tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-66784814789941912442024-03-14T02:13:34.710-04:00Just About WriteIt's not wrong -- it's just about write.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2509125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-79274057895834204002023-12-30T08:00:00.203-05:002023-12-30T08:00:00.146-05:00Jenn’s Pick: My 15 Favorite TV Shows in 2023 [Contributor: Jenn]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOL3uJQtM39frPc-N23l4ZZmC2m9QNOxhTv5-m2SgyoK0ld9_hbNsbczYbDt0PbfY2QJX5V2x0djfItrm5yRElEJo0ZLfqhhu_dJQpo-Har3_L57ZaCpIHNrSZd3JK4QLI_JcbhauREXEVn7YEUD2uP1Xg5ChsCqbxRWOxgZkF85ErYQotjHj36ED_qS22/s800/2023.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="569" data-original-width="800" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOL3uJQtM39frPc-N23l4ZZmC2m9QNOxhTv5-m2SgyoK0ld9_hbNsbczYbDt0PbfY2QJX5V2x0djfItrm5yRElEJo0ZLfqhhu_dJQpo-Har3_L57ZaCpIHNrSZd3JK4QLI_JcbhauREXEVn7YEUD2uP1Xg5ChsCqbxRWOxgZkF85ErYQotjHj36ED_qS22/s320/2023.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><p>The end of the year is always the perfect opportunity to reflect on lots of things — achievements, goals, heartbreaks, dreams... and all of the media you consumed! As someone who watches a whole lot of television, this year I thought I would sit down and write about some of my favorite shows from 2023. </p><p>They’re in no particular order, and you’ll notice an array of genres here but they all have one thing in common: they captivated me, made me feel something deeply, and also entertained me. And in (another) year of chaos and darkness, that’s exactly what I want out of my media.</p><p><i>Spoilers for these series will be included below so read at your own risk!</i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP1Ngg-Z4_7Zl1vMU7HBubdZp3bv_wJyGBoMjrF3r7SJVNCizLPVoig3y2pa_wyD7jTbIoleGHRICBQIpKAppN1r82Sx8vIeAqcNBb848-PpLJWTPg2hOEQh6nvenDthvo02uUyn9CY2pcDeuDlTK9nvkOZcBt5vIu6S5K_RHEDRkq8rTh1rrtbuRYMXn5/s1296/pedro-pascal-bella-ramsey_0-H-2023.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="730" data-original-width="1296" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP1Ngg-Z4_7Zl1vMU7HBubdZp3bv_wJyGBoMjrF3r7SJVNCizLPVoig3y2pa_wyD7jTbIoleGHRICBQIpKAppN1r82Sx8vIeAqcNBb848-PpLJWTPg2hOEQh6nvenDthvo02uUyn9CY2pcDeuDlTK9nvkOZcBt5vIu6S5K_RHEDRkq8rTh1rrtbuRYMXn5/s320/pedro-pascal-bella-ramsey_0-H-2023.webp" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>The Last of Us</i> (HBO Max)</h3><p>I’d stayed away from watching <i>The Last of Us </i>live on HBO Max for a few reasons: one is that I wanted to see if the show lived up to the hype by the end of the season (because adaptations of things don’t always) and the second is that I wanted to see if I could handle any of the gore or jumpscares the show had in store for me. And after hearing unanimous, effusive praise for “Long, Long Time,” I knew I’d eventually check out the series.</p><p>So this summer I sat down to binge watch it and quickly realized that while the series is incredible, it’s one that I had to pace myself for. Make no mistake: <i>The Last of Us</i> is definitely worth the hype (see: it being on nearly every “best of” list this year) but it is dark. It, after all, is set in the midst of a post-apocalyptic world. </p><p>But the storyline is captivating. Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey are truly incredible, versatile actors — equally at home conveying their characters’ pains as they do their comedic charms and witty banter. Pedro expertly conveys the reluctance of a man who has lost so much to get emotionally attached to anyone or anything. And Bella’s portrayal of Ellie as a young person grappling with trauma (Bella’s performance in “When We Are In Need” in particular is award-worthy) and also wanting love, acceptance, and friendship like any teenager is so compelling. Together, they represent everything you could want from co-leads of a series.</p><p>The show tackles everything you’d expect it to: grief, morality, love, survival, and found family. If you haven’t yet watched <i>The Last of Us</i>, I highly recommend doing so as soon as possible. You won’t regret it!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1O9cXBzIxHlX5kgNyubQ_Fil9lXrCUjpHbKs51GnmFs2NcjVIWrmpUNL23hkpYfXnQ3FFZ4Sz-TnVvRsqx05jBW8zMsxucOSrMxN3BMA2-hGCzOOhM22PKdoqCRmNSiKeV4iB_ir3zkv4x-vodBsoRAtaihHHYwEaLodC_L61r9j2HVxYHOJSEPCje2Hy/s2000/starstruck.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1O9cXBzIxHlX5kgNyubQ_Fil9lXrCUjpHbKs51GnmFs2NcjVIWrmpUNL23hkpYfXnQ3FFZ4Sz-TnVvRsqx05jBW8zMsxucOSrMxN3BMA2-hGCzOOhM22PKdoqCRmNSiKeV4iB_ir3zkv4x-vodBsoRAtaihHHYwEaLodC_L61r9j2HVxYHOJSEPCje2Hy/s320/starstruck.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Starstruck</i> (HBO Max)</h3><p>Rose Matafeo’s hilarious rom-com, <i>Starstruck</i>, came back this year. While <i>Starstruck </i>strayed more into somber themes in its third season, it remained one of the most charming shows on television that not enough people are watching and/or talking about online. The series begins with a normal woman named Jessie (played by Rose Matafeo) meeting and sleeping with a famous actor named Tom (Nikesh Patel) on New Year’s Eve. The rest of the show has depicted the highs and lows of their relationship across various holidays, and the newest season is no exception. </p><p>Even though I cried at the season three finale, the new season has no shortage of laughs either. Most importantly, watching Jessie’s trajectory has been so rewarding. Rose is an incredible comedic actress but she’s also so powerful this season whenever she is doing dramatic scenes — whether confronting love, loss, or failed expectations in herself, her relationships, and her friendships. The season specifically feels especially relatable as Jessie watches the people she loves most slip into new phases of their lives with seeming ease, and they appear to be growing away from her. Nikesh Patel continues to be such a great romantic lead too, balancing subtle humor and genuinely heartbreaking moments this season alongside her.</p><p>Literally the only complaint I ever have about <i>Starstruck</i> is that it’s too short. And as the show seems to be winding down (cue me crying), I’m more confident than ever that it will continue to be a frequent comfort rewatch for me.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI9I2AYyHJSoBYPv3TFJtmDaNRWors58hsQ0KDRJ9YkiaWZHI05ANTuX0t6nK0U9KBPldCxCXLFZE7UO5QTeErw_konGM4BlCNqkrgTuAaVChslCEXBHD2-9Sc-sKWNMCX5ADwyf94j2R5Nf-7NZ2mUeb79uKxLF0ic-GP-WlAvwFoewcEIxpdgUf10EjF/s2000/good%20omens%20season%202.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI9I2AYyHJSoBYPv3TFJtmDaNRWors58hsQ0KDRJ9YkiaWZHI05ANTuX0t6nK0U9KBPldCxCXLFZE7UO5QTeErw_konGM4BlCNqkrgTuAaVChslCEXBHD2-9Sc-sKWNMCX5ADwyf94j2R5Nf-7NZ2mUeb79uKxLF0ic-GP-WlAvwFoewcEIxpdgUf10EjF/s320/good%20omens%20season%202.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Good Omens</i> (Amazon Prime)</h3><p>When it was announced that <i>Good Omens</i> was coming back for a second season, I knew I would need to rewatch season one because anything that aired before the pandemic has essentially evaporated from my brain. <i>Good Omens</i> debuted in 2019 and it came back this year — stronger than ever, in my personal opinion.</p><p>The show is based on the novel of the same name in which an angel named Aziraphale (Michael Sheen) and a demon named Crowley (David Tennant), who have been longtime friends and allies, try to stop the apocalypse from happening. But the second season gives us a stronger, deeper — and more romantic — connection between these two characters as they try to keep Archangel Michael (Jon Hamm) away from both heaven and hell. </p><p>I really love <i>Good Omens</i>; it’s a wild, weird little series that hinges on the fantastic chemistry between David and Michael. The world around them is fantastical, but the connection between Aziraphale and Crowley is about as true and grounded as it gets. </p><p>It’s so heartbreaking to watch the end of the season after all of the growth that Crowley had, but at the same time I really love the depth and complexity of their relationship, which is really what makes this series as compelling as it is. Crowley is ready to break ties with hell and the other demons to be with Aziraphale, but Aziraphale can’t do the same thing. He believes the whole spiritual realm system can be improved if he is reinstated as an angel in heaven, while Crowley is not optimistic. The themes of religion and morality run deep in <i>Good Omens</i>, and the way the series depicts struggles with faith, free will, and love is so great.</p><p>With the news that <i>Good Omens</i> has been renewed for a third and final season, it’s time for you all to watch it if you haven’t yet!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ-hdtYeFfqnmbCgMCX4A0ElL5odapKudDWhXiA9m9onMUI43GJ9ML6VVyV-ZoKY3naalelGN7EWtgDEzlgKiGy3FvV0L9HhRgtKwXUwyxQDYxppPLljmRyQdwTx7khIdbEaFsEmbCpyixh1y_SLOWMWeC004kkdWqav7YmVWutGDe6PvwvLAo6Qk1NabZ/s1200/who%202023.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ-hdtYeFfqnmbCgMCX4A0ElL5odapKudDWhXiA9m9onMUI43GJ9ML6VVyV-ZoKY3naalelGN7EWtgDEzlgKiGy3FvV0L9HhRgtKwXUwyxQDYxppPLljmRyQdwTx7khIdbEaFsEmbCpyixh1y_SLOWMWeC004kkdWqav7YmVWutGDe6PvwvLAo6Qk1NabZ/s320/who%202023.webp" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Doctor Who</i> (Disney+)</h3><p>I’ve been a fan of <i>Doctor Who </i>for so many years. In fact, a long-standing tradition with my best friend has been to watch the show together every Christmas Day whenever the new holiday special drops. So imagine my joy when the show returned and, most excitingly, on a streaming service I already had! A minor qualm of my <i>Doctor Who</i>-watching days has been that I could not keep up with the series simply because it aired on BBC America and I cut the ties with cable TV years ago. An unfortunate consequence of the show not being available to (easily) watch weekly for me was that I missed out on part of Thirteen’s (Jodie Whittaker) era. </p><p>So when her regeneration dropped online and it revealed the return of David Tennant, I was surprised. And then when it was revealed that Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) would be returning alongside David for a few specials, I was overjoyed. Ten/Donna’s dynamic was one of the most lovely ones — they had an incredible friendship and comedic rapport — but also Donna’s exit was, arguably, one of the series’ most heartbreaking.</p><p><i>Doctor Who</i> returned with three specials (all of which were stellar, navigating <i>Doctor Who</i> lore and also giving us some new twists and old villains) leading up to our new Fifteenth Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) this year. It was such a joy and delight to see David and Catherine return to <i>Doctor Who</i>, specifically because their chemistry is so strong, whether they are bantering or having a gut-wrenching moment of honesty between them. But perhaps the most satisfying was how the specials wrapped up the Fourteenth Doctor’s journey: he is able to find freedom from all of the darkness and trauma that has happened to him since the last time we saw The Doctor with David Tennant’s face. Ultimately this leads to a bi-generation where a more emotionally-evolved Fifteenth Doctor splits from Fourteen and continues their journey throughout time and space.</p><p>The return of Ncuti in this year’s Christmas special, “The Church on Ruby Road,” that kicks off his new era really proved how great he is going to be as The Doctor. He is hilarious (leaping along the rooftop, singing an improvised verse or two to the Goblin King, defending the new sonic, etc.) and also heartbreaking (anyone else tear up when Fifteen listened to Ruby (Millie Gibson) talk about family and adoption?). There is so much promise with this new era of <i>Doctor Who</i> and I cannot wait to see all of the adventures that The Doctor gets up to in 2024.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Kq3xlmVxZDT4xF4Nx5SkMD1aUXD-J6lE3qyUVH_i6U4sQlcQYEW4UDvc685ZoRT2T7P-SPqSyiPqzx6UA8p1pl3kZAtVI0fbvHsjjvrWwFsOKwxLFmv3PT65D4U8qcZgyME-WukwYFgbzcHghk0oYp5UOljip2y7SuU2bqEnbCV_zYEJOZJ21zrpQX62/s1920/schmigadoon.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Kq3xlmVxZDT4xF4Nx5SkMD1aUXD-J6lE3qyUVH_i6U4sQlcQYEW4UDvc685ZoRT2T7P-SPqSyiPqzx6UA8p1pl3kZAtVI0fbvHsjjvrWwFsOKwxLFmv3PT65D4U8qcZgyME-WukwYFgbzcHghk0oYp5UOljip2y7SuU2bqEnbCV_zYEJOZJ21zrpQX62/s320/schmigadoon.webp" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Schmigadoon!