S01.E13: Blaine's World

[FilmTVGeek80]

Hmm. Wasn't as good as I hoped, mostly rather predictable, but overall OK, with the exception of Major, whom I feel didn't come out of this episode looking well at all. While I do agree that Liv keeping him in the dark to the extent of letting him think he's crazy was awful, his temper tantrum over being turned into a zombie was ridiculous. It's not death! There's a cure! And seriously, dude, if you want to die so much, you actually still can! Just shoot yourself in the head and we'll be free of you (and the show will probably become much better). And anticipating some comments in the style of "You just like bad boys!" - I was actually watching with my husband (one of the nicest guys ever) and he hated Major's behavior way more than me, even.

 

Also, Major being all suddenly badass reeked of the writer desperately trying to make the audience like us. Sorry, didn't work for me, even if the scene itself was cool.

 

Still, while I blame mostly him for his guilting Liv, she's also responsible for basically letting her brother die (if he dies, which was implied, I suppose?) I mean jeez, there is a cure. It's not available ATM but it's possible to find the other components.

 

 

 

How exactly was Major supposed to know there was a cure? Liv's been lying her ass off to him for months. He's had to learn about all this zombie stuff on his own. And up until recently there was no zombie cure. And even the zombie cure they have hasn't truly been tested, so they have no idea how long it works, if you could die from it, what the side effects are...Sure, there are ways to die as a zombie but that doesn't mean that Major doesn't get to be pissed that Liv took it upon herself for making a major life decision for him to turn him into a monster, without talking to him about it. Anyone in that situation would have been pissed. It really sucks that Major wasn't over it an hour after it happened. Almost everyone we've seen who is a zombie - even Blaine - isn't all "Yay, being a zombie rules!" Most of them really hate it.

 

And I didn't see any "guilting" of Liv. He just rightfully expressed his anger at her. Major would just be accused of being some Gary Sue if he had no real reaction to it and let it roll off his back.

 

Major "suddenly" becoming a badass isn't some thing the writers sprung in the finale. Major's been building up to this moment all season. He bought that arsenal and has prepared himself for this and it was nice to see the writers actually make all of those moments pay-off as well as it did.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

No, I don't want to see any "now, he is a zombie; now he isn't" nonsense. You can turn into a zombie once and once only. That's all.

Angel lost his soul again!

Please, God, no.

Ha, I was thinking about both Angel and The Vampire Diaries (Alaric is alive! Alaric is dead! Alaric is alive again! Alaric is a hunter! Alaric is dead again! Alaric is an Original! Alaric is a human again! Tyler is a human! Tyler is a werewolf! Tyler is a hybrid! Tyler is a human again! Tyler is a werewolf again!). But yeah, no thanks to the back and forth.

[Chicago Redshirt]

I definitely think Liv was majorly idiotic not verifying that was Major during the hostage exchange. Sure, some guy in a generic t-shirt is Major. It's not like Blaine is a duplicitous murdering psychotic.

 

In fairness to Liv, it wasn't a generic t-shirt. It was a shirt for Helton Shelter, the homeless service agency where Major used to work.

 

That doesn't change that she should have taken some more effort to double-check that it was in fact Major, that he hadn't been zombified or hurt, and that Blaine and Dupont wouldn't just kill them both on getting the brains.

 

I don't get why people are holding Major's outburst against him. He lost his job, he spent time in a mental hospital, he was attacked in his own home, beaten up in jail, kidnapped and ate Tommy's brain and had spent an unknown time in a meat freezer. Then he gets stabbed and told his ex girlfriend misled him every time the subject of zombies comes up and is a zombie and she zombifies him and wants them to be together literally 30 seconds after waking up. Why is Liv's selfishness celebrated as her being interestingly flawed and his momentary petulance after all the zombie related chaos infecting his life viewed as wrong?

 

YMMV, but I've not seen anyone criticizing Major for being upset. Indeed, several people have said that pissed off Major was the first time they liked the character.

 

Suzuki wasn't just detroying evidence; he'd finally found his way out. A way to stop Blaine's operation completely and to deal with his guilty conscience. After being forced into corruption and covering up successive murders, he saw a way to take Blaine down and end his own suffering. I personally bought it.

I wish they had made this clearer.

[MisterGlass]

My one complaint about Major's reproaches against Liv was the sneering way he commented on her taking brains from the morgue.  That's a heck of step up from what the rest of the zombies have been doing.

 

Major may well end up indicted for these killings.  His prints are probably on the guns, and he would have powder residue on his hands.  Even though Suzuki blew the place up, some of Major's blood is there too.  Blaine is a good storyteller, has disposable income, and as he said, he has connections.  Having his name written on a wall in blood could be spun as the act of a madman convinced that everyone involved in the shop was, gasp, a zombie!

 

 

She cured Blaine. Fine and good. Immediately after doing that, she should have emptied the clip into his torso. So she could eat *his* brain.

 

Unfortunately this has the same problem as if Blaine had tried to eat Major's brain to find the astronaut brains.  The visions are not a guarantee, just a disjointed series of hints.  I think Blaine delivered the boxes of brains immediately after he left the hand off, and that's why he wasn't there when Major initially started his rampage.

[cynic]

Ha, I was thinking about both Angel and The Vampire Diaries (Alaric is alive! Alaric is dead! Alaric is alive again! Alaric is a hunter! Alaric is dead again! Alaric is an Original! Alaric is a human again! Tyler is a human! Tyler is a werewolf! Tyler is a hybrid! Tyler is a human again! Tyler is a werewolf again!). But yeah, no thanks to the back and forth.

I was thinking Vampire Diaries too, but more along the lines of "There's a cure for vampirism! But there's only one. I guess it goes to our spunky heroine, since she's the only one in the world who shouldn't have to deal with this affliction. But wait! In a shocking twist, she uses it against her dastardly nemesis who ironically is probably the last person who would want to be cured!"

Hmm. Wasn't as good as I hoped, mostly rather predictable, but overall OK, with the exception of Major, whom I feel didn't come out of this episode looking well at all. While I do agree that Liv keeping him in the dark to the extent of letting him think he's crazy was awful, his temper tantrum over being turned into a zombie was ridiculous. It's not death! There's a cure! And seriously, dude, if you want to die so much, you actually still can! Just shoot yourself in the head and we'll be free of you (and the show will probably become much better)...

