S03.E08: The Rapture of Burning

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

Laura and Salim's quest forces them outside of their comfort zones as they learn to let go of their pasts. Trapped in a perilous situation, Shadow is surprised by a new side of Wednesday, while Technical Boy attempts to escape the prison of his own mind.

Promo:

Original air date: 3/7/21

Edited March 6, 2021 by ElectricBoogaloo

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Awwww, I loved the Laura/Salim storylines this week and I'm sad that their odd couple buddy road trip has come to an end.

I really loved that they both finally allowed themselves to say goodbye to their loves so they can try to move on. Despite what Laura said to Salim, it's clear that she loved Sweeney and is struggling to deal with his death.

I also loved that she was determined to keep Salim safe and that she admitted that she cared about him. His response was perfect: "I love you too, Laura Moon."

Tyr fell prey to the classic "talk too much and get yourself killed" pitfall.

Although he was only onscreen for a few minutes, Tianbo is my favorite new god character.

[Mr. Sparkle]

Best episode of the season. I hope they can keep it up for 2 more. 

[showme]

I love the opening story of this episode, but not the dic* swinging orgy, it is such a cliche, that is not what being LGBT all about.

So Wednesday just packed up and left? what about his war? It is not done with him yet. What is Shadow going to Florida?

Edited March 7, 2021 by showme

[T Summer]

1 hour ago, showme said:

I love the opening story of this episode, but not the dic* swinging orgy, it is such a cliche, that is not what being LGBT all about.

So Wednesday just packed up and left? what about his war? It is not done with him yet. What is Shadow going to Florida?

Marguerite's son Sandy's whereabouts are unknown. Sam Blackcrow said something about it to Shadow the night she was at her sister's for dinner and he walked her out and they talked. If he was in Jacksonville he'd have been in touch or she'd know it? something like that. When Shadow was talking to Marguerite handing her a homemade CD that was in the car he rented earlier in the season to get to Chicago(her son  older Sandy's  car), he then asked what the boy was studying? and she was super abrupt and didn't answer him and went off saying if you need me, you know where to find me.

 

As for your first point, YES!

Salim being an observant Muslim (for most of the series) who doesn't think God discriminates where love is concerned, doesn't preclude him from getting to know someone before bedding them. I'm  sure every gay man doesn't do that.

...and what's up with not even asking the man's name?

 

[LaMatadita]

Overall, I thought this was one of the better episodes of the season in terms of character development, but I definitely have some mixed feelings about it.

Whoever said that Tyr was the one killing Wednesday’s followers was on the mark. I’m still a little confused as to why Tyr looked so startled when Johan showed up if Johan was working for him, and why it looked like Johan was attacking him, but I’ll chalk that confusion up to them having to edit Manson out of the episode. I’ve seen some displeasure with the showdown between Odin and Tyr being kind of meh, but I’ll chalk that up to neither of those actors being spring chickens anymore (even with stunt doubles, it was probably still a bit more taxing than their usual scenes). Despite being an important Norse god, Tyr wasn’t a main character, so I wasn’t really bothered by their not-so-epic showdown.

Wednesday giving Shadow a trite “I’m proud of you, son” moment and then going poof was funny, but it was also sad. That’s part of why I found it confusing that Shadow decided to bail on Margeurite, who he’s put a lot of effort into connecting with, to go to Florida? I mean, I wasn’t really getting the vibe that Margeurite and Shadow were going to stay together for the remainder of the series, but damn, did he just drop this already guarded woman like a hot potato? Maybe not, because I don’t think the Lakeside storyline is finished, but what is so important about Florida? Is Bilquis in Florida? Am I missing or forgetting some important detail, or is it just that Shadow figured that if a Florida sign was winking at him, he should go to Florida?

I found the stuff with Salim a bit odd. I would have preferred to see him simply rebound with the cute bellhop in a more private scenario in this episode. Conflating accepting one's sexuality with being comfortable going to an exhibitionist orgy really didn’t work for me. Being pansexual is also not synonymous with being comfortable with orgies. Being comfortable with orgies is about extroversion and exhibitionism. Salim is obviously a shy introvert, and that’s a perfectly okay thing to be regardless of one’s sexual orientation. I think the writer’s intentions were good, but the execution was misguided.

