S03.E06: Conscience of The King

[ElectricBoogaloo 70.9k]

Quote

Despite his past following him to Lakeside, Shadow makes himself at home and builds relationships within the town; Laura and Salim continue to hunt for Wednesday, who attempts one final win over Demeter.

Promo:

Original air date: 2/21/21

Edited February 21 by ElectricBoogaloo

[ElectricBoogaloo 70.9k]

This episode would have been worth it just to see shirtless Shadow rocking out to Bell Biv DeVoe. But to be honest, no one will ever top Turk Turkelton:

 

[AnimeMania 8.5k]

18 hours ago, T Summer said:

He tells Sam Blackcrow his "intentions are honerable"?

I think that has more to do with him using a "fake"/different name than he used with Blackcrow. That by itself makes it seem his intentions are dishonorable.

[T Summer 260]

On first watch I thought this episode  was just kind of dull and wasted   valuable time, the season being a mere  ten episodes  and all. Watching  it again, I found it rather annoying. When Shadow tells Laura Wednesday is his father she said what she said about not much surprising her but that  certainly did...  wouldn't she have had a whole ton of questions for Shadow about whether HE  himself is a god or possesses  supernatural abilities? I'll bet it would have been good for  hours  of conversation, as Laura Moon has  seen as much   and quite possibly more of Wednesday's capabilities than Shadow has.

When the war between the old and new gods finally happens what are the chances Demeter's scattered lights recombine and we see her   in her old form when she swoops in to assist Odin? If that's not where the writers are taking it, showing us weeks of her indifference and avoidance only to  to "surprise" us with the turnabout...  then it was a complete  waste of time (IMHO).

Maybe it's just me.

 

[tennisgurl 89.2k]

I am sad that we didn't get more of a talk between Shadow and Laura, its been ages since they saw each other and a whole lot has gone down. Shadow knows that she's alive now and she knows that Wednesday is Shadows dad and that's about all we got from them. 

Mr/Ms World sure has been switching identities up a lot, having a bit of a personal crisis? This episode was alright, basically another place setter episode as for the actual plot. It had some nice moments, and I could watch Shadow dance around to Poison on a loop, but not a lot actually happened. 

That being said...Book Spoilers ahoy!

Spoiler

There might be some foreshadowing of things that will lead to the stories climax later on, which would make this episode a lot more important. I am guessing that Demeter may take Easter's role in the climax resurrecting Shadow, and I am also guessing that Mr. World was talking to Mr. Wednesday on the phone. Especially Mr. World telling whoever he was talking to about Laura. Also, Margarite hasn't heard from her oldest son in awhile? Yeah, I think I know where he is. Ouch. 

 

[T Summer 260]

Re: Demeter

 

Then I was pondering the child Demeter said they lost. I heard somewhere that Odin had two sons... one being Thor. This story line can't be about Shadow being the child Demeter mourns because she certainly would know as well or better than the father if her own child was still alive, no?

 

Spoiler

actually a reaction to a spoiler. Demeter resurrecting Shadow at the battle? interesting!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

;

Edited Tuesday at 10:49 PM by T Summer · Reason: must have been typing while you were posting, Tennisgurl

[showme 432]

I am not sure what happened at the end of this episode, did Demeter ditch Wednesday and left on her own, or did she turn into wind and died?

[T Summer 260]

1 hour ago, showme said:

I am not sure what happened at the end of this episode, did Demeter ditch Wednesday and left on her own, or did she turn into wind and died?

It looked to me like after  agreeing to leave the retreat with Wednesday  Demeter said her goodbyes to her friends then went outside and changed form while he watched  from inside.  IDK  of course, but I doubt she's dead and can't  reform and come back if she wants to.

 

Even though I reacted to Tennisgurl's spoiler above, I haven't read the book so I'm guessing. IDK what the different gods' (and godesses) capabilities are.

[rollacoaster 2.5k]

Demeter gave Wednesday the sweetest "fuck you" ever. 

