S04.E02: Blue Bloody

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

It's a real-life game of Clue for Liv after she eats the brains of a despicable dowager and must determine which one of her disgruntled servants killed her. Clive and Bozzio are struggling to maintain a healthy relationship. Meanwhile, circumstances place Major and Liv in opposition to one another.

Promo:

Edited March 5, 2018 by ElectricBoogaloo

[xqueenfrostine]

I liked this week's episode better than last week, but a second weak case in a row really makes me wish the show had the courage to grow past the weekly procedural format.  Don't get me wrong, I love watching Clive and Liv solving crimes but there's just too much going on in this "New Seattle" to give either the CotW or the ongoing story arcs the attention they deserve.   They either need to find a way to tie the human murders into a bigger plot line (like maybe something connected to Angus's new cult?) or stop making the day-to-day homicide investigations such a significant part of the show.

Edited March 6, 2018 by xqueenfrostine

[Lady Calypso]

Man, I felt so bad for Clive when he had to endure this week's brain from Liv: a racist and incredibly snotty socialite. And yeah, I was thoroughly annoyed with Liv on that brain, which is why I love that she got to be herself by the end and do the right thing. I guess the smuggling storyline is going to carry over.

Also, am I the only one super confused with what they're doing with Major and Liv? We only find out this episode that they're sleeping together, only for them to break things off by the end of the episode. I really do like the couple, but this show has got to decide if they're going to be together or not. That being said, I actually liked their fight scene. Both Rose and Robert really delivered on the intensity and I think having the two at odds could be fun. Too bad the dialogue made so little sense from what we've seen of the couple in the last two seasons. 

Now, Major's Peacekeeper friends probably need to find better tactics. Major also needs to keep an eye on his new recruit, who has already scratched somebody. 

It was nice to see Ravi and Clive share a humorous scene together. But it does go back to the zombie/human relationship with Clive and Dale, something they never fully explored with Liv and Major besides just keeping them apart. 

I did not miss Blaine or Peyton in any way. But I guess their stuff was taken over by Blaine's crazy daddy. By the way, I have always loathed cult storylines and this is clearly becoming a cult storyline. I'm pre-disposed to hate it. 

[Athena5217]

There is so much about New Seattle I don’t understand. If they can determine who is alive and who is a zombie, why can’t that little boy leave to get medical treatment? Why don’t the Fillmore Graves troops wear gloves to prevent scratching? Do zombie children just wander the streets? Given children’s lack of impulse control, it seems very unwise to let them wander with humans around. Can people have a living will not to be turned into a zombie?

So many questions that are more interesting than whodoneit in the case of the week.

i don’t know if I want Liv and Major to be a couple or just friends, but them fighting breaks my heart,

[xqueenfrostine]

37 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

Also, am I the only one super confused with what they're doing with Major and Liv? We only find out this episode that they're sleeping together, only for them to break things off by the end of the episode. I really do like the couple, but this show has got to decide if they're going to be together or not. That being said, I actually liked their fight scene. Both Rose and Robert really delivered on the intensity and I think having the two at odds could be fun. Too bad the dialogue made so little sense from what we've seen of the couple in the last two seasons. 

Nope.  It was super rushed.  I mean I wasn't surprised to see them sleeping together since they clearly love one another, but it was ridiculous to introduce that and then break them up in the span of a single episode.   I'm really rooting for these two, but I'm resigned to the fact that the show is either going to keep them apart until the very end or make them just stay friends.  

7 minutes ago, Athena5217 said:

There is so much about New Seattle I don’t understand. If they can determine who is alive and who is a zombie, why can’t that little boy leave to get medical treatment?

I don't have answers to your other questions, but I wouldn't be surprised if Fillmore Graves has decided to stop all humans from leaving the city for any reason.  As they said last week, the remaining human population in Seattle is the only reason to the US government hasn't bombed the city.  They're probably reluctant to let anyone go for any reason lest it opens the flood gates and humans start finding reasons to leave.  

Quote

Can people have a living will not to be turned into a zombie?

I don't think they're turning anyone into zombies anymore.  I thought Chase said last week that it's now illegal to change anyone else because they can hardly support the existing zombie population with the current brain supply.

[thuganomics85]

Totally knew the killer was going to be Hoshi... err, I mean, Linda Park's character.  At least it was one of the few times she ended up having understandable reasons for it, and considering how horrible the victim was, I'm not shedding to many tears for her.  Clive and Ravi were basically right that this version of Liv was the worst.

Glad they are addressing Clive and Bozzio being a couple despite not being able to be intimate with one another.  Glad they had the talk and I hope they figure something out.  I wonder if it will end up involving Ravi's experiment where he's kind of a hybrid right now, and it will lead to him finding some way to turn her back human just long enough for sexy times!

Fun seeing Vampire Steve again.

Have a feeling this isn't the last we will see of the coyote lady.

Still not all that interested in Angus' little cult story, although Robert Knepper seems to be having the time of his live devouring the scenery.

Kind of feels like this was the tenth time Liv and Major broke-up.

[HunterHunted]

Liv used to try to fight the influence of the brains more.

I loved all of the New Seattle stuff.

