Spoilers The Gifted - Season 2

[Christopher]

I wasn't fond of the Erg/Caitlin storyline, since it played into a tired cliche -- the story wherein a victim of systemic racism, who has every right to be angry at how the establishment built by the dominant race has victimized him, learns that his bigotry toward a specific member of the dominant race is unwarranted because she's enlightened and good. It's too self-congratulatory, like the kind of stories that white writers in the '60s and '70s did about race relations, with the angry young black men realizing they were wrong to hate all the white people because this one particular white person was good. The kind of story that paints the victims of systemic racism as the "real" racists who need to learn that things aren't so bad, and thereby rejects the legitimacy of their fight for equality.

It would've been a more honest story if Caitlin had gone down there wearing the shield of her enlightenment and tolerance toward all mutants, only to discover that some of the Morlocks creeped her out or that she unthinkingly condescended to them, and thereby learned that the mindset of privilege is not so easy to cast off entirely.

I did like the revelation that the reason Reeva and the Purifier-backing TV pundit are working together is because they both want a race war. It's reflective of the real-life symbiosis between extremist groups. Whenever American conservative pundits denounce Islam as an evil religion, they're giving the Islamist militants and terrorists exactly what they want. Hate groups need to sell the idea that their enemies are the ones who hate them. The people on both sides who reach out and try to make peace are a greater threat to the hate groups' agenda than the people on the opposite side who want a fight as much as they do. The polarization and conflict is exactly what both opposing hate groups want and need, so they're in a symbiotic relationship with each other.

 

[stj]

Erg the show's mashup of caricature versions of Booker T. Washington, Marcus Garvey, Father Divine and Elijah Muhammad, who brands his followers so they can't ever blend in again, and bars contact with human family members, isn't the one who shares the Purifier goal of separation? That's the Inner Circle? All I can say is, the KKK never felt any common goal with the Republic of New Africa carving out an African American homeland in the South. (There were some moves from a few Nazis and a few Zionists to cooperate in making Germany Judenfrei by sending them out of the country/down the sewers. I guarantee no one at the show was thinking of that.)

Marcos murdering Max happened. I expect the show will treat this as self-defense. Lorna has stepped up her betrayal and started fulfilling the Mutant Underground goal of killing bad mutants to appease humans. I know the show demands we forget the Frosts can read minds, but it is hard.

The episode is called Tempted, but curiously no one is tempted. Lauren is being manipulated by the Frosts when she succumbs to dream rapist. When she is being forced to go to Andy in real life she is haggard, distraught, under compulsion, none of which is temptation. I was puzzled about when Lauren and Andy were supposed to be connected. Lauren is way too cool to truly care about a loser like Andy, short of a threat to his life. He of course was deeply influenced by her, until he took up following Lorna like a puppy. It was amusing that no one thought Andy could do anything useful and they needed the threesome. Perhaps they finally noticed he not only fights like a girl but dresses like one?

It occurs to me Amy Acker and Jamie Chung may have decided to skimp on hair color damage and time in the makeup chair on behalf of a show they don't like/expect to be cancelled.

PS Forgot that something did actually happen: Reed's figured out a way to depower Andy and keep him prisoner if they catch him by surprise. (And yes, I know Marcos got shot but he's not going to die, because Sean Teale is third billed. It's not a courtesy billing like Lind and White, who have to be higher up because they're essential to the stars' story line, as well as having extensive resumes.)

 

[crookeddy]

I thought the crazies of this board congregate on marvel and dc movie boards, but apparently this is where white guilt self haters and viva la revolucion types go to hang out.

 

[stj]

^^^The show had a character say "They will not replace us," and no one here admits the show has political content? Trying to talk about anything but is the crazy.

Or to put it another way, anybody who thinks Jace Turner is about white guilt self hating is the one who's gone gaga.

The show is playing with edgy. It no more intends to undermine the status quo even in fiction than The 4400. But posts like this convince me even the gestures are too much.

 

[crookeddy]

^^^The show had a character say "They will not replace us," and no one here admits the show has political content? Trying to talk about anything but is the crazy.

Or to put it another way, anybody who thinks Jace Turner is about white guilt self hating is the one who's gone gaga.

The show is playing with edgy. It no more intends to undermine the status quo even in fiction than The 4400. But posts like this convince me even the gestures are too much.

Oh there is something/one here that's too much. It isn't this crappy show though.

 

[crookeddy]

Here is the thing - X-Men as an allegory of racism is kind of a mess.