</i> (Apple TV+)</h3><p>It’s no surprise to anyone who knows me that I love musical theatre. So when <i>Schmigadoon! </i>premiered in 2021, I was enamored by the cleverly-written, tongue-in-cheek Apple TV+ show that referenced classic musicals (and parodied them/their archetypical characters). And when I heard the show was coming back with “Schmicago,” I was even more excited. The show’s plot in the first season was about two doctors — Melissa (Cecily Strong) and Josh (Keegan-Michael Key) — who were struggling in their relationship and stumbled upon a magical, musical town called Schmigadoon. There, they met an array of characters, eventually rekindled their romance, and left. </p><p>In season two, Melissa and Josh are struggling again. But this time, their relationship is solid — it’s the rest of their life that has begun to feel mundane. Additionally, the couple is struggling to have a child. So they decide to embark on an adventure to find the quaint little town of Schmigadoon which they know will make them feel hopeful again. Unfortunately, Schmigadoon is gone and in its place is Schmicago — a nod to a darker, grittier period of musicals. Melissa and Josh must now adjust to a new town with familiar faces (since the actors from season one all mostly return to play new characters in season two) and try to solve a murder.</p><p><i>Schmigadoon!</i> is worth watching for so many reasons: the cast is immensely talented (in addition to Cecily and Keegan, the series also stars Dove Cameron, Aaron Tveit, Ariana DeBose, Jane Krakowski, Kristin Chenoweth, Alan Cumming, etc.), and we get the new additions of Tituss Burgess and Patrick Page in the second season too. The musical theatre homages are fantastic and funny — season two features parodies of <i>Chicago</i>, <i>Sweeney Todd</i>, <i>Hair</i>, and more. And the songs are incredibly catchy too!</p><p>If you love musical theatre and are looking for a comedy series to immerse yourself in, then <i>Schmigadoon!</i> is right up your alley.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrKNmnt1r65zy3qPGxWxnZt1yI38-I3I0VnflLM06d5_f7Pa1WDU4hxYEOTT819oicipJ6s00Jo7E139AhPKJhtEkhDlJ2GxTL4rVuo5TcEf55PWVtTKUr5ZS5wf-FfcQHYNS6mtAEHyAIM-e8NcbGESJAiJ_KUqtfUe0VOlDSIhI42N1yr0l_-ZBS8Il9/s980/shrinking.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="552" data-original-width="980" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrKNmnt1r65zy3qPGxWxnZt1yI38-I3I0VnflLM06d5_f7Pa1WDU4hxYEOTT819oicipJ6s00Jo7E139AhPKJhtEkhDlJ2GxTL4rVuo5TcEf55PWVtTKUr5ZS5wf-FfcQHYNS6mtAEHyAIM-e8NcbGESJAiJ_KUqtfUe0VOlDSIhI42N1yr0l_-ZBS8Il9/s320/shrinking.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Shrinking</i> (Apple TV+)</h3><p>Are you looking for a series from Bill Lawrence, Brett Goldstein, and Jason Segel that is equal parts funny and heart-wrenching and also stars Harrison Ford as a curmudgeonly mentor? Then <i>Shrinking</i> is the show for you! Jason Segel plays Jimmy, a therapist who recently lost his wife and is struggling — both as a therapist and as a dad to his teenage daughter, Alice (Lukita Maxwell). In a pretty dramatic move, Jimmy decides to tell his clients what he actually thinks instead of merely listening to their issues or approaching them in ethical, compassionate ways. This radical development is meant to unnerve us. And that’s what I love about <i>Shrinking</i> so far — the characters are complex and you don’t always root for Jimmy. He’s messy and trying to shove the pain and grief he’s feeling away. It’s hurting his daughter and his relationships with others. And Jason Segel is a perfect choice to play this immensely complex character, as someone who is equally at home with shenanigans but also can really deliver a dramatic moment with simplicity and gravitas.</p><p>Additionally, it wouldn’t be a Bill Lawrence show without the hilarious and talented Christa Miller as Jimmy’s neighbor and Alice’s pseudo-guardian. Christa’s dynamic with everyone in the cast is just perfect, and her storyline with Harrison Ford in one particular episode is hilarious. Jessica Williams is, however, my favorite performer in the show — witty, sharp, and deftly navigating both drama and comedy, Jessica is <i>Shrinking</i>’s MVP and if it were up to me, she would win Best Supporting Actress awards.</p><p>The writing of the series is stellar, weaving together humor and tragedy — all while able to find the humanity within each character and situation. The show has a bit more bite than <i>Ted Lasso</i> does, as the main character is supposed to be far less likable than Ted, but it’s also what makes <i>Shrinking</i> stand out. I kind of like when shows give us characters we do not want to root for at the beginning and, by the end, we see a little bit of growth. Plus, the final moments of the <i>Shrinking</i> finale deliver a jaw-dropping twist and I am really interested to see how it is handled in season two.</p><p>If you’re able to emotionally handle a show about grief and all its messiness, be sure to check out <i>Shrinking</i> on Apple TV+.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRubIgsf6HN-oMAWNGPXcmRRwixSXE3nnXGBQqy3BcY6sJRyPDZn-LMc3gr7cVVHOQtl3NP560Xf0bkUAdX2ywMk8cyrmGy8ezPM_B8QO9GavQ1Ghrc1M1osDjVlmxY16WEwI97bZmzsbJPl6cxYLAO6suGhlC3KWPNtBHOrYcL1mYzz07mSjIK-qtXOea/s1080/mrs%20davis.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1080" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRubIgsf6HN-oMAWNGPXcmRRwixSXE3nnXGBQqy3BcY6sJRyPDZn-LMc3gr7cVVHOQtl3NP560Xf0bkUAdX2ywMk8cyrmGy8ezPM_B8QO9GavQ1Ghrc1M1osDjVlmxY16WEwI97bZmzsbJPl6cxYLAO6suGhlC3KWPNtBHOrYcL1mYzz07mSjIK-qtXOea/s320/mrs%20davis.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Mrs. Davis</i> (Peacock)</h3><p>If someone were to ask me how to summarize <i>Mrs. Davis</i>, I wouldn’t quite know how without spoiling the show for them. So instead, I’ve told people: “It’s the wildest, most absurd, wonderful show you’ll watch this year.” The Peacock series stars Betty Gilpin as a nun named Simone who’s determined to destroy the A.I. interface (Mrs. Davis) that has taken over the world, and is tasked with locating The Holy Grail in order to complete this mission. In the process, she reconnects with her ex-boyfriend Wiley (Jake McDorman) who has been helping lead a resistance against Mrs. Davis. I won’t say more about the show’s plot for risk of spoiling some of the best TV twists this year, but suffice it to say that <i>Mrs. Davis</i> was an incredible series that tackled all kinds of topics — faith, love, trauma, our life’s purpose, family — in fresh ways.</p><p>And while the writing was fantastic, this show would not have worked without Betty Gilpin leading it. She is so compelling to watch — hilarious (see: her delivery of a specific plot twist in the finale) and nuanced, she embodied all of the complexities that made Simone who she was. Whether Simone was grappling with her evolving faith, her relationship with her mother, her dynamic with Wiley, or her complex feelings about Mrs. Davis, Betty truly made you feel all of the emotions in a scene. She deserves all of the accolades for the way she led this show with such force, always able to find exactly the right way to emotionally compel us. Jake McDorman too is such a great actor — he deserves to be in more things, honestly, and I am always rooting for that — and he and Betty had such delightful chemistry and rapport. Jake is hilarious (please go watch the tragically cancelled <i>Limitless</i> on Paramount+ for more evidence of his physical comedy) and has always been great at banter, but he excelled at the dramatic moments too, as Wiley grappled with what his life was truly worth and what he believed he deserved. The season finale is a tour de force for him, and I wish both he and Betty nothing but accolades for their performances anchoring this series.</p><p>I loved <i>Mrs. Davis</i> so much and truly believe it’s one of the most unique shows to have debuted this year. If you weren’t watching it when it aired and have access to Peacock, do yourself a favor and watch all of this limited series soon. You won’t regret the weird, wonderful ride.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEWdx2DfHhmTvsZ_COMABlyszR4dvpsxG8dwxJrIE7tR-oh1f_E-crro83g2PLQv2Tpx6DF5ONJSKPcpolmK-2wCL7tHJR297HvPCLd01zCyqi1CQKHmFsDBN3Hm4zyvQ0LnY17Ic8aHG9DMcNzA6q8SS6wbr9Yw-sytaS-vn49R_1XRBlSI6h0bJhR3oQ/s1200/jury%20duty.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEWdx2DfHhmTvsZ_COMABlyszR4dvpsxG8dwxJrIE7tR-oh1f_E-crro83g2PLQv2Tpx6DF5ONJSKPcpolmK-2wCL7tHJR297HvPCLd01zCyqi1CQKHmFsDBN3Hm4zyvQ0LnY17Ic8aHG9DMcNzA6q8SS6wbr9Yw-sytaS-vn49R_1XRBlSI6h0bJhR3oQ/s320/jury%20duty.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Jury Duty</i> (Amazon Prime/Freevee)</h3><p>I heard everyone singing the praises of <i>Jury Duty</i> and then decided to binge watch it to see if it held up to the hype. Spoiler alert, it did! I was a little worried, given the premise of the show, that I’d have secondhand embarrassment for Ronald or that I’d be subjected to some mean-spirited pranks. But <i>Jury Duty</i> is not even remotely mean-spirited or intentionally trying to be cringe-comedy. It is, instead, a show about a genuinely decent guy who is thrust into a chaotic little experiment (unbeknownst to him) and handles all of the characters he meets — including James Marsden playing an exaggerated version of himself — with such grace and kindness. The premise of the show is simple: Ronald thinks he got called for a normal jury duty assignment, but the whole jury duty experience is fake, filled with improv actors, and there is no real trial. All of the actors are following a loose script that they use as a foundation for their interactions with Ronald.</p><p>The star of the series, of course, is Ronald, who is not an actor. He’s the one we’re really watching for to see if, at any point, he begins to suspect that things aren’t what they seem and exposes the ruse. Because we live in a world saturated with reality television, we might expect Ronald to snap — yelling about the absurd behavior of his fellow jurors or questioning why he’s even there. But even though wild things happen around him every single episode, Ronald keeps his composure. He tries to find solutions to truly absurd issues that arise. He forms connections with people, even though he finds some behaviors weird. And while he’s not perfect because he, like all of us, is human, the way he acted throughout the whole show was so charming to watch! All of the actors adored him and we, the audience, did too. </p><p>And because he is nominated for awards this season, I have to mention how utterly perfect James Marsden is in <i>Jury Duty</i>. He, is consistently hilarious, utterly charming, delivers some truly fantastic lines and scenes, and he should truly be in all of our TV shows and films. Why is James Marsden not in all of the things we are watching?! (Aside: I also love that he and Ronald are still close after the show!)</p><p>So if you want a quick, light-hearted binge that will actually make you have faith in humanity,<i> Jury Duty</i> is the show for you.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOf2cCToYfVCF5MChHjQK4Oks-6zFvTRLQdZ3XqPg949oBJB8pzBTfMecI1KRr4C7awPDRdZcA8YP1UUzpSc8mPC357yAmV7qWqAoqLfrgSVN20SjFj9_nawL7OkUF15LuWksgwiQYEQ-aiXe3MESo2N_I-dgbR3geKnGYE4LcLKK2Q501_d-HxEq02ikC/s1200/mq%20season%203.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOf2cCToYfVCF5MChHjQK4Oks-6zFvTRLQdZ3XqPg949oBJB8pzBTfMecI1KRr4C7awPDRdZcA8YP1UUzpSc8mPC357yAmV7qWqAoqLfrgSVN20SjFj9_nawL7OkUF15LuWksgwiQYEQ-aiXe3MESo2N_I-dgbR3geKnGYE4LcLKK2Q501_d-HxEq02ikC/s320/mq%20season%203.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Mythic Quest</i> (Apple TV+)</h3><p>I’ve talked many, many times about how much I love <i>Mythic Quest</i>. If you have not yet watched this Apple TV+ show, just stop reading this article, go binge-watch it, and then come back. </p><p>Unsurprisingly, I loved season three of the series. (You can listen to <a href="https://www.buzzsprout.com/744329" target="_blank">And A Rewatch’s coverage of the show</a>, which includes special guests like Megan Ganz talking about the beautiful, heartbreaking standalone episode this season, “Sarian.”) One of the show’s continued strengths is the ability to mix and match character pairings and correctly assume that the dynamics will just work. Because they always do! The cast is so incredibly talented, but also genuinely enjoy one another and that comes through in the chemistry on screen.</p><p>This season, we got more of Dana (Imani Hakim) and Ian (Rob McElhenney) interacting (which I loved), as well as the unexpected trio of Rachel (Ashly Burch), Brad (Danny Pudi), and Carol (Naomi Ekperigen). Plus, David (David Hornsby) is starting to come into his own as a leader! While the show is still, at its heart, about the complex dynamics and relationship between Ian and Poppy (Charlotte Nicdao), it’s been really fun to see the other characters — especially Jo (Jessie Ennis) — shine over the last two seasons. (Can we get an Emmy for Jessie Ennis interacting with Joe Manganiello please?) </p><p>Whether the season was tackling the dynamic of brunches, leadership issues, creativity, or highlighting the bittersweet backstories of Ian and Poppy, <i>Mythic Quest</i> remained one of the most consistently well-done comedies on television.</p><p>If you haven’t checked out the series yet, use your Apple TV+ subscription (or free trial if you got a new device during the holidays!) to binge it. You won’t regret it.