I had a real question about the sick kid. If his custodial parent is in prison, typically the court would award the non-custodial parent primary custody provided that there weren't safety reasons keeping the other parent from custody. This is basic family law stuff. With countries, we've negotiated treaties to ensure that these kind of issues can cross national boundaries. If New Seattle was truly another nation, there should be some type of agreement like that for human children. But there don't seem to be an arrangement like that here, which is why they use coyotes. That's the kind of thing that Peyton could be doing.

Fillmore Graves is actually incompetent. Angus' church is exponentially bigger and they seem to be completely unaware. Furthermore, they don't seem to have a great working relationship with the US government. I don't know why they thought Z-day was here.

Edited March 6, 2018 by HunterHunted

[Thrifty]

4 hours ago, Athena5217 said:

There is so much about New Seattle I don’t understand. If they can determine who is alive and who is a zombie, why can’t that little boy leave to get medical treatment? Why don’t the Fillmore Graves troops wear gloves to prevent scratching? Do zombie children just wander the streets? Given children’s lack of impulse control, it seems very unwise to let them wander with humans around. Can people have a living will not to be turned into a zombie?

The biggest question of all, which I keep asking, is this.  How did the perpetrators of a major bioterrorist plot end up running the city they attacked?  After the September 11th attacks, we didn't make Osama Bin Laden the mayor of New York.  Last week, I speculated that it was sort of a "deal with the devil" that the U.S. government made.  But now that I think about it, the less sense it makes.  The government has a sizeable standing army that could do exactly what Filmore Graves does.

 

That quarantine is never going to hold, and the government is going to wish they did something about this plague when it was still contained.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Nice touch using "Take Me to Church" during the sermon. Interesting that we heard "I Go Crazy" at the laundromat and then in the next scene we saw Liv and Major end their friends with benefits relationship. I know we will be on this seesaw until the show ends, but I wish they had at least let us know that they were hooking up for more than one episode before ending it. From a storytelling point of view, if you want me to be sad that about it ending then you should show me more than one scene of it. Heh, I'm actually not a Liv/Major shipper (I can take them or leave them together) but I would have loved more of the awkward morning after comments from Ravi.

Remember S1 Clive who didn't want to discuss anything about his personal life? Now he's going to Ravi because he can't have sex with Dale.

Loved how Vampire Steve gave Clive this long explanation about how difficult it would be to crack the safe code and what his gadget was and all he got back was, "Don't care. Just open it."

[Mr. Sparkle]

Yes, the New Seattle thing requires a lot of hand waving on a show where people eat brains. 

How big is the containment area? All of Seattle? A million people? 300k? 

Are the humans still getting food deliveries? Clothes? 

Why are the humans, like the rich socialite, not upset about being stuck in zombie containment? Wasn't she rich enough to buy herself out? 

Why didn't the Filmore Graves enforcement troops notice Blaine's father going down the street with a microphone feeding people brains? No reports on the attack the night before? No notice of this growing threat? 

"I should repeat to myself that it's just a show, and I really should relax!" 

[cambridgeguy]

I'm assuming that Major's minor scratching the guy will be followed up on next week?  Because that's the sort of thing which could cause a volatile situation to blow up.

I guess Blaine also doesn't know about his dad creating his own cult?  In an era of cell phones and social media that sort of thing should be picked up almost instantly.

[Mr. Sparkle]

16 minutes ago, cambridgeguy said:

I'm assuming that Major's minor scratching the guy will be followed up on next week?  Because that's the sort of thing which could cause a volatile situation to blow up.

Also, was the guy that ran away filming the whole thing? That may mean the end of that zombie girl. 

Edited March 6, 2018 by Superclam
Me no rite good.

[Chicago Redshirt]

8 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

Man, I felt so bad for Clive when he had to endure this week's brain from Liv: a racist and incredibly snotty socialite. And yeah, I was thoroughly annoyed with Liv on that brain, which is why I love that she got to be herself by the end and do the right thing. I guess the smuggling storyline is going to carry over.

Also, am I the only one super confused with what they're doing with Major and Liv? We only find out this episode that they're sleeping together, only for them to break things off by the end of the episode. I really do like the couple, but this show has got to decide if they're going to be together or not. That being said, I actually liked their fight scene. Both Rose and Robert really delivered on the intensity and I think having the two at odds could be fun. Too bad the dialogue made so little sense from what we've seen of the couple in the last two seasons. 

Now, Major's Peacekeeper friends probably need to find better tactics. Major also needs to keep an eye on his new recruit, who has already scratched somebody. 

Technically, the brain Liv was on was an equal opportunity snob. At least, I don't remember seeing her do anything that was specifically because of someone's race. Compare/contrast to when she was on an actual racist's brain a season or two ago. One big flaw in the main plot IMO is that the rich chick would NEVER give $1 million to each of her main servants, given that she was such a bitch.

On the Peacekeepers, I was wondering if Jordan was being framed for scratching the douchebag. It is absolutely stupid that the peacekeepers don't wear gloves as a precaution from accidental scratching, especially since there's a chance that they can go into Full-on Zombie Mode. I have to say I'm not looking forward to the allegory on police brutality that is forthcoming.

ETA: Went back and looked at the sequence of the supposed scratching. Jordan gets her helmet taken off and chases after the guy. She tackles him by the shoulders. She next is seen punching the guy's face and she is taken off by a couple FG soldiers. Douchbag then is like, "She scratched me!" and has an apparent scratch on one of his forearms with his other hand near it the fresh scratch. So it's not just plausible that he scratched himself, that seems what the powers that be want us to think unless they were just sloppy shooting the scene. 