I think she made it clear she wasn't interested in being with him. He didn't listen, and really underestimated how the death of their child impacted her. 

[WatchrTina 11.5k]

I had to watch this episode a second time because there is SO much random shit going on and SO much of it is off-book that I just became confused.  Second viewing did not really help.  I have many unanswered questions.  So here they are in no particular order.

I have a recollection of who Demeter is from WAY back in some high school or collage mythology class.  What I recall is that Demeter's daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped by Hades (god of the underworld/death) and then tricked by him into eating some pomegranate seeds, which cursed her to remain in Hades for part of each year (some sources say 4 months, some say 6.)  Demeter, in her grief, refuses to nourish the earth while Persephone is in Hades and that's why we have winter every year.  So . . . is THAT the child she is grieving?  If so, that doesn't really make any sense. This episode suggests that Demeter retreated from the world after the death of a baby she conceived with Odin, right?  

Okay, I think I need to just hand-wave it and let it go.  After all, we saw several dozen versions of Jesus in an earlier episode so I guess I should just accept that the Demeter/Persephone tale I'm familiar with is the Greek story, and the story of American Demeter is different.  Apparently American Demeter was wooed by both American Odin and American Tyr, and then she retreated into prolonged grief (and finally into a long-term care facility) due to the loss of the baby she conceived with American Odin/Ofnir.

Okaaaaaay.  It's still not clear to me why American Odin was trying to spring Demeter from the facility. (Heh, "spring.")   At first she thought he was just after her money.  That may be partially true but I'm going to guess that she's a pretty damned powerful goddess and as such Odin is actually trying to recruit her for Team OldGods.  I thought he looked pretty surprised and disappointed when she decided to dissolve into a whirlpool of leaves rather than stay with Odin in corporeal form.  But -- as others have already suggested -- just because she went "poof" in the wind does not mean she is completely out of the fight.  I predict we are going to see her again.

Now lets talk about Tech Boy.  When he first showed up I was like "Wait what?  Didn't we last see him glitching all over the place and cowering in a warehouse?"  I was sure I missed something.  But then he starts glitching again in this episode.  So . . . emotions are his problem?  Ooooh, is this going to be like a Pinocchio/Blue Fairy thing?  Is Tech Boy going to become a REAL boy?  That's pure speculation there -- I don't recall anything about Tech Boy from the book after the episode 1, limo-from-hell scene.  But I LOVE what Bruce Langley is doing with the role of Tech Boy so I'm glad his role is continuing.  He was SUCH a douche-bag in the very first episode, it is genuinely shocking to me that I now feel sympathy for him and want him to overcome whatever is causing him to glitch.

Okay . . . WTF is Artifact 1?

And who was Mr/Mrs/Mr World talking to on the phone?  He seemed to be receiving marching order but I thought s/he was the top banana on team New Gods.

When Shadow and Laura finally talk the quick flashes from season 1 that they cut into the episode were well done -- a nice visual trick to remind us what these two meant to one another.  You know --how they felt back before she cheated on him with his best friend, then died, then came back as a re-animated corpse, then "died" again, then got resurrected via voodoo powered by Sweeney's love-infused blood.

You know . . . as I sit hear typing this I'm struggling to figure out how Laura found Shadow.  And when she DOES find him she make clear that she wasn't looking for Shadow -- she's just wants to know where to find Wednesday so she can kill him.  Which when you stop and think about it IS a bit of a "fuck you" to Shadow, but I guess they already had their parting-of-the-ways scene back in Cairo.

Meanwhile, back in Lakeside, it was good to see Shadow and Chad have a tiny bonding moment when Hinzelmann takes over the meeting.  That, more than anything else reassured me that he (Chad) really DOES believe that Shadow had nothing to do with the disappearance of the local girl.

Wait, Sam Blackcrow is Marguerite Olsen's half sister?  Okaaaay.

WTF is up with people stealing underwear in Laketown?  There are just SO many plot lines winding around this strange town.