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1rVtnLjT5kluLBhVjZkeP6am8VexApxQMsIuBXGDcTmukIyn1qxBqEwh2aM-wzrXF1FKrKlNgDCRv95H1C8hQv6vmPwL60BrpPAWyhkGNjIo_3ygne-TydMwvoGlMqJpV4KuNAdeCAT19KuyVx78b2fSZPd7IXNECR757NROSVPlP7QaN6f3ijpv-kKBs/s1440/poker%20face.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="810" data-original-width="1440" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1rVtnLjT5kluLBhVjZkeP6am8VexApxQMsIuBXGDcTmukIyn1qxBqEwh2aM-wzrXF1FKrKlNgDCRv95H1C8hQv6vmPwL60BrpPAWyhkGNjIo_3ygne-TydMwvoGlMqJpV4KuNAdeCAT19KuyVx78b2fSZPd7IXNECR757NROSVPlP7QaN6f3ijpv-kKBs/s320/poker%20face.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Poker Face</i> (Peacock)</h3><p>In the era of “whodunnits,” <i>Poker Face </i>was Peacock’s “howcatchem” series that compels you from the very first episode. Created by Rian Johnson (if you loved <i>Knives Out</i> and <i>Glass Onion</i>, you’ll definitely like this show), <i>Poker Face</i> follows the story of Charlie (Natasha Lyonne) who is a waitress at a casino but is also basically a human lie detector. When her best friend is murdered, Charlie begins investigating — and unfortunately lands herself into hot water. The rest of the season is Charlie running away from the people hunting her down and, as she arrives in various places, solving murders. Unlike a “whodunnit,” the audience sees at the beginning of each episode, exactly what crime happened and who committed it. The fun of a “howcatchem,” then, is for us as an audience to see Charlie piece the clues together. We wonder if she’ll figure out who the bad guy is in time or if her curiosity will land her into precarious situations.</p><p>Natasha Lyonne was really born for the kind of detective role she gets to inhabit with <i>Poker Face</i>. Because even though this series is chock full of big name guest stars each episode — Adrien Brody, Hong Chau, Judith Light, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Rhea Perlman just to name a few — the whole series is really about Charlie. If we don’t care about her, the episodes don’t matter as much. But we do care about Charlie. We want to see her succeed and we root for her to outwit those who are tracking her.</p><p><i>Poker Face</i> is a really fun series that works well as a binge watch or, when it returns to Peacock next season, as a week-to-week show.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS9o1oSUs4EC7tEZqwY8N5OqVhmmJO97VA2zyz6_rkPAj7EJb0pqzaepM9TZKohRlocfMU1zzWrHue7ZFhtp7etIhhx1m0yNDtH3GkRnZEULxoBvx1UmM-DJ_MPYh0j4LSWc3qfErhilvN_ueO0AYUB8S4wpK8r1aGJmJ6JSgnsKBpIV3WMirE7Ymr2RTP/s1280/somebody%20somewhere.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiS9o1oSUs4EC7tEZqwY8N5OqVhmmJO97VA2zyz6_rkPAj7EJb0pqzaepM9TZKohRlocfMU1zzWrHue7ZFhtp7etIhhx1m0yNDtH3GkRnZEULxoBvx1UmM-DJ_MPYh0j4LSWc3qfErhilvN_ueO0AYUB8S4wpK8r1aGJmJ6JSgnsKBpIV3WMirE7Ymr2RTP/s320/somebody%20somewhere.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Somebody Somewhere</i> (HBO Max)</h3><p>I heard quiet murmurings of how <i>Somebody Somewhere</i> was a great show and I finally decided to check it out this year when season two dropped. The show is just as great as everyone said it was, and I think what makes it so wonderful is just how unassuming it is. Unlike a lot of shows on this list, there are no fantastical elements — no demons or angels, no sci-fi, no crimes to solve. It’s a show about a woman in Kansas named Sam (Bridgett Everett) who moved back to her hometown and is dealing with the death of her sister. Sam is trying to figure out what makes her happy and how to be okay with a town she doesn’t feel like she fits into anymore. She reconnects with a friend from high school, Joel (Jeff Hiller), who introduces her to people who also don’t fit the typical mold.</p><p><i>Somebody Somewhere</i> is a lovely little show about figuring out who you are, loving yourself, struggling with grief, and developing relationships in adulthood. It’s a deceptively simple show that packs an emotional punch through its storylines. You truly feel all of the emotions that Sam does when she and Joel get into a fight or when she and her sister don’t see eye-to-eye. You ache because she’s trying to figure out her life while trying to hold everyone together — including her parents.</p><p>But when Sam is in her element — when she’s singing on stage — you watch her come alive and you see, clearly, her passion and love for music. In the second season, the scenes between Sam and her old music teacher are so subtle and yet so emotionally poignant. Season two of <i>Somebody Somewhere</i> walks the tightrope between drama and comedy; Sam’s relationship with her sister Trish is rife with both, for example. If you, like me, have only heard about this show but haven’t watched it, be sure to catch up as soon as you can.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlmrehBHIfmnFeHS38w0qQ-HWh25j5XPz29tIe_BT9MkzZSx3oPAGqpx_HJZWBrpuMngAhqceOQBX-zotF8iCwmw1w4iKNtTD2OS0J8zab1RDJxkJVeBR_DH49AReX1lXk26DqW2b02CK3yVymw97olOXuH3Q695KFt7lrqoMHsR-ytbz3hjEvd7D8Sz50/s1200/the%20bear.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlmrehBHIfmnFeHS38w0qQ-HWh25j5XPz29tIe_BT9MkzZSx3oPAGqpx_HJZWBrpuMngAhqceOQBX-zotF8iCwmw1w4iKNtTD2OS0J8zab1RDJxkJVeBR_DH49AReX1lXk26DqW2b02CK3yVymw97olOXuH3Q695KFt7lrqoMHsR-ytbz3hjEvd7D8Sz50/s320/the%20bear.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>The Bear</i> (Hulu)</h3><p>Much has been said and written about <i>The Bear</i> and I’m not sure if anything I say will convince you to watch the show but I’ll try: this series is consistently one of the most tense, character-centric shows — and season two has, perhaps, the most prime example of that (“Fishes” will have you feeling like you are watching the most intense drama). Even though things aren’t really life-and-death stakes in <i>The Bear</i>, the way that the series is written, shot, and acted would beg to differ. It centers on Carmy (Jeremy Allen White), a chef who was once in the high-dining world and comes back to Chicago in order to run his late brother’s small restaurant. There, he begins a quasi-mentorship with a promising young chef named Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) and continues to struggle with his relationships — including his friend, Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). I am so glad that this year Ayo is in a leading actor category because she and Jeremy are truly the anchors of the show. It would not work if it was just Carmy leading the restaurant; Ayo depicts the passion, creativity, and leadership that Sydney has in a way that parallels and yet perfectly contrasts Carmy. Her scenes in the finale with Ebon were incredibly moving too, and you really root for Sydney and her journey.</p><p><i>The Bear</i>, like I said, is rather low stakes in the grand scheme of things: one of the biggest sources of conflict in the second season involves re-opening the restaurant and all the things that go wrong prior to, and up until, the opening night. But I cannot emphasize just how frantic and tense this show manages to make everything feel. I’m on edge, and sometimes in a way that unsettles me. Make no mistake, though: even though <i>The Bear</i> is labeled as a comedy in awards shows (because of the rule that half-hour series are “comedies” and hour-longs series are “dramas”), there are difficult topics that the show tackles — with grief and trauma being at the forefront.</p><p>The series has some of the most compelling characters and dynamics (whether you ship them romantically or not, the Carmy/Sydney relationship is fascinating, thanks to the writing and chemistry between the actors), and had some of the best episodes of television this year (the aforementioned “Fishes” but “Forks” is an incredible episode focused on Richie as well that deserves to be in award conversations). </p><p>So if you are looking for a TV binge this winter break and are fascinated by the fast-paced, tense, dramatic world of dysfunctional family dynamics, then <i>The Bear</i> is for you.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVzSkIxrCfvztDHzO2hsxA-UhaJaC2XmSSrkLe7lhfJn00lgbfPXthRVku5qrFAQJ8ruHRVVPmEtAAssUS9jK7khLHo-aTz42rMRnOhvB9XGCfVGWAY3wGpxzrXUI82Ov7S3F6toLW3vePKC5S5qIOvZWZ4GkRbJCOZC_QyBnUwzR1WVf_TYvPStgzhReS/s980/queen%20charlotte.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="654" data-original-width="980" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVzSkIxrCfvztDHzO2hsxA-UhaJaC2XmSSrkLe7lhfJn00lgbfPXthRVku5qrFAQJ8ruHRVVPmEtAAssUS9jK7khLHo-aTz42rMRnOhvB9XGCfVGWAY3wGpxzrXUI82Ov7S3F6toLW3vePKC5S5qIOvZWZ4GkRbJCOZC_QyBnUwzR1WVf_TYvPStgzhReS/s320/queen%20charlotte.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Queen Charlotte</i> (Netflix)</h3><p>While we’re all waiting for a new <i>Bridgerton</i> installment, Netflix gave us a self-contained <i>Bridgerton</i> story this year: <i>Queen Charlotte</i>. The series is a <i>Bridgerton</i> prequel, taking place as a young Charlotte (India Amarteifio) meets and marries a young King George III (Corey Mylchreest). She realizes upon marrying George that he is struggling with a mental illness, and the rest of the series is about their partnership, family, and love. The series also flashes to the present-day queen (Golda Rosheuvel) who is dealing with the death of Princess Charlotte and putting the pressure on her sons to marry so that there will be a legitimate heir. Charlotte is not the only character we get to see in both flashbacks and present-day though — Violet and Agatha also woven throughout the season’s storylines and we get a clearer understanding of who both women are in the present by understanding their pasts. Arsema Thomas, in particular, does a fantastic job depicting the strength and heartbreak of young Agatha.</p><p>What I loved about <i>Queen Charlotte</i> as a series was that it focused on how Charlotte became the queen we saw in the first and second seasons of <i>Bridgerton</i>. We know, of course, about George’s mental state but seeing the young Charlotte navigate all of the emotions that come with being a wife and caretaker — her frustration, sadness, and love for George — is heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time. India did an absolutely stellar job and I was captivated by her performance. India and Corey, meanwhile, had incredible chemistry together. Their love story was so beautiful to watch (and I’ll be thinking about the final scene with them for a while).</p><p>If you’re a <i>Bridgerton</i> fan who didn’t watch <i>Queen Charlotte</i>, check it out on Netflix!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix67qMIDC0-oM9zc3T_pij1egg4da3TM_N0BnLCaD7NLpjVg8IONzgXMQhV-M-4XdukYWz_0aWIfUUbWpRGwdVKn_dfFANpMDPuYZkdLQKIWWjgRQN2O3VQiPBGKUeUCZjkklDtqV9HygJ9QqayVKRooXQ89oAEMta-tdtP_F9oFdI9Fuua8ERcNcGfP4s/s2560/daisy%20jones.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="2560" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix67qMIDC0-oM9zc3T_pij1egg4da3TM_N0BnLCaD7NLpjVg8IONzgXMQhV-M-4XdukYWz_0aWIfUUbWpRGwdVKn_dfFANpMDPuYZkdLQKIWWjgRQN2O3VQiPBGKUeUCZjkklDtqV9HygJ9QqayVKRooXQ89oAEMta-tdtP_F9oFdI9Fuua8ERcNcGfP4s/s320/daisy%20jones.webp" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Daisy Jones & the Six</i> (Amazon Prime)</h3><p>This summer, music from <i>Daisy Jones & the Six</i> was stuck in my head (particularly “Look At Us Now”) because it was so catchy and so good. The Taylor Jenkins Reid adaptation exceeded my expectations — particularly in regards to the chemistry between Billy (Sam Claflin) and Daisy (Riley Keough). Both the book and series are constructed like a “behind the music”-style interview about the rise and fall of the titular band, Daisy Jones & the Six. </p><p>What makes this show so compelling is, of course, Daisy herself — an immensely talented, free spirit singer-songwriter. Daisy, however, has her own darknesses from her childhood and the way she’s been treated by people. She self-medicates with drugs and alcohol, much to the disappointment of Billy who’s sober by the time he meets Daisy. But Daisy is a force to be reckoned with — and Riley is just so talented, inhabiting this messy, complex character and making us fall in love with her. Her vocal performances are stellar, and her dynamic with Sam is the kind of chemistry that producers can only dream of finding. </p><p>Speaking of: Sam Claflin really deserves to be in more things. Not only does he deliver some heartbreaking moments in the series (specifically the end of “Looks Like We Made It”), but he’s also such a compelling romantic lead, able to communicate longing and heartbreak and love. The rest of the cast is so great too — particularly Camila Marrone who plays Billy’s wife, Camila. She’s navigating her love for Billy, her disappointment with his choices, her fierce desire to be loved the way she deserves, and much more. Camila navigates all of these emotions with such grace and vulnerability. Additionally we get way more time with Simone (Nabiyah Be) in the show than we do in the book. We get the opportunity to see the trajectory of her career and personal life as a Black queer woman in the 70s, and Nabiyah does a fantastic job depicting all of the highs and lows, as well as her complex friendship (and often codependency) with Daisy.