Freeform orders Marvel's Cloak and Dagger series

Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by Enterprise is Great, Apr 7, 2016.

  1. Turtletrekker

    Turtletrekker Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2003
    Location:
    Tacoma, Washington
  2. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    I found the framing device in tonight's episode incredibly awkward and on-the-nose. Framing a story about two heroes' journey by having a teacher lecture about how hero's-journey stories are structured? That's the very epitome of telling rather than showing.

    I wonder... if Tandy can steal people's hopes as well as seeing them, does that mean Tyrone can take away people's fears?
     
  3. Enterprise is Great

    Enterprise is Great Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2004
    Location:
    The Island
    I liked how they worked in the Stan Lee cameo with that painting.
     
  4. Greg Cox

    Greg Cox Admiral Premium Member

    Joined:
    May 12, 2004
    Location:
    Lancaster, PA
    Hard to believe next week is the season finale. I'm enjoying the show, but it doesn't feel like everything is coming to a head just yet.

    Thanks goodness the show has already been renewed for a second season, because I can't imagine they can wrap up all these varied plot threads in one ep . . . .
     
  5. Turtletrekker

    Turtletrekker Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2003
    Location:
    Tacoma, Washington
    Don't forget that the finale will have a credits scene.

     
    Greg Cox likes this.
  6. The Nth Doctor

    The Nth Doctor Infinite Possibilities... Premium Member

    Joined:
    Jul 20, 2000
    Location:
    Lost in a temporal and spatial anomaly
    Hopefully it'll be better than the penultimate episode because that was absolutely awful.

    Combined with the multiple musical montages that demanded us to feel a certain way, this is why I thought that episode was so awful. The whole thing pushed me to the point of asking "Why do I care about any of these people when they continue to do stupid shit?" Granted Tyrone and Tandy are teenagers in uniquely difficult situations but it's not just them.

    I wondered the same thing and that was about the only good takeaway from the whole episode.
     
  7. CorporalCaptain

    CorporalCaptain Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Feb 12, 2011
    Location:
    astral plane
    Well, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I've really enjoyed this show so far. Based on the ads, I didn't expect that at all, but this is better than Agents of SHIELD, The Gifted, and Runaways.

    Cloak & Dagger has a great cast, excellent character dynamics and conflicts, and sufficiently good situations and plot. I would rank it higher than either season of Agent Carter, though S1 of that show was excellent. Of the Netflix series, I've seen only S1 of Jessica Jones, so I really can't comment on what the overall quality is there. I'd say that C&D finishes behind S1 of JJ, but that isn't intended to diminish C&D.

    Really good effort here, and definitely outside the box.
     
  8. Turtletrekker

    Turtletrekker Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2003
    Location:
    Tacoma, Washington
    Well, I'm glad that my theory that Evita was going to be the one sacrificed for the "divine pairing" prophecy didn't pan out. I like her. I wonder what the fates will
    think of being cheated out of their usual sacrifice.

    I don't like that they got rid of Cloak's cloak! It gave him real comics accurate feel that wearing a hoodie just doesn't capture. However, seeing him finally suck someone into the Darkforce dimension was cool.

    Tandy's response "Why not me?" when her mother asked why she had to be the one to help others was Tandy's hero moment.

    And, of course, fans of the comics saw the post-credit sequence coming a mile away. "Mayhem", indeed.

    All in all, an enjoyable first season that was a little slow to pick up the pace. I look forward to season 2.
     
    Last edited: Aug 4, 2018
    Admiral2 likes this.
  9. Enterprise is Great

    Enterprise is Great Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2004
    Location:
    The Island
    Yeah, I was bummed to see Ty's cloak go. I hope he can make another one. Cloak's cloak is iconic. What happens to people who get absorbed by Cloak's powers?

    I liked Olivia Holt's cover of Styx's Come Sail Away
     
  10. Guy Gardener

    Guy Gardener Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Apr 15, 2000
    Location:
    In the lap of squalor I assure you.
    The terror is a replacement for heroin.

    It's going to be like that reality tv show "I didn't know that I was pregnant" where a young idiot goes for a dump, only to become a mother.
     
  11. Tosk

    Tosk Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jan 7, 2001
    Location:
    On the run.
    Ah, is that who was singing it? Cool.

    I did expect the song to show up, the score used the melody of it in at least one earlier scene (maybe more) and I was sure my mind wasn't playing tricks on me. :)
     
  12. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    This is the second week in a row that the show didn't quite work for me, and as with last week, the framing narration was what marred it for me. That whole "Divine Pairings" mythology was arbitrary, clumsy, and silly. Even granted that magic has now been introduced into the MCU through Doctor Strange and Ghost Rider, the stories about New Orleans repeatedly being miraculously and immediately saved from disaster because one person died were clumsy and implausible. And it all felt like a totally contrived way to create an arbitrary sense of doom for Tandy or Tyrone, one that turned out to be false anyway because they were both able to survive and there was no real explanation for how they avoided the supposed "curse."

    Plus, when Tandy burned her shoulder, she and Tyrone seemed to be aware of the significance of such a mark to the myth, even though Evita hadn't actually told them that part. So that made no sense. Not to mention that the whole "shoulder marking" thing was another arbitrary bit of the myth that just got tossed in here out of nowhere.

    The one part that really worked for me was Tyrone's speech to the cop guarding him and O'Reilly, reminding him of what a cop's duty is supposed to be. That was a marvelous and important statement, and it was really well-delivered by Aubrey Joseph. I thought he was a weak actor at first, since I thought he had kind of a flat and mumbly delivery, but he's proven that he's actually a rather strong and compelling actor. Plus I love hero moments that are about inspiring others to be their best rather than just achieving physical feats.
     