When first created, I do believe that Stan Lee had the best intentions for the team to truly represent rising above racism. However, to avoid making the team villains, and because of the necessity of having someone to fight in a mainstream superhero comic book series, the theme basically became "the oppressed have to police themselves if they ever hope to achieve anything". And then the ongoing nature of comics made it so that they can never achieve anything, or risk outliving their purpose in the comics universe. And so, the X-Men mostly fight their own kind, and an effort to bring about peace that will never happen.

Due to licensing issues, the Underground are a stand-in for the X-Men, except inept writing made them even worse. Their goal is to endlessly help mutants escape persecution. They have no endgame. They had some purpose when the X-Men were around. They protected the oppressed, while the X-Men fought to end the oppression (supposedly). Without the X-Men, the Underground is just fighting a never-ending battle.

And Jace Turner - UGH. I think his role is to show how a good man can do terrible things for a misguided sense of the common good, but it was never clear why we should think that he's a good man to begin with. The show's depiction of mutant persecution is just so inconsistent that it's impossible to tell exactly what's happening. We can only assume that Sentinel Services are a gestapo-like organization, so why should we care about the toll their members have to face?

Having said all that, almost all message movies fall apart when analyzed deeply, so why do it? Just enjoy them as mindless entertainment, absorb the shallow base message, and move on.

 

[kitik]

I liked the last 2 episodes. Definitely didn't see the Marcos/Max outcome coming. Marcos was of course going to do some very bad things to Max to get him to talk, so Max was justified in trying to defend himself, as was Marcos from someone shooting at him. In the end, we end up in a situation where Reeva's apparent plan of mass murder may have to be changed, so at least this counts as a minor victory for our protagonists.

 

[crookeddy]

Strong ratings rebound for The Gifted, from 1.59 to 1.82 million viewers. Still too low for Fox to renew though. The show needs strong ratings growth for the final 2 seasons to even contend for renewal (unless Fox movie studios really feels the need for an X-Men show on TV, like Marvel with SHIELD)

 

[Q2UnME]

I actually enjoyed the last 2 or 3 episodes more than I thought I would. I was just about ready to write this show off and it has pulled me back in, delaying the inevitable DVR reprogramming.... Any chance they get an episode or two to wrap this up if FOX pulls the plug?

 

[stj]

Someone watching a show they think is "crappy" is definitely someone too much. As much as I disagree with with the show's politics, I can see it is very well done for a comic book show. To pick a trivial example, when Andy became a fourth Frost sister, they gave him his own pose, hands clasped behind back. You really should admire this kind of attention to detail. The Gifted works very hard on visuals.

For some reason gushing feels wrong, but there is a lot I really enjoy. I despise the people who libeled the mentally ill with their vicious caricatures in the Lynnwood Hospital episode, but the people who make the show, or for that matter the actors, are not the show. I can separate them. Even more to the point, being about something, even wrongheadedly so, is more interesting than being about somebody else's daydreams. They tend so often to be rather pallid, unlike my own.

It would be interesting to retail the plot so far, in chronological order. It would be a minor revelation, like telling the plot of The Maltese Falcon in chronological order. But that would be lengthy, therefore offensive, somehow. Yet, the discovery that Reeva Payge has infiltrated the government means that when Campbell's had his mule attack her agent from the DOJ who was trying to shut down the Hound program, Campbell was fighting the Big Bad, far more effectively than the MU! Or for another example, when Andy first manifested Fenris at the age of fourteen, Lauren, who had known for a year that she was a mutant, did not tell him anything whatsoever.

The odd way that Andy became obsessed by the wolf motif despite Lauren withholding the truth from him has been a puzzle. How does the Fenris work? It occurs to me that the wolf motif was a foreshadowing of Andy dream-rapist. The wolf is a standard werewolf. But werewolves are basically a rape metaphor. Andy's obsession with the wolf was his toxic masculinity expressing itself. You may object that Andy as toxic masculinity is like using cooked spaghetti or a wet dishrag as phallic symbols. But Andy murdered his girlfriend, then blamed her for "making' him do that! You don't get worse than that.

 

[crookeddy]

Someone watching a show they think is "crappy" is definitely someone too much. As much as I disagree with with the show's politics, I can see it is very well done for a comic book show. To pick a trivial example, when Andy became a fourth Frost sister, they gave him his own pose, hands clasped behind back. You really should admire this kind of attention to detail. The Gifted works very hard on visuals.

For some reason gushing feels wrong, but there is a lot I really enjoy. I despise the people who libeled the mentally ill with their vicious caricatures in the Lynnwood Hospital episode, but the people who make the show, or for that matter the actors, are not the show. I can separate them. Even more to the point, being about something, even wrongheadedly so, is more interesting than being about somebody else's daydreams. They tend so often to be rather pallid, unlike my own.

