^ agreed. I don't dislike the show... but I can't say I like that much, either. It's....OK.
Spoilers The Gifted - Season 2
- Thread starter jmc247
- Start date
Kind of frustrating. The conclusion to last season, where Lorna and Marcos actually made choices was very dramatic. But now they've cheated to undo the drama. At the end, the Mutant Underground was on the ropes. Magically, it's back in business. And the Hellfire Club has been shut down completely! So, now, instead of the Mutant Underground coping with failure there's arbitrary nuttiness about Marcos and Caitlin finding people to do something unspecified. I mean, Marcos ditched Lorna, which was a huge deal. Now he's unditched her! Well technically, he could be plotting a custodial kidnapping, but the show doesn't seem to even remember Marcos rejected Lorna. Lauren even says Lorna left them, which isn't true. They rejected her.
There was a cast interview for season two, where Natalie Alyn Lind replied to a question about how the Struckers are doing without Andy, and she said they're much happier. Stephen Moyer chimed in that Percy Hynes White wasn't there because no one liked him. Aside from the hate for child actors this also reflects distaste for the character who is unrelievedly evil. This episode finishes the character off with the dream rape, which is of course to be read as absolute truth about the "real" character. I don't think it's helpful to blacken a character so ham-fistedly, which inspires resistance. I really dislike the show's insistence that those guys in the high school were right. But worse, it leaves Lauren's character in a void. She fears and hates Andy so why is she so dutifully looking for him? She doesn't want to be Fenris so why isn't she actively avoiding him? What does she want? I think the actress is naturally a little lost, left to be kind of expressionless, or with mystery faces where you can't even guess what she's feeling.
Reed's powers coming back because of the script is lame. His resistance to them coming back is lamer.
If John is doing the dishes, why does Blink interrupt him, then twit him about doing the dishes to get her in the mood? Is she trying to be passive aggressive?
A mental block preventing dilation is....words fail me. The clumsy announcements about how monstrously evil the Inner Circle, coming from a criminal doper? Oh my, they really are Blue State, just like the color coding in the PR.
There was a cast interview for season two, where Natalie Alyn Lind replied to a question about how the Struckers are doing without Andy, and she said they're much happier. Stephen Moyer chimed in that Percy Hynes White wasn't there because no one liked him. Aside from the hate for child actors this also reflects distaste for the character who is unrelievedly evil. This episode finishes the character off with the dream rape, which is of course to be read as absolute truth about the "real" character. I don't think it's helpful to blacken a character so ham-fistedly, which inspires resistance. I really dislike the show's insistence that those guys in the high school were right. But worse, it leaves Lauren's character in a void. She fears and hates Andy so why is she so dutifully looking for him? She doesn't want to be Fenris so why isn't she actively avoiding him? What does she want? I think the actress is naturally a little lost, left to be kind of expressionless, or with mystery faces where you can't even guess what she's feeling.
Reed's powers coming back because of the script is lame. His resistance to them coming back is lamer.
If John is doing the dishes, why does Blink interrupt him, then twit him about doing the dishes to get her in the mood? Is she trying to be passive aggressive?
A mental block preventing dilation is....words fail me. The clumsy announcements about how monstrously evil the Inner Circle, coming from a criminal doper? Oh my, they really are Blue State, just like the color coding in the PR.
A fair premiere, but nothing spectacular. Although the birth scene had some nice special effects with it.
Why did they immediately stop driving the cars when the power went out? Why not at least keep driving straight and see if you spot anything out of the ordinary?
The dream sequence Andy seemed to be the opposite of the real Andy we saw in this epsiode. He was nothing but helpful and caring in real life. Which was then made doubly strange when you realize that we got a warning from Lorna to him about Reeva and the Stepfords possibly doing something unhelpful towards the baby, but then when it came time to act they acted completely positively as well, only trying to help Lorna.
I guess I'll simply assume that that was a warning that will bear fruit in a future episode, sorta like that Blink/contact lenses thing mentioned previously.
Anyone else like how usually there was only one Stepford on screen, and then occasionally we'd get a wider camera shot that showed all 3 of them were there, but then we'd cut back to a shot with just one of them on screen?
Anyways, as many have said, no one is calling this show perfect, but I certainly intend to keep watching. This episode was mostly just a set up to get everyone in place for season 2, so I guess we'll see where it all goes from here.