But, "if you don't like it, you could always just KILL YOURSELF" is kinda a crappy choice to give to someone. It's one thing to accept your own death. It's quite another thing to commit suicide. Also, he didn't know about the cure. Edited June 11, 2015 by cynic

[shapeshifter]

Heck, it occurs to me that there is an even better solution. She cured Blaine. Fine and good. Immediately after doing that, she should have emptied the clip into his torso. So she could eat *his* brain. Human Blain cannot keep any secrets whatsoever from Liv, if Liv is willing to kill him. And he has forfeited his right to consume oxygen many times over.

...Unfortunately this has the same problem as if Blaine had tried to eat Major's brain to find the astronaut brains.  The visions are not a guarantee, just a disjointed series of hints.  I think Blaine delivered the boxes of brains immediately after he left the hand off, and that's why he wasn't there when Major initially started his rampage

Still, I would have a sense of satisfaction of the "finally!" variety if the mid-season 2 break starts after Liv does this. I think the unknown quantity and quality of the visions would work well for plot points without all of us viewers crying: Plot hole! But first David Anders has to have another project that warrants his even asking to be released from whatever contract it is that zombie actors sign.

[Jadzia]

And the song was Falco's "Der Kommissar" from 1981.

 

Actually, it was After the Fire's cover version on "Der Kommissar", which was recorded a year later, in 1982. I've always loved both versions and it was very cool how they used it in this scene.

[wayne67]

YMMV, but I've not seen anyone criticizing Major for being upset. Indeed, several people have said that pissed off Major was the first time they liked the character.

 

I wish they had made this clearer.

 

See below

 

Hmm. Wasn't as good as I hoped, mostly rather predictable, but overall OK, with the exception of Major, whom I feel didn't come out of this episode looking well at all. While I do agree that Liv keeping him in the dark to the extent of letting him think he's crazy was awful, his temper tantrum over being turned into a zombie was ridiculous. It's not death! There's a cure! And seriously, dude, if you want to die so much, you actually still can! Just shoot yourself in the head and we'll be free of you (and the show will probably become much better). And anticipating some comments in the style of "You just like bad boys!" - I was actually watching with my husband (one of the nicest guys ever) and he hated Major's behavior way more than me, even.

 

Also, Major being all suddenly badass reeked of the writer desperately trying to make the audience like us. Sorry, didn't work for me, even if the scene itself was cool.

 

Not a lot of people were criticising Major this episode but it kind of feels like the whole season people have been complaining about Major because he's been cluelessly roaming around endangering his life every other episode trying to figure out what happened with dead teenagers. Which I don't understand the criticism at all as Liv and Ravi declined to tell him anything useful. Liv eats brains and deals with her guilt about it by solving their murders which results in a karmic wash as far as it goes. Major tries to solve a massive conspiracy and he gets no love until he starts murdering the zombies who kept him captive in the finale. It's odd.

 

Liv has been obsessing about Major... We haven't seen any indication as far as I remember that Major has been obsessing over her. So I don't understand the OTP complaints either as it's fairly low key and one sided and infrequent. Unlike predestined pairing eg Flash and Iris

 

That said I haven't been captivated by Major. I love Ravi and anything with Ravi is usually awesome but I find Liv deeply hypocritical and tiresome. The show reminds me of Dollhouse where the main character is different every other episode and this show displays even less of Liv's core personality than that show which is kind of odd considering.

 

Ravi is basically the only reason I watched the show but Liv has always been a bit haphazard and hard to relate to because I'm never quite sure who she actually is. For instance that "I'm a doctor not a killer" would have resonated more if she hadn't killed a friend who was zombified while on sociopath brains or hadn't killed Enforcer guy. It's like do something with Blaine. She could of at least shot him in payback for Lowel before letting him wander off. I mean seriously? She just kind of let him wander off without trying to extract any information from him whatsoever.

 

*edited to add some much needed clarity to my thoughts

Edited June 11, 2015 by wayne67

[possibilities]

I keep thinking that even if they never found Blaine's client list, the clients would start showing up asking for lunch, and could be identified that way. Or they could put the word out that Blaine's "successor" was looking for his clients. Liv just looked really stupid there. Even Blaine knew to keep custody of the person who had the info he wanted. If he had just let Major go before he knew where the astrobrains were, no one would have thought him to be very smart. Now Liv has TWICE given up an opportunity to stop Blaine, and she choked. I agree there is no storytelling reason for this and it undermines her character. I'm not seeing what other people see in David Anders. he's fine, but is he so great that they can afford to make the show's main character look like a totally inexplicably stupid idiot? If they want to keep Blaine, at least write something that accounts for it. Maybe he escaped, or she discovers Major first and decides to sit with Major instead of chasing Blaine. Easy enough, plausible, and forgiveable. Just randomly decide to let him go? Stupid. Certainly she's had time to think about what would happen if she killed him, which she vowed to do after Lowell was killed. SHe never thought of the client list as an issue til Blaine mentioned it? C'mon.

 

And if she doesn't want to kill, that's really fine with me, I can live with it. She could have incapacitated him, as others have said. But just standing there while he talks her out of it is the worst route they could have gone.

[FurryFury]

How exactly was Major supposed to know there was a cure?

 

He could have asked. Also, I'm not sure, but was he unconscious when she cured Blaine? Maybe he noticed it? Anyway, she just SAVED HIS LIFE. I mean, I understand and support the anger over being lied to - he was 100% right to do it. Only the problem is he was pissed she saved his life. She gave him a freaking choice! Nobody forced him to go on as a zombie. And really, he didn't even ask what exactly means being a zombie, he just started blaming her. I just can't side with him on this.

 

But, "if you don't like it, you could always just KILL YOURSELF" is kinda a crappy choice to give to someone. It's one thing to accept your own death. It's quite another thing to commit suicide. Also, he didn't know about the cure.

 

It's still a choice. It's better than just dying and that's it. Especially in such crappy circumstances as being killed by a shitty wannabe druglord in your 20s.