It would be interesting to retail the plot so far, in chronological order. It would be a minor revelation, like telling the plot of The Maltese Falcon in chronological order. But that would be lengthy, therefore offensive, somehow. Yet, the discovery that Reeva Payge has infiltrated the government means that when Campbell's had his mule attack her agent from the DOJ who was trying to shut down the Hound program, Campbell was fighting the Big Bad, far more effectively than the MU! Or for another example, when Andy first manifested Fenris at the age of fourteen, Lauren, who had known for a year that she was a mutant, did not tell him anything whatsoever.

The odd way that Andy became obsessed by the wolf motif despite Lauren withholding the truth from him has been a puzzle. How does the Fenris work? It occurs to me that the wolf motif was a foreshadowing of Andy dream-rapist. The wolf is a standard werewolf. But werewolves are basically a rape metaphor. Andy's obsession with the wolf was his toxic masculinity expressing itself. You may object that Andy as toxic masculinity is like using cooked spaghetti or a wet dishrag as phallic symbols. But Andy murdered his girlfriend, then blamed her for "making' him do that! You don't get worse than that.

It's crappy. I watch because I almost always finish what I start.

 

[Aragorn]

I let the last few episodes collect dust and finally got around to them. Reeva still sucks as a villain and they must know it too because she doesn't even appear in half the episodes. Sewer Cyclops the cult leader is even worse, and of course by the end of the episode he learns a valuable lesson about humans that would've been painfully obvious even if he had no eyes. It'd be funny to see the Purifiers target anyone with an M scratched into their face, just to see Sewer Cyclops' reaction. Also, the show-appointed main character is the least interesting of the bunch.

 

[Christopher]

Reeva still sucks as a villain and they must know it too because she doesn't even appear in half the episodes.

That doesn't necessarily follow. It could just be that the actress's availability is limited, or that they're saving money by only signing her for a certain number of episodes.

 

[Set Harth]

Now just wait one damn minute.

How do the Frosts not know that Lorna was the one who hacked the system? THEY CAN READ HER MIND

Unless they do know, and they're playing a long game of some sort where they need her alive so they offered up Sage as a patsy?

 

[Turtletrekker]

It'd be funny to see the Purifiers target anyone with an M scratched into their face, just to see Sewer Cyclops' reaction.

You must've thought that tonight was hysterical.

 

[Christopher]

The backstory explanation for why Reeva and Ryan are working together struck me as surprisingly plausible. Extremists want the opposition to be just as extreme as they are, to be calling for their extermination so they can say to their own people "See? They want to destroy us, so our extreme methods are necessary." The fanatical haters on both sides nourish each other and depend on each other.

Although on second thought, I'm not really comfortable with a story saying that the equivalent of the KKK has been tricked into being so extreme by the equivalent of Malcolm X (sort of). That seems like trying to shift the ultimate blame for the conflict onto the oppressed group.

And I can't believe they

Spoiler

killed off Blink. Did they get so tired of not getting her hair color right that they just gave up?

But seriously, I'm trying to decide if this was a fridging or not. She sacrificed herself for her own reasons, as the culmination of her own arc, rather than being a passive victim of a conflict driven by male characters, so that argues against it being a fridging; but it seems likely that they'll use her death to motivate John to go on a revenge spree or something, which is pretty much the textbook definition.

 

[Set Harth]

Extremists want the opposition to be just as extreme as they are, to be calling for their extermination so they can say to their own people "See? They want to destroy us, so our extreme methods are necessary."

You know what, though? If the opposition doesn't play along, they get accused of the same shit anyway. "They want us dead." It's like, nah, dude, you're projecting.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Damn. I can't believe they killed Clarice. She was probably the most well-rounded character of the whole cast. I like to think "She isn't really dead until we see the body" but it seems unlikely that would survive from multiple gunshot wounds and with no one around to treat her wounds.

And please spare me Jace's "Oh, there were children among them?! Golly gee, I never considered I would become the very monster I hated!" I'm so sick of his crap. I accidentally saw the beginning of next week's preview and it looks like John is going to amp his stupidity levels to a new high. I know it won't happen, but it would be nice if John and Jace just killed each other off. Bleah.

Now just wait one damn minute.

How do the Frosts not know that Lorna was the one who hacked the system? THEY CAN READ HER MIND

Unless they do know, and they're playing a long game of some sort where they need her alive so they offered up Sage as a patsy?

Yeah, I thought that was awfully fishy, too. It would be one thing if it was just Esme, who clearly has a soft spot for Lorna, but all three? Something is off there (and hopefully not bad writing).