Why did they immediately stop driving the cars when the power went out? Why not at least keep driving straight and see if you spot anything out of the ordinary?
The dream sequence Andy seemed to be the opposite of the real Andy we saw in this epsiode. He was nothing but helpful and caring in real life. Which was then made doubly strange when you realize that we got a warning from Lorna to him about Reeva and the Stepfords possibly doing something unhelpful towards the baby, but then when it came time to act they acted completely positively as well, only trying to help Lorna.
I guess I'll simply assume that that was a warning that will bear fruit in a future episode, sorta like that Blink/contact lenses thing mentioned previously.
Anyone else like how usually there was only one Stepford on screen, and then occasionally we'd get a wider camera shot that showed all 3 of them were there, but then we'd cut back to a shot with just one of them on screen?
Anyways, as many have said, no one is calling this show perfect, but I certainly intend to keep watching. This episode was mostly just a set up to get everyone in place for season 2, so I guess we'll see where it all goes from here.
Presumably because the electromagnetic pulse shut down the cars' electrical systems along with everything else. At least that was the way it seemed to me.
I didn't specifically notice that, but it fits with the tricks I saw them use last season to save money on tripling effects (e.g. showing the three of them with their faces out of focus until there was just one in the frame).
Also, I was glad that Agent Turner wasn't in the episode. Not because I dislike him, but because it would have been too much to say that "oh yeah, along with everyone else, Agent Turner is also randomly in Washington DC now too."
At least this way, we can now see that there's a reason he's chasing them to DC. (Because of some actions we'll actually see onscreen.)
PS. They're still shooting in Atlanta, right? Just pretending it's DC?
At least this way, we can now see that there's a reason he's chasing them to DC. (Because of some actions we'll actually see onscreen.)
PS. They're still shooting in Atlanta, right? Just pretending it's DC?
Bumping for comments on second episode...Apparently the consensus is Legion was good so this show has to be unwatched. But I did anyhow, for for what it's worth...
Nobody sighted in North Carolina attacking the Humanity Today summit and assassinating a Senator (and the real target, Campbell,) is thought to be dead in a mysterious explosion in Atlanta. The catastrophe was in North Carolina, if you believe killing a Senator is unforgivable. But the red state team thinks the Hounds/Hound pair getting killed was unforgivable, just like killing guards to rescue the group at Trask was unforgivable, so they talk about "Atlanta."
It seems we are to think the Hound program never existed and nobody saved anyone by stopping it. Lauren’s idea that she took the Hounds away from their families borders on the offensive, like her forgetting Cristina’s parents were killed two days before. A six month time jump so they can gloss over the absurdity of their comeback still takes a toll on the internal coherence of the story.
Lauren would rather throw herself off a building to avoid a Fate Worse Than Death. Of course Andy’s innate vileness won’t let him see what’s wrong with raping his sister. To emphasize the point that Andy is contemptible, we get to laugh at him running into a wall....twice. Good times!
Reeva knows the Struckers are like a set of dueling pistols: The complete set is much much more valuable. And it’s still true that Strucker mutation is dominant, and even an otherwise useless Andy can breed soldiers. And it’s especially true that killing your allies is no way to win loyalty. The subplot about killing Andy was about blackening Reeva’s character at the expense of making the character stupid. And about Andy telling the Inner Circle where the DC Mutant Underground is. Even a monster like Reeva can feign humanity when given a treat like that. There was by the no way no training for the whole six months because Andy is a minor character who doesn't exist when off screen, just like Bulk and Fade.
The chances that a lawyer cured John’s drug addiction by chaining him to a bed range from zero to none, as the cliche has it. Dreamer no doubt helped him, except the show is building up Blink, so Dreamer’s disappeared from his biography. Bathroom sex because they imagine him chained to a bed? Oh, yeah, they’re really into Blink. John is of course an ineffective leader. In one way it’s not his fault, because the Mutant Underground strategy of keeping your head down and occasionally serving up the corpse of a militant is doomed to failure. Attrition by the remorseless grind of uncontrolled events guarantees it.
Marcos had a lovely moment but the truth still is that he ditched Lorna over politics. Campbell's life was more important than his love.