As far as Laura, I think her privately coming to terms with her feelings for Sweeney and letting him go hit the right notes for me, especially her saying “Fuck you” in place of “I love you” (which was also a callback to when her cat died, and I loved it). I was left with no doubt whatsoever that she loved Sweeney, and it was nice to hear Salim say it out loud even if she couldn’t. I don’t have a problem with them taking so long for her to let go and gain some closure because I think giving her that much time to process did their complicated relationship justice, and the fact that she does still feel guilt about his death also felt pretty realistic. Having Liam not pop up with the spear until after Laura said goodbye and spread his ashes seemed poetically appropriate. Liam started going off about how crazy Sweeney’s hoard was and how there was a Pookah in there, and it seemed like a subtle sign that perhaps there was still some of Sweeney’s magic in his hoard, and he wasn’t going to let her have that spear until she let him go. Maybe Laura realized it, too, and that’s why she seemed lighter after she got the spear—she felt like she was finally moving toward her destiny with Sweeney’s approval. I genuinely want her to succeed in killing Wednesday because I think she deserves that closure and has earned it more than any other character.

However, I do take issue with how the writers strung viewers along for 8 episodes. It would have been one thing if Brigitte and Ibis, both gods/entities that deal in death, had told Laura that resurrecting Sweeney was impossible and why. I would have believed them and understood that Laura was carrying his remains around out of denial, emotionally holding her own grief hostage, etc. I mean, it was obvious that she was doing that anyway, but it would have been clear that that’s ALL it was. Instead, I think the way it was handled toyed with viewers’ hopes. I do think that as it stands, resurrecting Sweeney may not have been impossible after all, but Laura decided it was better to let him rest rather than bring him back to the same conflict he’d died trying to end. When she said goodbye to him and spread his ashes, she also thought she wasn’t going to get the spear and had no hope of killing Wednesday, and she knew Sweeney loved her, so bringing him back just to experience her death would also have been cruel.

It’s also just frustrating that they put so much time and effort into a) giving Sweeney a huge glowup from what he was in the book, and b) building all of this rather epic subtext about Laura and Sweeney’s connection, starting as early as 1x07 (2 episodes after they met), only to have it ultimately just serve as a plot device to resurrect Laura, add urgency to her mission to kill Wednesday, and now possibly even hook her back up with Shadow. I do think having her relationship with Sweeney affect the first two of those plotlines was actually good writing and was probably Gaiman’s doing, but I also feel like they put a lot of effort into something that didn’t result in a satisfying payoff or do justice to its setup, at least not yet.

When we saw Laura and Sweeney’s souls together in 2x05, it seemed like that was supposed to show us that that is who they really are and what they truly wanted to be for each other, but the insane circumstances of their existences and their own demons at the time made that impossible. I don’t want Sweeney back as a god (I don’t think he would want that, either). I don’t even want Sweeney back as a main character. I do want a happy ending for them that does justice to that scene in 2x05, to the time- and death-transcending story Gaiman and the writers set up, and to the magical world the show has built. They could accomplish this either by unexpectedly resurrecting him as a mortal in the series finale to live out a happy, normal human lifetime with her and die a normal human death, or by showing us some future incarnation of them having a happy life together as a bookend for the way they tied them together in the past in 1x07.

By the time the show is done, whether that’s this season or next season, I think he and Laura will have both earned some fucking happiness together. Laura got two second chances, Bilquis was able to remake herself, and Techno Boy lynched Shadow and now seems to be getting a “Pinnochio becomes a real boy” storyline, so why can’t Sweeney get in on the second chances if they’re handing them out like candy? (Other than because they can’t get the actor to come back for even one episode, which is a valid possibility.)

If they pull some kind of “Now that she has truly experienced love and learned some shit about herself by dying twice and watching her lifetime home movies in purgatory and taking out Shadow’s dad, she can finally give Shadow the love he deserves and become a god and be his other half” shit, I am going to be PISSED. They’ve spent 3 seasons telling us that she didn’t love Shadow—literally, verbally telling us this multiple times—and keeping them apart, and they spent 18-20 episodes on Laura and Sweeney (in comparison to about half that number dealing with Laura and Shadow), so if they try to make Laura and Shadow some kind of “endgame power couple” now, I am NOT here for it. Part of that is just the way they chose to tell the story—don’t spend 20 episodes on her love story with one guy and then try to hook her up with her ex at the last minute—but part of it is also that I’m not sure the Laura I’ve watched over the last 3 seasons would have any interest in becoming a god or ruling over America, especially considering that she saw firsthand what godhood did to Sweeney, and she knows what an asshole Wednesday is. I think Laura wants to kill Wednesday and isn’t looking past that because she doesn’t know if she’ll survive it, but if she does, I think she’d just want a normal human lifetime afterwards because that’s what she’s fought for. I hope that’s what she gets.

