S02.E03: The Tournament Job

[AnimeMania]

The team has to infiltrate an e-sports tournament to stop a ruthless team owner from mentally and physically abusing his young players.

Premiere Date: November 16, 2022    

Edited November 16, 2022 by AnimeMania

[Prevailing Wind]

That dude was really evil.

[Maelstrom]

Oooh, this was a good one. Think I'd call it one of the best of the new series, IMO at least. First off, I absolutely loved how they kept Hardison so present despite being offscreen the whole time. Loved Hardison's texts to Eliot after Breanna snitched - I could just hear Aldis saying all of that with that aggrieved tone of voice he gets when sniping with Eliot, just perfect. And his last minute save advising Sophie to have Parker use the techie failsafe. "He really is always watching. That's disturbing." Sophie's not wrong 😄

Eliot is always at his best when he's playing big brother and looking out for the little guys, and this was a strong ep for him. I saw Beth directed this one, which would explain why Parker wasn't in it quite as much. Even so, her terrible Schwarzenegger impression made me laugh every time (though Eliot's expression might have had something to do with that) and getting to take down the mark with a t-shirt cannon was epic.

Speaking of, the mark was definitely one of the worst we've come across in all seven seasons, yikes. I'd seen the actor in another role years ago, where he played a perfectly nice human being, so I was impressed with just how damn soulless and evil he was here.

Breanna getting to be the inside woman was a good development for her character, too. One of the things I've always appreciated most about this show is that the female characters are never victims or damsels waiting to be rescued. Eliot's busy beating up the cybernetic organism enforcer? She'll just take the mark out with a champagne bottle (it's a miracle that didn't kill him, lol).

I'm on record for not being the biggest Noah Wyle fan, especially when he gets zany, but somehow they kept him reined in enough here that I enjoyed his over the top nerdiness about the gaming, and it worked for me.

Definitely to be rewatching this one!

[Mabinogia]

Agree with everything you said Maelstrom. The show is doing a great job of keeping Hardison around. Not just in name dropping him, but having him still be part of the team, giving them advice on what to do even if he can't be with them. Love it. 

"Big Brother" Elliot always gets me and I will admit to tearing up a bit this ep. The story, while very disturbing, was very well done. 

Speaking of well done, I loved how Elliot and the big guy's fight mimicked the game battle and how the show cut back and forth between them. I abhor violence and usually cringe through Elliot's fight scene's but I do like how this one was edited. 

I have no opinion of Noah Wiley having been one of maybe 5 American's who has never seen a moment of ER (I think that's the right show, (looked it up, that's the right one)), but I am loving Harry Wilson. I think he works well with the team and I love the callback to him being a gamer. It's an unexpected little character trait that makes him seem more real, since most real people aren't cliches. 

My only complaint is that I now have to wait for the next episode. I'm so glad this show is back, but the waiting for a show to "drop" is giving me flashbacks to my network TV childhood where I had to wait a week between episodes. The Netflix generation doesn't understand the torment of those olden days. LOL

[DearEvette]

Yeah, I liked this one. 

We got to see Elliot the chef again and I loved how he took the gamers under his wing. 

Breanna got to be the inside woman.  I thought it was believable.  She was good but there were some bumps.  Also I just friggin loved that she took the most expedient way to save herself -- no fast talking, no grifting, just a champagne bottle to the head.

This is exactly the type of bad dude I love them to take down.  He was terrible and deserved his very public downfall.

Agreed on how seamlessly the show manages to keep Hardison a part of everything even when he isn't there.

Finally, I gave no idea who the actor was and he had little to no dialogue, but the guy who played the big wig investor that Breanna and Sophie pretended to work for was really quite handsome. 

[Maelstrom]

Mabinogia, I'm also one of the 5 Americans who never watched ER! I watched NW on the Librarians series, and didn't necessarily like him there for various reasons so I was wary when he was announced as being on this show, but for the most part I've enjoyed him far more than I expected. He really does fit with the team, and it's always good to have an outside perspective to compare with the others (Breanna, though technically being a newbie, grew up with Hardison and Parker in her life and therefore has a slightly skewed outlook on the world as one would expect, lol).

Agree that the final fight sequence cutting between Eliot and the game was brilliantly done.

I have to admit that I'm actually liking the time between new episodes. (So far, at least, lol). Having also grown up on network television, there's still a big part of me that finds waiting week to week more "normal" than having all of the episodes dropped at once* - and it helps make the season last longer, since we have to wait so long between seasons. Then again, I'm a dinosaur when it comes to the modern digital age 😄

(*Except for my Korean drama addiction, because so help me if I had to wait a week for more episodes. Those shows are television crack.)

[Mabinogia]

31 minutes ago, Maelstrom said:

and it helps make the season last longer, since we have to wait so long between seasons.