"Suppress and repress! That's the Strucker way!" Oh, yes. And it's not just Reed, it's Lauren too. What does it mean to her when Andy comes home? How could Reed and Caitlin possibly have any idea? Worse, the audience hasn't a clue either. You have to feel sorry for Natalie Alyn Lind, how can she act the character when it's impossible to tell what she wants or feels. On the rare occasions when something comprehensible comes up, like Lauren's terror at being touched by her perv brother, she seems to do OK.
Jamie Chung, bless her heart. When she complained about worse than wearing heels, it seemed like she was struggling with the weight of the anvil. The season publicity mentioned a secret. Given the character's in-universe, bio, a fifteen year old runaway from a happy home*, the most plausible secret would be a child given up for adoption.
*But totally different from Andy Strucker, who did something terrible for bad motives, while Clarice Fong did it to fulfill herself.
Nobody sighted in North Carolina attacking the Humanity Today summit and assassinating a Senator (and the real target, Campbell,) is thought to be dead in a mysterious explosion in Atlanta. The catastrophe was in North Carolina, if you believe killing a Senator is unforgivable. But the red state team thinks the Hounds/Hound pair getting killed was unforgivable, just like killing guards to rescue the group at Trask was unforgivable, so they talk about "Atlanta."
It seems we are to think the Hound program never existed and nobody saved anyone by stopping it. Lauren’s idea that she took the Hounds away from their families borders on the offensive, like her forgetting Cristina’s parents were killed two days before. A six month time jump so they can gloss over the absurdity of their comeback still takes a toll on the internal coherence of the story.
Lauren would rather throw herself off a building to avoid a Fate Worse Than Death. Of course Andy’s innate vileness won’t let him see what’s wrong with raping his sister. To emphasize the point that Andy is contemptible, we get to laugh at him running into a wall....twice. Good times!
Reeva knows the Struckers are like a set of dueling pistols: The complete set is much much more valuable. And it’s still true that Strucker mutation is dominant, and even an otherwise useless Andy can breed soldiers. And it’s especially true that killing your allies is no way to win loyalty. The subplot about killing Andy was about blackening Reeva’s character at the expense of making the character stupid. And about Andy telling the Inner Circle where the DC Mutant Underground is. Even a monster like Reeva can feign humanity when given a treat like that. There was by the no way no training for the whole six months because Andy is a minor character who doesn't exist when off screen, just like Bulk and Fade.
The chances that a lawyer cured John’s drug addiction by chaining him to a bed range from zero to none, as the cliche has it. Dreamer no doubt helped him, except the show is building up Blink, so Dreamer’s disappeared from his biography. Bathroom sex because they imagine him chained to a bed? Oh, yeah, they’re really into Blink. John is of course an ineffective leader. In one way it’s not his fault, because the Mutant Underground strategy of keeping your head down and occasionally serving up the corpse of a militant is doomed to failure. Attrition by the remorseless grind of uncontrolled events guarantees it.
Marcos had a lovely moment but the truth still is that he ditched Lorna over politics. Campbell's life was more important than his love.
"Suppress and repress! That's the Strucker way!" Oh, yes. And it's not just Reed, it's Lauren too. What does it mean to her when Andy comes home? How could Reed and Caitlin possibly have any idea? Worse, the audience hasn't a clue either. You have to feel sorry for Natalie Alyn Lind, how can she act the character when it's impossible to tell what she wants or feels. On the rare occasions when something comprehensible comes up, like Lauren's terror at being touched by her perv brother, she seems to do OK.
Jamie Chung, bless her heart. When she complained about worse than wearing heels, it seemed like she was struggling with the weight of the anvil. The season publicity mentioned a secret. Given the character's in-universe, bio, a fifteen year old runaway from a happy home*, the most plausible secret would be a child given up for adoption.
*But totally different from Andy Strucker, who did something terrible for bad motives, while Clarice Fong did it to fulfill herself.
Second episode is about the same as the first. Decent enough but not entirely special, complete with obligatory pop song montage to close out the episode (between this show and Cloak and Dagger, I'm very much tired of that trope).
Stephen Moyer's acting was particularly bad this episode but fortunately his role was limited, but with his powers continuing to manifest as they are now doing, that won't last long.
Reeva taking Andy under his wing is a nice development, even if she was literally a breath a way from killing him. I'm curious to see more of that relationship. Between that and the quiet rumblings of discontent between the Frost triplets (there might still be some good in "soft" Esme), I'm finding myself enjoying the Inner Circle characters much more than the Mutant Underground characters.