Personally, I don’t believe in any kind of afterlife, so if you took this story and transplanted it into a real world setting without all the magical stuff and the afterlife stuff, I would be all for Laura being able to find closure re: Sweeney, move on and find love with someone else, and live a long and happy life because this is all you get and then you die (and as Laura said, you rot). I believe you can find love with more than one person in a lifetime, and I also don’t even think that everyone has to have romantic love in their life to be happy and fulfilled. But the show’s universe is pretty far from realistic—it’s a magical, epic place with different rules and gods who live for centuries. They paralleled Laura and Sweeney through time in his first flashback episode, their souls made love in a red voodoo haze, his love was deep enough to bring her back to life from a pile of dust, they wrote a song just for them this season, and it seems like he was the first person she genuinely fell in love with and it happened while she was a walking corpse. Knowing that within this universe, there are gods and magic and an afterlife (or even multiple afterlives), Laura and Sweeney seem like an epic love story that literally transcends time and death, so it’s hard not to still root for these two star-crossed souls to get an ending that’s not soul-crushingly depressing, not… Laura ending up back with her ex, who rejected her in favor of Wednesday when she was at her lowest and whose love-infused blood did NOT bring her back to life. I actually really like Shadow and don’t hold those things against him at all, but those facts do turn me off to the idea of Shadow and Laura ending up together. Plus if you compare Shadow's dalliance with Margeurite to Laura's relationship with Sweeney... one of those relationships was clearly given a huge level of importance and one of them was not. I also think that Shadow put Laura on a pedestal when they were together and didn't even truly know who she was, and I don't think he actually met the real Laura until their scene in 3x06. If Laura and Shadow end up together, it’s going to feel like an emotionally unsatisfying afterthought to me after 20-ish episodes of Laura and Sweeney.

Edited March 8, 2021 by LaMatadita
Fixed typos.

[hnygrl]

Lucky for me, they have the episodes on demand the day before so I got to watch it with fast forwarding ability. Did NOT have to sit through Salim getting laid. I was not in the mood. That whole segment was so unnecessary to me. Added nothing to the storyline.
 

Thoughts...Laura Moon is any god’s  worst nightmare: a woman who is not afraid to die. Been there, done that, not scary anymore.  Odin better not underestimate her.

And I honestly, sincerely believe after the preview for next  week’s episode that this is THE LAST SEASON. I think they’re winding things up cause book stuff is showing again 

Don’t underestimate Salim’s  role in this either, I Don't think he’s done. 
 

Why do the baddies feel the need to make freaking speeches before they murder you?  Noticed that in Star Wars too.."there they are!" And by the time you get ‘are’ out, ya dead. Tyr  should’ve  just ripped Shadow’s head off an given the speech to his corpse. 
 

I don’t know how Wednesday will die in this series, but he WILL be killed, and personally, I think Laura may be  the one who kills him - and herself...maybe ‘book-style’ but w/Wednesday...

This was great, but the The whole Salim getting laid and the lead up to it was wholly unnecessary.. we could’ve  gotten the same results with him being caught in bed with hot-bellboy-guy. The next morning. 

Edited March 8, 2021 by hnygrl

[T Summer]

I'm going to watch it again and may experience it differently, but I didn't like this episode especially as the 8th out of a series of 10. I liked it because Laura Moon getting Odin's spear figured prominantly, but what else was there, really? I'd already had enough of Odin and Tyr and as you stated Lamatilda, the Yohan coming at Tyr and Tyr yelling his name does not figure  if Tyr was the one on the killing spree.

I don't think Shadow is done with Marguerite, he's doing something FOR her, as I stated in my post upthread. Yes, just rewound and  it's in the previews. Sam BlackCrow telling Shadow if he (Sandy, Marguerite's older son) was with his Dad in Fla., she would have heard from him. She also said Marguerite's son leaving and going to his Dad's really broke her heart.

Even I don't think Laura and Shadow will be reuniting,

My whole point about Laura and Sweeney not being some epic romance came down to where Sweeney's heart was wide open for Laura, hers already belonged to another. In a way that is her habit she's not thinking she destroyed her marriage to Shadow, but rather that Wednesday did. Wednesday stole him away, and this last part is likely 100% true...  that Wednesday means him no good. If he gets his battle, unlike in  tonight's one on one, I doubt his focus will be on whether Shadow  is in danger. As a matter of fact I'm worried when this battle comes, our favorite pairings will be on opposing sides. If it leaves off that way, I'm going to be big mad!  I don't like her alliance with Mr World / The New Gods.