[wayne67]

He could have asked. Also, I'm not sure, but was he unconscious when she cured Blaine? Maybe he noticed it? Anyway, she just SAVED HIS LIFE. I mean, I understand and support the anger over being lied to - he was 100% right to do it. Only the problem is he was pissed she saved his life. She gave him a freaking choice! Nobody forced him to go on as a zombie. And really, he didn't even ask what exactly means being a zombie, he just started blaming her. I just can't side with him on this.

 

It's still a choice. It's better than just dying and that's it. Especially in such crappy circumstances as being killed by a shitty wannabe druglord in your 20s.

 

Or she could have given him the choice while he was still Conscious...

 

Or at the very least after being told that he was cranky that he'd been zombiefied instead of receiving medical care she could have respected that he wanted a CHOICE and asked him before dosing him with an experimental "cure" while asleep.

 

Also did she forget that she used to be an ER Doctor? She didn't even bother to try and give him any medical care at all. Not even a half assed attempt to stop the bleeding before turning him into a zombie.

 

Major was unconscious/bleeding out when she dosed Blaine with the Cure so it's unclear if he heard or understood any of her diatribe to Blaine. Also if he did, that would be more of a reason to be upset as she told Blaine herself she has no idea whether it'll kill him or not...

 

From Major's POV if she did have a cure she would have used it herself unless she liked eating human brains and from a normal human perspective that's unlikely a best choice option. Why should he assume there's a readily available cure ?

 

People are allowed to be upset about how people saved their life. It's like saying that you'd be happy to receive a new heart from some dodgy person that killed the original person for spare parts for profit. Major's entire interactions with zombies has been murder, deception and consumption of brains. Why should he want to be all team zombie ? Liv could have called a bloody ambulance instead of sitting around cradling his bleeding body uselessly.

 

It's not like Liv gave him a chance to adjust to being a zombie for more than 5 minutes before making another unilateral choice about his body/life. Maybe if she gave him a day or two to process maybe he would have dug past his initial disgust and contempt to thank her for saving his life even if it was by ruining his normal life by turning him into a ZOMBIE. It took over 6 months for Liv to find a way to deal with the zombie condition in a way that made her feel sort of okay about the process and yet Major can't be annoyed or upset for 6 minutes without criticism ? What's that about ?

Edited June 11, 2015 by wayne67

[Chicago Redshirt]

I think criticizing Major's being upset about being a zombie is not the same thing as criticizing Major's outburst in general. The poster who talked about that is right. Major knows zombies can be killed. He just in fact killed about a half-dozen of them. If he really despised being a zombie so much, he could kill himself (but hopefully after making a confessional video to prove that zombies are real, so the public could be aware and take steps to protect themselves.)

 

I'll argue that Liv is short-sighted and reckless rather than selfish. And to the extent that she's any of those things, she's much less so than many of the other characters on TV, such as Flash (I'll listen to my archenemy's halfbaked time-travel scheme and risk the entire planet to potentially save my mom, oh and release him from confinement because reasons), Arrow (I, too, will work with my archenemy and lie to all those close to me while potentially risking an entire city of people, and end up installing my archenemy as the head of an army of assassins), Supernatural (I will lie to my brother for the 59th time, work with someone I know to be evil and mess with powers I don't understand that turn out to be keeping yet another primordial evil in check if it means saving my brother). etc etc.

[editorgrrl]

I don't get why people are holding Major's outburst against him.

Why is Liv's selfishness celebrated as her being interestingly flawed and his momentary petulance after all the zombie related chaos infecting his life viewed as wrong?

YMMV, but I've not seen anyone criticizing Major for being upset. Indeed, several people have said that pissed off Major was the first time they liked the character.

Not a lot of people were criticising Major this episode but it kind of feels like the whole season people have been complaining about Major.

Please don't make blanket statements about the people who read & post here.

I enjoy reading your thoughts about the show. Being told how I feel about the characters? Not so much.

[editorgrrl]

Suzuki wasn't just detroying evidence; he'd finally found his way out. A way to stop Blaine's operation completely and to deal with his guilty conscience. After being forced into corruption and covering up successive murders, he saw a way to take Blaine down and end his own suffering. I personally bought it.

See, that's not my impression at all. And that's one of the things I enjoy about this show—the ambiguity.

IMO, Suzuki shot himself to control the narrative about what had happened at Meat Cute. No angst, no guilt—just manipulation. He wanted the authorities to find a bullet in him. If he wanted to end his own suffering, why shoot himself in the leg?

Then he wrote Blaine's name on the wall in blood—to send a message. And blew himself up. But he sustained way less damage than human Evan (Liv's brother) out on the street. And Suzuki's brain cavity looked intact.

 

I don't yet know if Lt. Suzuki is dead or alive. Cliffhangery!

Edited June 11, 2015 by editorgrrl

[Sakura12]

I criticize Major because I don't like his character. Suddenly becoming a badass does not make up for that. That hasn't worked for Laurel on Arrow either. They need to be interesting first and neither of those characters are. 

 

For me it still sucks that Major's going around to be around next season. 

[fastiller]

I also selfishly wanted more time with zombie Major. He would have been cranky for a while but he would have gotten over it I feel. He already seemed to be coming around when she gave him the cure. I'm glad he finally knows the truth.

He was pretty bad ass the whole episode. He could definitely make a living as a zombie hunter for hire. It would have been so much more poetic if he was a zombie while he did it but I digress.

When he threw the grenade into the walk-in and ducked, he was so darn sexy.  There was something about the fluidity of his movement.

 

So now the only one still out of the loop is Clive. Plus Evan's life hangs in the balance. It will be interesting to see how Liv explains her refusal to donate blood to her mother. Even if other donors can be quickly found I imagine mom will still want an explanation.

 Well, Mom and Evan are also unaware.

[Julia]

Without in any way taking a side in the Liv v Major conflict, I have to agree that Liv has been firmly in control of the idiot ball where Blane is concerned these last few episodes. Me, I thought it was idiotic that Liv let Blane murder her boyfriend (and create a plague of zombies and turn homeless teenagers into a buffet) instead of taking the shot. But, OK, fine, she's a doctor, and she has to act like a doctor, and whatever.

 

So, yeah. Informed consent, maybe? And no human experimentation? And I'd say having vowed to destroy all the zombies is pretty much a DNR order.