 

8 hours ago, Athena5217 said:

There is so much about New Seattle I don’t understand. If they can determine who is alive and who is a zombie, why can’t that little boy leave to get medical treatment? Why don’t the Fillmore Graves troops wear gloves to prevent scratching? Do zombie children just wander the streets? Given children’s lack of impulse control, it seems very unwise to let them wander with humans around. Can people have a living will not to be turned into a zombie?

So many questions that are more interesting than whodoneit in the case of the week.

i don’t know if I want Liv and Major to be a couple or just friends, but them fighting breaks my heart,

They can determine through such things as the blood pressure test we saw last episode and the ghost pepper test we saw them use at the Scratching Post last season (although someone who was a zombie who wanted to pretend to be human could pretty easily fake that) who is a zombie right now. But there is no proof of whether someone is in the process of turning into a zombie or a carrier of the zombie virus, etc.

We've been given the rules of the universe that someone has to be scratched or sexed or otherwise have a transmission of fluids to become a zombie. But there's no way for the iZombieverse people to know that's the case, especially given the newness of zombie-ism. It's safest to enforce 100 percent quarantine as best one can.

We saw in this episode and the last that there are zombie children who are homeless.

7 hours ago, HunterHunted said:

Liv used to try to fight the influence of the brains more.

I loved all of the New Seattle stuff.

I had a real question about the sick kid. If his custodial parent is in prison, typically the court would award the non-custodial parent primary custody provided that there weren't safety reasons keeping the other parent from custody. This is basic family law stuff. With countries, we've negotiated treaties to ensure that these kind of issues can cross national boundaries. If New Seattle was truly another nation, there should be some type of agreement like that for human children. But there don't seem to be an arrangement like that here, which is why they use coyotes. That's the kind of thing that Peyton could be doing.

Fillmore Graves is actually incompetent. Angus' church is exponentially bigger and they seem to be completely unaware. Furthermore, they don't seem to have a great working relationship with the US government. I don't know why they thought Z-day was here.

 

I don't remember Liv really trying to fight off the influence of the brain she was on, except for the time she was on nympho CDC official brain and she restrained herself from sleeping with a couple of human strangers, and then gave in when it was Chase. Other than that, she mostly was like, "Man it sucks that I'm on X brain. But I can't control myself."

At least one FG employee is aware -- the guy providing black market brains was there and escaped the attack on the black market. Now what he does with this information remains to be seen. 

3 hours ago, Thrifty said:

The biggest question of all, which I keep asking, is this.  How did the perpetrators of a major bioterrorist plot end up running the city they attacked?  After the September 11th attacks, we didn't make Osama Bin Laden the mayor of New York.  Last week, I speculated that it was sort of a "deal with the devil" that the U.S. government made.  But now that I think about it, the less sense it makes.  The government has a sizeable standing army that could do exactly what Filmore Graves does.

 

That quarantine is never going to hold, and the government is going to wish they did something about this plague when it was still contained.

A couple of differences from your analogy: 

9/11 paled in comparison to the zombie attack. Conventional government was able to handle 9/11, as tragic as it was. I don't think a conventional government response could handle something like New Seattle.

As far as we have been shown, it was not the entirety of FG that was responsible for New Seattle. It was a rogue faction operating without the knowledge or consent of its actual leadership. 

The U.S. military did not have an infrastructure in place to do what FG is doing. FG had some level of planning to allow it to arrange for feeding and training of zombies. I don't see someone human voluntarily serving in a situation where he or she would have to be quarantined for life and where there was a non-zero chance of being turned into a zombie. 

1 hour ago, Superclam said:

Yes, the New Seattle thing requires a lot of hand waving on a show where people eat brains. 

How big is the containment area? All of Seattle? A million people? 300k? 

Are the humans still getting food deliveries? Clothes? 

Why are the humans, like the rich socialite, not upset about being stuck in zombie containment? Wasn't she rich enough to buy herself out? 

Why didn't the Filmore Graves enforcement troops notice Blaine's father going down the street with a microphone feeding people brains? No reports on the attack the night before? No notice of this growing threat? 

"I should repeat to myself that it's just a show, and I really should relax!" 

There is apparently a wall around all of Seattle. How they managed to erect that wall in such a fashion that it created any sort of containment is beyond me. Like the moment that there was news of zombies in the midst of Seattle, I would think most humans would try to get out. And there are, after all, some levels of bodies of water in and around Seattle. Were those somehow drained or walled off or what? But there is a wall there. 

Presumably, there is some means of deliveries in to Seattle for brains, human food, clothes, etc. 

Some humans are upset about being stuck in the quarantine. Last episode, we saw some of it in the blue collar people and the zombie-hater whose brain Liv ate. The socialite's life, though, from what we were shown doesn't seem to have been affected that much. She still gets to drink her drinks, bone her chauffeur, golf her golf, and generally be obnoxious to people. 

We don't know what FG central knows about Angus's cult. We did have the one FG soldier who now knows. I think a bigger question is what Blaine knows. Has he been back to the well to feed Angus? Has he missed the big dummy who freed him? Has he heard any street chatter about this zombie cult?