</p><p><i>Daisy Jones & the Six</i> is only 10 episodes, and by the time you finish binge-watching the series, you’ll be ready to listen to the soundtrack on repeat!</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi07pcZqEFSJZ7FPxLz9mPoahxEhk9A2QeEPJ63OyfywQ2VpRS_iNYo7B_hahTwoiv7qBP3Gg9Wb1D99nhHV-pl15-bqWCawIbyr4p0mtkpHjmFGGD3Fn-z0pZLxJjYnpfHCBSM_sZbXz6uHOeZBeUVnWfn6EqAt3PjmiljIMITXZsPeBMaqjW8o982n-nP/s1920/cbs%20ghosts.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi07pcZqEFSJZ7FPxLz9mPoahxEhk9A2QeEPJ63OyfywQ2VpRS_iNYo7B_hahTwoiv7qBP3Gg9Wb1D99nhHV-pl15-bqWCawIbyr4p0mtkpHjmFGGD3Fn-z0pZLxJjYnpfHCBSM_sZbXz6uHOeZBeUVnWfn6EqAt3PjmiljIMITXZsPeBMaqjW8o982n-nP/s320/cbs%20ghosts.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;"><i>Ghosts</i> (Paramount+)</h3><p>I love this CBS sitcom and have been singing its praises ever since my friend Alicia introduced me to it. If you’re in the market for a really charming ensemble comedy with a bunch of talented actors, then watch <i>Ghosts</i>! The series follows Sam (Rose McIver) and Jay (Utkarsh Ambudkar), a couple who inherit a bed and breakfast. The only problem: it’s inhabited by ghosts. And after a near-death experience, Sam can see all of them. The rest of the show is about the dynamics between Sam, Jay, and the ghosts —and it’s so much fun to watch. </p><p>The lighthearted, found family-centric ensemble comedy is just that: an ensemble. It’s the kind of show where you can put any two actors together and it just works. The ghosts all also get their own arcs and stories. This season, we got more backstory of what happened to Alberta (Danielle Pinnock) and also learn how she died. We get a really fun, unexpected dynamic between Hetty (Rebecca Wisocky) and Trevor (Asher Grodman), and a sweet relationship between Flower (Sheila Carrasco) and Thor (Devan Chandler Long). Plus this season we also got perfect running commentary from Sass (Román Zaragoza), some truly great moments for Pete (Richie Moriarty), and growth for Isaac (Brandon Scott Jones).</p><p><i>Ghosts</i>, more often than not, stays pretty light in terms of the drama, but when they choose to focus on emotional beats, the show really knocks it out of the park. With <i>Ghosts</i> returning for season three soon, be sure to catch up on this delightful little series!</p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Honorable mentions: <i>Reservation Dogs</i> (Hulu), <i>Lessons in Chemistry</i> (Apple TV+), <i>What We Do in the Shadows</i> (Hulu), and <i>The Afterparty</i> (Apple TV+)</h4><p>What were some of your favorite television shows this year?</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-24551273450105826542023-08-01T17:00:00.012-04:002023-08-01T17:03:44.366-04:00The Final Season of Reservation Dogs Proves Its Power In Its Storytelling [Contributor: Jenn]<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-h8RJGHvO8PC6Z3GNIIQw1I9xNhcGW9qbFkWHaUJWjrUGdanKi7-TJjifbs0cI9eSs_S_fg2pF1PWnSHcw8qZrk4llg5bUhM6MBxz9sq_MMnKsMkHZ8Tgr0DzudcCRD1SoQqpJABE1ZbRhdHI9hj0SO6p9mUOemZnoHss5o_HmDNGF4pqtYb87Ibh5JLw/s3000/FX's%20Reservation%20Dogs%20-%20Season%203%20Premieres%20August%202%20Exclusively%20on%20Hulu.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2001" data-original-width="3000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-h8RJGHvO8PC6Z3GNIIQw1I9xNhcGW9qbFkWHaUJWjrUGdanKi7-TJjifbs0cI9eSs_S_fg2pF1PWnSHcw8qZrk4llg5bUhM6MBxz9sq_MMnKsMkHZ8Tgr0DzudcCRD1SoQqpJABE1ZbRhdHI9hj0SO6p9mUOemZnoHss5o_HmDNGF4pqtYb87Ibh5JLw/s320/FX's%20Reservation%20Dogs%20-%20Season%203%20Premieres%20August%202%20Exclusively%20on%20Hulu.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>(Image credit: Shane Brown/FX)</i></span></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Even though I have only seen the first four episodes of <i>Reservation Dogs</i>’ final season, I can already tell that the show is going to end its run just as strongly as it began it. This groundbreaking series features four Indigenous teenagers on a quest to get out of their Oklahoma reservation and to California. At the end of season two, all of the teens — Bear, Elora, Cheese, and Willie Jack — managed to do just that to honor their deceased friend, Daniel. Unfortunately for them, their car and money were stolen so season three picks up where we left off.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The four episodes I watched were all quite different from one another, but all of them are engaging and gripping for various reasons and set up what is sure to be an exciting final season.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Below, I break down what you can look forward to in the first few episodes, with minor plot spoilers. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The season premiere features all four of the teenagers interacting, marking a rare occurrence in the first few episodes, as they head back to Oklahoma via bus (thanks to a rescue from Aunt Teenie). I’d missed the banter that these individuals had in pairs and as a group. (There’s a particularly silly scene about day-old donuts and how each character reacts differently to the idea of them.) </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">But what the episode really serves as is a springboard for Bear’s character arc the rest of the season. He’s the primary focus of the few episodes I saw, and it’s fascinating to see just how he’s growing. More on that in a minute!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Meanwhile, on the bus back to Oklahoma, Cheese is drawing and Willie Jack tells him how amazing his art is. Even though all of the teens wanted to escape Okern, both Cheese and Willie Jack admit that they appreciate it more after California. They also both discuss that Bear and Elora are destined to leave them and Oklahoma altogether. I loved that we got some genuine, heartfelt moments between these two characters. Since Cheese is the youngest, he obviously knows that his friends will likely leave before him. But it was sweet to see how excited Willie Jack was by the drawings, and how encouraging she was about his talent.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Elsewhere on the bus, Aunt Teenie gives Elora some unexpected information that is part of what her character arc will be about the rest of the season.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">A theme that runs through these first few episodes is the idea of figuring out what you consider home, as well as how to care for and protect the people you love. The teens were desperate to go to California at the beginning of the series, but the truth that they uncover is that it wasn’t all they expected — or even wanted. The teens all now recognize that the idea of California was more appealing to them than actual California itself; it was the escape — from their routines, from their grief, and from their boredom — that they really wanted. And while it was cathartic for them all to honor Daniel and feel his presence on that beach with them, it seems like everyone is actually grateful to be going home again by the time we reconvene in season three. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">All, unfortunately, except Bear who gets left behind at the bus station with no money or way home.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">In the next episode, Bear meets a stranger named Maximus. Dehydrated and left behind in California, Bear begins to walk (and gets increasingly frustrated with his visions of William “Spirit” Knifeman and how Spirit will not practically help him out) — and then gets shot with a very real tranquilizer dart. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">As it turns out, that dart belongs to Maximus — who appears to be a conspiracy theorist. He is Indigenous and reveals to Bear that he used to live in Okern, Oklahoma too. He gives Bear some much-needed water at his home. The rest of the episode is an unexpectedly moving one in which the two characters have conversations about life, friendships, and the way they perceive the world differently than others around them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">This one is a Bear-centric episode, and one that D'Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai absolutely knocked out of the park. Isolated from the rest of his friends, it was impressive to see how Bear handled challenges that arose. I think this episode and the next one (“Deer Lady”) are great examples of the kind of person Bear is and the quality of his character. Yes, he still often makes poor decisions in the company of his peers because... well, he’s a teenager. But he has a lot of compassion and empathy for others, even if he doesn’t understand them. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Even though Bear is initially (and rightfully so) wary of a stranger, he carries on conversations with Maximus throughout the episode without making Maximus feel judged or condescended. And while the end of the episode is a bit heartbreaking, the core of it is about two human beings just trying their best to understand each other and the world around them better — and that is beautiful.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcsiUcCe31RVudOmeLCeqww16tI6gTIwW7g7KprCz51lUz3lyZwQcpvr3x7llPsFiZcwr1SaKzy0DjhPx1bin5nkHRkHbRsFczuci__PPOydqd69tlgAv5jW0je4IzMMm40OzYswgKv_cwg60YpnHTMFRSc1qiRwZJnYetQtsXY61l_vXPhyvE_AYsVOF9/s3000/RDS3_301_0184.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /><img border="0" data-original-height="2001" data-original-width="3000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcsiUcCe31RVudOmeLCeqww16tI6gTIwW7g7KprCz51lUz3lyZwQcpvr3x7llPsFiZcwr1SaKzy0DjhPx1bin5nkHRkHbRsFczuci__PPOydqd69tlgAv5jW0je4IzMMm40OzYswgKv_cwg60YpnHTMFRSc1qiRwZJnYetQtsXY61l_vXPhyvE_AYsVOF9/s320/RDS3_301_0184.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>(Bear and Elora in season three; image credit: Shane Brown/FX)</i></span></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">“Deer Lady” is episode three and is definitely the standout of the episodes so far in the season. As the title suggests, this episode is all about the Deer Lady, which means that Kaniehtiio Horn absolutely shines in a very nuanced, gut-wrenching performance. Young Deer Lady, played by Georgeanne Growingthunder, is truly wonderful too.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">We learn about Deer Lady’s backstory — how she was taken away from her family and forced into an Indigenous boarding school where her hair was cut, she was not allowed to speak her language, and was abused if she (or any of the other children) did anything the nuns did not like. There, she meets a kind boy named Koda who tries to help her and tells her that the nuns will take a lot from them, but they never be able to take their smiles. Later on in the episode, we see the poignant moment where the child of Young Deer Lady becomes the Deer Lady herself.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">“Deer Lady” technically and story-wise is impeccable and proof of why <i>Reservation Dogs </i>deserves acclaim. One of the most subtle elements of the episode that I appreciated is that when we’re in Young Deer Lady’s perspective in flashbacks, all of the adults sound garbled and like they’re speaking gibberish — this, of course, is because Young Deer Lady doesn’t know English and that is what it sounds like to her. That choice alone provides a way to immerse us in her point of view: confused and scared in a place that is meant to torture and kill.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The episode flashbacks are harrowing and horrifying (the episode opens with a viewer discretion warning), and they’re contrasted by some growing tension in the present-day story: Bear wanders into a diner that Deer Lady happens to be eating at. And while Bear is afraid she is there to kill him, Deer Lady assures him that she is not. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Kaniehtiio Horn is the emotional heart of this episode. We’ve seen her before in the series, but watching her as Deer Lady unpack her trauma in the present-day storyline is so powerful and poignant. There’s a specific moment toward the end of the episode where you can see almost every emotion flicker across her face in the span of a few seconds. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Additionally, like I noted earlier, “Deer Lady” is yet another example of how this season’s <i>Reservation Dogs</i> episodes are setting Bear up on a path toward finding his purpose in life. His empathy toward Deer Lady throughout the episode is incredibly touching, especially near the end.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Trust me: this episode is not going to be one that you want to miss.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The season premiere and “Friday” (episode four) are the only two episodes in this set that feature all of the teenagers. And both episodes are really about the individual characters’ storylines.