If Laura had turned all those feelings inward, she'd be moping somewhere  depressed. Instead she's  marrying those feelings to an action and now has a fire in her belly to do the seemingly impossible, kill Wednesday. It's this singleness of purpose and not having grieved her marriage properly that hasn't left her open to  seeing how Sweeney's feelings changed over their time spent together, much less questioning whether she returned those feelings,  the way I see it. I do wonder why she keeps saying she got him killed though. Is that just because he took the assignment to kill Laura from Wednesday? During this downtime trying to find the spear she's seemingly struggling with all these questions.

 

Thinking of the way she got to the other Leprechaun and his story he relayed, why would Wednesday have asked him to kill Laura Moon when he had one so heavily indebted to  him already in his pocket? I remember Sweeney saying I don't do his (Wednesday's) bidding because I want to, I do it because I f'ing owe him.  Liam said Wednesday stole his lucky coin from him, so that indicates he had no other leverage over him.

 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

10 hours ago, T Summer said:

and what's up with not even asking the man's name?

He already knew Kai’s name. He introduced himself downstairs when Laura and Salim arrived. They talked again later when Kai came to fix the bed, which is when he invited Salim to the party.

9 hours ago, hnygrl said:

Did NOT have to sit through Salim getting laid. I was not in the mood. That whole segment was so unnecessary to me. Added nothing to the storyline.

We’ve had several hetero sex scenes on this show, so having one for Salim all season was fine with me. What it added to the storyline was showing that he was finally able to let go of the Jinn and start moving on. Until that point, he’d been clinging to the hope that someone had a way for him to find him so they could be reunited. 

Edited March 8, 2021 by ElectricBoogaloo

[LaMatadita]

29 minutes ago, T Summer said:

I don't think Shadow is done with Marguerite, he's doing something FOR her, as I stated in my post upthread. Yes, just rewound and  it's in the previews. Sam BlackCrow telling Shadow if he (Sandy, Marguerite's older son) was with his Dad in Fla., she would have heard from him. She also said Marguerite's son leaving and going to his Dad's really broke her heart.

Thank you, I knew I was missing something simple! I now remember that they showed Sam talking about Margeurite's son being in Florida in the recap, and I still completely spaced it. Glad Shadow wasn't being a dick. I've always found him to be a decent person and it would have been out of character.

30 minutes ago, T Summer said:

My whole point about Laura and Sweeney not being some epic romance came down to where Sweeney's heart was wide open for Laura, hers already belonged to another.

I may answer this later in PM because I don't want to keep derailing episode threads by rehashing this same issue.

37 minutes ago, T Summer said:

In a way that is her habit she's not thinking she destroyed her marriage to Shadow, but rather that Wednesday did.

The first episode where we get to see Laura's PoV (1x04) tells us, multiple times and even from her own mouth, that she hadn't actually loved Shadow. Robbie points this out, Audrey points this out, and Ibis asks her point blank, "Was it love?" and she answers, "It wasn't. But I guess it is now." In their initial relationship, Shadow put Laura on a pedestal and didn't really know her--he loved his idea of who she was--and Laura unintentionally used him to fill a hole in her life because she was depressed and suicidal and thought that being with someone who loved her might be enough. Dying changed her perspective some, but I don't think it suddenly made her love him when she hadn't before. It made her think she'd been given a second chance to be a better person, and the light she saw emanating from him (which was part of the coin's magic) made her think protecting him was the way to do that. She blamed herself for hurting Shadow and for her own death for all of S1 because she didn't know any better, but following and protecting Shadow wasn't really about loving him, it was a desperate, subconscious need to be able to love herself and not think she was a worthless human being (which ties in with her experience in Purgatory this season). She didn't find out that she'd been killed on Wednesday's orders and start to blame him for everything until the end of S1/beginning of S2, and her hatred for him has steadily ramped up since then.

Her existential situation on the show is so complicated and nuanced and fucked up because on the one hand, yes, Wednesday snuffed her out to get at Shadow, but at the same time, she hadn't actually loved Shadow, hadn't been happy, and had tried to save herself and her relationship by robbing a casino. Wednesday hiring Sweeney to kill her has an element of cosmic irony because it was through her walking death that she actually did find love (and tragically lost it) with the very same person who'd been partially responsible for her death, and it was through her second death and her rebirth that she was able to start to accept that she's been self-sabotaging herself her entire life due to events from her childhood and isn't actually to blame for every bad thing that's ever happened to her. At this point, I think Laura has moved on from the simplistic motivation of hating Wednesday because he ruined her already unsatisfying marriage and wants him dead because he has been the root of so much sorrow and chaos for herself and everyone she cares about. Her character arc is, IMO, the most consistent, coherent, and moving one of the whole bunch, so it makes me sad that so many people just see her as some annoying bitch who fucked around on her husband.

