S03.E12: Loss

[Trini]

Henry finds himself on a collision course with Xiao, whose latest plan results in devastating consequences for Nicky and her family.

Richard Speight, Jr directed the episode written by Ryan Johnson & Peter Lalayanis.

Airdate: 3/1/2023.

[paigow]

She kidnapped the dude... they have already COLLIDED...

[Trini]

I'm only halfway through, but WHY do they keep introducing new magic rules and mcguffins?? Even in the second-to-last episode??

[paigow]

Bo got his Red Dead Redemption, Henry now has Professor X  / Cerebro superpowers, all Warriors and Guardians have dropped down to Black Widow / Hawkeye level... Not sure what next season[?] will look like...

[Trini]

Yeah, I'm just so over the overuse magic on this show; so 75% of this episode was just eyeroll-y.

They brought back Mia just to kill her?

Why did they even introduce the global threat of Xiao killing ALL the Bloodline families when we only saw it affect the Shens and it was resolved in the same episode anyway? And there's more I could say about that plot, but I'll just say I think the writing has really fallen off lately.

Well, I guess the 'love' triangle is resolved with Bo (unnecessarily?) taking himself out of the equation.

At least they finally connected the Xiao and Delta arcs -- took them long enough!

Evan and Nadia are going to be parents?!!

[thuganomics85]

Kind of odd that they would bring Mia back to just kill her off after two episodes.  I wonder if the actress had something else lined up and they just wanted to give her an official send-off.  I guess one could argue that her death was to raise the stakes and show how dangerous Xiao has become, but it didn't feel needed.

Xiao creating a magical disease to wipe out the Bloodline families definitely felt like it should have been something that should have been a storyline for a few episodes and not already get wrapped up after its first episode.  Plus, despite the great work from the cast as always, it's clear that everything was going to work out, because there is no way they are wiping out over half of the cast and turning it into the Jin, Henry, Sebastian, Evan, and Dennis show.

Kind of weird that Evan and Nadia just disappeared after the whole pregnancy reveal.

Did love the part of the cure involved having to use Sebastian's chef skills!

Bo makes a sacrifice to complete his redemption arc, but I'm not sure if he's dead or if those creatures will turn him into whatever that thing was he was fighting.

So, it looks like Xiao's next step in her evil plan is use that algorithm Delta created for her nefarious purposes.  She did take out the main guy though since I guess Patrick Fabian is no longer available!

[Trini]

53 minutes ago, thuganomics85 said:

and turning it into the Jin, Henry, Sebastian, Evan, and Dennis show.

... But if they did, they could call it The Avenging Widowers! They travel around, looking sad and hot, fighting magical crime.

 

[paigow]

23 minutes ago, Trini said:

... But if they did, they could call it The Avenging Widowers! They travel around, looking sad and hot, fighting magical crime.

 

Henry would get super plot armour because he is the only one with magic powers.... Every episode the group gets smaller... 

[Camera One]

There were way too many "huh?" moments in this episode and not in a good way.

Normally, I hate it when they kill characters off.  For some reason, I didn't care as much for Mia.  I agree it didn't feel necessary to raise the "stakes" when everyone got magically better (literally) by the end of the episode.  

The whole getting the flower in the woods subplot became a moot point halfway through the episode when Bo came up with the anti-magic fruit out of nowhere.  It isn't good writing to waste a bunch of time on something that is ultimately a dead end.

I didn't even understand Henry's role until he drank the juice and somehow managed it pass it on to everyone he "found" using his compass powers?  It all felt randomly made up, which is again not good writing.  If they insist on relying on magic so much, they need to come up with clear rules that they follow and the audience understands.

Xiao needed Henry to "find" Nicky because she could mark all warrior and guardian bloodlines through her?  Huh?  

The various scenes of impending death were moving, though.  I like Evan and his girlfriend, but that whole pregnancy scene just didn't feel naturally incorporated.

I guess they want to "redeem" Bo with his own sacrifice in an alternate world, which is similar to what happened with Zhilan last season on a smaller scale.

The final "huh" moment was the super weak connection they are using to link the Xiao subplot to the Delta subplot.  Ancient sorceress wants the algorithm!  How modern of her!  So now she wants to rule the world or what?  

[Trini]

19 hours ago, Camera One said:

  I like Evan and his girlfriend, but that whole pregnancy scene just didn't feel naturally incorporated.

I've thought it over a little, and I wonder if this plot twist is a way to possibly exit Evan from the show? Like if they need to cut some cast to save money. (Assuming that there's an unlikely 4th season.)

[Camera One]

35 minutes ago, Trini said:

I've thought it over a little, and I wonder if this plot twist is a way to possibly exit Evan from the show? Like if they need to cut some cast to save money. (Assuming that there's an unlikely 4th season.)

That could be why they are giving Althea a new job as well (and not working with Evan).

They could also have Althea and Jin both away for half a season working for the government.

Edited March 5, 2023 by Camera One

[tennisgurl]

They really brought Mia back just to kill her off, even when they gave her a perfectly serviceable ending? I guess it was to raise the stakes, but I don't think it was needed and seems like a dick move after everything Mia went through. I didn't even really like Mia, but there was no reason to kill her off for no reason. 

Xiao's big plan to create a magical disease to take out the whole bloodline is definitely the sort of big stakes that need to be expanded for a few episodes and resolved in the season finale, not started and ended in one episode before the season finale. Its a cool idea, but it really needed the time to make the stakes look dire, even if we all know that of course they'll reverse the curse and everyone will be fine. Looks like her next evil plan is tying into the data guy? Glad that they are tying those plots together, hopefully it will make things less confusing instead of more, because the magic stuff is getting more convoluted by the episode. 

Evan and Nadia having a baby is nice but I'm not really sure why it was included here, especially because they disappeared from the episode after Nadia told Evan. Will we find out that one of them are secretly from some totally different magical family from another part of the world and that their baby is another chosen one? Do they want an excuse to cull the cast and write them out? Is the actress pregnant? In general this episode felt weirdly like a season finale and not the episode before.

Poor Bo, he suffered the leading cause of death for former bad guys who have had a change of heart, dying redeeming yourself. We didn't see a body though, so he could still pop up again. I don't think that he and Nicky will get together and I have no interest in a love triangle, but I would be glad if he got a happier ending, his life has been pretty awful. 

I did like how many people got to use their skills to help save the day, Sebastian even got to use his cooking!

[Trini]

19 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

Poor Bo, he suffered the leading cause of death for former bad guys who have had a change of heart, dying redeeming yourself. We didn't see a body though, so he could still pop up again. I don't think that he and Nicky will get together and I have no interest in a love triangle, but I would be glad if he got a happier ending, his life has been pretty awful. 

They did this way better with Zhilan in the previous season finale. To me, it seemed unnecessary how Bo died*, the way the scene was set up. Like, I was already thinking of a couple of different ways they could have got out of that situation without him trapping himself there. Anyway, yeah; a happier or even a more ambiguous ending might have been better, since the writers/etc. seemed to like the character and actor.

*(I think they left enough wiggle room that he could return one magical way or another, though.)

Edited March 7, 2023 by Trini
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