself. 100%. Didn't even question it. And then, when Veronica said he could run the speakeasy, I did a double-take, and said, "Wait, is he not still moving to Toledo? Why is he leaving the gang if he's not moving to Toledo?" And... yeah, why is he leaving the gang if he's not moving to Toledo? I mean, he already doesn't care about his parole violations, so... did he just realize it was a gang of kids?

[S05.E04: Pandora's Box]

On 5/18/2018 at 10:58 AM, Bobcatkitten said:

I could not get past Octavia's red forehead. It was so distracting.

 

I didn't love the way it looked, but I liked the idea of adapting the traditional Commander's makeup to look like blood, since she cemented herself as their leader when she refused to wear the old makeup and showed up with her face covered in blood (I also didn't love the sequence where she showed up with her face covered in blood). But good concept from the makeup department.

[S02.E05: Seeds]

On 5/16/2018 at 10:30 AM, dmc said:

It's interesting to me that Serena wants June to be her confidante but is legitimately horrible to her.  She doesn't even try to be nice and when she does...it comes off the way a cold detached mother treats a child.

 

I also found it interesting and, for a minute, it made me think maybe Serena would learn a lesson about how you shouldn't try to break somebody's spirit, but, ha ha, no. She just doubled down on being terrible.

In all seriousness, though, people prefer if their victims seem okay with being victimized, because it makes what they're doing seem less bad for them. It's one way of resolving the cognitive dissonance that comes from doing something evil. So, I don't think Serena sincerely cares about what's good for June (if she did she wouldn't be into this handmaid thing to begin with) but she would sincerely prefer for June to be all right with it, because that would ease her conscience.

On 5/16/2018 at 1:36 PM, Miles said:

Our modern ideal of marriage is a pretty new one. Gillead is bringing it back to it's roots in biblical times. At least they are consistent.

Which is also why it was always so laughable when christians talked about "traditional marriage" when they were trying to keep gay people from getting married. Nothing traditional about modern day hetero marriages.

...

Serena seems conflicted as well. On the one hand, she likes June subservient and under her heel, but on the other, she isn't comfortable with it either. She wanted June to actually hold a conversation with her on their walk. Part of it is probably because she is bored out of her skull, but another is that somewhere deep down she knows how creepy and inhumane this is.

One of the things I find really interesting about this season is that it's doubling down on the religious stuff, and the contrast between the religion Gilead presents and the version of Christianity that people remember from before, about love and peace. It seems clear that Gilead's religion is really just a way to justify a caste system that places the leaders of the revolution above everyone else in the society they created -- making up a bunch of reasons why that's holy is almost an afterthought.

The thing I probably liked most about this episode was the contrast between the awful, holy Gilead marriage ceremony that's all about service to the state, and the marriage in the colonies, where God doesn't care if you're Jewish (or gay) as long as you love each other.

On 5/16/2018 at 3:52 PM, Joana said:

Serena looked like she was about to spontaneously combust with fury when she saw Aunt Lydia writing, and Auntie picked up on it and rubbed it in. The dynamics between these two women are quite fascinating. Serena probably considers Aunt Lydia to be beneath her, while Aunt Lydia must have realized that Serena is far from happy with her new life under Gilead, which likely makes her a false believer in her eyes. I wasn't sure about it before, but it does appear that Aunt Lydia wields more power in this society than a Wife does. Serena should be careful.

It seems like women's power in this society is limited to the power to kick down at other women, but the Aunts are the only women we've seen who hold state jobs, so they do have that. Similar to what I said above, I think it's interesting that Aunt Lydia seems like she's a true believer in this religion that has conveniently raised her up to a much more powerful position than she probably had before (and toppled the kinds of women she probably didn't like before). Once again, I'm curious to know more specifics about who she was before everything happened.

[S02.E22: Chapter Thirty-Five: Brave New World]

I don't get why it was a better plan for Veronica to get Pop's than the Worm, unless it's a thing where it's "better" because now all the Whos down in Whoville can hold hands and sing on the North side and, in so doing, defeat Hiram's evil plan somehow. And yes, I was also quite taken aback when Betty said she was supposed to be a great detective. I mean, she was crying and her dad's in jail for murder, so that's not the right moment for Fred to tell her no one thought she was a great detective, but....