WTF is up with Shadow painting the wall of his RENTAL unit (and choosing that horrible color)?  That was distractingly weird.  There better be a purpose behind all that.  If it turns out that it was just an excuse to allow Ricky Whittle to have a topless scene I will be disappointed (not that I don't appreciate the view.)

Danny Trejo as Mr. World is some interesting casting.  But, alas, all I can see is Machete!  Run, Laura!  Run!

[T Summer 260]

Reading your post and remarks about Laura and Shadow made me think, I guess Laura Moon's super strength  went with her back from the dead (but not really alive) status? So how is this hundred pound girl planning on killing Wednesday?  The only one she has on her teem is another mere mortal, Salim.

An aside: Most exciting scene to date for me was in S2 when Bilquist said to Laura Moon about her bloodlust for Wednesday, you better bring power when you go against that one. Laura said you seem pretty powerful, do you want to help me [kill him]? Bilquist said Thank you for the offer, it is a very tempting one. It ended with Bilquist saying I know how to find you. Most interested I've been in the whole series.

Second thought whirling around in my head... how does she just let that gold coin that used to be inside her keeping her here "alive" back on earth connected  to  Shadow (she could always see his light), just sit in a cardboard box? A Leprechaun who used to be a king's coin?  I'd keep it on my person.

I think Laura was only too happy to take any opportunity to see and talk to Shadow, he being the only one she could ask about his whereabouts... definetely not a fuck you, IMO. Once again, I hated the way Shadow threw her off when Marguerite was coming through the door. Their embrace seemed so sweet before that. After she asked Ibis, IDK who that leaves that might know where Wednesday is? Bilquist knows how to reach Laura Moon but I doubt that  it works both ways.

 

 

 

[LaMatadita 504]

It was heartbreaking to watch Laura casually tell Salim to get over the Jinn, then immediately jump up to rescue Sweeney's ashes from falling off the table and cradle them protectively. That wasn't done out of a sense of obligation, that was just love, even if she is still understandably struggling to admit it (because if she admits that she loved him, she also has to admit that she lost him). To be honest, that storyline is one of the few I'm still invested in because it's been one of the more coherent and consistent narratives in the show.

I'm struggling a bit with how to adjust my expectations about Laura's storyline this season, though, because it seems like viewers are still being encouraged to invest in that relationship, which implies that there will be some kind of payoff that's more than just Laura "getting over it," as she's been encouraging Salim to do. Laura's character arc has larger, overarching themes about Laura being apathetic about life and continually self-sabotaging herself, but her relationship with Sweeney (and Shadow to a lesser extent) has basically been her main storyline/way of exploring these themes since he tracked her down to get his coin back, and that doesn't seem to have changed even with him gone.

Her storyline this season doesn't feel like it's about Laura learning that she's capable of love because she loved Sweeney, but about Laura admitting that she loves Sweeney. It's as if he's being presented as her soulmate in an epic ballad sort of way, to the point where they were even given a romantic theme song 4 or 5 episodes after he died. For the past 2 episodes, the box with his ashes has gotten the first close-up in nearly every scene they were in, serving as a constant reminder of both the person whose ashes are in the box and how important he is to Laura even now. Multiple characters, including a complete stranger in purgatory, have prodded her about how she felt about him. Ibis, the most apathetic character on the whole show, seemed both touched and awed by the idea that Sweeney had loved her and that his blood had brought her back to life, and Salim even brought it up again when Laura tried to avoid talking about it the first time. Even the things that Laura learned about herself in purgatory seemed to relate directly to her ability to love both herself and others and served to push her closer to admitting her feelings toward Sweeney. We're more than halfway through the season now and she's still somewhat in denial about those feelings, so even dragging it out for this long is placing further emphasis on the importance of their relationship. If all of this leads to nothing more than Laura screaming into the wind and throwing his ashes over a cliff, I'm going to be pretty annoyed that they spent an entire season getting there. If they'd actually been able to have a romantic relationship for a time, then spending this much time on her grieving process would make sense, but spending this much time on a relationship that tragically didn't even get a chance to happen doesn't make sense to me unless it's still going somewhere.