1 hour ago, T Summer said:

I do wonder why she keeps saying she got [Sweeney] killed though.

Because the morning after they connected during the voodoo sex, Sweeney came back to Samedi's place to find her, and she asked him why he'd come back for her, insisted that the intimacy of the previous night had been Wednesday's doing, and then told him that he kept saying Wednesday owed him a battle because he was too scared to find his own battle (basically, she called him a coward). He then went and essentially found his own battle, which was his attempt to take out Wednesday, and he died. She felt guilty because she felt like her pushing him away and saying that to him goaded him into seeking his death, and her guilt was later compounded by realizing that he had genuinely loved her after all, and the very same death she felt like she'd goaded him into led to her being resurrected by his love-infused blood (cosmic irony again).

Anyway, I'm not sure what Laura actually wants beyond killing Wednesday, but I think that's because she won't let herself even think about what she wants beyond that. Personally, I want her to succeed in taking the fucker out, and I want her to live through it, because I feel like getting a second chance was something she desperately wanted throughout the series, and as Salim pointed out, every beat of her heart is a sign that someone truly loved her. (I would love to see her reunited with Sweeney in some way, but I don't want her to throw her life away to see him again.) After everything she's been through, I'm not sure I think that the traditional domestic life of settling down and having 3 kids and a nice house and a cat is going to fulfill her the way it did Essie. I also don't think she'd want to be an immortal god, as I said before, so I hope they're not going there. I guess I could see her devoting the rest of her life to herself, in a way, and just traveling and seeing the world in a solitary fashion and finding some contentment that way? I'm definitely curious to see how they tie up her storyline.

[T Summer]

34 minutes ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

He already knew Kai’s name. He introduced himself downstairs when Laura and Salim arrived. 

 

Yes, thank you. I caught it when I watched the second time which made me feel better.

 

Do you (or anyone)  think the proprietor  of the hotel  Toni looking the same age as she did in the opening vignette from 1951 holds any significance? Is she a god? The young man she hid in the vignette said he'd been looking for a new temple for over a hundred years then he said I am Tu Er Shen the rabbit god, telling  the story in the third person of how he became a god and protector of homosexual love.  Toni seemed to disbelieve him and wonder if he hit his head too hard, until  he proclaimed her establishment a temple   and blew butterfly kisses that reassembled as a peacock marquee.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 hour ago, T Summer said:

Do you (or anyone)  think the proprietor  of the hotel  Toni looking the same age as she did in the opening vignette from 1951 holds any significance? Is she a god? The young man she hid in the vignette said he'd been looking for a new temple for over a hundred years then he said I am Tu Er Shen the rabbit god, telling  the story in the third person of how he became a god and protector of homosexual love.  Toni seemed to disbelieve him and wonder if he hit his head too hard, until  he proclaimed her establishment a temple   and blew butterfly kisses that reassembled as a peacock marquee.

He also blessed her with "a long and happy and loving life" so I'm guessing that at the very least she doesn't age as quickly so that she can continue to look over his temple.

[T Summer]

2 minutes ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

He also blessed her with "a long and happy and loving life" so I'm guessing that at the very least she doesn't age as quickly so that she can continue to look over his temple.

Thank you again. That would indeed be a long life! I guess I took it to mean in human terms, aging  along the way and all. Not necessarily so, I guess.as things sure are different in the world of American Gods.

[T Summer]

2 hours ago, LaMatadita said:

Anyway, I'm not sure what Laura actually wants beyond killing Wednesday, but I think that's because she won't let herself even think about what she wants beyond that. Personally, I want her to succeed in taking the fucker out, and I want her to live through it, because I feel like getting a second chance was something she desperately wanted throughout the series, and as Salim pointed out, every beat of her heart is a sign that someone truly loved her.

^This, I agree with wholeheartedly.

[tennisgurl]

This was a really nice episode for Laura and Salim, and while they are going their own separate ways for now I hope they can meet up again. Laura finally said goodbye to Sweeney and acknowledged her grief (in her own way) and Salim is finally moving on from the Jinn, even finding his faith again. Its obvious that Laura did love him, even if she still cant say it out loud in those words, and that she feels terrible grief and guilt over his death and being unable to bring him back, so I am glad that she apparently found some closure. At least in that she has acknowledged what he meant to her and that he's gone (again, in her own way) so now she has moved forward to finally killing Wednesday. Interesting that his horde is still active with magic and that's how she got the weapon she will need to kill him, its like she is still getting help from Sweeney even after he died.