19 hours ago, notcreative enough said:

So Tall Boy was the fake black hood. Maybe because the actor didn't play the part because he was wearing a mask but I don't think that Archie could take a guy of that hight and size in a fight.

I don't understand how this case wasn't immediately solved when Archie realized the guy who attacked him was tall. I mean, that's how we closed the junkyard case. The guy who went there was tall, ergo, it was Tall Boy. Come on.

6 hours ago, nilyank said:

I don't know why Archie warned Hiram of his intentions. Even he must have some idea what kind of man Hiram is. Of course, Hiram had him arrested and embarrassed in front of the whole school before the ceremony to make him class president. 

I really don't understand how Veronica is able to conduct business, sign contracts and meet with a lawyer as she is still is a minor and Hiram is her legal guardian. Demanding the money from the trust that originally was blackmail money from another crime family? Wanting to open a speaker which will need a liquor license when she cannot legally drink?

Yeah, all through that scene where Archie pulled a Ned Stark and told the villain how he planed to slowly expose his crimes in the future, I was like, "WTF are you doing?!" (although I appreciate that he said "make my bones" again). At first I wondered why Hiram didn't have him whacked, but then I remembered that that dumbass teenager was his only kapo, so there was nobody to do the whacking. And that the bed he's made for himself is one where he has to fall back to embarrassing a teen at a high school event. Badass mob boss. LOL.

For the business stuff -- to be completely real, there was a time when I lived with my parents as an adult and my insurance broker took for granted that it was okay to tell my mom the details of my policy. I feel like, even if it were all legal for Veronica to sign these contracts and own these businesses, the reality is that it wouldn't matter and most people would assume they were really dealing with Hiram.

[S05.E04: Pandora's Box]

I'm leery of this thing where Abby's "addicted" to pain medication. In real life, people with chronic or long term pain conditions are stigmatized for using medication they actually need, and TV shows often play into it. Like, there's this idea that because some people misuse pain killers that means there's no legitimate reason for people to use them over an extended period of time. The situation where someone has a very serious medical condition that's gobbling up resources, in a setting where resources are really limited, presents an interesting dilemma and, here, that dilemma is getting reduced to "she could stop taking the medicine, though." Lame.

Anyway.

On 5/16/2018 at 1:52 AM, Subrookie said:

I'd like to know more about the "dark year". 

I love how no one who shows up new ever asks many questions about what happened to earth. It's like, "only one valley left, it's ours. And, we aren't interested in knowing why everyone is all Lord of the Flies down here." "Blood filled room I just dropped in, not worried about it."

I would also like to know about the dark year, assuming it wasn't just that incident we saw where they all started fighting with each other and Octavia killed anyone who wasn't with Wankru.

As far as people not asking questions, that actually reminded me of one of the funniest parts of the previous episode -- where the newbies did ask questions and we cut away, and then cut back to Clarke in the middle of explaining Allie. Maybe once you've heard the plot from the first couple seasons you're just like, "Okay, I see that I just have to go with whatever's happening, here."

[S02.E04: Other Women]

My suspension of disbelief is failing a little bit, now. I think that's the natural consequence of expanding a pretty compact story across two seasons of TV. I understand why they need to get June back in the House of Fred for story-telling purposes but this isn't even her first escape attempt. No way would they let her loose in the neighborhood again.

I was actually interested in the POV that June was in a different mindset because she didn't care about keeping her head down anymore. One of the really difficult things about this situation is that exact dilemma -- do I keep my head down and try to wait for this to blow over? History is full of people who did that -- even recent history, like when ISIS started taking over cities. It's a painfully difficult thing to wrestle with, so it was interesting to see what June was like once she had fully given up on the idea of keeping her head down and waiting for it to be over. Now, within an episode or two of having that happen, they've reset her again and I find it disappointing.

 

On 5/9/2018 at 1:16 AM, chocolatine said:

Things are looking very bleak now with Mayday having gone silent and June seemingly accepting her fate, but I have a feeling the scene with the commanders shooting and talking about Canada was shown for a reason. If Fred goes there, I can see the Canadian branch of the resistance kidnapping him and demanding his handmaid as ransom.