    The Nth Doctor and Admiral2 like this.
  13. kitik

    kitik Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

    Joined:
    Nov 13, 2013
    Yeah, I was worried about the exact same thing. Since obviously we knew that the two leads are basically safe from death, she was the sacrifice that logically popped into my mind. When she wasn't around during the grand finale, I thought to myself "phew, she's safe".

    That said, speaking of being around for the finale, seriously, how the hell did O'Reilly just happen to be up on top of a food truck sniping terrors to protect our heroes? That's awful. And yeah, I agree with some of the above complaints about the show (that teacher's lecture framing mechanism was awful, and the divine pairing/band on the arm setup in the finale wasn't much better), but in general I'd say that I like this show. I'll certainly stick around for the second season.

    This show is nowhere near as good as Runaways or AOS though. Runaways is on a whole different level compared to this show. Significantly sharper writing and noticably superior production values. You get what you pay for with Freeform obviously, and I've enjoyed stuff like Siren and Cloak & Dagger.

    The two leads were well cast (as were all their family members), and I've enhjoyed just about all the scenes that anyone from the Hess family showed up in too.

    Noticed that no one here has mentioned Tandy's old boyfrined. You know, the one that she left rotting in jail while she was out galavanting around. And then that she mind-raped or whatever the heck you call it when she took people's hopes. Let me just say that he was TOTALLY JUSTIFIED in taking that money from her. She screwed him royally. I hope we don't see him again, and can assume that he just rode off into the sunset and is out in California enjoying his bundle of cash. I'll be a bit pissed if he shows up in season two and is written as a despicable person who deserves whatever justice the writers feel like giving him. (Unless it's REALLY well written, which would be a surprise.)

    Speaking of, I assume season 2 will tell us why Evita was able to resist Tandy's little hope-taking trick.
     
    Turtletrekker likes this.
  14. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    I figured it was because she was aware that Tandy had some sort of power (since she'd figured out that Tyrone did and that he and Tandy were linked) and thus was able to recognize what was happening. Also her mom is a vodoun priestess, so she's been raised with beliefs about people being able to influence and control other people's minds/spirits and thus has probably been taught how to defend herself against such influence.
     
  15. The Nth Doctor

    The Nth Doctor Infinite Possibilities... Premium Member

    Joined:
    Jul 20, 2000
    Location:
    Lost in a temporal and spatial anomaly
    Finally got around to watching the finale. Decent episode, but I'm more interested in what direction the show will take now than what actually happened in the episode. Most of what happened was by the numbers and fairly predictable, but what should've been a resonating and triumphant moment (Tandy and Tyrone combining their powers to save the day) was completely watered down by a crappy pop song. Aside from the occasional horrendous dialogue (such as Tandy saying "need" three or four times in 15 seconds), the overuse of pop songs has been the worst part of the show. I get the show's target audience is young adult, but godsdamn, the show needs a better music supervisor.

    While I liked Chantelle's recounting of New Orleans's history with sacrifice, the actual narration often felt trite and even condescending at times. Maybe it was just me, but it really rubbed me the wrong way. Nothing wrong the interludes themselves, but the execution was poor.

    I'm glad the Connors storyline came to close and he died by disappearing into Cloak, but I do wish he lived long enough to discover Brigid survived (to become Mayhem, who I never heard of until this show).

    I'm disappointed Tyrone's cloak was destroyed by the zombies and he had "resort" to his old hoodie. I guess the idea is he'll have to recreate the cloak, but it's still disappointing.

    Much like The Gifted, I see a lot of great potential in Cloak & Dagger, so I hope the production team learns from their mistakes this season and work towards making the show much better in season two.
     
    Turtletrekker likes this.
  16. Turtletrekker

    Turtletrekker Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Aug 23, 2003
    Location:
    Tacoma, Washington
     
  17. CorporalCaptain

    CorporalCaptain Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Feb 12, 2011
    Location:
    astral plane
    Doing any kind of cover of "Come Sail Away" wouldn't have been in my top ten thousand choices. In the overwhelming majority of shows, I find I need to overlook something.

    When comparing two shows, it comes down to an overall comparison. It's about which show is weighed down by its bad points less and lifted up by its good points more than the other.
     
  18. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    If the way that power works is anything like the comics, then Connors probably isn't dead -- he's just not currently in this plane of existence.
     
  19. The Nth Doctor

    The Nth Doctor Infinite Possibilities... Premium Member

    Joined:
    Jul 20, 2000
    Location:
    Lost in a temporal and spatial anomaly
    Ah, thanks for the clarification. I wasn't sure about the exact nature of that power (all I know of the characters are from the 90s trading cards and I'm working in memory) and I didn't have a chance to look it up.
     
  20. Reverend

    Reverend Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Jul 31, 2002
    Location:
    UK
    Yeah, that whole "literally explaining plot mechanics" to the audience bit gave me a very unpleasant 'Lady in the Water' vibe. And the "you must feel this now!" musical interludes are something too many shows (especially dramas about young people) have been using as a crutch for going on two decades now.

    It's a shame really, because other than that the show has a lot of potential. I'm honestly pleasantly surprised it's been as good as it has.

    I think they get to hang out in the Darkforce dimension. I mean I assume this is the same stuff featured on 'Agents of SHIELD' & 'Agent Carter' right?
    If so, kind of begs the question as to exactly why there's been a big chunk of Zero Matter sat under New Orleans. Though I think it's safe to say the presence of the Lightforce (is that what it's called?) is the only reason the whole planet hasn't been pulled into a singularity before now.