Tyr really should know better after being around for so many centuries. Never give a big villain speech before killing someone, just kill them and get it over with. Yeah that's Wednesday for you. Gives Shadow a thumbs up for helping him kill his fellow god and then just fucks off. I originally thought that the imagines that Shadow was seeing was about him understand his past, but maybe its also about what is going on in Lakeside. Did the poster send him to Florida to look for Margarites son who is supposedly there with his dad? Even if he is going to Florida he can probably make it back to Lakeside in a few hours driving, I guess he inherited some of his dads magic that allowed him to drive in the space between spaces, which is the only way he could be driving around this much in such a short period of time. 

The opening was really good, I have really liked all of these intros where we meet various gods this season. So does the Peacock hotel have anything to do with the random Peacock that Shadow saw in the woods ages ago at the start of the season? 

[T Summer]

3 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

 

The opening was really good, I have really liked all of these intros where we meet various gods this season. So does the Peacock hotel have anything to do with the random Peacock that Shadow saw in the woods ages ago at the start of the season? 

That's one of the things I'm wondering. Didn't he also see a peacock on a magazine cover,  and peacock pictures in the hall way on the way into Bilquis' place and then once inside he noticed those peacock feathers with what looked like metal claws attached? They  may have even been near the blood on the floor... have to rewatch that episode to be sure.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

What worries me about Laura is that since Sweeney died, her primary goal has been to kill Wednesday, partly to finish what he started and partly to avenge his death. I think that focusing on killing Wednesday is what has kept her going. If she manages to kill Sweeney, I think she may find her self aimless and unsure what to do next which may cause her to slip backwards in her grieving process. It can be similar for people dealing with normal/natural human deaths - they initially have to focus on planning the funeral and the flurry of activity surrounding that. Once that's over, the grief can hit really hard because there isn't this huge distraction that involves planning and organization and suddenly you're just alone. I don't need Laura to have some huge epiphany about how she wants to become a god killer or a yoga teacher or whatever. I just hope that she finds some peace after her mission is over and that she can embrace her second chance at life.

[T Summer]

Does anyone know what the flurry of little orbs  of light that Shadow sometimes sees are? In  the episode from s2 where Sam BlackCrow gives him a ride back to Cairo, he sees them when she drops him off and she sees them too, and asks "friends of yours?"

Didn't he see them outside Marguerite's when he was saying goodbye to her after dinner? Now I'm trying to remember the other times he saw them?

In the convo in Sam Blackcrow's truck she said something about her dual nature and I would almost be asking if she could be his twin (obviously not identical), except she's younger. [the actress who plays Sam BlackCrow is 12 years younger than the actor who plays Shadow Moon]

[LaMatadita]

8 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

What worries me about Laura is that since Sweeney died, her primary goal has been to kill Wednesday, partly to finish what he started and partly to avenge his death. I think that focusing on killing Wednesday is what has kept her going. If she manages to kill Sweeney, I think she may find her self aimless and unsure what to do next which may cause her to slip backwards in her grieving process. It can be similar for people dealing with normal/natural human deaths - they initially have to focus on planning the funeral and the flurry of activity surrounding that. Once that's over, the grief can hit really hard because there isn't this huge distraction that involves planning and organization and suddenly you're just alone. I don't need Laura to have some huge epiphany about how she wants to become a god killer or a yoga teacher or whatever. I just hope that she finds some peace after her mission is over and that she can embrace her second chance at life.

I've had similar thoughts. I just read an interview with Emily Browning about this episode, and she confirmed that Laura is not thinking past taking out Wednesday. She had a moment of vulnerability when she thought her chance at getting the spear was gone, but then the spear showed up and she was like, "Nevermind, I'm fine, the plan's back on!" With the way that she's been written, and after everything she's been through, it's hard to imagine what would actually make her happy. She got her human life back, but she hasn't had a chance to really examine the state it's in and is throwing herself headfirst into something that could very well end it for good.