I think it's significant that the guy who had his hand cut off was there, too. Remembering that Fred isn't super into the religious aspect of this dictatorship, and that that other dude losing his hand was the moment Fred realized what deep shit he was in, I think his plan is to defect to Canada if he can get them to send him there. It would be interesting to see what would happen, then.

On 5/9/2018 at 5:07 AM, Poohbear617 said:

I would really like to see some of the background of Aunt Lydia.  IRL i am curious about some powerful women who use their position to push and keep other women down thinking that the agenda they are following wont  turn around and bring them down as well no matter how many womens necks they are standing on.  What was lydia like before Giliad? Was it power or faith or self preservation that created this monster.

 

Aunt Lydia is kind of a problem character for me who's starting to read more as "inconsistent" than "complicated" but I would also like some explanation of what kind of person she is and how she got to this place.

On 5/9/2018 at 3:08 PM, Umbelina said:

None of that was June's fault.

The fault lies squarely on the men and women who slaughtered the elected leaders, got rid of the US Constitution, enslaved or murdered the intelligentsia, and anyone else who could stand up to them, anyone else that dared to have a different religion than the new state religion, and have made women not much more than slaves.

 

I agree. I was a little bit frustrated by that scene, because it's obvious to me that the people responsible for Omar's murder are in the Gilead oligarchy. It's true that, in real life, people will often pressure you to believe you're responsible for their negative actions (like, "I wouldn't have hit you if you didn't make me angry!") and that people buy into that, but I would have liked it if June wasn't so easily swayed.

[S02.E04: The Riddle Of The Sphinx]

Oh, man. I'm so confused this season. I came here to read the recap just to understand what's going on (and FWIW, I agree with the recap that it makes no sense to burn the whole room that the Delos host is in -- even if you want to destroy the evidence that he existed, why not keep the other stuff?)

I feel like somebody on this show now has to be one of the hybrid host-humans, with the three most obvious candidates being Ford, William, and Bernard. Trying to sort out the timeline in my mind to figure out if any of those possibilities has been ruled out already made me stressed. I could see it being Bernard because he's displaying some of the same symptoms as the Delos host did, and because I'm getting the idea that this season is about his journey like last season was about Delores. I could see it being Ford because the timing seems to line up best if it is. I could see it being William because he was the one overseeing the project and, after he decided some men are better off dead, maybe he killed himself and accepted 30 days to be a real part of Westworld as a host and play the maze. I could also see all of those being totally wrong.

51 minutes ago, Cthulhudrew said:

I thought it was very interesting that the technician on duty at the time of the 149th iteration of Delos noted that "he was stable!" Suggested to me that that version was actually functioning fine, and that Delos Corporation had perfected the technology, but that William at this point had decided he didn't want people to be able to live forever (due to Julia's suicide and his realization of his own failings) and that he went there to torment his father-in-law.

What it made me think of was how Ford said last season that he tried to keep Bernard and Delores apart because seeing each other again would trigger them or something. Maybe seeing somebody he actually knew is what triggered Delos.

[S02.E21: Chapter Thirty-Four: Judgment Night]

I get what they were trying to do by making this the episode where all the random plot lines suddenly crashed together, and I applaud the ambition, but, because those plot lines were super well-developed in the first place, for me this was more like constantly being reminded of story lines I didn't care about.

Observations:

• It's funny that the Serpents vote by making fang hands. It's also funny that Cheryl got to vote because she was just randomly there.
• When the Sheriff said he didn't know the terms of FP's parole, that reminded me that the one term we were explicitly told was that he's not supposed to hang out with the Serpents. He's, like, not even trying to hide it now. Smooth.
• I forgot at first, but now I remember that Veronica believed until this episode that her dad didn't whack Papa Poutine, so having a psycho burst into her house and try to kill her and her mom was not just scary, it was another thing on the growing pile of lies.
• If this were a better, subtler show, I'd like what they were doing by showing that, even though Hermione seems to believe she's making her own choices, she's being manipulated by Hiram.

19 hours ago, notcreative enough said:

 I need Veronica and Cheryl to emancipation themselves and move in together.

I would watch that show.

19 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

 When blond lady kidnapped Toni, I was like "I wouldn't be afraid of Jughead, I would be afraid of Toni's girlfriend, lady" and low and behold!