That is a good point. I am impatient, so if a season drops all at once I basically mainline if for however many hours it takes to watch, then complain for the other 51 weeks of the year that I have to wait so long for the next one. hahaha

Edited November 20, 2022 by Mabinogia

[MissLucas]

I'm so glad this show (and Hardison) is back!!! All the episodes were great so far but this one really stands out. Whenever show decides to write a love letter to geekdom* it goes above and beyond its already pretty high standards. The editing of the two fights at the end: fantastic. Parker channeling Arnold AND Linda Hamilton/Sarah Connor in that tank top and sunglasses: also great (Ninja appearances to unnerve Harry was just a bonus). 

*nerddom for nitpickers though the lines certainly get blurred. I'm with Hardison: Age of the Geek!

[DoctorAtomic]

They could not have casted the 'coach' better. He just looked like someone you wanted to clock with a champagne bottle. 

I thought Harry got a little too into it though. Otherwise, I like the plot of the esports.

[marceline]

I'm not liking the clothing this season. That green suit on Sophie is atrocious.

Whoever handled wardrobe in the final season on TNT should be brought back

[Maelstrom]

Marceline, I suspect at least part of the problem is that ugly seems to be the current trend in fashion - every show I watch is full of ugly, ugly clothes, lol.

[andromeda331]

This was a great episode! Wow, that guy was really evil. I love the team realizing win or lose he would still win then finding a way so that he still lost. 

I love how much Breanna loved the game and Harry too.

Great seeing Eliot cooking again and I loved how he took care of the team. The argument about whether gaming was a sport or not. Eliot finally agreeing it was a sport.

I really like how they show Hardison is still around even though he's not.

I loved how into his role Harry got and Sophie reminding him that he was. The team as all had that problem in the past. 

[blueray]

Finally an episode that I really enjoyed. Don't get me wrong I didn't dislike the other ones before this, but this season was kind of lacking something... until this episode.

All the characters got something to do. I especially loved Harry playing the documentary producer. And I found the whole tournament interesting. I enjoyed how they had Hardison around and play a major part without being on screen.

[aradia22]

Visually, the bad guy in this one was cartoonishly evil. Almost like that character on The Boys. Maybe I'm out of the loop, but I didn't think e-sports had these issues. They seemed to be conflating it with youtubers and twitch streamers a bit. The parts about fame and psychological manipulation felt more in line with that. There was some alpha/hustle culture stuff in there too. I feel like they piled on the racism and hair-sniffing to make him more hate-worthy and distract from whether this set up made all that much sense. I think this is how they would have written an old episode about traditional sports with steroid use and a coach/team owner who was a failed jock. It doesn't quite map correctly with all this new context. Basically, I don't think the writers understood the world. Tam was also giving me echoes of Bao in The Golf Job.

The Hardison references were cute in this episode.

"I'm going to be ThiefPuppy21. No! ChihuahuaBandit17!"

Giving Elliot a proper opponent was fun even though there wasn't a lot of interesting fight choreography.

Even though I didn't think the writers grasped the context of the subculture, I do think the overall structure and the evolution of the con worked better. They had a mark who was actually getting around their tricks, we had sufficient focus on who was being hurt, and the stakes were at an appropriate level. Also, a bad guy monologuing always means it's going to get caught on tape. There was also a good payoff for things like the ninja run and the t-shirt cannon.

[aradia22]

Quote

She'll just take the mark out with a champagne bottle (it's a miracle that didn't kill him, lol).

I think TV shows tend to undersell how much force and blunt force trauma is needed to actually kill someone with one blow. 

Also, I appreciate that while no one died, we had a gun last episode and the champagne bottle this episode. Some stakes! 

Quote

I have to admit that I'm actually liking the time between new episodes. (So far, at least, lol). Having also grown up on network television, there's still a big part of me that finds waiting week to week more "normal" than having all of the episodes dropped at once* - and it helps make the season last longer, since we have to wait so long between seasons. Then again, I'm a dinosaur when it comes to the modern digital age 😄

I am young enough to have not wanted to watch ER while it was on but old enough to remember appointment TV. I like to be able to binge-watch because I don't think most shows are great at planning out a season so this way I can push through the weak filler episodes until I hit a better one rather than getting discouraged from finishing a season after some boring episodes. 

[andromeda331]

55 minutes ago, aradia22 said:

I think TV shows tend to undersell how much force and blunt force trauma is needed to actually kill someone with one blow. 

Also, I appreciate that while no one died, we had a gun last episode and the champagne bottle this episode. Some stakes! 

I am young enough to have not wanted to watch ER while it was on but old enough to remember appointment TV. I like to be able to binge-watch because I don't think most shows are great at planning out a season so this way I can push through the weak filler episodes until I hit a better one rather than getting discouraged from finishing a season after some boring episodes. 

I like both. I love being able to binge Leverage Remeption, Bridgerton and other shows. But I also like having shows that have an episode a week like the Equalizer, Alaskan Daily and various Star Wars shows.