Edited March 6, 2018 by Chicago Redshirt

[Thrifty]

When Clive went to Ravi with his concerns about his sex life, I expected Ravi to bring up the vaccine he's been secretly hoarding for 3 months.  Ravi is hands down my least favorite character for his utter selfishness.

7 hours ago, xqueenfrostine said:

I don't think they're turning anyone into zombies anymore.  I thought Chase said last week that it's now illegal to change anyone else because they can hardly support the existing zombie population with the current brain supply.

Well, it's also illegal to poison a vaccine supply with a dangerous infection.  There weren't really consequences for that, so I think anything is fair game now.

[dubbel zout]

9 hours ago, thuganomics85 said:

Still not all that interested in Angus' little cult story, although Robert Knepper seems to be having the time of his live devouring the scenery.

Same here. I wish that story would move faster, because right now it's a giant waste of time for me.

5 hours ago, Thrifty said:

The government has a sizeable standing army that could do exactly what Filmore Graves does.

The Filmore Graves army is made up of zombies, though, so it can keep the zombie population in check as well as the humans. A government force would likely be mostly/only humans.

[Thrifty]

Just now, dubbel zout said:

The Filmore Graves army is made up of zombies, though, so it can keep the zombie population in check as well as the humans. A government force would likely be mostly/only humans.

I don't understand what that means.  Why would a human force of trained soldiers be at a disadvantage?

[Diapason Untuned]

9 minutes ago, Thrifty said:

I don't understand what that means.  Why would a human force of trained soldiers be at a disadvantage?

Because they would get turned into zombies.

 

2 hours ago, Thrifty said:

When Clive went to Ravi with his concerns about his sex life, I expected Ravi to bring up the vaccine he's been secretly hoarding for 3 months.  Ravi is hands down my least favorite character for his utter selfishness.

Ravi's vaccine turns people into zombies sometimes, and Clive has been very clear that he doesn't want to be a zombie.

[Thrifty]

44 minutes ago, Diapason Untuned said:

Because they would get turned into zombies.

 

Ravi's vaccine turns people into zombies sometimes, and Clive has been very clear that he doesn't want to be a zombie.

Ravi didn't even mention the vaccine.  And he hasn't mentioned it to anyone other than Liv.  The CDC could probably use that information.  Or the tens of thousands of humans trapped in the city.  The army, for example, could use it to protect soldiers against the terrorists who have taken over Seattle.

[Diapason Untuned]

6 minutes ago, Thrifty said:

Ravi didn't even mention the vaccine.  And he hasn't mentioned it to anyone other than Liv.  The CDC could probably use that information.  Or the tens of thousands of humans trapped in the city.  The army, for example, could use it to protect soldiers against the terrorists who have taken over Seattle.

Clive already knows about the vaccine, since he wasn't surprised by Ravi's naturist phase last week. The CDC must be working on a cure/vaccine already, and the current incarnation of Ravi's vaccine isn't useful anyway. And it's a bit much to call Fillmore Graves terrorists that have taken over Seattle. The government seems to be working with them out of pragmatism.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

4 hours ago, Superclam said:

Also, was the guy that ran away filming the whole thing? That may mean the end of that zombie girl. 

Yes, he was filming before he ran off so I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before he posts that video and Major gets into trouble at FG.

[xqueenfrostine]

3 hours ago, Thrifty said:

Well, it's also illegal to poison a vaccine supply with a dangerous infection.  There weren't really consequences for that, so I think anything is fair game now.

Sure, but it's Fillmore Graves, not the government who is enforcing this mandate.  That was the crime their guillotine was built for.  

1 hour ago, Thrifty said:

I don't understand what that means.  Why would a human force of trained soldiers be at a disadvantage?

First and foremost, they could be turned into zombies themselves and the purpose of this quarantine is to contain the zombie plague.  Using US forces would increase the possibility of the zombie virus spreading.  Secondly, thanks to zombism and their exclusive access to the Super Max serum, the Fillmore Graves mercenaries are faster, stronger, have better stamina and are all around more durable than a human soldier.

 

39 minutes ago, Diapason Untuned said:

And it's a bit much to call Fillmore Graves terrorists that have taken over Seattle.

Is it though?  They infected thousands of people against their will by purposefully contaminating a flu vaccine (for a deadly flu that they intentionally brought to Seattle!).  If that's not bioterrorism, what is?  I can hand wave the US government being willing to work with them for now until they come up with a better plan, but calling Fillmore Graves a terrorist force that has essentially taken control of Seattle is an entirely fair assessment.  

[Thrifty]

It's a real bitter irony that the humans opposing Fillmore-Graves are called terrorists in the show.

[xqueenfrostine]

1 hour ago, Thrifty said:

It's a real bitter irony that the humans opposing Fillmore-Graves are called terrorists in the show.

Maybe, but I'm not prepared to exonerate the humans who are targeting non-FG affiliated zombies. These are people who were (mostly) infected against their will, and many are literally starving.  Any human who goes out of their way to terrorize a zombie civilian is also a terrorist.

[CletusMusashi]

I never realized how many commercial breaks there actually are on the CW website until I had to sit through a commercial for "Thoroughbreds" every single time. As if the show itself wasn't already providing enough "spoiled rich bitch."