I kind of like the idea that Penny just doesn't care enough to know who's dating who. She's like, "Here's a girl I saw you with one time. Close enough!"

[S05.E03: Sleeping Giants]

I liked this episode. I was pretty impressed by how smoothly the writers finessed the situation on the prison ship so that we have an explanation for why they didn't just kill all the chryo dudes, why Raven stayed behind, and why Murphy stayed behind. I also suspected right away that there was no escape pod, so I'm glad they just admitted that and moved on instead of trying to draw it out. My favourite moment was when Emori heard that someone had to stay behind and said they should leave Murphy -- it was so casual but so brutal at the same time; it told us a lot about what it's like for him to have to live in close quarters with her after they broke up, and what it's like for everyone else to be in the middle of it.

On 5/9/2018 at 3:09 AM, CooperTV said:

Madi recognized Bellamy from the pictures? He looks completely different now, lol. But that was a nice scene, though. Also, Bellamy finding "The #1 Dad" cup? I see what you did there, writers.

Honestly, she would have done just as well thinking he was Kane, but maybe she recognized them all collectively as resembling the drawings of spacekru.

On 5/9/2018 at 7:00 AM, Paloma said:

I'm as bleeding heart liberal as they come, but in this case I was on the "let's kill them all now" side because it was Survival 101. The cryo prisoners were apparently all violent criminals, most if not all murderers, and if the rest of them woke up there is no way the few in SpaceKru could protect themselves.

I don't totally disagree -- given that this is a TV show, and we know that any sleeping criminal who shows up in episode 3 will definitely turn into a problem before episode 8. But I also think it's worth being cautious. Like, yeah, it appears that that's what the situation is, but this situation is completely new to them, and there are still a lot of missing pieces they don't understand. Doing something rash and final as a first resort can also screw you later if the situation turns out to be different than you thought it was at first glance.

On 5/9/2018 at 7:17 AM, ottoDbusdriver said:

According to the Captain's log, it looks like the guards and some of the inmates rebelled against the ship's crew -- why exactly ?  Especially since they had no idea that Earth had been destroyed.

The Captain said that the prisoners found out about "order 11" or something similar, and I got the impression that the Lieutenant told them because he thought it was immoral or something. I'm guessing the mining ship wasn't just on an innocent mission, and that whatever its purpose was and whatever its mysterious cargo is is being set up as this seasons big problem somehow.

[S05.E02: Red Queen]

I just caught up on the first two episodes today, and I'm surprised by how happy I am to have a new season. It's dumb sometimes, but I like it.

I was surprised by how much effort they made to check in with a bunch of secondary and tertiary characters (some of whom I had completely forgotten about), but it reminded me that one of the things I like about this show is how the cast is stuffed with women and they all get to have different personalities and goals.

On 5/1/2018 at 10:31 PM, ParadoxLost said:

Seems like they regressed Octavia in the beginning back to sweet, innocent girl who hid under the floor trying to rule Wankru...

Wait, I wasn't paying attention. Is their name seriously spelled as Wankru?

On 5/2/2018 at 11:41 AM, roctavia said:

I'm also wondering how they knew the bunker food/farm growth would last exactly 5 years and not a minute more... and how long are they expecting to live down there? Forever? Or do they assume someone will eventually dig them out if there are survivors up top? I feel like there would be other ways to stretch the food supply a little without going to half rations from the start.... I mean, I know it's an unknown of how long they will be stuck there... but way to freak people out from the beginning.

Yeah, the response to the food situation seemed puzzling for a few reasons. One because, as you say, it seems like they reacted too quickly, and it seems like stretching out the rations will not solve the actual problem, which is needing to leave the bunker. Also, because it sounds like the problem is that the plants they're farming won't be unuseable in five years, it's not clear to me that cutting back rations will help very much, unless they have a way to stockpile produce. Also, I'm not 100% sure I buy the idea that the plants will be unuseable.

[S02.E01: June / S02.E02: Unwomen]

On the torture porn front: me too. After watching the first two episodes I felt sad, scared, and unsafe and I started to question whether there's a good reason why it's necessary for the show to do some of the stuff it's doing. As others have said, the hanging scene didn't tell us anything we didn't already know, didn't completely fit into the philosophy espoused by Gilead (obviously they won't mass murder their handmaids, come on), and also could have been deleted from the episode entirely without losing anything. I honestly think it would have been fine to start at the part where they're holding rocks. It's more directly related to their "crime," it's a plausibly cruel thing these people would do, and it didn't linger forever while a Kate Bush song played.