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The plot is pretty simple: the teens all face consequences from the adults for going to California. The adults decide to divvy up punishments for everyone by having them work at the IHS clinic — including Jackie who, as she protests, didn’t even go to California! (She’s retroactively being punished by Bev for other things.) Jackie and Bear are on sweeping duty, Cheese and Willie Jack are cleaning graffiti, and Elora is taking out the trash. Throughout the course of the afternoon, all of the characters make some decisions or learn new information that will likely impact them in the rest of the season.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Jana Schmieding is truly the scene-stealer in this episode. She has a scene early on with Bear’s mom Rita which involves them hilariously bantering about Bear and Jackie, but then there’s one scene in particular toward the end of the episode between her and Officer Big that had me cackling out loud. It is truly perfect, and one of the funniest scenes I have seen in a while. Give Jana an Emmy for goodness’ sake!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Besides the subtle and fun moments that this episode inspires (Cheese finally gets his glasses, Willie Jack takes an interest in taking over medicine when talking to Old Man Fixico, Jackie refuses to believe Bear met Deer Lady), “Friday” focuses on what Elora wants to do with her life. She’s thinking about applying to colleges and is also still processing the news that Aunt Teenie told her in the premiere. I like that Elora is charting her own course in the world, but what’s interesting is that she’s seemingly keeping this from her friends — especially the news Teenie told her. The episode ends with the group exiting the IHS clinic together after a day of work, Elora covertly taking an important document with her as she does. I am very interested to see if she involves her friends in her decisions moving forward.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Still, despite the fact that Bear, Elora, Willie Jack, and Cheese are likely to have conflict this season, the first few episodes of <i>Reservation Dogs</i> are proof that they are a tight-knit group, through and through. They show up for and support one another, and I love that. I am definitely excited to see how the series wraps up.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><blockquote><i>Watch the final season of </i>Reservation Dogs<i>, beginning August 2 on Hulu.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><b><i>Support the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes for fair wages and treatment by donating to the <a href="https://secure2.convio.net/afa/site/Donation2?df_id=8117&8117.donation=form1&mfc_pref=T" target="_blank">Entertainment Community Fund</a> if you can.</i></b></blockquote></b></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-53749636054521740212023-07-11T22:03:00.002-04:002023-07-11T22:15:04.294-04:00The Afterparty Continues to Explore Mayhem and Mystery in Season Two [Contributor: Jenn]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4efdmn7w_gR9zfjMX5JvsUoidLLPsgDjnKLYXJAJvVA8gSfyzon-vwggQzbBXRfXN46TMtgFyHhm7zDDs4t0OPR7rKQE0vqcoNUpu0ga_JSZ-LEcb-fP1nHbgB9laDUH1bR9k1Mhp8rLZr5Y5ekBsmiM39QGotG-Fo6mUmOscqo0apX8yvgZeLoxKS4X0/s3840/Apple_TV_The_Afterparty_key_art_16_9.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4efdmn7w_gR9zfjMX5JvsUoidLLPsgDjnKLYXJAJvVA8gSfyzon-vwggQzbBXRfXN46TMtgFyHhm7zDDs4t0OPR7rKQE0vqcoNUpu0ga_JSZ-LEcb-fP1nHbgB9laDUH1bR9k1Mhp8rLZr5Y5ekBsmiM39QGotG-Fo6mUmOscqo0apX8yvgZeLoxKS4X0/s320/Apple_TV_The_Afterparty_key_art_16_9.png" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Image credit: Apple TV+</i></span></div><p>The first season of Apple TV+’s murder mystery, genre-homaging comedy was a huge success for an array of reasons. It had a stellar ensemble cast, tight comedic writing, and enough twists and clues for viewers to try and solve along the way. While, admittedly, the second season of the series doesn’t quite reach the highest highs of season one, <i>The Afterparty</i> still remains one of the most creative storytelling endeavors on television right now.</p><p>The plot of season two is as follows: Aniq (Sam Richardson) and Zoë (Zoë Chao) are now together after the events of the first season, and they’re en route to Zoë’s sister Grace’s wedding. Aniq is nervous to be meeting Zoë’s entire family — and the weekend goes awry when Grace (Poppy Liu) wakes up next to her new husband Edgar (Zach Woods), only to discover that he’s dead. A murder mystery kicks into high gear with the bride’s family, the groom’s mother and sister, and guests all becoming suspects in Edgar’s death.</p><p>As I mentioned earlier, The Afterparty’s second season almost works as well as the first one. But as I was contemplating it, I think one of the reasons season two doesn’t work as well for me is that Aniq and Zoë don’t spend time together on screen the way that Aniq and Yasper (Ben Schwartz) did in season one. The two characters actually split up to do their own investigations once Danner (Tiffany Haddish) arrives on the scene. </p><p>And while Sam Richardson and Zoë Chao shine individually in their stories (they are both just so comedically talented), it’s slightly disappointing that we don’t get more of them paired up and solving the crime together. This does, however, lend to more scenes with Zoë and Grace together, which I enjoyed.</p><p>Aniq and Zoë, in addition to being separated, go through a little bit of a rough patch in this season — which is understandable since Aniq quickly deduces that there’s a high probability one of Zoë’s family members is the murderer. She, of course, does not want to believe that anyone in her family is capable of murder. And while she still stands by them throughout the show, Zoë quickly learns that she doesn’t know her family as well as she thought she did... especially her sister. </p><p>Apart from that tiny qualm of Aniq and Zoë’s separation, I enjoyed the majority of the first nine episodes — critics didn’t get the finale to screen — of <i>The Afterparty</i>’s second season, and without giving away spoilers, here’s why:</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE GENRE HOMAGES REMAIN TOP-TIER</span></h4><p>Obviously one of the biggest and most unique draws of <i>The Afterparty</i> is that each character shares about what happened leading up to the murder through a specific storytelling lens. Last year we had an animated episode, a musical episode, a rom-com, and so many other clever genres to play around with. This season is no different! Aniq gets a sequel to his romantic comedy (which is the only “recycled” genre, though this one felt more like it was focused on sequels not necessarily rom-coms themselves). Then there’s a<i> Pride & Prejudice</i>-style episode that details how Grace met Edgar, a film noir homage, a nod to heist films, and more. Each genre is filled with comedy, drama, romance, and mystery. The weakest of the bunch, to me, is Danner’s standalone episode simply because it felt too long and unnecessary. There is a Wes Anderson homage episode focusing on Edgar’s sister Hannah (Anna Konkle) that would have probably played better had there not been a TikTok viral trend a few months ago with users creating their own Wes Anderson-style homages.</p><p>I think my favorite genre this year is one that revolves around social media video storytelling. It was a creative use of a genre — Aniq and Danner watch TikTok/Instagram videos that Zoë’s father Feng (Ken Jeong) provides courtesy of the wedding videographer. This genre works specifically well because it feels relevant to a murder mystery where the characters and audience are actually seeing evidence and piecing it together alongside everyone else.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE ENSEMBLE IS GREAT</span></h4><p>As I mentioned earlier, most of the ensemble characters are new to The Afterparty universe, and each character has specific comedic beats. Ken Jeong shines in his comedic timing and beats as the father of the bride. Anna Konkle’s specific comedic choices as a quirky and odd, but inevitably hopeless romantic play very well with the Wes Anderson genre. No one else but her could have made the concept work as well. Edgar, too, is supposed to be socially awkward and Zach Woods has fun playing that up — especially when he’s got a lizard on his shoulder almost the entire time we see him. But in the course of the season, you’ll begin to watch a different, darker side of Edgar emerge, and Woods does an incredible job incorporating his character’s blunt, emotionally-detached line delivery into dramatic moments and scenes.</p><p>But as much as other critics loved Travis (Paul Walter Hauser) and his detective film noir homage, I admit that I found Travis — a wannabe sleuth who is really just a Reddit conspiracy theorist — the least funny of the new characters in the ensemble. The series uses pratfalls and clumsiness too much with his character, to the point where it becomes cringeworthy and not funny. Seriously, so much of his comedy is centered on the idea that he’s either obnoxious, oblivious, or knocking things over/falling over.</p><p>A shining star of the ensemble, however, is Ulysses — played by the consistently funny and vastly underrated John Cho. (Justice for ABC’s <i>Selfie</i> by the way.) He swoops in with a grand, romantic, Western, dance-centric flashback story and is the kind of charming, effortlessly funny character the series really benefits from. It is truly a standout episode that manages to be funny and heartbreaking. John Cho deserves to be in way more things! Give him all the things!</p><p>Ultimately the chemistry and tension between the ensemble cast members is what initially sold <i>The Afterparty</i> to viewers and it’s what sells this season too.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE SHOW IS STILL ABLE TO SURPRISE</span></h4><p>The first thing I felt when I finished episode nine was frustration that I couldn’t watch the finale. What <i>The Afterparty</i> did in season one, it continues to do well in season two: leave every episode with a little cliffhanger, making you question what you know about the previous episode’s character as you head into another character’s story. (There is also just an unexpected moment in episode five that made me gasp but I won’t say more than that!)</p><p>If season one’s twist of a finale taught you anything, it’s to pay attention to little clues as you watch the show. I began to take some notes of details in rooms and in characters’ stories to see if I could piece together the murder. By the end of episode nine, it seems like things are wrapping up... until they’re absolutely not. I have a few ideas about what could happen but genuinely am excited to see how the series ties up the mystery — and where that leaves Aniq and Zoë!</p><p></p><blockquote><b>The first two episodes of <i>The Afterparty</i> season two are now streaming on Apple TV+ with new episodes dropping weekly.</b></blockquote><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-61919194420196159412023-06-23T09:00:00.023-04:002023-06-23T09:00:00.133-04:00The 2023 Just About Write Awards Are Here! [Contributors: Jenn and Chels]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNLxyspJwPLE8tLxxcnEwAImZ8B17zNLB4MgIBJoBeH_gUrt2-VpBBytSjXZYSLQPUM_5FCwQTx20k5Ti0fPv99pkZ5x8ct8eA8J79pG8xbyy-EFMqYJ10FblQtTIE24r9TQtGeL0z_qtZaGTTQaFBtEa7wPR6YfsBvpHj3pzUKBRYIwdqY7s9_ICKIg/s480/tumblr_om0ievPNdH1qe8lb8o1_500.gif" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="246" data-original-width="480" height="164" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNLxyspJwPLE8tLxxcnEwAImZ8B17zNLB4MgIBJoBeH_gUrt2-VpBBytSjXZYSLQPUM_5FCwQTx20k5Ti0fPv99pkZ5x8ct8eA8J79pG8xbyy-EFMqYJ10FblQtTIE24r9TQtGeL0z_qtZaGTTQaFBtEa7wPR6YfsBvpHj3pzUKBRYIwdqY7s9_ICKIg/s320/tumblr_om0ievPNdH1qe8lb8o1_500.gif" width="320" /></a></div><p>Welcome back, everyone, to our annual awards show! This year, you're going to notice a few changes in the awards ceremony. We've changed our name, for one, in order to better reflect what the awards are about. So we'd like to officially welcome you to the Just About Write Awards!</p><p>Secondly, in order to be inclusive, we've moved to gender neutral categories. That means that the competition this year was especially difficult because there are <i>so many</i> incredible performers. We know you might wonder why some performers and shows are not included (such as <i>Succession</i> or <i>Barry</i>, etc.), but it is likely because we know they will get represented at the Emmys or Golden Globes. We tried to select performances and shows that will not get as much love at those ceremonies. </p><p>Additionally, for eligibility purposes, a show had to air at least one episode between last summer's awards and May 2023 in order to be considered eligible. And while a show like<i> The Bear</i> is considered a comedy series by the voting academies (because it is a half-hour format, not an hour-long), we decided to arrange our categories in ways that made more sense to us, tonally.