S02.E01: Fight and Flight

[AnimeMania]

Lovers Philo and Vignette risk their lives to help the oppressed Faefolk of Carnival Row.

Premiere Date: February 17, 2023    

[thuganomics85]

I normally don't say this but thank goodness for the overly long previously recap, because I didn't remember over half of the stuff that happened last season.  I know I've said "It's been a while!" for many shows that have long breaks in between seasons, but in this case?  It's really, really been a long while!

Anyways, it's certainly no surprise that the humans continue to be dicks and basically all of the Fae are living in poverty and being put through hell on the Row.  Certainly not helped that Jonah is letting himself be manipulated by Sophie and basically is going the opposite direction of everything his father (RIP, buddy!  Will miss Jared Harris here) tried to do.  I do see why Runyan wants to believe in him since I don't necessarily think Jonah is a flat-out evil man, but he is clearly not using his Chancellor role to deescalate tensions between the humans and the Fae.

Also not surprised that Philo is having a rough go of it, because he pretty much has no one but Vignette in his corner.  The humans now hate him for being part Fae, but the Fae themselves still see him as one of those human "coppers" that held them down for so long.   Hopefully they are going somewhere with him possibly telling the truth about his father and maybe shaking things up a bit.

Vignette is making a name (and a mark) for herself as part of this Black Ravens group, but it seems like she is pissing off their leader as well.  Whoops!

Not sure what to make of whatever is going on with Tourmaline and being possessed (?) by Alice Krige's character from last season and I think committing murders or something?

Imogen and Agreus are still on the boat, but it looks like they might have just gotten captured or something.  I wonder if Ezra was somehow behind it or it will be someone else instead?

[AmigaJoe]

And to think people complained about 'The Sopranos'.😄

I'm gonna have to go back and watch the last couple of eps to remind myself.

The recap was helpful, but mainly served to remind me of how much of the story I'd forgotten.

Can't help but wonder what behind the scenes shenanigans led to such a delay, can't believe this was just because of Covid.

Surprised they didn't just give it up...

[Scarlett45]

We’ve been waiting so long!

Orlando Bloom is so “facially blessed” as my Mom would say. It was nice to see Philo and Vignette having a domestic scene. 
 

What did Philo want from the bouncer of the “fight club”? Did they show us what the favor was?

 

3 hours ago, AmigaJoe said:

Can't help but wonder what behind the scenes shenanigans led to such a delay, can't believe this was just because of Covid.

Covid, Orlando went on paternity leave, got injured and then post production. 

[iMonrey]

I had to go back and re-watch Season 1, it's just been too long of a gap. Hell, I have to do that when it's only been a year between seasons.

Anyway, I'm glad to have the show back, but I was initially a little disappointed they felt the need to open by leaning hard into a fight scene juxtaposed with a train robbery action scene. This isn't a Marvel movie, I don't need action sequences and fight scenes to grab my attention. Plus I can't imagine anyone watching this without having seen the first season. (And boy if they tried, would they be confused.)

I notice they're doing a lot more with the wings - last season they just hung flat unless they were doing a flying sequence. This time they are moving around even when they are on the ground, like when Vignette walked in and hugged Philo and her wings hugged him too. Or when Tourmaline was running from Haruspex. 

Looks like we're going to get into more of the Pact this season, they were just sort of faceless villains last season.

I don't know why the Burgh doesn't just banish the Critch and make them find someplace else to live. It's just taking up land space keeping them locked up in a ghetto.

[Megras]

14 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I don't know why the Burgh doesn't just banish the Critch and make them find someplace else to live. It's just taking up land space keeping them locked up in a ghetto.

Cheap labour.

[iMonrey]

Quote

I don't know why the Burgh doesn't just banish the Critch and make them find someplace else to live. It's just taking up land space keeping them locked up in a ghetto.

Cheap labour.

How? They're not allowed out of the Row so they can't be working the factories or being servants for the idle rich. Are they manufacturing goods within the Row and exporting them to the humans? 

[Affogato]

On 3/10/2023 at 11:55 AM, iMonrey said:

How? They're not allowed out of the Row so they can't be working the factories or being servants for the idle rich. Are they manufacturing goods within the Row and exporting them to the humans? 

They were manning the factories and servants. The burgh is suffering without them. 

[roctavia]

On 2/18/2023 at 5:15 PM, AmigaJoe said:

And to think people complained about 'The Sopranos'.😄

I'm gonna have to go back and watch the last couple of eps to remind myself.

The recap was helpful, but mainly served to remind me of how much of the story I'd forgotten.

Can't help but wonder what behind the scenes shenanigans led to such a delay, can't believe this was just because of Covid.

Surprised they didn't just give it up...

We ended up rewatching the last ep of S1 after this episode, just because we had forgotten so much- Somehow I didn't remember at all what the deal was with Jonah's parents- I remember the chancellor being attacked... but forgot about all the secrets and that the wife was behind the big bad.... 

[Affogato]

16 hours ago, roctavia said:

We ended up rewatching the last ep of S1 after this episode, just because we had forgotten so much- Somehow I didn't remember at all what the deal was with Jonah's parents- I remember the chancellor being attacked... but forgot about all the secrets and that the wife was behind the big bad.... 

I had to rewatch the whole thing. Remembered absolutely nothing except that the first episode was something like Jack the Ripper.

[Rahul]

On 3/9/2023 at 6:53 PM, iMonrey said:

I had to go back and re-watch Season 1, it's just been too long of a gap. Hell, I have to do that when it's only been a year between seasons.

I'm thankful I opted to delay my viewing of this show as long as I did. It's been on my "to see" list for quite some time but I decided to wait for season two to complete its airing so I could watch seasons one and two back to back.

(I'm going to have to go and rewatch Shadow & Bone though because too much time has elapsed and that world is uber complicated.)

[WatchrTina]

On 3/20/2023 at 2:41 PM, Affogato said:

I had to rewatch the whole thing.

Ditto.  And even though I went straight from that re-watch into this episode, I still struggled a bit.

Random thoughts:  

• I'm happy that both couples still have each other but, damn, could the world just leave them alone for a while?
• Not a fan of dream sequences that masquerade as plot.  I can certainly understand that they serve as a useful narrative tool to remind us of what happened in the first season, but I still don't like them.  It feels like a cheat.