 

It's not that each by itself is an unusually silly handwave. It's that the two of them are diametrically opposed handwaves, like the sound of one hand failing to clap twice.

[justcris]

From the HitFix review of this episode:

 

 

 

Why does Suzuki sacrifice himself like that? Just the realization that with Meat Cute out of business, he's likely to go full-on zombie soon, anyway?

Rob Thomas:  No. We have scenes on the board, and scenes that were written, and we wanted to really get the idea across that Suzuki was a good cop at one point, forced to do very bad things, and that he did not like his life anymore. He was a noble character forced to do things that he did not want to do. He wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, as a hero, and that was his way of doing so.

 

Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/season-finale-review-izombie-blaines-world-major-victory#4Q6CAPjjld2SJAyq.99

 

I'm not sure this came across on screen, Suzuki's motivations were very unclear to me.

[editorgrrl]

We wanted to really get the idea across that Suzuki was a good cop at one point, forced to do very bad things, and that he did not like his life anymore. He was a noble character forced to do things that he did not want to do. He wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, as a hero, and that was his way of doing so.

 

I've never seen anything of his other than Party Down, but I just don't get this Rob Thomas guy. He was flabbergasted when an Entertainment Weekly commenter thought Peyton might have been zombified by Sebastian. Now this?

 

I guess I'm spoiled by Vince Gilligan (Better Call Saul, Breaking Bad), who feels the fans' interpretation of what they see on screen is at least as valid as his intent.

[LoneHaranguer]

 

I hope Liv can come up with a good excuse for why she didn't give her brother her blood otherwise her mother will be beyond livid.

A thumbnail version of the truth, skipping the z word should be fine. Serious disease. Ravi's working on a cure. Didn't want to worry her family and friends.

 

 

For all we know, Major would have gone 'if staying a zombie means curing all of us in the future, then let's wait'. He could have still been mad at her, but it would have been his choice to stay a zombie for the better of mankind. And let's face it, Major is a good guy and I believe he would have done that for the cure to zombieism. Not to mention they don't know the side effects of the zombie cure. For all they know, it only half works and Blaine and Major will still need to eat brains to survive.

But if Major hated the idea of being a zombie as much as he seemed to, and the cure was untested, why wouldn't he have wanted to have it tested on him? That's being altruistic in a way that could benefit him, but people do that every day. Essentially that's what Liv did.

 

This episode felt like it could have used more editing. Lots of big scenes not joined together well.

[fastiller]

And I can only assume there's already a gif out there of Steven Weber's weird neck shimmy.

 

Ask and ye shall receive: On the Finale of iZombie, Everyone Becomes a Villain.

[questionfear]

 

Ask and ye shall receive: On the Finale of iZombie, Everyone Becomes a Villain.

 

I am normally paralyzingly afraid of zombies, yet the most frightening part of iZombie is definitely Steven Weber's neck shimmy.

[Sakura12]

Liv can just tell her mom she's sick, I mean she is really pale I'm sure the Doctor would buy it. She just needs to think of a disease, which also shouldn't be that hard being she's a doctor too. 

[The Cake is a Pie]

 

 

I've never seen anything of his other than Party Down, but I just don't get this Rob Thomas guy. He was flabbergasted when an Entertainment Weekly commenter thought Peyton might have been zombified by Sebastian. Now this?

I guess I'm spoiled by Vince Gilligan (Better Call Saul, Breaking Bad), who feels the fans' interpretation of what they see on screen is at least as valid as his intent.

 

I thought Suzuki's motivation was pretty clear. He shot himself in the leg so it would look like he got into a gun battle with the henchmen, and also to have blood to use to write Blaine's name on the wall. Seemed like a pretty good opportunity to take Blaine down, end his own suffering, and also make himself look like he went out a hero in one swoop. And if there were any records of his involvement with Blaine in the shop, they were probably destroyed in the blast. 

 

I was pretty surprised people thought Peyton was a zombie, too. I thought it was pretty obvious she just took a blow to the head, since she still had her brains intact and didn't have any scratches or bites.

[Chicago Redshirt]

IMO, Suzuki shot himself to control the narrative about what had happened at Meat Cute. No angst, no guilt—just manipulation. He wanted the authorities to find a bullet in him. If he wanted to end his own suffering, why shoot himself in the leg?

Then he wrote Blaine's name on the wall in blood—to send a message. And blew himself up. But he sustained way less damage than human Evan (Liv's brother) out on the street. And Suzuki's brain cavity looked intact.

 

I don't yet know if Lt. Suzuki is dead or alive. Cliffhangery!

I kind of hope -- even though it would make no real sense -- that he is still unalive. I mean, we are to believe that he was right by the stove that he tried to have explode through leaking gas, so it doesn't make sense that he would still be. But unlike Candyman, we were not shown shrapnel or anything impacting his brain.

 

There's definitely some ambiguity -- Suzuki could have just been afraid that he'd be found out as a zombie and hunted.

 

The thing about Suzuki's plan that doesn't make sense is that he calls in at night that he is right by the  Meat Cute and he'll check it out and radio if more backup is needed. Then when on scene he says, no just kids playing with firecrackers. Let's say that's about midnight, conservatively. He then spends X amount of time at the Meat Cute, and only blows it up sometime in the morning when Liv's little brother is showing up for work. (So let's say 7 a.m. at the earliest.). 

 

It seems like his own documented actions are going to undercut the notion of "he died a hero." What veteran homicide cop is going to confuse anything like the carnage that went down with kids playing with firecrackers?

 

Also, there is presumably the possibility of coming up with a connection between Suzuki and Blaine.

 

So, yeah. Informed consent, maybe? And no human experimentation? And I'd say having vowed to destroy all the zombies is pretty much a DNR order.

 

To be fair, Major said that when he only knew of zombies as predators killing homeless kids. He might not have said that if he had known that it was possible for zombies to be non-murderous and basically good.

 

I was pretty surprised people thought Peyton was a zombie, too. I thought it was pretty obvious she just took a blow to the head, since she still had her brains intact and didn't have any scratches or bites.

 

We weren't shown how Peyton was attacked, just that she was out unconscious. We don't know if she had any scratches or bites. We don't know how she took the blow to the head.