</p><p>Because these races are so tight, instead of six nominees per category, you get to vote on eight this year! The awards winners function the same as they did in years past: each category will have three total winners at the end of the voting period we will award gold, silver, and bronze medals to. Vote as many times as you'd like and feel free to share the awards across whatever social media platforms you want. </p><p><b>Voting opens today, June 23, and closes on June 30 at 9 a.m. ET.</b> The winners will be announced on our social media platforms July 1. Enjoy!</p><h3 style="text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES </h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGUZ7PmHjpz1eQZHgqfFs7JnLIWMpOA718jleGgZznuKlQpBEf4dsEn_nbZgyiLWVDwjm-VK97rG8RfYXMl_UBMxdAQeYD1ZkD1dXPI0MATyi4p9dIKCLIHniDhT8DB6y_pXWkT_PDaos23nCCgKwltYItfTZ2zlzJdwLXoj6L2g-SAsqGaeWZI-JAww/s2000/Outstanding%20Comedy%20Series.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGUZ7PmHjpz1eQZHgqfFs7JnLIWMpOA718jleGgZznuKlQpBEf4dsEn_nbZgyiLWVDwjm-VK97rG8RfYXMl_UBMxdAQeYD1ZkD1dXPI0MATyi4p9dIKCLIHniDhT8DB6y_pXWkT_PDaos23nCCgKwltYItfTZ2zlzJdwLXoj6L2g-SAsqGaeWZI-JAww/s320/Outstanding%20Comedy%20Series.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835125x64e54EA1-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<div><h3 style="text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING LEAD PERFORMANCE — COMEDY</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkYBR5bDQ-G9NPI1RYx-3TC5I5nk1RE5xPpOIohgwkOn6rSUgc6uKVWNJ1pDBQ86-lOu7ny4IqkeqVVihUIJeKSgmhpnspWcfxuIg5Nz4xSngER7OYm289GJl8H-51Px-ufCa5x14jvMjSfzoPglZBrme5H7g6hkwyvUOXCT58tdDYvvbc5zs-XzZFbg/s2000/Lead%20Performance%20-%20Comedy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkYBR5bDQ-G9NPI1RYx-3TC5I5nk1RE5xPpOIohgwkOn6rSUgc6uKVWNJ1pDBQ86-lOu7ny4IqkeqVVihUIJeKSgmhpnspWcfxuIg5Nz4xSngER7OYm289GJl8H-51Px-ufCa5x14jvMjSfzoPglZBrme5H7g6hkwyvUOXCT58tdDYvvbc5zs-XzZFbg/s320/Lead%20Performance%20-%20Comedy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835129xA56ae02C-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE — COMEDY</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU4Klww68fnhJ922xkwBYzYpj_687gwPhI7I07i7q_oUy-grAat_qqtlgGV-68ePj6EDHWMl4G8awxzND1FpwzEK4fRQNz7vp8EBvespm9cCQlEvFxGajWzAnCmgOFNEuDqZPXy6B5SX-vuJultpRzEg1YX5wmPeIpTsQBHMn57B79eSFNVm6nlBjvDA/s2000/Supporting%20Performance%20-%20Comedy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU4Klww68fnhJ922xkwBYzYpj_687gwPhI7I07i7q_oUy-grAat_qqtlgGV-68ePj6EDHWMl4G8awxzND1FpwzEK4fRQNz7vp8EBvespm9cCQlEvFxGajWzAnCmgOFNEuDqZPXy6B5SX-vuJultpRzEg1YX5wmPeIpTsQBHMn57B79eSFNVm6nlBjvDA/s320/Supporting%20Performance%20-%20Comedy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835135x69924BBF-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn10Kr_9ImGbbZn5xfFT2iA1b2aZVQDARJyliPBoOvxkZkZcmH5005SgjdIZFxQVmJHPVtRip3BS8kczGF-X4LNK6ZJFrYcY3vYTrLCWBcfhrKP_eAUOQ9_xXy1K5Emzf3fgtO6ItAheVTkeHzL9cL0-s7xg-LE9nOyo_Ps9PdkUIrMIh8-VSCcfVnow/s2000/Outstanding%20Drama%20Series.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn10Kr_9ImGbbZn5xfFT2iA1b2aZVQDARJyliPBoOvxkZkZcmH5005SgjdIZFxQVmJHPVtRip3BS8kczGF-X4LNK6ZJFrYcY3vYTrLCWBcfhrKP_eAUOQ9_xXy1K5Emzf3fgtO6ItAheVTkeHzL9cL0-s7xg-LE9nOyo_Ps9PdkUIrMIh8-VSCcfVnow/s320/Outstanding%20Drama%20Series.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835136xaa534162-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING LEAD PERFORMANCE — DRAMA</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNSAJ_WKisd1SE6o2ANNmy9DzIch4qa4fojzsS8fm77RtQdJIxH4-Cd89sudEFbOziXbOsMY6V6Iogl-Xa5zFYFn7ebLZOsbNln0k37Fz1fNf-tMS7O4Pb0itNilI-fBau16dzeR1qEV0Mx2ISV1AWgqjBTWQDWP58ZVZi8pJKteUIf68uqPZydVMDUQ/s2000/Lead%20Performance%20-%20Drama.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNSAJ_WKisd1SE6o2ANNmy9DzIch4qa4fojzsS8fm77RtQdJIxH4-Cd89sudEFbOziXbOsMY6V6Iogl-Xa5zFYFn7ebLZOsbNln0k37Fz1fNf-tMS7O4Pb0itNilI-fBau16dzeR1qEV0Mx2ISV1AWgqjBTWQDWP58ZVZi8pJKteUIf68uqPZydVMDUQ/s320/Lead%20Performance%20-%20Drama.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835141x66D8E304-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE — DRAMA</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAcGTtXsh-Eo49BLfU8oaX5kyRu6UlcuZk-lOnViu2EA4co8tfahebGlJpb9VnLzb9Wx2MgYIqsuHxgUPHysgjzt6yT-rp10jhX5B6E-gzMhpFHSJBO43PGO5UogiJkGExDju3gu4GNnnRhJBz7CfVp3uU9djKFCo1s__DTwZ3NpiEPg5ESyn4ba2bJw/s2000/Supporting%20Performance%20-%20Drama.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAcGTtXsh-Eo49BLfU8oaX5kyRu6UlcuZk-lOnViu2EA4co8tfahebGlJpb9VnLzb9Wx2MgYIqsuHxgUPHysgjzt6yT-rp10jhX5B6E-gzMhpFHSJBO43PGO5UogiJkGExDju3gu4GNnnRhJBz7CfVp3uU9djKFCo1s__DTwZ3NpiEPg5ESyn4ba2bJw/s320/Supporting%20Performance%20-%20Drama.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835144x9F5C45c1-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OTP OF THE YEAR</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgghBP0CGs3hxFrrC1kBprZwdBKDSPJmXgATDj5XSd33wBThafQzcewQuN13SgJYHKHtOP-lipC1u4y2xEXKJr2fO0wSMfzFuogga3ihbqhFtidWajFgeFauLBAh5JtO434m9nRqrgFAiccmf3-2bwP4TovHBUZdpp2tPPo7cbWD7HoPEeCXTEZtf0XSQ/s2000/OTP%20of%20the%20Year.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgghBP0CGs3hxFrrC1kBprZwdBKDSPJmXgATDj5XSd33wBThafQzcewQuN13SgJYHKHtOP-lipC1u4y2xEXKJr2fO0wSMfzFuogga3ihbqhFtidWajFgeFauLBAh5JtO434m9nRqrgFAiccmf3-2bwP4TovHBUZdpp2tPPo7cbWD7HoPEeCXTEZtf0XSQ/s320/OTP%20of%20the%20Year.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835145xA2476989-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">BEST NEW SERIES</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHkH-jl0EuYMgYtCdHGArDZHh-R76RV1v4_HatuZJXnrwBxJxy9aDhUzOlUgmelVASu-pKhQZHtDxHiJS0WPLxWKbVHuvt6hWpTxPuaqIgFfja0xI6ImHwvOXSibP95hd6cDci_VzCA0-BtJQBhWsYiwHeS41urdCDvOOUaYWvemzfu63r6d4bUS9kiw/s2000/Best%20New%20Series.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHkH-jl0EuYMgYtCdHGArDZHh-R76RV1v4_HatuZJXnrwBxJxy9aDhUzOlUgmelVASu-pKhQZHtDxHiJS0WPLxWKbVHuvt6hWpTxPuaqIgFfja0xI6ImHwvOXSibP95hd6cDci_VzCA0-BtJQBhWsYiwHeS41urdCDvOOUaYWvemzfu63r6d4bUS9kiw/s320/Best%20New%20Series.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835146xfaF847dD-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">OUTSTANDING ENSEMBLE</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheqzuqR1X4zb3N078r9HwxDOUgd0SU0y_3r5JEC5IISL0ERiGQKT8QoRGFzxfo_M_meIvlC7PiLjD3-rVzCtpVEz385dM8z4Jng0SuxUiDAxK862LBt_XUywuoTj5M8NdRsT0v9LFxkivnVYfnCEtHs6CSPUHkF0BcePUGxio-Xto4K6VQY39UrcygqA/s2000/Outstanding%20Ensemble.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheqzuqR1X4zb3N078r9HwxDOUgd0SU0y_3r5JEC5IISL0ERiGQKT8QoRGFzxfo_M_meIvlC7PiLjD3-rVzCtpVEz385dM8z4Jng0SuxUiDAxK862LBt_XUywuoTj5M8NdRsT0v9LFxkivnVYfnCEtHs6CSPUHkF0BcePUGxio-Xto4K6VQY39UrcygqA/s320/Outstanding%20Ensemble.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835148x4E704532-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style>
<h3 style="clear: both; text-align: left;">GUILTLESS TV PLEASURE</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhvZuzel0qcR0ySGmZOicWJkVwPMS8b1SxYqrf2nn9i9M__rBlseGfzc4-Jcby9IVCUegdK9zSgVp4fU1KCBdbzH5I0G1SunBcPrqNK1iDPebbKXu8cYqHmHi1n0R5irVd_O0tKGv3STuRc-8SdNdyevw9FXIEmcfe9ShBCvIpGoexAOoAXL1RKdGG1Q/s2000/Guiltless%20TV%20Pleasure.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhvZuzel0qcR0ySGmZOicWJkVwPMS8b1SxYqrf2nn9i9M__rBlseGfzc4-Jcby9IVCUegdK9zSgVp4fU1KCBdbzH5I0G1SunBcPrqNK1iDPebbKXu8cYqHmHi1n0R5irVd_O0tKGv3STuRc-8SdNdyevw9FXIEmcfe9ShBCvIpGoexAOoAXL1RKdGG1Q/s320/Guiltless%20TV%20Pleasure.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div></div>
<iframe class="qp_iframe" frameborder="no" seamless="seamless" src="https://poll-maker.com/frame4835150xA1704764-149" style="background: transparent; border: 0; height: 100%; width: 300px;"></iframe><style></style><div><br /></div><div>Happy voting, everyone!</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-65505943397663466872023-05-27T22:47:00.001-04:002023-05-27T22:47:43.786-04:00The Flash 9x13 Review: "A New World, Part Four" (So Long and Thanks for All the Flash) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVMDUccRRem-Dtpo-t79g-AIs8Goy8yCY6Efj_dJ1R7SoSlA3hmoGJwu52YLTrKNouz61FURFjtZY7StUyRxozR4ACMgYg-6eBa3W7vTjHfdk1eF87-abA8dX-OhiQ_nSAljG2teEPK189EfCMH2t2X0_f91MBEZGZPEhOXGHu2LXRd0MMDrsCkiE_HA/s512/unnamed%20(4).png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="341" data-original-width="512" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVMDUccRRem-Dtpo-t79g-AIs8Goy8yCY6Efj_dJ1R7SoSlA3hmoGJwu52YLTrKNouz61FURFjtZY7StUyRxozR4ACMgYg-6eBa3W7vTjHfdk1eF87-abA8dX-OhiQ_nSAljG2teEPK189EfCMH2t2X0_f91MBEZGZPEhOXGHu2LXRd0MMDrsCkiE_HA/s320/unnamed%20(4).png" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“A New World, Part Four”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: May 24, 2023</div><p>Alas, all good things must come to an end. And despite my periodic complaints in these reviews (163 of them!) I do count this show as a good thing. For all its flaws, <i>The Flash</i> has frequently embodied everything I appreciate about comic books and comic book shows — not the least of which being a full embrace of absurdity. But how does “A New World, Part Four” measure up as a series send-off? I guess we’ll see!</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PART FOUR: FINALE</span></h4><p>We begin with a voiceover, in classic <i>The Flash</i> fashion, as Barry asks us to believe in the impossible. As a fun bit, Allegra accidentally answers that plea with “Nope, I can’t believe it,” while Team Flash recaps that Eddie Thawne has become the Negative Speed Force avatar. Just as Mark laments that they could really use the Flash to help deal with this, Barry calls out over the comms. He’s heading to the hospital, but he shares the bad news that the timeline started fracturing back in 2049 and they’ll be in trouble if it reaches the present day.</p><p>Zoom/Hunter Zolomon appears in a red-tinged, Negative Speed Force version of the West house, having just died. Godspeed shows up shortly after him. Surprise! The old speedster villains are making an appearance in this grand finale. Considering how boring I find speedster villains, this isn’t a good surprise, but it is technically a surprise. Savitar and Godspeed posture and threaten and generally prove why they’re such unappealing villains, before Wells-faced Eobard Thawne interrupts. He’s also an unappealing villain, but at least he has a little comedy flair. Savitar, the God of Speed, is ironically late to the party.</p><p>Eddie says that he’s the reason for the Evil Speedster Meet-and-Greet and holds up the glowing blue crystal, which looks extra cool in the red-lighting of the house. He clutches the crystal and gets a magical costume change, then promises the villains he’ll help them get enough speed to defeat the Flash. This is the corniest thing the show’s done in a long time and I’m thrilled it’s going out with a negative cool factor. Once a nerd, always a nerd, The Flash.</p><p>Eddie — now going by Cobalt Blue — interrupts the reunion between Barry and Iris in the hospital, bearing blue roses and a creepy smile. His plan is to kill Barry, destroy the timeline, and rebuild a new timeline where he’s the hero. When he asks for Barry and Iris’s last words, Iris pulls out the ol’ “Run, Barry. Run.” Negative. Cool. Factor. Barry zips Eddie away from the hospital room while Iris carries on being incredibly pregnant.</p><p>Speedster fight! Eddie hits Barry with lightning and the blast sends him flying off, destroying like, five cars in the process. Nora saves Barry from another strike, then the rest of Team Flash arrives — in costume — to provide backup. This presents a perfect opportunity for Eddie to present his evil speedster team and declare that he has “a whole legion.” First: four people does not a legion make, Ed. Second: everyone on your side has been defeated before, so I don’t know why you’re so smug.</p><p>Another high speed fight breaks out, with each member of the team facing off with an evil speedster. Nora gets Savitar, who stabs her in the same way he was supposed to stab Iris back during the Savitar season, but Nora just yanks the blade out of her gut and stabs him right back. Cecile makes short work of Godspeed and even lands a cheesy one-liner. Chester, who was not part of the field team, somehow ends up facing Eobard Thawne, who speed-electrocutes him and scares us all with the possibility of him being a series finale sacrifice, but Allegra saves him. Khione and CCPD handle Zoom. Barry, of course, gets tasked with Eddie.</p><p>All the other villains were subdued but not killed, so when Jay Garrick swipes Eddie’s speed, it gives him the opportunity to suck up the speed of his former allies. Eddie disappears and the temporal storm that had spelled doom for 2049 begins rumbling in the sky, indicating that the timeline has begun to unravel. Barry and Jay realize Eddie’s next step will be to absorb the Negative Speed Force, which will mean overloading and killing himself like Thawne did.