[Chicago Redshirt]

4 hours ago, Thrifty said:

I don't understand what that means.  Why would a human force of trained soldiers be at a disadvantage?

1. Zombies are unkillable except for headshots and can recover from most wounds. Human soldiers - very killable/vulnerable to just about everything.

2. Human soldiers can be turned into zombies. 

3. FG has a base of operations in Seattle. Although human soldiers could set up up a base, there's a real danger of it getting overrun.

4. Human soldiers (it seems to me, anyways) have a higher likelihood of deserting faced with the prospect of being zombiefied or killed. FG zombies are essentially all in because staying on the force keeps them fed.

5. Zombies don't need sleep. Human soldiers do. 

6. Zombies are faster, stronger than humans.

7. Zombie peacekeepers (it seems to me, anyways) are likely to get more buy-in from the zombie population than human soldiers would. In other words, there would be a suspicion that the agenda for human soldiers would be to wipe out zombies entirely as opposed to create some level of co-existence.

Edited March 6, 2018 by Chicago Redshirt

[AllyB]

11 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Like the moment that there was news of zombies in the midst of Seattle, I would think most humans would try to get out.

The issue there is that many families would have a zombie family member. Would you really leave if it meant abandoning your partner or child? Many families would have dithered over deciding to split the family and while they were still unsure the wall went up and the choice was gone. Remember 57 years ago, the initial barriers that split Berlin went up over night. With modern building technology, massive financial resources and little need for the type of extreme subterfuge that Ulbricht and the GDR had to work under the US could have erected a substantial wall in what seemed like hours to the population of Seattle.

And just imagine the type of international pressure the US would be under to contain this. Canada and Mexico would be imposing very strict limitations on their borders. Would other landmasses even be allowing ordinary transport from anywhere in North America (or maybe even the entire Americas) to come within spitting distance? Globally, ordinary passenger flights would be under severe restriction. Even without a "zombie homeland" on other continents, the news that zombies have been operating covertly for two years would mean Eurasia, Africa, Australia, etc would all have severe restrictions on travel as every continent, international union and country would suspect each other of having vast secret zombie populations. I can't imagine the types of new restrictions on trade, only that America is not a mass producer would be saving the world from crippling recession. Even still it would be pretty bad as every nation on earth would be attempting degrees of isolationist policies. I'd say big Pharma would be raking it in selling various types of zombie vaccines, except that FG used a vaccine as cover to spread infection, so they'd have a lot of bad publicity to get past. I guess that the homeopaths are doing mega-business.

All of this is why this was such a bad route for the plot to take. This is soooo much bigger than the writers seem to realise. And instead we get the ever increasingly wacky Liv on brains. In earlier seasons, she was Liv under the influence of a different personality with Liv being self-aware and either enjoying or being frustrated by her personality changes. She was different but still essentially Liv at her core. But now it's just Liv's body hosting an oblivious caricature of a totally different person. It's crappy and done for laughs that don't come now because it's all laid on too thick. And since when was Ravi a creep who was all in for hearing about someone else's sex problems. He used to have a normal sense of human boundary. And the - surprise Major/Liv are together but just for sex even though they've always been genuinely in love but look now they've split up for reasons - plot was boring. And the Angus as a mad priest taking his ever increasing numbers of followers on murderous rampages in a city under a form of martial law yet is still going unnoticed was just so stupid.

I'm not out. Yet. This show was so so very excellent in the past and I'm hoping against hope that it will recapture that but I'd say I'll be waiting in vain based on this week's episode.

Edited March 7, 2018 by AllyB

[Goldmoon]

I am almost out.  I think one or two more episodes to see if they seem to be going anywhere then boom.  I will be done.  I don't want to watch the Angus show with Liv hijacked by a corpse.

[Chicago Redshirt]

Maybe I'm just unsentimental or extra selfish, but if my wife, brother, or best friend was a zombie, I would have not a single problem leaving them behind. They're basically dead. I don't want to either be a zombie, a zombie victim, or the victim of a nuke or other weapon of mass destruction. Staying means risking those fates, and risking my love one losing control and eating me or others.

And if I were the zombie, and they were the normal humans, I would surely be telling them to GTFO while they can.

[twoods]

I hate Angus, so all that stupid cult stuff is FF material. 

We get another short Liv and Major reunion, and then whiplash again when they break up. What was the point of getting them back together again?

Ravi and Clive talking about sex is everything that I wanted on this show. More scenes with them, please. I’m glad we are seeing him struggle with dating a zombie.

[xqueenfrostine]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Maybe I'm just unsentimental or extra selfish, but if my wife, brother, or best friend was a zombie, I would have not a single problem leaving them behind. They're basically dead.

How are they basically dead?  The iZombie zombies aren't like the zombies of most of the zombie genre.  They're basically people with a very serious and very contagious longterm illness, albeit one where violent behavior is a symptom if the illness isn't properly managed. Sure, the zombies like Liv who eat unprocessed brains have their personalities constantly overwritten which might make them hard to maintain a relationship with, but the people who are living off the brain tubes aren't like that.    I can understand wanting to flee an area where the plague has essentially set in, but treating infected loved ones as if they're now dead-to-me because they're zombies is too cold. 