I haven't made up my mind about whether I think it's worth it to keep watching, but I feel like, in the absence of giving us some kind of suggestion about what we might do to PREVENT the future from ending up this way, it's just a bummer to watch people get tortured all the time.

(On top of that, I'm also one of the LGBT people who sat there saying, "Shit, is this literally my future?" and that sucked.)

On 4/26/2018 at 6:28 PM, oldCJ said:

 It isn’t like anyone knows whether who actually go to the colonies or not since no one comes back. And why did they send Jeanine instead of making the handmaids stone her to prove that they had the power to make them after the torture?

I wondered about that, too. At the end of season one, it seemed like Aunt Lydia caved to their defiance because she actually didn't want Janine to get killed. Now she's saying it would have been better that way so... why not kill her anyway and then still punish everyone? Or, as you say, why not torture them until they agree to kill Janine themselves? I'm not saying I want either of those things, but their choices seem weird, given who they are, and what we've seen them do.

On 4/30/2018 at 9:18 PM, marinw said:

I didn’t quite understand the airport scene, horrible as it was. If Gilead hates Lesbians so much, why not make it easy for them to leave the country?

Not that logic has anything to do with it.

Because they don't hate lesbians. They f--ing love lesbians because it gives them somebody to feel superior to and because it means they get to punish all the unbelievers who don't live according to the strict set of rules they've imposed on themselves. There's no scenario where Gilead wanted everyone who didn't agree with them to leave the country. Then they wouldn't have anyone to boss around. They needed to keep people there if they could.

[S02.E20: Chapter Thirty-Three: Shadow of a Doubt]

The biggest issue I have with this episode is that everybody seems to think it's cool for somebody to moderate a political debate and then report on it as a journalist. Or for the moderator to be a person who's employed at a business owned by one of the candidates. Why?

I don't get the plot with Veronica at all. If they wanted her to turn against her dad, her dad's betrayal of both Archie and her mom should be enough to spur that decision. I 100% agree that the casino idea is stupid, that a million dollars wouldn't fund it, etc, etc, but I also don't understand what the point of those meetings actually was? Like, even if we believe that Hiram knew Archie had outlived his usefulness and wanted to get Veronica with someone else, why was this weird speed dating event the method he used? And why did everyone else go along with it?

Finally, I have a theory that maybe the only adult Serpent other than FP was Tall Boy, and now that Tall Boy's gone, it's just FP and some teens, much like the mafia is just Hiram and some teens. If I lived in the universe this story takes place in, I bet I could make a lot of money writing an investigative piece about the small, weird town where a couple of adults fight a never ending battle using local youth.

[S02.E19: Chapter Thirty-Two: Prisoners]

So, a lot of things about this show are dumb but kind of funny. A thing that's dumb but not at all funny to me is getting confirmation that literally nobody reported the gay conversion torture school to the police -- and I know they didn't, because Betty tells the sisters that if they don't cooperate with her, she'll do it now. Why on earth wouldn't she do it IMMEDIATELY? How is anyone who knows about it allowing that place to stay open? I'm being completely serious. WTF?

On the side of things that are dumb but funny:

• "He overdosed on jingle jangle."
• Mr. Lodge saying that Archie isn't blood so they can't do anything to rescue him when, a) he made Archie do a stupid blood brothers ritual with him that makes him the next best thing to blood, b) we've established that Archie is literally his only guy at this point, and c) Archie's basically marrying into the family, which should count for something. In spite of all that, Mr. Lodge still doesn't care enough to try to save Archie, which is really funny to me.
• "I still have to make my bones with you" is also really funny to me.

The part I like least about Hal (possibly) being the black hood is how he weirdly trolls his daughter.

[S02.E18: Chapter Thirty-One: A Night To Remember]

LMFAO Archie sold his music equipment to buy a rusted-out hunk of metal from "junkyard Steve." My interpretation is that Fred's crying because his son's such a dumbass.