</p><p>Barry doesn’t want to just let Eddie die, but he’s struggling to find a solution to the problem because the Negative Speed Force is just an endless cycle of fighting and death. Khione says they need coexistence. Barry says it’s impossible, but Khione implores him to believe in the impossible in order to create a better world. Grant Gustin’s really stellar in this scene, by the way.</p><p>Speaking of stellar: the fight scene between Eddie and Barry! The all red lighting interspersed with blue-tinted flashbacks, Eddie’s fracturing sanity, and — holy moly, when Eddie punches Barry, Barry actually spits blood all over the wall! I don’t think we’ve ever gotten that much blood on this show before. Barry throws some more speechifying at Eddie and finally gets through to him, resulting in Eddit ripping the blue crystal off his chest and shattering it. The red lighting of the scene shifts to blue in a neat little effect, and while Eddie still seems to be the Negative Speed Force avatar, he’s no longer insane and violent. Eddie wants Barry to tell Iris he’s happy for her, they shake hands, and Barry is transported to the hospital where Iris has officially gone into labor.</p><p>Despite only just being past the halfway mark of the episode, everything from here on out is tying up loose ends. Baby Nora is born (and we get an incredibly touching Barry/Iris love story montage as Joe sings to his new granddaughter), Chester has black hole powers (kinda cute that the black hole meta and the light meta are a couple), and a visitation from that timeless version of Harrison Wells inspires Khione to ascend as a goddess protector of the natural order, allowing Caitlin to take her body back. </p><p>A week after the events of the episode, Barry and Iris host a party celebrating the new addition to the family. Barry and Caitlin apologize for the fight they had over bringing Frost back to life and hug it out, and it’s very sweet — if only because they’re two of the original members of Team Flash, and I’m feeling nostalgic. The party’s an array of <i>The Flash</i> faces, but Cisco is notable in his absence. Understandable, since Carlos Valdes couldn’t make the filming, but it’s still a tad disappointing not to see him in the last episode. Anyway, Joe and Cecile get engaged at the party, just to add to the happy vibes.</p><p>After the party, Barry soothes a fussy baby Nora by asking her to believe in the impossible, then telling her the story of the Flash. Barry says that, in order to keep Nora from experiencing the tragedies he experienced, he’s going to spread the amazing gift of super speed to worthy people: Avery Ho, Max Mercury, and Jess Chambers. He hopes sharing his powers will create a better world, where nothing has to be impossible.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE END</span></h4><p>Well, that’s all, folks — and what a lovely end! I’d like to take a moment to thank Jenn for giving me the space on Just About Write to ramble about a show that’s teetered between fun, infuriating, brilliant, and bewildering like the world’s wobbliest Weeble. What started as a temporary guest contribution turned into, as stated at the beginning of this review, over 160 installments averaging around 1,400 words each. It is, without a doubt, my longest-lasting and largest writing project ever, and it’s all been dedicated to this ridiculous show full of speedsters and talking gorillas and man-sharks, too much angst and too little Cisco Ramon, wonderful moments and baffling plot decisions. </p><p>I hope these reviews have been entertaining to read. If they’ve managed to inspire a chuckle or two over the years, I’ll go ahead and consider it a success. If they haven’t, well... don’t tell me. I’m very sensitive.</p><p>And to sign off, for old time’s sake after a long, long absence, I present you with the very last ever:</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">BARRY ALLEN PUPPY GIF OF THE EPISODE</span></h4><p style="text-align: center;"><b>THE FAREWELL PUPPY</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://media.tenor.com/cDj-qG6kJuQAAAAC/dog-waving-dog.gif" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="280" data-original-width="498" height="180" src="https://media.tenor.com/cDj-qG6kJuQAAAAC/dog-waving-dog.gif" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>“Meet Eddie Thawne, the dumbest branch on my family tree.” It’s not Eddie’s fault the writers decided his smart plan had to be undone for the sake of extended angst, Eobard.</li><li>Eddie talking through a stuffed bunny and making a sad face about destroying the universe was funny enough to make him my favorite of the evil speedsters. Not saying a lot, but still.</li><li>How did Godspeed know Cecile’s superhero name when we just learned it last week and he wasn’t there? Why would Thawne target Chester? How did Zoom know Khione was a goddess? These are just a few of the questions I don’t have to care about getting answers for anymore!</li><li>Nora, in the waiting room for her own birth: “Am I breaking timeline rules by being here?” Oh, sweetie. It’s way too late for anyone in your family to worry about that.</li><li>Very cute that Chester memorized the names of all Khione’s plants.</li><li>Barry, as he watches Nora cuddle her baby self: “Okay, even for us, this is trippy.”</li><li>Two things about Joe and Cecile’s engagement: adorable that Cecile puts a pillow down to protect Joe’s knees, and hilarious that Joe kneeling is almost as tall as Cecile standing.</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-66337792341608584942023-05-27T22:40:00.000-04:002023-05-27T22:40:02.345-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x19 and 19x20 Recaps: “Wedding Bell Blues” & “Happily Ever After?” (Couples Galore) [Contributor: Julia Siegel] <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy8J6RT0CYewqvbqTMinDJDa2IQd8jn000jTRQIIn69e6aVfUc1gAwjL-MyHkDR8nsUNyic9JI8Itg6l39-Up5h-wxmnhPhlGbuA-otkoW18fXr9hUAKvItgCcGBq6eFVatpKDaeyrl-BeAglWSxJcLiyPVmes0p4uqUgoD-JOJxwQOEJSpDrRGXvLAg/s579/wedding.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="325" data-original-width="579" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy8J6RT0CYewqvbqTMinDJDa2IQd8jn000jTRQIIn69e6aVfUc1gAwjL-MyHkDR8nsUNyic9JI8Itg6l39-Up5h-wxmnhPhlGbuA-otkoW18fXr9hUAKvItgCcGBq6eFVatpKDaeyrl-BeAglWSxJcLiyPVmes0p4uqUgoD-JOJxwQOEJSpDrRGXvLAg/s320/wedding.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Wedding Bell Blues”</b> & <b>“Happily Ever After?”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdates: May 18, 2023</div><p>A wedding, an awards ceremony, and lots of drama: it sounds like another <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i> season finale is upon us! This year’s two-hour ender is packed full of intense moments in what might be our final episodes for a while with the writer’s strike underway. The episodes are highlighted by the on-screen returns of Meredith and Maggie and plenty of reunions to go around. So buckle up for a wild ride.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">WEDDING DAY</span></h4><p>On the morning of her wedding, Simone wakes up to a text from Trey saying that he has left a latte outside her bedroom door. She gets out of bed and opens the door to see Trey standing with the hot drink in his hand. Simone isn’t sure he should be there, but decides it is okay since she isn’t in her dress yet. They kiss, Trey leaves, and Simone walks down the hall to Lucas’ room. She is upset to see he has already left for the day, and we see Lucas and Mika on the way to work in the latter’s van. Simone grabs her wedding dress and goes to leave the house only to find Jules at the door. She is glad her maid of honor is there because she needs a ride to Grey Sloan Memorial.</p><p>Over at the hospital, Winston gives Teddy parting instructions for his patients before he leaves for Boston. Blue tails behind them and takes notes for his boss. Teddy has a toothache, so Winston offers to stay behind so she can go see a dentist. She refuses to let him miss the Catherine Fox Award ceremony and names him chief of cardiothoracic surgery. Teddy says he has earned it, and Winston is thrilled for the promotion and tells Teddy she won’t regret the decision. After Winston leaves to catch his flight, Blue tells Teddy he can skip Simone’s wedding, but she tells him to go and skip the reception instead since the hospital is short staffed.</p><p>Up in the ICU, Jules shows Max the dress she is wearing to the wedding. She didn’t have time to buy a new one, so she is wearing her Renaissance Fair dress. Max tells Jules to stop over-checking her chart and asks if she finished her toast. Jules is horrified that she didn’t know she needed to write one, and Max assures her it will be easy to make up. She then asks Jules if Blue is her date, which Jules scoffs at.</p><p>Mika present rounds on Sam to Owen and Link. After four days of formal rounds, Sam is done with the process and asks the doctors if they can just act like his friends now since they practically live together. Mika puts Sam in his place by explaining that they are not friends since she is his doctor and worked incredibly hard for eight years to get to where she is now. All of the men in the room are impressed and gain a bit more respect for Mika.</p><p>Simone walks into the hospital and past Schmitt, who wants to know why she is there. She asks if he knows where Lucas is and then goes to find him in the skills lab. Simone tells Lucas she is upset he left the house without her. She starts giving him notes about their now-mutual patient, Toby, the breast cancer patient from a few episodes ago. Simone says that she can’t be at the hospital today because she is getting married and wants to leave Toby in Lucas’ hands. She also tells Lucas that she can’t deny his feelings and the connection they have, but she wants him to know that Trey does love her. She thinks their relationship deserves a chance even though she doesn’t want to hurt or lose Lucas. She asks Lucas to take care of Toby for her, and Lucas replies that he would do anything for her.</p><p>Outside Sam’s room, Link tells Mika that she did a great job and that Sam needed some humbling. Owen tells the intern to order a CT angiogram for Sam, and Mika reminds them that she has Simone’s wedding to get to. Link and Owen are more than happy to cover for her. Before she can go, Link asks Mika if Sam has been inappropriate to her or anyone else. Mika says if he is asking about Jo, the inappropriateness is reciprocal. Owen offers to take over Sam’s care, but Link refuses the help.</p><p>We then see Simone and Jules running from the hospital to the parking lot to get to the wedding and right past Blue, who winds up with a situation of his own. Blue sees a mother, Carmen, looking for help for her son, Enzo, who is passed out in her car. Blue scoops up Enzo and carries him inside the hospital while shouting for help for a potential opiate poisoning in an eight year old. Carmen only speaks Spanish, and it so happens that Blue appears to be fluent in Spanish. Blue calls for someone to page Owen to help with Enzo. After Owen arrives as backup, Blue asks Carmen if she gave Enzo any medications, which she didn’t. Blue tells Owen that he thinks he might be wrong, but it seems like a textbook case of opiate overdose. Right on cue, Enzo wakes up. Owen wants to admit the boy for further testing and tells Blue to call Child Protective Services since they now know Enzo overdosed. Carmen then collapses, and Owen orders a toxicology screening for her too.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">BUMPY RIDE</span></h4><p>Mika is driving herself and Helm to Simone’s wedding in her van and tells her date how proud she is to have shown the attendings who she really is that morning. She can’t believe how great she can be when she isn’t working multiple jobs and is getting eight hours of sleep each night. Mika thanks Helm for taking the kryptonite out of her system and standing up for her. She then asks Helm if she can kiss her at a red light, and the two share a very passionate kiss.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Lucas meets Toby, Simone’s breast cancer patient from a few episodes back, in the lobby. Toby wasn’t aware that Simone was getting married that day and realizes her doctor didn’t mention it to make sure she kept her appointment. Lucas tells Toby that Simone asked him to be there for her, and he promised to do so for her and won’t leave to go to the wedding. Toby thanks him and goes to pre-op before her mastectomy.</p><p>Link wheels Sam into an elevator to go upstairs for the angiogram, and Jo sneaks into the elevator too. She shows Sam some of the ASL that she learned in the past two days and is surprised to find out that Sam also knows a few signs. The two flirt, which visibly angers Link. When the door opens on the next floor, Jo decides to join Link and Sam for the test, much to Link’s chagrin.