Stephen Moyer's acting was particularly bad this episode but fortunately his role was limited, but with his powers continuing to manifest as they are now doing, that won't last long.
Reeva taking Andy under his wing is a nice development, even if she was literally a breath a way from killing him. I'm curious to see more of that relationship. Between that and the quiet rumblings of discontent between the Frost triplets (there might still be some good in "soft" Esme), I'm finding myself enjoying the Inner Circle characters much more than the Mutant Underground characters.
I've been tired of it for a couple of decades.
Yeah, it has been going on for a long time, hasn't it? I guess it hasn't bothered me as much because it didn't happen so much with the shows I watched. And really, the only reason I watch those particular two shows are because of the Marvel connections.
Since he didn't see Sonya's death, it didn't seem like it was his flashback, not even as I saw it.
tl;dr...
Besides, his grief over Sonya's rage never kept him from wanting to save her murderer's life, even if it meant rejecting Polaris. (Nor did his grief for his best friend Pulse keep him from wanting to save the man who brainwashed Gus and addicted him.) Strangely, the flashback also puts Polaris' undermining his leadership by staging a walkout on par with Sonya's death.They didn't show John reacting to the news from Clarice, or in fact any reaction whatsoever, to the actual events. it might have been unpleasantly human of him to show he couldn't help but wonder why Clarice wasn't the one bravely defying Campbell, or asking Lauren why she didn't save Sonya to begin with. Something like that would be "flawed," in the true, unpopular sense of the word. At any rate, Jamie Chung is the lead, Elena Satine was a mere recurring. Dreamer had to go, and her passing had to leave no sore spots, much less scars. Clarice therefore is the true love
Bumping for a comment on last night's new episode....
I’ll have to rewatch, but the cold open seemed to me to hint Marcos murdered his father. At the beginning it was clearly played like a narco making a hit on an enemy. The thing is, I think the cold open was supposed to be all about justifying Marcos’ violence in his custody dispute with Lorna. As near as I can tell, child custody issues are the real bone and muscle of MRA, so this is a delicate point for those paying attention.
The #MeToo moment for Lauren was quite topical, and rather more interesting than anything with Reed’s powers. (It is now official, his powers are back because last season is being retconned shamelessly.) The show is furious at Bryan Singer, so this is an ostentatious commitment, just like the huge girl power motif. Agency as heroism, much less liberation, is for me rather less convincing than the show thinks.
Reeva’s continued efforts to commit Andy to the cause would be more interesting if the show weren’t determined to make Andy too useless for his commitment to matter. But in my opinion it’s still vastly more interesting than Blink’s* loony attraction to people hiding in sewers because they think that’s being open and free. The Morlocks are indeed the real Mutant Underground. They expose the underground's commitment to failure and ignominy.
*PS They could have made something of Clarice's reaction when John told her the default plan was to kill Lorna, and his fears that he couldn't bring himself to do the right thing. The character was apologetic and sympathetic, instead of having an opinion of her own. I guess that's what this show thinks is cool.
I’ll have to rewatch, but the cold open seemed to me to hint Marcos murdered his father. At the beginning it was clearly played like a narco making a hit on an enemy. The thing is, I think the cold open was supposed to be all about justifying Marcos’ violence in his custody dispute with Lorna. As near as I can tell, child custody issues are the real bone and muscle of MRA, so this is a delicate point for those paying attention.
The #MeToo moment for Lauren was quite topical, and rather more interesting than anything with Reed’s powers. (It is now official, his powers are back because last season is being retconned shamelessly.) The show is furious at Bryan Singer, so this is an ostentatious commitment, just like the huge girl power motif. Agency as heroism, much less liberation, is for me rather less convincing than the show thinks.
Reeva’s continued efforts to commit Andy to the cause would be more interesting if the show weren’t determined to make Andy too useless for his commitment to matter. But in my opinion it’s still vastly more interesting than Blink’s* loony attraction to people hiding in sewers because they think that’s being open and free. The Morlocks are indeed the real Mutant Underground. They expose the underground's commitment to failure and ignominy.
*PS They could have made something of Clarice's reaction when John told her the default plan was to kill Lorna, and his fears that he couldn't bring himself to do the right thing. The character was apologetic and sympathetic, instead of having an opinion of her own. I guess that's what this show thinks is cool.
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I'm out.