 

ETA: Given Sebastian's creepy-ass licking of Liv's blood back when Sebastian was just a human psycho, I wouldn't be shocked if he did something similiarly creepy as a zombie.

 

Her being zombified would potentially explain why she has not contacted Ravi. From what we were told, they seemed to be in a steady relationship and were about to go on a trip together. We obviously don't know Peyton very well, but it seems like most folks would at least call and say, "Listen, something came up, and I'm going to have to bail on the trip," or "Sorry I bailed on the trip without a word. Please forgive me."

 

Her becoming a zombie would reasonably have Ravi as one of the last things on her mind.

Edited June 11, 2015 by Chicago Redshirt

[Julia]

To be fair, Major said that when he only knew of zombies as predators killing homeless kids. He might not have said that if he had known that it was possible for zombies to be non-murderous and basically good.

 

But I suspect there are always valid arguments a doctor could make against a patient's decision to refuse treatment. That's not something the doctor gets to decide. And a doctor particularly doesn't get to make the decision on behalf of a patient to turn him into something he thinks should be dead and then inject him with an pre-trial drug with a 50% death rate over two whole non-human trial subjects. We even got a nazi experimentation on unwilling human subject reference in canon to point that out.

 

Which, fine, it's not as if people who are in extreme circumstances make rational decisions, but she let Blaine go off to create more zombies and feed homeless kids to them because she's just that much about her hippocratic oath. Which, apparently, no she isn't.

Edited June 11, 2015 by Julia

[arc]

If Suzuki didn't die, his actions at the Meat Cute would be a huge fail. He would have destroyed evidence and made it practically impossible for him to return to police work since the cops thought he was all-the-way dead. Regular humans don't come back from an explosion that bad. Evan was standing outside, and not in a direct line from the oven. Suzuki was right next to the explosion.

 

I'd almost forgotten Evan and esp Liv's mom. They were kind of unevenly sprinkled in throughout the second half of the season.

[LoneHaranguer]

 

I kind of hope -- even though it would make no real sense -- that he is still unalive. I mean, we are to believe that he was right by the stove that he tried to have explode through leaking gas, so it doesn't make sense that he would still be. But unlike Candyman, we were not shown shrapnel or anything impacting his brain.

I once saw an old magazine explaining the novelty act where someone would go into a box with some explosives, "blow himself up", and come out unhurt. The key is to have a really powerful blast that you cozy up to so that you wind up in what is essentially the eye of the storm, whereas a weak blast will kill you. Someone doing that trick for show would also want some shielding to have that "not a scratch" look to impress the audience, but it wouldn't matter to a zombie. Suzuki could have survived, but I don't think that's what the writers had in mind when they showed us his body.

[wayne67]

Please don't make blanket statements about the people who read & post here.

I enjoy reading your thoughts about the show. Being told how I feel about the characters? Not so much.

 

I didn't say that all people on the forum felt a particular way. I just posted a few examples of some people criticising Major's reaction to being turned into a zombie and asked why they thought it was unlikeable that he was upset about being turned into something inhuman against his will. Especially how some people's reaction is that if he didn't like being a zombie he could just kill himself .

 

I'm not even like super fond of Major but it seems unreasonable to expect someone to kill themselves if they disagreed with the medical care as if Major has no right to object to something that happens to his body. It seems extreme to want a character to off themselves just because they were irritable for like 2 minutes after undergoing torture, near death and zombification. SOME people have been complaining about Major being stupid and reckless for doing the same thing that most protagonists do in every show basically sticking their nose into the businesses of dangerous people without a solid plan eg Veronica Mars & the Supernatural Brothers

 

Just curious as to why there's so much hate for the character. Yeah he's kind of bland acting wise but he's much better than Robbie Amell in either Tomorrow People or the Flash.

[CletusMusashi]

You know what I just realized? Major may well have already been turning into a zombie before Liv scratched him. Blaine has a weird habit of flipping out his butterfly knife, stabbing people, and then immediately flipping it closed without wiping the blood off. So it's always got DNA on it from whoever the last person he stabbed was. In this case, the last person he stabbed before Major was probably Big Asian Thug. So Major had zombie DNA stabbed right into his internal organs. Even in tiny amounts, I would expect that to be at least as likely to turn you as a little scratch wound.

Edited June 12, 2015 by CletusMusashi

[cynic]

...

But if Major hated the idea of being a zombie as much as he seemed to, and the cure was untested, why wouldn't he have wanted to have it tested on him? That's being altruistic in a way that could benefit him, but people do that every day. Essentially that's what Liv did.

...

I think he would object to the fact that Liv used the last dose on him after Ravi had already told her that it would be extremely difficult to replicate it without that sample. It's not exactly altruistic to potentially deprive other people from ever getting the chance to be cured. Plus, there's the whole thing of Liv unilaterally deciding once again what happens to Major's body. She learned nothing from his reprimand.

I didn't say that all people on the forum felt a particular way. I just posted a few examples of some people criticising Major's reaction to being turned into a zombie and asked why they thought it was unlikeable that he was upset about being turned into something inhuman against his will. Especially how some people's reaction is that if he didn't like being a zombie he could just kill himself .

I'm not even like super fond of Major but it seems unreasonable to expect someone to kill themselves if they disagreed with the medical care as if Major has no right to object to something that happens to his body. It seems extreme to want a character to off themselves just because they were irritable for like 2 minutes after undergoing torture, near death and zombification. SOME people have been complaining about Major being stupid and reckless for doing the same thing that most protagonists do in every show basically sticking their nose into the businesses of dangerous people without a solid plan eg Veronica Mars & the Supernatural Brothers

Just curious as to why there's so much hate for the character. Yeah he's kind of bland acting wise but he's much better than Robbie Amell in either Tomorrow People or the Flash.

I can only speak for myself, but I find the actor to be excessively bland with negative charisma. I don't think he has chemistry with Liv. I don't even think he has chemistry with Ravi and Ravi usually can make anyone better. I also didn't like the actor on 666 Park Avenue either. I'm not sure that I would agree that he's better than Robbie Ammell, who may be less talented, but does have more presence. (Now, STEPHEN Ammell is a piece of wood, at least during the few episodes of the Arrow that I could bear to watch.) Maybe I just don't see whatever Ron Thomas sees in his leading men though. I thought Duncan Cane was a vacant charisma vacuum even more than this guy.