Now, that doesn't mean I'd have stayed in Seattle if a parent, sibling or friend had been infected.  People move away from friends and family all the time for all sorts of reasons, and presumably I could still call, email and FaceTime with my zombie loved ones while we all hope and pray for a cure to make reunification possible.  The calculus might be a little different though if the zombie in question was my child.  I can't imagine any circumstances under which I would leave a kid to become homeless and destitute to save my own skin.

[Chicago Redshirt]

People's mileage will vary on what dead means in this context.

I don't know if you watch the Walking Dead. In that show, people only become zombies after their biological functions cease and when they do, they are the traditional mindless and snarling monsters. And still some characters in the show believed that those zombies were still human and just needed curing. But as far as I believe we've been shown, there is no prospect of a cure. 

iZombieverse zombies do not have to undergo anything close to biological death to turn. They can retain much of their personalities and there is an actual cure, albeit not one widely available or known.

So what makes them "dead" to me? That they are no longer human and they can survive mortal wounds. That their drives are such that it's likely that they will become killers. Perhaps "undead" would be a better term.

Anyway, that's a quick 2 cents.

[Thrifty]

The increasing domination of Liv's personality is getting old to me too.  It's Flanderization at its worst.  I want to go back and watch some of the first season episodes just to compare.

 

I wish they'd drop this whole police procedural aspect.  There are already too many police procedurals.  It was fine when the show was new, but they have a lot more to work with now.  They talk about having a lot of plot lines to service and not enough time.  Well it's easy enough to make time!

 

The case this week was pretty poor too.  Clive had a weak case against the lady, and if she had done the smart thing and gotten a lawyer, she could have gotten away with it.  The case can easily be made that she knew the combination to the safe but there was no proof she knew about the will, or that she was the only one.  The victim was so widely hated that any number of suspects would have had a motive.  They didn't need to invent a money motive.  The motive "this person was a miserable piece of garbage" does just fine.

[Paloma]

13 hours ago, AllyB said:

All of this is why this was such a bad route for the plot to take. This is soooo much bigger than the writers seem to realise. And instead we get the ever increasingly wacky Liv on brains. In earlier seasons, she was Liv under the influence of a different personality with Liv being self-aware and either enjoying or being frustrated by her personality changes. She was different but still essentially Liv at her core. But now it's just Liv's body hosting an oblivious caricature of a totally different person. It's crappy and done for laughs that don't come now because it's all laid on too thick. And since when was Ravi a creep who was all in for hearing about someone else's sex problems. He used to have a normal sense of human boundary. And the - surprise Major/Liv are together but just for sex even though they've always been genuinely in love but look now they've split up for reasons - plot was boring. And the Angus as a mad priest taking his ever increasing numbers of followers on murderous rampages in a city under a form of martial law yet is still going unnoticed was just so stupid.

I'm not out. Yet. This show was so so very excellent in the past and I'm hoping against hope that it will recapture that but I'd say I'll be waiting in vain based on this week's episode.

I second, third, and fourth this. I loved the show so much in earlier seasons and was excited about it coming back, despite the problems with the last season. The first couple of seasons especially had a perfect blend of humor and drama, and the characters interacted in a believable way that got me invested in them. I'm sure the idea of a zombie takeover of Seattle seemed like a good one to the writers, with the possibility of opening up new plot lines and allowing them to focus on social issues. But the way it is being done is mostly boring, and this expanded plot is ruining the storylines and characters I've loved.  

[Mr. Sparkle]

9 minutes ago, Paloma said:

I second, third, and fourth this. I loved the show so much in earlier seasons and was excited about it coming back, despite the problems with the last season. The first couple of seasons especially had a perfect blend of humor and drama, and the characters interacted in a believable way that got me invested in them. I'm sure the idea of a zombie takeover of Seattle seemed like a good one to the writers, with the possibility of opening up new plot lines and allowing them to focus on social issues. But the way it is being done is mostly boring, and this expanded plot is ruining the storylines and characters I've loved.  

Fifth. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

14 minutes ago, Thrifty said:

The case this week was pretty poor too.  Clive had a weak case against the lady, and if she had done the smart thing and gotten a lawyer, she could have gotten away with it.  The case can easily be made that she knew the combination to the safe but there was no proof she knew about the will, or that she was the only one.  The victim was so widely hated that any number of suspects would have had a motive.  They didn't need to invent a money motive.  The motive "this person was a miserable piece of garbage" does just fine.

If visions are admissible as evidence, it's a decent case. They know Snob was killed by a golfball firing gun, a relatively unique weapon. They know from the vision that the three main workers were familiar with such a gun and had access to such a gun. They know that Hoshi had the combo to the safe, and they know Snob's will was in the safe. So she at least knew that she stood to inherit a million. Motive+means+opportunity=valid suspect.

I personally was actually hoping for all the servants did it together, but alas, not to be.

As for why she didn't shut her mouth and try to beat the rap, the show explained it. She traded her confession for getting her child out of Seattle to get the health care he needed. 

[Diapason Untuned]

21 hours ago, xqueenfrostine said:

Is it though?  They infected thousands of people against their will by purposefully contaminating a flu vaccine (for a deadly flu that they intentionally brought to Seattle!).  If that's not bioterrorism, what is?  I can hand wave the US government being willing to work with them for now until they come up with a better plan, but calling Fillmore Graves a terrorist force that has essentially taken control of Seattle is an entirely fair assessment.  