She also had this to say about Sweeney:

Quote

"I don’t think she sees herself as fragile or insecure in any way whatsoever. Episode 8 is the first time you actually really see her like [that, because] Sweeney dies and she’s like, “F—k.” Not even to speak of the feelings she may or may not have for him, but that’s her ticket into this world that Shadow is now in, this afterlife world that is her only world at this point. She doesn’t understand it. She doesn’t know how to operate in it without Sweeney…"

She was clearly talking about when Laura found out he'd died in 2x08. Her not knowing how to navigate the magical world without him and feeling lost makes perfect sense, but Laura either had the feelings or she didn't, whether she understood them or not. I couldn't figure out if Emily just spoke imprecisely and was referring to Laura's difficulty with understanding and expressing her own emotions, or if she was actually still calling Laura's feelings for Sweeney into question even in the present and suggesting that maybe she doesn't love him but just cared about him and felt lost without him. It's true that she has never actually said that she loves him, but the dialogue and events of 2x05, which was all about her inner truth, certainly seemed to indicate that she had moved on from Shadow and that she was falling in love with Sweeney--the whole voodoo love scene was about Laura showing Samedi her truth as payment for the potion. Unless they're actually still planning to have Laura say the words about Sweeney at some point in the future and Emily didn't want to spoil that, or unless they're retconning that relationship because they want to reunite her with Shadow, I cannot imagine what would be the point of playing coy about her feelings for the guy at this point in the narrative.

Or maybe she just misspoke slightly and the general consensus that she loved him but couldn't say it is correct. Even the bit before that where she told Salim she cared about him and he said, "I love you, too, Laura Moon" back to her seemed to be him acknowledging that she can't say the words, which set up her still not being able to say the words about Sweeney. (Maybe she knows she said those words to Shadow when she didn't mean them, so she has an aversion to saying them now?)

Edited March 9, 2021 by LaMatadita

[WatchrTina]

Hmmmmm.  So what happened in this ep? 

• Salim got his groove back.  
• Laura got the spear back.
• Odin got rid of a Tyr-shaped thorn in his side, and
• Shadow headed south for Spring break.

I suspect I'm going to like this season better when I can do a binge re-watch because despite all I described above, it still feels like we're marching through quicksand.

It should be noted that Shadow has now killed TWO old gods -- Tyr and Sweeney -- while defending Odin.  One wonders what the old god community thinks of that.  Aren't they supposed to all be banding together against the threat posed by the new gods?

[Joimiaroxeu]

Poor Shadow, he's too trusting. When they do an autopsy on that gas station attendant how are they going figure out why he got his larynx ripped out so precisely? Is there an animal that can do that?

Ramsey Bolton!

Salim wearing the Jinn's sweater for luck and courage. So sweet.

What did they do to Tech Boy? What that some kind of malware scan?

Bilquis imitating Tech Boy was amazing. (Except for the affected acccent, anyway.) Tech Girl.

Such a amazing moment for Salim. He finally stopped living in his grief and got him some hot bellhop.

I don't understand why Shadow had to be involved in that battle between Odin and Tyr.

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It should be noted that Shadow has now killed TWO old gods -- Tyr and Sweeney --

Shadow didn't kill Tyr. He just provided enough of a distraction so Odin could kill him. He gets credit for the assist I guess. Maybe if Tyr had left Shadow out of it he'd still be alive.

[AnimeMania]

2 hours ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

Maybe if Tyr had left Shadow out of it he'd still be alive.

Tyr's biggest weakness is that he always follows the rules and since Shadow interferred, Tyr had to kill him. Tyr spent too long explaining to Shadow what the rules are.

[rollacoaster]

17 hours ago, Joimiaroxeu said:

Bilquis imitating Tech Boy was amazing. (Except for the affected acccent, anyway.) Tech Girl.

That was actually my favorite part, accent and all, lol! I bet the actress had a blast. 

15 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

Tyr spent too long explaining to Shadow what the rules are.

Monologuing!

Ramsey Bolton popping back in at the end complaining about the condition of Sweeney's hoard was hilarious! I was really worried that he'd screwed Laura. 

[LaMatadita]

On 3/9/2021 at 3:36 AM, T Summer said:

Does anyone know what the flurry of little orbs  of light that Shadow sometimes sees are? In  the episode from s2 where Sam BlackCrow gives him a ride back to Cairo, he sees them when she drops him off and she sees them too, and asks "friends of yours?"

Didn't he see them outside Marguerite's when he was saying goodbye to her after dinner? Now I'm trying to remember the other times he saw them?