Just for context, I'm the proud owner of a second-hand car that's worth about $200 in the blue book, and it's literally eight million times more of a car than whatever that was. Like, when you buy a car you want to "fix up" even if it's an old model car, you don't buy a pile of rust. JFC. That scene was worth the price of admission for me.

Otherwise, this was the shark jump episode for me. I'm okay with musical episodes that have original music, and I'm okay with ones that stitch together contemporary pop songs, but borrowing the score from an unrelated musical and kind of half-assedly shouting it for an hour is a disappointment.

On the other hand, it made me kind of wish that the concept for this series had been, "Jughead is a movie fan, so he re-tells the events that happen in Riverdale through the lens of different film genres" and we could have seen musicals, and film noir, and documentaries, and all kinds of things that might have made the random leaps in tone make sense.

Also, as an LGBT person myself... I still have lingering concerns about this whole Cheryl story line. It's funny when Toni tries to give her a pep talk by saying she's totally the same person who burned down the house and cut off her mom's oxygen -- like, that's a good joke, and I laughed -- but it's a joke that takes place in a completely separate universe from the super serious, very special coming out episode stuff we got just a few weeks ago. And I'm confused about whether I'm supposed to believe that Cheryl covering herself in pig's blood solves this problem.

3 hours ago, Snookums said:

That's pretty typical. I was heavily involved in theater in high school and it was routine to sell ad space to local businesses to pay for things like props and costumes. Granted, I don't recall selling space to ruthless small-town mobsters whose goals are both murky and odd, but hey, Riverdale! 

(I also don't recall a student director with absolutely no teacher oversight for a huge, flashy musical held on school grounds, but...sing it with me if you know the words...RIVERDALE!)

I don't recall having such an extensive back stage area. Like, that theatre space is amazing. (FWIW, I think the playbill thing was a nice touch, because it shows that the Lodges get more recognition for donating money to the theatre than Fred gets for donating his time and labour).

While we're on the subject of the play, I was willing to roll with them putting Alice in the show, because it was just a way to bring that character into the plot line (though... wouldn't it have been interesting if Betty had played that role instead and, in the process of playing it, started to understand things about her mother and come to some kind of revelation?). The part that I wasn't willing to roll with was Alice being genuinely psyched to be in a high school musical and trying to get FP to... come and watch her in it? That seemed weird.

[S02.E17: Chapter Thirty: The Noose Tightens]

Personally, I'm hoping Alice and FP get together now, just so I can hear Jughead's dramatic voice-over saying, "And back on the south side, my girlfriend became my step-sister."

Random speculation, but is it going to turn out everything in Riverdale was a just a story Jughead made up? That would make me surprisingly okay with most of these weird plot points.

On 3/31/2018 at 4:44 PM, PeekaBoo said:

I loved that he showed up and saved the day with the serpent babies ...

I love that you called them serpent babies.

[S02.E17: Chapter Thirty: The Noose Tightens]

I realize that there's only so much time in the episode, but I was a little taken a-back that solving Cheryl's problems was as simple as breaking her out of the torture hospital. There should be a lot more fall-out from that. Like, her crazy mother could just come snatch her again at any time, now, and would legally be able to unless she gets a lawyer and goes to the police. It's very, very unsafe for her to just go back to school.

Also, I guess nobody cares about the other kids in the torture hospital?

On 3/28/2018 at 10:53 PM, Cranberry said:

So Archie sees no problem with involving a bunch of high school students in mob-related stuff now? Great.

Archie also sees no problem with calling it "The Dark Circle," like he totally failed to learn a lesson from the time he said "The Red Circle" on YouTube for everyone to see and LOL at him.

23 hours ago, Snookums said:

Most especially the employees of the bank, who handed over ten grand to Alice's minor daughter without a blink, apparently! Even if she brought a promissory note any teller who didn't want to be fired would not be accessing that account for a third party who is a minor, without the permission of BOTH the signatories on the account~I couldn't do that with MY parent's accounts and I'm forty six years old!

There was a weird moment before Betty left the house, where Alice said, "It's in our joint account, so you shouldn't have a problem." The only way it being a joint account would help them is if it's a joint account that Alice shares with Betty, which is hella weird if that's a thing. If it's a joint account with Hal, then I completely agree, there's no way they're letting a third person walk in and withdraw that much cash.