I can buy Fillmore Graves being guilty of bioterrorism, yes, but what I don't buy is that they're holding Seattle against the will of the US government. Seems more likely to me that they've simply made a deal with the government to take over management of Seattle in lieu of a better solution. A fine distinction, perhaps, but a distinction all the same.

 

14 hours ago, AllyB said:

All of this is why this was such a bad route for the plot to take. This is soooo much bigger than the writers seem to realise.  

Rather than a bad or good route, I feel it's more of an inevitable route, considering the premise. The more zombies were revealed existing, the more implausible it becomes that they could remain undetected forever. Eventually the secret would have to come out. I actually applaud the show for taking the premise to the logical conclusion.

 

Quote

And since when was Ravi a creep who was all in for hearing about someone else's sex problems. He used to have a normal sense of human boundary.

I don't think he was interested in the sex part specifically, he was more interested in Clive, who in the past has volunteered mostly nothing of his personal life, and rebuffed most of Ravi's attempts to learn more, coming to him for personal advice.

 

Quote

And the Angus as a mad priest taking his ever increasing numbers of followers on murderous rampages in a city under a form of martial law yet is still going unnoticed was just so stupid.

Except it didn't go unnoticed. We literally saw a Fillmore Graves soldier witness them. We just haven't seen the blowback yet.

Edited March 7, 2018 by Diapason Untuned

[sacrebleu]

Quote

But now it's just Liv's body hosting an oblivious caricature of a totally different person. 

yup-- agreed. They're playing fast and loose with the rules of Zombie-dom and I'm not on board. 

 

Is Rob Thomas still with the show? It really feels that the pacing is waaaaay off. Liv and Major have been Zombie-Friends with Benefits for months-- and it's introduced and ended in the course of one episode. Angus is growing a healthy cult following by feeding homeless zombies the brains they need-- but there is no mention about an increase in dead bodies by the police or FG. We're two episodes in, and already I feel like the show is suffering from the over-stuffed plottiness that made last season unsatisfying.

[Thrifty]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

If visions are admissible as evidence, it's a decent case.

I feel like they probably wouldn't be.  Any zombie could simply make up a vision.  It would be even worse than hearsay evidence.

[Chicago Redshirt]

6 minutes ago, Thrifty said:

I feel like they probably wouldn't be.  Any zombie could simply make up a vision.  It would be even worse than hearsay evidence.

Given that it's a scientifically accepted fact that zombies do have visions of the deceased memories, there's not a good reason to disallow such people's testimony on its face. It'd be subject to the usual tools of cross-examination -- did the person really see what s/he said s/he saw, can you trust the person, etc.

Given that there are now apparently more than one outed zombie working for New Seattle PD as of last episode, I will assume that testimony of zombie visions is admissible until there's evidence otherwise.

[Thrifty]

8 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Given that it's a scientifically accepted fact that zombies do have visions of the deceased memories, there's not a good reason to disallow such people's testimony on its face. It'd be subject to the usual tools of cross-examination -- did the person really see what s/he said s/he saw, can you trust the person, etc.

Given that there are now apparently more than one outed zombie working for New Seattle PD as of last episode, I will assume that testimony of zombie visions is admissible until there's evidence otherwise.

That sounds like a terribly dangerous game to play.  To let police, or even civilians purporting to be witnesses, invent their own evidence like that.  At least with an eyewitness account, you would have to establish you were there to see the crime, and this can be disproven.  You can have a zombie vision at any time or place after the fact.  Maybe it would be admissible, but it strikes me as extremely poor quality evidence.

[sacrebleu]

Quote

That sounds like a terribly dangerous game to play.  To let police, or even civilians purporting to be witnesses, invent their own evidence like that.  At least with an eyewitness account, you would have to establish you were there to see the crime, and this can be disproven.  You can have a zombie vision at any time or place after the fact.  Maybe it would be admissible, but it strikes me as extremely poor quality evidence.

 

Agree. I think it would probably fall into the same bucket as law enforcement agencies who use psychics. A person's 'vision' might lead them in a certain direction, or to evidence-- but police would need verifiable evidence to actually bring charges. 

[questionfear]

I actually think the case of the week format gives us a new way to have insight into the whole New Seattle concept. Last week it was the hatred, marking, and brain shortages...this week it was the human trafficking. If they abandoned case of the week and we just learned there was human trafficking, I don't know that it would feel as tense as it did when it tied into the case; this kid wasn't just being trafficked, he was being trafficked as a result of a number of other tragedies, almost all of which were kicked off by the walling of Seattle. I could see the case of the week fading into the background as we get deeper, but for now it's like we are experiencing what the characters are experiencing-a desire to have normalcy that's being destroyed when the reality of New Seattle slaps them in the face. 

I am also looking forward to seeing more of Mama Leone...it should be interesting. 

[Affogato]

21 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Maybe I'm just unsentimental or extra selfish, but if my wife, brother, or best friend was a zombie, I would have not a single problem leaving them behind. They're basically dead. I don't want to either be a zombie, a zombie victim, or the victim of a nuke or other weapon of mass destruction. Staying means risking those fates, and risking my love one losing control and eating me or others.

And if I were the zombie, and they were the normal humans, I would surely be telling them to GTFO while they can.