 

[stj]

Grace Byers may be at The Gifted for much the same reasons Amanda Tapping went to Stargate Atlantis. But whether or no, I think there's not a doubt she appears less often to save money.

There's no reason to think Reeva Payge's "gifts" could make Benedict Ryan a nationwide phenomenon. Also, what Ryan was selling on the radio is exactly what he was selling on TV, leaving a mystery what Reeva thought she was bringing to the table. There is actually a temporary convergence of interests between the Morlocks and the Purifiers, though the show won't admit this. The only way there could be a temporary convergence of interests between the Purifiers and the Inner Circle is is the Inner Circle is promising to colonize all mutants somewhere else. A mutant homeland in the US is in direct opposition.

It is unclear how hitting the Morlocks could possibly help Reeva's project. It may be a repeat of the Fairburn ploy, bring the Morlocks on board. It's hard to tell, because even Jace Turner could have figured out that the repeated thefts of food by mutant bands meant there was a large mutant settlement close at hand. That preposterously gigantic hole would I think be found by municipal workers but it's like the Frosts not being able to read Lorna's mind.

"Lucky it wasn't serious." This was supposed to John's irony, as a way of hanging a lantern on the fakeout end last episode. But it seems to me this is one time the actor bungled the delivery. The show works very hard on visuals, but taking the time for the actor to get it right was too much money for them I suspect. Shame visuals aren't the key creative decisions the way auteur theory says.

Much of the episode focused on the weakest links. To me the notion that John/Clarice is some great love affair retcons how Clarice got her love second hand, from Sonya. I've always assumed she couldn't give up the memory because it was her first experience of love, but of course the show wasn't ever interested in developing Clarice as a character. No, giving her the snarkiest lines isn't characterization. Icons, even feminist ones, aren't people. As for the Morlocks, it didn't take me long to wonder why Iris didn't hide an ambush behind her wall illusions. The Morlocks didn't die from Purifiers, they died from stupid. All this stuff was a waste of time. That said, Turner condescending to Officer Ted had a delightful looniness to it all. The difference between them is Turner's victim was bullet-proof and he did his shoot on Purifier property. This does not reflect well on him the way the show thinks.

Not quite as much of a waste was more Rooty-tooty from Caitlin. I could not possibly bear Joss Whedon but I fast forwarded a bunch of Person of Interest episodes with Amy Acker. She was clearly hired to deliver a copy of Root, except with an acceptably apolitical and feminine obsession with her son to explain why she's crazy. I think that makes the Rooty-tooty less interesting, a pale copy of Root's fanatical embrace of the future. It still was inadvertently amusing that Caitlin wasn't ashamed of killing that Purifier.

It is odd that the serum which makes Lauren sick is what *not* taking will make Reed sick, maybe die, if Risman Garber was to be trusted about anything. By odd, I mean, stupid. Also stupid is the careful avoidance of their real interest in the serum, which is taking Andy's powers.

The big dramatic moments are supposed to be Reed and Lauren deciding to accept that they have powers, because they really can't avoid that. Apparently just having powers is evil in itself. But if they are good and say their prayers and don't use them, or at least not for evil, then maybe they won't go to hell, or something like that. The thing is, like Marcos being a hardened criminal and Polaris a mass murderer, there are double standards for what is evil. People who are unpleasant to the Good Guys (we know who they are, they're attractive people,) deserve what they get. At this point this is nothing new really. The discovery that most of their sufferings have in one sense been self-imposed, uncomfortably like anguishing over masturbation, is kind of anticlimactic. And it's even more anticlimactic when one considers that Andy, if it weren't for his dream-rapist shtick, has a far better track record in using his powers. Breaking Lynnwood, saving Lorna from Twist, freeing the mutants are in fact commendable, no matter what the show says in words. Lauren tried to keep mutants in abusive psychiatric hospitals and prisoners tortured by collars. She should be ashamed of herself. But if we take the show in its own terms, Lauren wanting to face her problems head on means killing Andy.

 

[Turtletrekker]

If all three sisters have turned against Reva, then perhaps Tessa is still alive. We, the audience, never saw the body Hit the floor, and they could have made Reva believe that she was dead. Of course, if all three sisters had turned against Reva, then why not just take control of her mind? Maybe they would need to keep her around long enough to get Jace and the purifiers out of the way. If it is just Esme, perhaps she is somehow altering her sisters perceptions.

At any rate, I thought it was kind of cool when they brought the Morlocks in, but it never occurred to me that they would suffer the same fate as they did in the comics. I imagine this is probably the closest we'll ever get to an adaptation of the old mutant massacre storyline.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutant_Massacre