So there's this constant emphasis on his absence, his ashes, his coin, and Laura's feelings for him, all of which encourage viewers to continue to invest, and yet the actor keeps saying he's not coming back. It's hard to know if he's just trolling and will be making a reappearance, if the writers are just clueless about the expectations being created here and have no intention of bringing him back in any capacity, or if they're planning to just go with some kind of underwhelming plan B option involving CGI or a Sweeney-shaped silhouette. I just have no idea what my expectations should be at this point.

I didn't mean to make such a long post, but I recently caught up on the show after giving up halfway through S2, and like I said, this is the storyline I was able to stay invested in and follow all the way through. Their story makes sense to me, at least so far, even if I'm a little apprehensive of where they're going with it. The main plot has stalled out and lost its train of thought so many times that it's barely intelligible to me, and I've read the book!

Edited 17 hours ago by LaMatadita

[T Summer 260]

No need to apologize for the lengthy posts! I for one am very interested to read other people's perspective, particularly  on Laura Moon's trajectory. It's one of the most enjoyable elements of the series for me. If it weren't for that and every single second Bilquist is on screen, I don't think I'd  still be watching.

I've wondered, did Laura love Sweeney? I don't necessarily think if Laura Moon were to see  him alive  when she was blasted back to  earth and found herself in the tomb... she'd hug him the way she hugged Shadow. I don't think if she saw Sweeney it would have deterred her for more than a few moments from going after Wednesday who she perceives as having ruined her relationship with Shadow. She'd just be making sure he could bring  the sword from his hoard. On the other hand we were shown at least one scene where they'd been alive and in each other's orbit before. I'm remembering the jail scene where they were talking to each other through the bars.

Stopped right here to rewatch the episode s1 e7, A Prayer For Mad Sweeney. 

Basically in the telling of Essie McGowan's   story  (as written by Ibis)  it is she who brings a certain Leprechaun and former King to the new world. Essie McGowan believed in all kinds of   magical creatures, especially Leprechauns. She kept belief in them alive through her   storytelling over her lifetime  and though she hadn't ever seen one, she  never stopped leaving them offerings of cream and bread and at one point a gold coin she'd been given by a lover. Days before her death sitting on the porch of the farm she'd inherited from her husband, Mad Sweeney walked up and said it was she who brought him here. She and a few others like her. He's doing tricks with his gold coin  and lamenting  this land has no time for magic; no place for faeries and such folk.  That's a   short version,  but they acknowledge the good  they'd done for one another. She'd been an indentured servant and from England to the new world and back and forth again and in trouble for thieving (at one point almost executed) and had to survive doing sexual favors before marrying and ultimately  becoming the proprietor of the farm.

Getting back to this juncture:  When Ibis  and Salim talked about Sweeney's love for her ultimately facilitating her  journey back to life by completing Baron Samedi's potion, IDK if it was romantic love she was feeling like she feels for Shadow?  Maybe more gratitude and regret that the opportunity  to express it was gone forever? Maybe not even that. I keep remembering Sweeney calling her the c-word over and over and IIRC it was  he who caused the car accident (and possibly Shadow being caught  executing Laura's perfect plan to grift the casino and being put in jail), all on Wednesday's orders. She's still driven by the rage she feels for Wednesday having had her killed and ruining her marriage, so IDK if she feels that much forgiveness for Sweeney just because he was fulfilling a debt he owed  Wednesday when he acted.

 I forget which episode it was, possibly also in season one where Laura Moon expressed her disillusionment with life when  one gets past their formative years and learns there is no Santa Claws, no Easter Bunny and no farm where old dogs go? She may not be able to slay Wednesday in the literal sense as a regular girl back among the living, but isn't it legions of non-beleivers like her that threaten The Old Gods right out of  existence?