I can see it happening faster than people think. Initially people would take some time to react. Explain it to the kids. Say goodby. Take a day or two and ...the walls are up. 

[Affogato]

6 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Given that it's a scientifically accepted fact that zombies do have visions of the deceased memories, there's not a good reason to disallow such people's testimony on its face. It'd be subject to the usual tools of cross-examination -- did the person really see what s/he said s/he saw, can you trust the person, etc.

Given that there are now apparently more than one outed zombie working for New Seattle PD as of last episode, I will assume that testimony of zombie visions is admissible until there's evidence otherwise.

Most of what we’ve seen simply leads them to evidence and/or confessions so it wouldn’t need to stand up in court. I think it would be easy enough to say it could provide reason for a search warrant, if necessary, in Seattle since the PD has circumstantial evidence it works.

Is it scientifically accepted, though? By Ravi? Who has published in the field of zombie? People talk like this is a known area. It’s fillmores secret whatever they’ve done, Rager’s secret whatever they did, and Ravi and Liv. 

Edited March 7, 2018 by Affogato
Can’t spell

[Affogato]

7 hours ago, sacrebleu said:

yup-- agreed. They're playing fast and loose with the rules of Zombie-dom and I'm not on board. 

 

Is Rob Thomas still with the show? It really feels that the pacing is waaaaay off. Liv and Major have been Zombie-Friends with Benefits for months-- and it's introduced and ended in the course of one episode. Angus is growing a healthy cult following by feeding homeless zombies the brains they need-- but there is no mention about an increase in dead bodies by the police or FG. We're two episodes in, and already I feel like the show is suffering from the over-stuffed plottiness that made last season unsatisfying.

 I Didn’t have an issue with Liv and Major. It has been four months and both of them, wanting sex and burned by the zombie dating scene, take solace in the familiar. They’ve been off and on while growing apart in other ways .  I feel, don’t hit me, that the romantic bits are less plot lines and more character studies and the point has been made that the characters have grown too far apart to be together at this time. I think the priest has been noticed and the hungry kids introduce that they would have been early adopters of the vaccine as a vulnerable population.  Damn. Religion would play into this  I’m pretty pleased with the pacing, now that I think of it.  

Liv on brains is really annoying even when we’ll acted. 

[seacliffsal]

I am just stumped as to what led to Liv and Major breaking up.  Major allowed them through the check point and, indeed, his career and life may be on the line for it.  So, why is she so upset with him?  That made absolutely no sense to me.

[Chicago Redshirt]

5 minutes ago, seacliffsal said:

I am just stumped as to what led to Liv and Major breaking up.  Major allowed them through the check point and, indeed, his career and life may be on the line for it.  So, why is she so upset with him?  That made absolutely no sense to me.

Liv is upset that Major has changed from how he was when they were engaged. And to a certain extent, she has a point. Original Major was a social worker who loved kids and would go out of his way to look out for them. Remember the lengths he went to to investigate all those missing homeless kids back in Season One?

Now he's more focused on the rules and his own well-being than being happy that a sick kid got smuggled out of New Seattle to get life-saving medical help. Is that the way Original Major would have reacted? Not at all. 

I think that would have been easier to appreciate if we saw that issue play out over a couple episodes. But as it was, it came off as arbitrary.

[Affogato]

15 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Liv is upset that Major has changed from how he was when they were engaged. And to a certain extent, she has a point. Original Major was a social worker who loved kids and would go out of his way to look out for them. Remember the lengths he went to to investigate all those missing homeless kids back in Season One?

Now he's more focused on the rules and his own well-being than being happy that a sick kid got smuggled out of New Seattle to get life-saving medical help. Is that the way Original Major would have reacted? Not at all. 

I think that would have been easier to appreciate if we saw that issue play out over a couple episodes. But as it was, it came off as arbitrary.

I saw major as being upset that she had forced him to put himself in a vulnerable position that could have had serious professional and personal repercussions. She used him. He covered for her but it was unfair of her to put him in that position. She figured Major should have not been upset by this because a child’s life was on the line. She had a higher purpose  

Both have changed. She probably wouldn’t have smuggled a child in the first season. She was kind of lawful. Major less so. Role reversal. 

[kieyra]

Quote

Too bad the dialogue made so little sense from what we've seen of the couple in the last two seasons. 

Re: Liv and Major's hundredth breakup. The dialogue was so bad. So bad. Does anyone know who is writing these days? Is it still Rob and Diane? I was kind of cringing in second-hand embarrassment for that scene. The actors are doing all right with what they're given, but it's a stretch. "If my life choices so offend you ..."  is not a real thing either of them would say, certainly not as some stinging kicker in an argument.

[Solace247]

13 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Given that it's a scientifically accepted fact that zombies do have visions of the deceased memories, there's not a good reason to disallow such people's testimony on its face. It'd be subject to the usual tools of cross-examination -- did the person really see what s/he said s/he saw, can you trust the person, etc.

Given that there are now apparently more than one outed zombie working for New Seattle PD as of last episode, I will assume that testimony of zombie visions is admissible until there's evidence otherwise.

Actually, last week's ep. established that visions aren't admissible. When the son was trying to convince the mother to stay strong and not confess, he stated that zombie visions aren't admissible.