8 hours ago, AdorkableSars said:

• Why were the parents at a high school debate for student council? However, it did give us the pleasure of seeing Fred SERVE Hiram (I legit laughed out loud at Fred talking about Hiram going to prison.)

Just like I don't understand why anyone outside this high school cares what's in the school paper, I can't fathom why they care who's class president. I don't have any spoilers, but, just based on the idea of setting up characters for next season, I'm assuming Reggie and Josie will win this election and Fred will be the Mayor.

7 hours ago, Ruby Red said:

Anyway, did anyone realize how FP said that Betty slept in his bed while he and Jughead slept on the couch, implying that the bed is FP's and Jughead sleeps on the couch when he is home and not in jail? Wow. Parent of the year.

Yeah, I noticed that, too. Although, to be fair, not everybody can afford to have multiple bedrooms and beds, so this is an arrangement that happens. I'm assuming it's a fold-out couch.

[S02.E16: Chapter Twenty-Nine: Primary Colors]

So... joining the Vixens is basically the same process as joining the serpents. You have to do a really sexualized dance while everybody stares at you. Not loving these traditions.

Re: the Lodges and how stupid people are to trust them: my suspicion is that we might be headed toward a twist where it turns out Mr. Lodge was trying to do a good thing all along and we just never heard the details of his plan. That's not what I want to have happen, but it might happen.

Re: Cheryl -- I don't see how putting her in conversion therapy helps the Blossoms get what they want. Having Cheryl found psychologically unfit to manage the fortune she inherited would get them closer to their goal of taking the money for themselves, but an insane conversion therapy doctor can't go to court with them for that. So this  just seems like... getting her out of the house in the most needlessly horrifying way possible?

Re: Chic -- my big question is why Alice didn't just tell everyone that Chic wasn't related to Hal as soon as Betty started talking about the DNA test. It doesn't make sense to me that that needed to be a secret at any point, but especially not now. I'm also curious about whether the DNA test was thorough enough to say whether Chic's related to Betty's mom, since it seemed like she was just using the service the Blossom lawyers (who only care about Blossom blood) set up.

[S02.E15: Chapter Twenty-Eight: There Will Be Blood]

My favourite part of this episode is definitely how Jughead and Archie jumped on the same obscure analogy of likening Mr. Lodge to Dracula, and then Archie had to explain the analogy to Mr. Lodge and the audience. I still don't get it. But it makes me wonder if Archie heard Jughead say the analogy and thought, "That's smart! I'm going to use it!" or if they both just independently made the same weird connection. I don't know which option I want to believe in more.

My second favourite thing is how Mr. Lodge's mob has a sacred tradition of becomming blood brothers without touching hands.

9 hours ago, WhosThatGirl said:

I think there might be more to it than a prison? Something more to do with what disgraced The Lodges back in NYC. There has to be more. Why would they need to buy a newspaper that badly to control the press just for a prison?

Without getting super political about it, for-profit prisons are the most evil type of prison you can build, so there's that. Also, most people don't want a prison to be built near them. Their original plan was to get their preferred Mayoral candidate elected so that they could get permission to build the prison, so I guess there's a chance that, if people knew what they were planning ahead of the election, they might vote for somebody who wasn't a business partner of the Lodges and being endorsed by them. But I'm sure the scheme is way more complicated because everything these people do ends up being complicated.

[S02.E14: Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Hills Have Eyes]

Oh, Riverdale. I didn't want to watch Love, Simon before and I don't want to watch it now. The whole town converging on the theatre to watch it on opening night didn't change my mind.

Here's the thing I liked about the robbery: I liked how it was set up in the scene where they were in town. After Veronica shares that her parents aren't with them at the cabin, there's a really nice shot where she walks out of the store and you can see a) she's really overdressed for the situation and stands out like a sore thumb and b) all of the guys smoking outside the store turn to look at her with hard, hostile expressions. The camera doesn't really linger on them; it just allows them to be in the background while she's talking. Having the working class white guys from the sticks show up to rob everyone after is literally the plot of a whole bunch of horror movies, and that's a cliche, but they set it up well.