I do agree with you that Major had right to be mad and I actually thought the actor was better at playing mad than most other things.

Or it's possible that I just like when people call Liv out, because I enjoy it immensely when Ravi does it too.

Edited June 12, 2015 by cynic

[AudienceofOne]

I have to disagree with you. Stephen Ammell is an excellent actor. You probably watched the first two or three episodes when he was portraying shellshocked and traumatised - people who, by the way, don't express emotion the same way other people do. Stephen Ammell is excellent. Robbie Ammell seems mostly pleasant from what I've seen. I think the actor who plays Major is somewhere between the two.

[wayne67]

I have to disagree with you. Stephen Ammell is an excellent actor. You probably watched the first two or three episodes when he was portraying shellshocked and traumatised - people who, by the way, don't express emotion the same way other people do. Stephen Ammell is excellent. Robbie Ammell seems mostly pleasant from what I've seen. I think the actor who plays Major is somewhere between the two.

 

It's all fairly subjective. I watched Robbie Amell for 20 episodes of Tomorrow People and the only time he really seemed alive as a character was with Astrid his best friend, he seemed to have negative chemistry with his supposed Love Interest and it didn't help that he was basically carrying the Idiot Ball for most of the first season. As for Stephen I watched a couple of seasons of Arrow and he was okay but he didn't really do much for me as a viewer. He wasn't horrible or anything just never really clicked with me as a viewer for whatever reason.

 

I don't even know the name of the actor that plays Major. He rates a neutral for me as far as acting goes. Nothing exciting but nothing too excruciating delivery wise but I may have low standards as a viewer as I love myself some cheesy soap opera.

 

I can understand how being indifferent to an actor can make someone less inclined to take their POV in an argument but some characters/actors seem to generate a lot of hate for reasons I never understand story wise. The actor may or may not suck (YMMV) but the character hasn't really done much to merit scorn other than being around trying to find out why teenage runaways are disappearing and being somewhat reckless.

 

Yet Liv goes about her life with no regard for the spread of zombiefication and noone cares. Boggles my mind. She could at least wear gloves to prevent accidental scratching when she's manhandling people.

[cynic]

I have to disagree with you. Stephen Ammell is an excellent actor. You probably watched the first two or three episodes when he was portraying shellshocked and traumatised - people who, by the way, don't express emotion the same way other people do. Stephen Ammell is excellent. Robbie Ammell seems mostly pleasant from what I've seen. I think the actor who plays Major is somewhere between the two.

Yeah, I get that was what he was going for. I did give up watching it regularly early in the first season, but I have watched it sporadically since, including a few episodes of this season. I've also been subjected to him on the Flash. I don't like him any better now. But hey, different strokes!

Anyway, I think it a different actor portrayed Major, I might like him more. Then again, I love David Anders and am ambivalent to him here and like Aly Michalka, but have only barely started to tolerate Peyton (probably due to Ravi). I just need to stop watching this show. Something is just not working for me.

Edited June 12, 2015 by cynic

[ketose]

I like that they didn't drag out the "Major gets the cure" storyline since we all knew it would end up there. I like Major calling Liv out for turning him, and I can't be mad at him for live using the cure on him. Major was very good tonight. I think that's the most I've ever liked Robert Buckley. I kept waiting for the brother to show up, and they really got a lot out of him for one minute of screen time. Love the added twist of the knife that Evan has apparently donated to Liv before when she can't.

Crazy theory: eating the brain of the cured will cure zombism.

Curing the big Z seems to be a big part of the show. Utopium might as well be Unobtainium. Why can't Ravi get more? How exactly is it "tainted?" The idea of the cure being communicable would be interesting. It was the reveal in one of my favorite vampire movies,

Daybreakers

. You could never be turned back into a vampire because the blood of the cured former vampire became the cure.

What can get dumb is chasing the cure for the next 3-4 seasons. If Liv doesn't eat brains, there's no show. If there's a cure and Ravi can't replicate it, it becomes a stupid plot device. I can only hope that Cure 1.0 has major (pardon the pun) flaws with it.

[KAOS Agent]

I've never seen anything of his other than Party Down, but I just don't get this Rob Thomas guy. He was flabbergasted when an Entertainment Weekly commenter thought Peyton might have been zombified by Sebastian. Now this?

I guess I'm spoiled by Vince Gilligan (Better Call Saul, Breaking Bad), who feels the fans' interpretation of what they see on screen is at least as valid as his intent.

 

Rob Thomas has been intensely interested in fan response in the past. Back in the days of TWOP, he actually came by and posted multiple times as well as gave shout outs on the show to TWOP. To give you an idea of his past views towards fan interpretation and interest, here's one of his posts from the VMars thread from Television Without Pity:

 

"In case any of you doubted this, we read TWOP pretty religiously around the Veronica Mars offices...One of the other producers on the show likened reading the postings to getting hit with a tidal wave of love tempered by a million papercuts. Let me say, first and foremost, thank you for watching, commenting on and caring about the show. I promise you, we value your feedback more than the overnights. (Though I would cut off a digit for a 5 share.)"

 

Now TWOP was a bigger site traffic-wise than PTV (and VMars was hugely popular on that site), but they did care and read the fans' reactions and I would bet that they are interested in what people thought about the iZombie finale and may even address some things in show more clearly if something they thought was clear (like Peyton not being zombified or Suzuki's intentions) seems confusing to fans. So keep up the conversation and questions you have, you never know who might be reading and working to increase fan enjoyment and understanding of what's happening.

Edited June 12, 2015 by KAOS Agent

[Julia]

I didn't say that all people on the forum felt a particular way. I just posted a few examples of some people criticising Major's reaction to being turned into a zombie and asked why they thought it was unlikeable that he was upset about being turned into something inhuman against his will. Especially how some people's reaction is that if he didn't like being a zombie he could just kill himself .