In the convo in Sam Blackcrow's truck she said something about her dual nature and I would almost be asking if she could be his twin (obviously not identical), except she's younger. [the actress who plays Sam BlackCrow is 12 years younger than the actor who plays Shadow Moon]

I was just thinking about this, and I think it might make some sense, except for the fact that we haven't seen much of Sam in the show so far. Not that she's his twin, necessarily, but I think Shadow has only seen those firefly things when she's around (the other time was when she dropped him off at the funeral home in Cairo in S2). That seems like it must mean something, especially since they've now connected Sam to Lakeside and his new love interest. Sam has to be there for a reason! There's also all of the "King of America" foreshadowing from S1 and the fact that he was given a coin with a liberty head on one side by one of the Zorya's (I don't recall what's on the other side of the coin, if we were shown what it was). Maybe Shadow's lineage represents the immigrant experience and Sam's represents the Native experience? 

Edited March 12, 2021 by LaMatadita

[T Summer]

5 minutes ago, LaMatadita said:

I was just thinking about this, and I think it might make some sense, except for the fact that we haven't seen much of Sam in the show. Not that she's his twin, necessarily, but I think Shadow has only seen those firefly things when she's around (the other time was when she dropped him off at the funeral home in Cairo in S2). That seems like it must mean something, especially since they've now connected Sam to Lakeside and his new love interest. Sam has to be there for a reason! There's also all of the "King of America" foreshadowing from S1 and the fact that he was given a coin with a liberty head on one side by one of the Zorya's (I don't recall what's on the other side of the coin, though). Maybe Shadow's lineage represents the immigrant experience and Sam's represents the Native experience? 

 

Yes outside the funeral home in s2 is what I meant when he saw them and she saw them too and  and asked "friends of yours?" Then he saw them when he walked her out at Marguerite's.  Started thinking about Shadow's mom and whether she could be Native American and then thinking about their ages and trying to figure out what the connection is.  I really don't recall if those are the only times he saw the firey orbs?

Driving along in her vehicle in s2 Sam BlackCrow  mentioned her dual nature and the Moon / silver coin Zorya lady said something  to Shadow about following two  paths, his nature  being half in shadow half in light. That he's  intrigued with Wednesday's war of the gods BS and at the same time he says he want to break free... words to that effect.

I can't remember now if he's seen  them other times?

[LaMatadita]

7 hours ago, T Summer said:

Driving along in her vehicle in s2 Sam BlackCrow  mentioned her dual nature

That was about her gender identity, I believe--she said she contains both male and female. She doesn't seem to insist on gender-neutral pronouns, though (pretty sure everyone, including her sister, uses feminine pronouns for her). From what I remember, she seemed to think the golden lights were "friends" of Shadows, but they only seem to appear when she's around, so it's definitely intriguing.

Edited March 12, 2021 by LaMatadita

[T Summer]

25 minutes ago, LaMatadita said:

That was about her gender identity, I believe--she said she contains both male and female. She doesn't seem to insist on gender-neutral pronouns, though (pretty sure everyone, including her sister, uses feminine pronouns for her). From what I remember, she seemed to think the golden lights were "friends" of Shadows, but they only seem to appear when she's around, so it's definitely intriguing.

I've been watching s1+2 again and trying to sort out if he saw those fiery orbs any other time. I think I was remembering the Ways of the Dead ep e5? where  Shadow saw the ghost of Mr James in his bathroom mirror, his head with flames coming off it.  Shadow  started having dreams and visions of the lynching and burning James had suffered and in one  scene  they were having a conversation on the street and it actually looked more like embers flying around, as opposed to little orbs. So it may actually be only around Sam Black Crow?

[WatchrTina]

On 3/10/2021 at 7:27 PM, Joimiaroxeu said:

Bilquis imitating Tech Boy was amazing.

Okay now I feel like a doofus for not recognizing that that is what she was doing.  Thank you for pointing it out.  (Now I have to watch again to fully appreciate it.)

Edited March 13, 2021 by WatchrTina

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Inside the episode

Goodbye

We settle this the old way

Subconscious

 

[lightninggirl]

On 3/8/2021 at 2:18 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

He already knew Kai’s name. He introduced himself downstairs when Laura and Salim arrived. They talked again later when Kai came to fix the bed, which is when he invited Salim to the party.

We’ve had several hetero sex scenes on this show, so having one for Salim all season was fine with me. What it added to the storyline was showing that he was finally able to let go of the Jinn and start moving on. Until that point, he’d been clinging to the hope that someone had a way for him to find him so they could be reunited. 

THANK YOU. It might've been the music, but I teared up a little with Kai and Salim finally got together. Salim had hung onto the Jinn's love for so long, and he was just a shell of a person. We got a glimpse of him coming out of that shell when he negotiated for Laura with Mr. World, but he stopped praying and stopped being due to his grief. And can I just say how much I LOVE KAI. He was so kind, so tender, so sweet. I just wanted to give him a hug, he was so wonderful.