13 hours ago, SeanC said:

The possibility of Cheryl and Toni being a thing was one of those ideas that was raised in fan speculation, etc. pretty much before the season started, and seemed to be broadly where things were headed based on the early interviews about Cheryl getting a love interest, etc., so it's a bit strange in one sense how long it took to get that plot going.  But now that it's here, the early signs are promising.

Cheryl and Toni is a ship I can finally get on board with, even if I don't understand why Tonni's so determined to make it happen. I also would have been fine with Cheryl and Josie, but whatever.

[S01.E15: Will You Take My Hand?]

Straight up, I'm not a fan of the genre where characters just react to an emergency each week and forget whatever they said or did last week, and this show started to grate on me by the end of the season. In particular, they're all in a very dangerous situation where they should be sharing information with each other as a crew, so that they can make good decisions to protect themselves, but somehow everything is a secret conspiracy.

Last episode, I didn't understand why Starfleet wanted to lie to the Discovery crew about who Georgiou was -- the excuse was that no one could know the mirror universe existed, but obviously everybody on the ship already knew that. This episode, the idea of keeping it secret went right out the window, when it was apparently fine to tell Ash and Tilly. If you're just gonna tell everyone who has to interact with her personally, and she's not under any pressure to pretend to be someone else, why not just tell the truth from the beginning?

Other things that went right out the window: Tyler's PTSD. I guess nothing the Klingons did to him as Ash Tyler matters now that he also remembers being Voq?

I think what the show intended with L'Rell is that she always had the heart of leader and didn't believe in herself, so now that she does believe in herself, the Klingons will naturally follow her. I'm not sure they dramatized it very well, but that's what I took away from the speeches. The part that troubles me is that I don't see any reason why L'Rell should wish to end the war against the Federation, now that they've given her their bomb controls. She didn't like that the houses weren't united anymore, but I don't see any reason why she couldn't just unite them and keep the war going.

I don't know what to think about Stamets and Culber. It seems to me like nobody put much thought into how it would play to kill off half of a happy gay couple -- which, unfortunately happens all the damn time in TV and movies. The only way out I could see is the speech about how, if people knew their loved ones were alive in the mirror universe, they'd do anything possible to see them again. Stamets is the only person who both knows about the mirror universe and has the technical ability to go there, so that could happen. But, with the actors saying it won't... I think it was just an insensitive decision. They were so busy patting themselves on the back for having gay characters that they kind of didn't do their homework and repeated a bunch of cliches.

 

On 2/13/2018 at 8:02 AM, paigow said:

Season 2- Star Trek: Masterchef 

 

On 2/13/2018 at 10:17 AM, paigow said:

Beat Bobby Flay... Or Die

Bobby: Phillipa, what is your signature dish?

Phillipa: Braised ganglia in a red wine reduction...

Bobby: WTF??!!! This is not in the script....

Spoilers, but the ganglia came from another contestant.

[S02.E13: Chapter Twenty-Six: The Tell-Tale Heart]

I don't think this show can make up its mind about whether Veronica's okay with her dad being a mob boss.

Also, wow, I guess FP feels really remorseful about everything he did to Jason Blossom given that his way of preventing Betty and Alice from making "the same mistake" as he did was to stop them from getting caught. I'm really glad the show worked so hard to convince us he was secretly a good guy who didn't want to murder a teenager. Also LOL, because of course his way of helping is to add more crimes; that's how everybody helps in this damn town.

On 2/7/2018 at 10:13 PM, HunterHunted said:

I get that an affair is scandalous, but Kevin's mom is on a naval base in Bahrain.  We've never seen her or even had another character mention talking to her for 2 years. And Mayor McCoy's estranged husband is musician in recovery who is constantly on the road. I suspect everyone in town would be entirely sympathetic to Mayor McCoy and Sheriff Keller.

Wow -- I'm impressed that you remember all this stuff. I forgot those characters even existed. Or that the affair did.

On 2/7/2018 at 11:14 PM, RogerDodger said:

While I admittedly do not watch Riverdale for reality, I have a very hard time buying that millionaire mafioso Hiram Lodge would be that concerned over what Jughead would write in a student newspaper.

THIS. Except, multiply it and ask why anyone cares what Jughead writes in the school newspaper. I've literally never heard of a school newspaper that was read by anyone outside the school or by most people in the school.