 

I'm not even like super fond of Major but it seems unreasonable to expect someone to kill themselves if they disagreed with the medical care as if Major has no right to object to something that happens to his body. It seems extreme to want a character to off themselves just because they were irritable for like 2 minutes after undergoing torture, near death and zombification. SOME people have been complaining about Major being stupid and reckless for doing the same thing that most protagonists do in every show basically sticking their nose into the businesses of dangerous people without a solid plan eg Veronica Mars & the Supernatural Brothers

 

Just curious as to why there's so much hate for the character. Yeah he's kind of bland acting wise but he's much better than Robbie Amell in either Tomorrow People or the Flash.

Just, in order to answer the question you appear to be asking, I've got to sort out what unnamed people you're calling out here, figure out what you think they said, what part of it you objected to and on what grounds, decide what my opinion is about whatever it turns out to be, and then compare it to audience reaction to the behavior of characters in four different shows I've never watched.

I'm reasonably certain that your thoughts about whatever it is are more interesting than that. Maybe go there next time?

But to address what I think your point is, Major has a right to decide what happens to his body, a right to refuse care, and a right to choose to die rather than take a treatment he objects to morally. People do it with stem cells all the time. We may or may not agree, but we're not Major, and if Major would rather be dead than stay alive eating brains he has the right. JMO.

Edited June 12, 2015 by Julia

[questionfear]

 

The thing about Suzuki's plan that doesn't make sense is that he calls in at night that he is right by the  Meat Cute and he'll check it out and radio if more backup is needed. Then when on scene he says, no just kids playing with firecrackers. Let's say that's about midnight, conservatively. He then spends X amount of time at the Meat Cute, and only blows it up sometime in the morning when Liv's little brother is showing up for work. (So let's say 7 a.m. at the earliest.).

 

Unless the police decide Suzuki was held hostage and then made a move to escape/blow the place up as chaos erupted. Which is the most likely scenario if you're the police and zombies aren't on your radar.

 

I can see a cop look at that crime scene like this: Suzuki responds to sounds of gunfire. He's held at gunpoint, concerned about escalating violence in the neighborhood. As a result, he radios in an all clear in the hopes of diffusing the situation and keeping civilians safe. Then the perps realize they're holding a cop hostage, everyone melts down over several hours of standoff, they start fighting, Suzuki makes a break for it and blows the place up in the process. 

 

Plus since Liv will likely give Ravi a heads up that a slew of zombie parts are coming in (or he'll figure it out pretty quickly), he's going to agree with whatever the cops think happened rather than draw attention to it, mostly so he can easily cremate and destroy potentially dangerous biohazards.

[LoneHaranguer]

 

What can get dumb is chasing the cure for the next 3-4 seasons. If Liv doesn't eat brains, there's no show. If there's a cure and Ravi can't replicate it, it becomes a stupid plot device. I can only hope that Cure 1.0 has major (pardon the pun) flaws with it.

Liv needs to recognize that eating brains doesn't have to be disgusting if you put some effort into preparing them (like Blaine did) and embrace the value she's providing in being a psychic homicide detective. Then the search for a cure can be back-burnered.

[Izeinwinter]

As long as Zombies are as infectious as they are, chasing the cure is going to be a priority - Really, as far as the show goes, I think Ravi really needs to discover a vaccine, so that they aren't ignoring the potential end of the world. As for the cure.. It would make all the sense if it had severe side effects or a high fatality rate. That's pretty much what happens when you merrily skip the animal trials...  

[Pixel]

The problem is that analogy doesn't really hold up. I mean antibiotics cure several types of infections but it doesn't make you immune from catching that infection again. That would mean Ravi's cure that he whipped up in like 2 months in the morgue lab is both a cure and a vaccine against infections from zombieism which considering he's only had access to 3 zombies would be ridiculous.

That's because antibiotics cure bacterial infections, not viral. You can only get sick from one virus once, then you're immune. The reason you can get a cold every year is because there are countless different strains of cold virus, but you never get the same cold twice. But the same bacteria can get a foothold in your system multiple times. All it has to do is lay low and multiply quietly.

Blaine would be immune if it's viral not because of Ravi's cure, but because his immune system would recognize the virus from its previous residence in Blaine and fight it. Unless, of course, like the common cold, it has many strains.

Edited June 14, 2015 by Pixel

[Julia]

Liv needs to recognize that eating brains doesn't have to be disgusting if you put some effort into preparing them (like Blaine did) and embrace the value she's providing in being a psychic homicide detective. Then the search for a cure can be back-burnered.

 

Except that the only way that Liv wouldn't have to accept being a cannibal to get comfortable with eating brains is if she doesn't consider herself human any more.

[LoneHaranguer]

 

Except that the only way that Liv wouldn't have to accept being a cannibal to get comfortable with eating brains is if she doesn't consider herself human any more.

It hasn't been established that it has to be human brains to survive. Worst case, using something else may require a medical supplement. It'd be easier to rationalize nibbling on human brains if it were specifically to solve the owner's murder.

[beowoof]

Who was the person at the hostage exchange who wasn't Major? That bit really confused me.

[LoneHaranguer]

 

Who was the person at the hostage exchange who wasn't Major?

He's credited as "Frightened Young Man", so probably just somebody Blaine grabbed at the skate park to be a stand-in. it's possible we already saw him as an extra there, but it's nobody we knew.

[theatremouse]

Didn't Ravi make his zombifier from regular Max Rager and tainted Utopium?  Maybe with Super Max, regular Utopium would work?

I might be wrong; it's certainly been ambiguous to date, but I thought the thing which tainted said Utopium was also the thing in Max Rager that causes the symptoms. So theoretically, he could taint more himself if he had managed to reverse engineer the proportions correctly, which of course takes a whole lot of effort to even land back at the current point he would've been at with his theoretical current cure and test subjects. And they also still have no idea if the new rat might not die too, just taking longer to do it than Hope did.

 

IMO, Suzuki shot himself to control the narrative about what had happened at Meat Cute. No angst, no guilt—just manipulation. He wanted the authorities to find a bullet in him. If he wanted to end his own suffering, why shoot himself in the leg?

Then he wrote Blaine's name on the wall in blood—to send a message. And blew himself up. But he sustained way less damage than human Evan (Liv's brother) out on the street. And Suzuki's brain cavity looked intact.