The show is at its best when the action is driving the soap and not the other way around. The past few episodes tried to use the soap rather then the schism to drive the story and that was a mistake. It looks like the episode tonight may be a real course correction based on the preview and early reviews.
Speaking of Marcos' father, the X-Men films have been consistent on having the X-gene passed down via the father as opposed to the mother. But we find out that Marcos' mother was a mutant and his father refers to his "demon powers". So if this implies Marcos' father is not a mutant, is The Gifted diverging from the established rules of the X-Men filmverse on this point? Are the showrunners even aware of such a thing? Or could we assume that Marcos' father is in fact also some kind of mutant or mutant gene carrier, just not one with a healing factor?
I didn't care for this one. I am so sick of torture as a plot device, even when it's to show how bad it is and how dark the heroes have gotten. Even those stories still tend to perpetuate the assumption that torture actually works to extract information or cooperation, which it really doesn't. It was particularly stupid here, with Caitlin putting the guy into withdrawal and then getting him high to get his help at a highly complex and delicate hacking operation. That shouldn't work! Making him that physically and mentally impaired would not be a productive thing in such circumstances. And the supposed good guys didn't even try to offer any kind of positive incentive or win his trust before jumping right to threats and intimidation.
Then we have Reed falling back on self-medication to try to suppress his powers (and the very contrived way the script had John specifically mention that option to him while trying to talk him out of it) and Agent Turner following a predictable path toward joining the anti-mutant hate group -- and making an unbelievably abrupt leap from rejecting their invitation to accepting it. Too many of the character arcs are going in directions that are both unpleasant and cliched as hell.
It's weird that we saw so little of the Inner Circle, with the POV remaining almost entirely with the Underground. I guess that's to conceal whoever it is the IC broke out of the hospital.
Then we have Reed falling back on self-medication to try to suppress his powers (and the very contrived way the script had John specifically mention that option to him while trying to talk him out of it) and Agent Turner following a predictable path toward joining the anti-mutant hate group -- and making an unbelievably abrupt leap from rejecting their invitation to accepting it. Too many of the character arcs are going in directions that are both unpleasant and cliched as hell.
It's weird that we saw so little of the Inner Circle, with the POV remaining almost entirely with the Underground. I guess that's to conceal whoever it is the IC broke out of the hospital.
I have to agree: Caitlin putting Wire's brother through withdrawal and then getting him high again just for the sake of maybe getting her son back (who doesn't want to come back and she knows it but is in denial) goes too far for me and makes Caitlin look really bad. She's that willing to throw out her Hippocratic Oath for her son?
I don't know if it's actually gotten worse or my tolerance has completely disappeared but the dialogue in the last two episodes has been absolutely awful. "Wow, that's kind of dark." UGH. Granted the seasons are shorter, but at least my biggest issue with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (i.e. the dialogue) was largely fixed by its second season, but it seems like it's only gotten worse here.
Between the poor dialogue, the bad acting (Blair Redford and Stephen Moyer are especially bad), and the far too many clichés (some of which Christopher covered), I'm pretty close to bailing. The episode cliffhanger on who the Inner Circle rescued and the rising possibly of open conflict between mutants and non-mutants are just about the only things getting me to return and that's not going to be enough for long. I just don't see The Gifted having some kind of paradigm shift like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. did to keep me interested (and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. only had that because it was deliberately holding back on the HYDRA plotline).
I don't know if it's actually gotten worse or my tolerance has completely disappeared but the dialogue in the last two episodes has been absolutely awful. "Wow, that's kind of dark." UGH. Granted the seasons are shorter, but at least my biggest issue with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (i.e. the dialogue) was largely fixed by its second season, but it seems like it's only gotten worse here.
Between the poor dialogue, the bad acting (Blair Redford and Stephen Moyer are especially bad), and the far too many clichés (some of which Christopher covered), I'm pretty close to bailing. The episode cliffhanger on who the Inner Circle rescued and the rising possibly of open conflict between mutants and non-mutants are just about the only things getting me to return and that's not going to be enough for long. I just don't see The Gifted having some kind of paradigm shift like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. did to keep me interested (and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. only had that because it was deliberately holding back on the HYDRA plotline).
That was exactly the only thing I liked about this episode. I enjoyed seeing the narrative deliberately being curtailed to just the Underground's perspective and not just so we don't know who they rescued. It's a nice storytelling trick, but obviously it's not one they should do often for an ensemble show.
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