This show is losing me. It's spending most of its time in this surreal realm of symbols, and what's actually going on in real-world terms is unclear. It's strange that the "record store" setting exists both inside Andre's mind and within Ty's Darkforce dimension, with the show not seeming to care about the distinction between the two, if any. I guess maybe Andre's linked to it because he got his powers from the same source as T&T, though that hasn't been adequately explained in-story, so it feels arbitrary.
I just don't care for the fantasy/mystical/surreal turn this show has taken. Granted, magic and supernatural phenomena are an established part of the MCU by now, but the movies and Agents of SHIELD have consistently presented them as just a form of science we don't understand yet, an alternative metaphor for harnessing the physical forces of the universe. C&D treats it in a more mystical, pure-fantasy way that doesn't feel like a good fit to the other shows. And it's just annoying to me to try to parse all these weird symbolic and pretentiously arty sequences.
Strangely enough, I'm actually liking that part, even though I would normally feel 100% partial to what you wrote and feel like turning the show off because of that.
On one hand, I'm enjoying the insight into aspects of Louisiana Vodoo, and the illustrative depiction its getting, even though I assume the artistic license used is probably not giving it close to fair depiction – e.g. loas obviously don't
rape force marry mambos, and from what I can tell there isn't a form of symbolic marriage, although I still hope that part with Evita meant something different.
On the other hand, I've been starting new attempts to write, failing so far, but the mall/record store/gas station, and the mythology surrounding them, is eerily similar to my latest crazy idea, and I drew a lot of inspiration for what's otherwise a painful realism worship. And the show kinda makes sense to me.
In particular: Where parts of Cloak & Dagger makes zero sense in the real world, they would make 100% sense in the Framework. And the reality in the MCU's has its share of features that may bring it closer to the Framework in terms of rules – for example what Thanos has been able to pull off with the reality stone, the Mirror Dimension as seen in Doctor Strange, or what people were able to do the Darkhold outside the Framework in AOS (I was almost disappointed the portals opened using the Darkhold were not the same as the Dr. Strange ones; or were they?).
And there was some incoherence as to what's actually happening, but that's been mostly creeping me out, rather than turning me off, as it makes Andre seem unstoppable. And now the only person who could make head and tails of it is dead.
What really lost me, though, is where they took Ty's mother this week, having her give in to revenge. And I was confused by the ending, but it looked like they were implying that Tandy's mother killed herself? On top of that, you had the teenaged Evita suddenly being forced to become a vodoun priestess and "marry" a loa against her will, which feels like a kind of rape even if it's only a symbolic marriage. Anyway, it just went to an unpleasantly dark place for multiple characters all at once and it was a real turnoff. I'm not sure I even want to watch the remaining two episodes.
However, that hit me. The show went too dark, and that's normally good (although it's not what I started off to watch), and I even understand where Ty mother's went – I maybe appreciate what happened
because I really wished it hadn't gone there.
But the Evita bit went too far. It's worse than what you say. The show put up a choice – either Tandy has to fight the person who just mind-raped her in a silly video game for completely confusing reasons, or Evita is forced to marry some shady god. And the whole thing was a consequence of... what? Ty lost the will to live out of nowhere, the timing made zero sense to me, I don't even recall Andre putting on a record to mess with his head (even if he did, it shouldn't have worked in that moment). Not to mention that one bit of the incoherence of the record store is that he needed to touch some people to affect them, whereas for others he simply put on a record and controlled them remotely.
Question – did all the people from Andre's audience commit suicide last week, before attending his recital?