I think he went in originally thinking he'd help cover up, but then later hit a new level of desperation and/or misery and only then decided to blow the place up. He screwed the pooch with his earlier "firecracker" remark. Sure one could try to argue hostage whatever, but the whole thing is very very hard to explain. It's better for him if he is dead, but still doesn't quite make enough sense to handwave, unless there's someone else with the police higher up than he also invested in washing the incident away. I'm hoping something interesting comes of it. If it were just a red herring/way to make us not suspect he was going to try to end the operation later, I'll be mighty disappointed.

I too wonder if the brother might be infected already anyway. I guess we'll see next year because if they're saying he needs blood/he's at death's door because his heart rate is super low...well...we know that could go either way.

I do also think there was a very strong chance Major was infected anyway, between the knife, his other open wounds and the zombie blood splatter from his rampage. However, that doesn't negate that Liv chose for him when she thought he was toast. It doesn't make her less wrong even if he were on the road to Billy Idol hair already. That said, I think it was played as her clearly panicking and distraught. So, whether it's right or wrong, it's comprehensible that she reacted the way she did. She's not the first person to make a very bad decision in a traumatic situation.

Her doing it again with the needle/maybe-cure was extra buckets of stupid, to me, but I guess can be explained as her still in the haze of the trauma, and possibly running on an "appear to have lost Peyton can't lose him too" desperate chaos spiral.

Do no harm out the fucking window, that's for sure.

[aradia22]

WOW. They cashed a lot of chips in this season finale... in a great way.

• Killing all of Blaine's gang and destroying his business/base of operations
• Giving him an antidote but keeping him alive
• Having Major learn the truth, become a zombie, and then get the antidote
• Having Liv be unable to donate blood to her brother because she gave Major the antidote and doesn't want to turn her brother into a zombie
• Getting rid of Suzuki (relatively minor)
• Max Rager being exposed (at least partially)

 

I do think it was a little cheap for the hospital to be conveniently out of that blood type with Liv as the only possible donor. Also, I was looking forward to Major as a zombie. I don't think it's completely out of the cards that he'll become a zombie again in the future but I would have liked to see them play with it a while instead of immediately reversing it. Also, if we're talking about lessons learned, even though she gave Major back his human life, it didn't really solve the problem of Liv making decisions for other people, in this case affecting Major, Ravi, anyone who is a zombie, and anyone who is not a zombie who is now vulnerable to a possible zombie apocalypse without consulting anyone. And unlike with Lowell, we can't blame the brains she was on.

 

Still, I'm very excited for season 2.

[aradia22]

 

I dunno, I just don't see a big future for Peyton. I think it would be better for her to die or move away and for Liv to get a female friend who's more connected to the main plot.

Why must it be either or? It would be great for her to have two female friends. Most of the other women she could interact with (Peyton, her mom, the girl she worked with in the hospital who went full zombie) get written out.

 

The main thing I'm wondering about is if they'll kill Blaine, and TBH, I hope they won't. It's just my love for David Anders, I can't help it. I know he's a bastard and everything but he's just so fun.

It's always hard to root against the best actors in the cast, though I think iZombie has a pretty strong cast in general.

 

Why doesn't Liv try something herself?  By leaving Blaine alive, he's still going to be a problem and still probably going to kill innocents.  Of course, he's now "cured", so his immortality is off the table, but he can still be a threat.  Plus, is the cure permanent?  If not, Blaine just needs to find another zombie and get himself scratched.

In a darker show I could see them making him a prisoner the way he imprisoned Major. Well, not in a freezer but you get the point.

 

That said, her not being able to donate blood to her brother because of being zombie, is an interesting dilemma.  Not sure why the hospital doesn't have any on back-up, but maybe he's just in that bad of shape.  Even if they do find another donor, this has to hurt her relationship with both him and her mom, because in their eyes, she's going to come off selfish and uncaring.

I haven't thought about TV medicine since House went off the air but I wonder if they'll find a blood donor but there'll be a side effect to waiting. I can't think of anything but for instance, if we were talking about oxygen, he might be alive but have brain damage. Something like that would really foster pathos and guilt and resentment.

 

I get the feeling they're going to turn Blaine into a reluctant ally of Liv's next season. There's still too much potential with his character, more so than with Major's, imo.

I wonder if they'll find a way to tease a Liv/Blaine romance for the shippers (I just assume there are always shippers). The show is not afraid of getting silly. No love potion macguffins come to mind but TV writers always find a way.

 

That is why I am anxious to see how the supposed Cure works. I hope it works differently on both men.

That's a fantastic short term idea though tricky if they're supposed to cure everyone. I guess they could always explain it away if Ravi can refine the antidote.

[Julia]

I want to keep Peyton, if only for the scene where she sprang Major from jail and Ravi got all starry-eyed about her awesomeness and she appreciated his dorky charm. Don't much care about Liv's love life right at the moment, but I'm all over Peyton/Ravi.

If one person had to go, I'd choose Blaine. I don't know if it's because I don't know the actor from whatever role people liked him in, but he doesn't work for me as the epically evil big bad. He strikes me more as the drug dealer from a seventies after school special, and I thought they had to turn Liv into an indecisive adolescent to explain why she didn't squash him like a bug the first chance she got.

[paramitch]

Thank goodness for Netflix, so that I could finally see this show -- I was a huge VM fan and while I don't think this is nearly as good, I still think it's better than most TV out there.

I got a little tired of the brain-of-the-week scenario about halfway through the season, but I thought the show really began to pick up by the last few, and I thought this was a genuinely exciting and surprising finale.

It's been interesting to thread-lurk through the season. I don't have the problem with Major that many do. While I don't think he'll win an Oscar anytime soon, I like the actor who plays Major, and he's light-years better than poor Duncan on VM. And his character's journey has actually been -- by far -- the one that most interested and engaged me this season.

And in this episode, I thought Major's story was really riveting and exciting. It's been incredibly sad and yet genuinely suspenseful to watch this nice, selfless guy become a driven killer convinced he had take out the monsters who were killing his kids. And when he went in and took down the Meat Cute, I cheered (and, like the recapper, rewatched the sequence again immediately).

I also thought the final decisions by Liv were genuinely surprising and interesting -- her curing Blaine, turning and then curing Major, and then her "No" when asked to give blood to save her brother.

I thought this was a great first season, and I'm really psyched to see where it goes from here.