</p><p>Mika and Helm make it to Simone’s grandmother’s house and are instantly bombarded by an anxious Trey. He tells Mika that he was in charge of ordering the flowers, which didn’t show up because the company had the wrong date. Trey is freaking out, so Mika tells him to take a deep breath. She offers to go get Simone a bouquet, so Trey asks her to try to find tulips because they were her mom’s favorite flower.</p><p>We then see the party going to Boston get on Catherine’s private plane. The hostess greets Nick when he gets on, and we see that Winston and Richard are already there too. Bailey makes it in time and tells the group that Ben couldn’t make it due to the floor collapse at the firefighter’s ball in the Station 19 season finale. Bailey talks about how she didn’t want to go with them on the private plane at first because planes terrify her, which is clearly a nod to the season eight tragedy that took the lives of Lexi and Mark. Catherine walks over to the seated Nick and tells him how happy she is that he was able to come. Richard then tells Nick that he is sitting in Catherine’s seat and makes him move to a couch where Winston is sitting. Amelia then pops out of the back of the plane, and Winston is not thrilled his sister-in-law is joining them. When she sits on the couch next to Winston, he makes Nick switch seats with him so he doesn’t have to sit next to Amelia. With tensions running high before the flight takes off, it seems like it will be a long trip to Boston for this crew.</p><p>At the hospital, CPS arrives to ask Carmen questions about Enzo, who has been separated from his mother. Blue is with Carmen and asks the agent if he can stay to translate since she knows very little English. The agent says a translator is on the way and kicks Blue out, but Carmen asks the intern to stay with her son and tell him she is still there before he leaves. Blue finds Owen and tells him that Carmen only had a vasovagal response and did not overdose. Owen says Enzo’s tests came back clean, but he could have fentanyl in his system since that doesn’t show up on a normal blood test. Teddy comes over to see what is going on, and Blue tells her that he is skipping Simone’s wedding to help Carmen and Enzo. Teddy keeps grabbing at her face, so Owen tells her that she needs to go see a dentist. She would rather rip her own tooth out because she is pulled in four different directions at once at work and can’t step away to take care of herself.</p><p>On the plane, Amelia can’t wait to see Meredith. She assures Nick that he made Mer very happy, to which he replies that Mer has a funny way of showing it if that is true. Amelia reveals Mer asks her about him and thinks she might be ready for them to be in a relationship now. Nick says that the harder someone chases Mer, the further she runs, which makes it sound like he has given up. Winston sarcastically quips that it is perfect that all three sisters are single at once. At the back of the plane, Bailey tells Catherine and Richard that she wants to get as far away from the couch situation as possible, while Catherine is happy to watch the show. The plane hits a bit of turbulence, which makes Bailey nervous.</p><p>Next, Jules helps Simone get dressed for her wedding. Simone is missing her mom and tells Jules that her mom’s favorite bird was the robin. On her first date with Trey, a robin was perched close to them, so she took it as a positive sign from her mom. Simone knows Trey is a good, steady man, which is what her mom would have wanted for her. She thinks her mom would be proud of her on her wedding day. </p><p>Simone’s dad then shows up, and a bird flies into the window of the room they are in. Jules looks out the window and sees that the bird is not okay. Simone wants to know what kind of bird hit the window, but Jules won’t say, which tells us that it was a robin. Jules then rips Simone’s dress when trying to zip it up, which makes the moment anxiety central for the two interns. The count is up to three bad things occurring before the wedding even starts, so maybe the signs are pointing the opposite way than Simone first thought.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE PLOT THICKENS</span></h4><p>In pre-op, Toby is waiting for her procedure time, so Lucas goes to check in on her. Toby talks about how she regrets not appreciating her breasts more, and Lucas reminds her that the surgery will save her life. She knows it won’t be the same, which Lucas agrees with because she will be cancer-free. Toby tells Lucas that he is cute, a doctor, and knows the right thing to say, so she is curious why he isn’t going to the wedding. The look on Lucas’ face tells her the reason instantly, which they will bond about later.</p><p>Teddy joins Link and Jo for Sam’s scan in Winston’s place. The scan shows Sam has a grade one aortic transection, which Teddy thinks is a deceleration injury from the crash. She says this injury usually heals on its own and that they should rescan him in 48 hours. Jo volunteers to watch Sam, so Link tries to override her and say he will do it himself. Jo complains that Link doesn’t even like Sam, so Link snaps back, “Not the way you do.”</p><p>Elsewhere, Blue finds Max wandering around the ICU as he brings Enzo up to a room. Max says she got turned around and wants to know why there is someone in her room. Blue explains that she must have wandered from the north side to the south side, and her room is on the north. Enzo asks for his mom, and Blue gets a page for a consult. Max says she will sit with the boy and can rest in a chair instead of a bed. Blue decides to let her do that because he can’t seem to say no to Max. Before he can leave, the police come over to Blue and say they need to ask him a few questions because Enzo tested positive for fentanyl, which makes it a criminal case now.</p><p>Back at the wedding, Jules is trying to fix Simone’s dress when the latter’s grandma wanders in. Simone pretends to be her mom since that is who her grandma thinks she is. Her grandma tells her not to marry Kenneth if she doesn’t want to. She also says she should go with Dwayne, Simone’s father, if that is who she wants to be with. Jules and Simone are stunned at the revelation, to which Jules says, “The plot thickens.”</p><p>Blue goes back to the ICU and finds that Max got kicked out of Enzo’s room. She now knows the full situation after eavesdropping on everyone and asks Blue why the mom would give fentanyl to her son. She then asks if the police have the situation wrong. Blue thinks they do, but he feels he might be partial to single moms and their sons since he had a single mom. Max tells him to fight if he thinks it is wrong, but Blue is worried he will lose his job if he does speak up. Max tells Blue a story about how many years ago, she didn’t ask a coworker why she had bruises on her face and then that coworker turned up dead a few weeks later. She says not asking still keeps her up at night. Blue goes down to the ER to find the police handcuffing Carmen. He questions Schmitt as to what is going on and asks if there was an interpreter for her interview with CPS. He doesn’t want to see the family split up and knows the system is making assumptions they wouldn’t make if Carmen was speaking English. Owen overhears and tries to calm Blue down, but the intern won’t let it go. He goes over to Carmen and asks her if Enzo ate any candy or if she left him alone at all. Carmen replies that Enzo did not eat any candy and the only time he was alone was when she took a shower.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">WHAT TO DO?</span></h4><p>In the sky, the private plane is still experiencing a lot of turbulence. Amelia is freaking out, and Winston thinks it tracks that she wants to tell the pilot what to do. We see a flight attendant fall from the turbulence, but she is fine. Amelia tries to apologize to Winston again, but he wants nothing to do with it. He asks if there was any truth to what she said about him being the reason Maggie left. Amelia admits that there might have been some truth to what she said, but she thinks Winston should love Maggie, not compete with her. Winston feels Amelia doesn’t know him at all and doesn’t understand what he overcame to be there. He doesn’t appreciate the fact that she called him small and a coward because his marriage didn’t work out. Winston then says that maybe Amelia is the reason Maggie left. Catherine tells Amelia and Winston to stop wasting time with petty arguments just as the turbulence gets a lot worse, which worries everyone on board. </p><p>Catherine thinks the plane is going down and says this isn’t the way she is supposed to die. The plane starts to plummet, and Amelia says that she can’t die because she is a mom. Winston reaches out and tells her to give him her hand. Richard takes Catherine’s alcoholic drink and looks like he wants to drink it, but Bailey slaps it out of his hand and exclaims, “Oh hell no!” before he can take a sip. The plane gets through the turbulence and the pilot apologizes for the roughness. Catherine inappropriately laughs at the situation, while everyone else looks worse for wear</p><p>At the hospital, Max gets to sit with Enzo again, while Blue and Schmitt watch from outside the ICU room. Blue thinks he is going to get fired for sticking up for Carmen. Schmitt tells him that he also grew up with a single mom, which he finds to be a strength. He knows not all single moms are like his and Blue’s, so they have to follow protocols. Owen arrives to give some good news. The police searched the rental place that Carmen and Enzo are staying at and found a bag of weed gummies and fentanyl that was left behind by previous tenants. Owen tells Blue that he fought the good fight, but the intern doesn’t know what to do with the rage he feels about the situation. The police have let Carmen go, and mother and son are reunited at last.</p><p>Down the hall, Sam is still flirting hard with Jo as she checks his chest tube output. She thinks they can remove the tube in a few days and finds that the nerve signal in his right leg is still strong. Sam asks if they can tell their kids this was their first date, and Jo laughs and leaves the room. Link is waiting outside the room for her and isn’t happy about watching the flirting. Jo asks if there is something he needs to say to her. Link doesn’t approve of the relationship because she is one of Sam’s doctors. Jo is surprised he is going that route and says, “You slept with an intern. Did I judge you?”</p><p>Simone and Trey’s wedding is finally about to start. As Simone steps into the backyard for the ceremony, we see that Mika found flowers and got enough to decorate a bit. Mika gives Simone a bouquet of flowers that she collected from the neighbors’ yards. Simone instantly pricks her finger on a thorn and proceeds to bleed on her wedding dress. Jules immediately steps in to help Simone hide the blood with the bouquet. Surprisingly, Simone doesn’t freak out, and her dad starts walking her down the aisle. After a few steps, Simone sees a dead robin outside the window of the room she was getting ready in, and she starts to realize she might not be able to go through with the wedding. Mid-aisle, Simone asks her father if her mom was engaged to someone else before him. They stop walking, and Simone wants to know the truth before going any further. Jules tries to stall Trey at the altar to ensure he doesn’t think anything is wrong. Simone’s dad tells her that he met her mom two months before she was going to get married. Her mom called off her wedding last minute, and they both knew they were meant to be together. Poor Simone is confused and doesn’t know what to do with all the signs now pointing to a not-so-joyous day.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">CODE BLUE FOR EVERYONE</span></h4><p>Blue finally gets Max back to her own bed, and the elderly patient thinks she and Blue are a dynamic duo. She also sees why Jules is falling for him. Blue doesn’t believe her since Jules barely talks to him anymore. Out of nowhere, Max start having trouble breathing. Blue calls for help and gets her oxygen as she starts to crash. Blue begs Max to hold on. A nurse comes in and reminds Blue that Max has a DNR. She tries to stop Blue from saving Max’s life when he asks for an intubation tray.</p><p>Teddy goes to her office and is followed in by Owen. He wants her to eat and brought her a smoothie, knowing that it would hurt her mouth to chew. Teddy is glad that Owen always takes care of her, and the two sit on the couch together. The Catherine Fox Award crew then lands in Boston. Bailey calls Ben and asks Nick if he is going to follow everyone else when he doesn’t immediately get up. Nick wants to meet up with them later because there is something he needs to do first. Bailey leaves a voicemail for Ben and exits the plane. After taking a deep breath and sighing, Nick gets up to leave too.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, we quickly see Blue trying to revive Max, but the nurses won’t bring him an intubation tray due to the patient’s DNR. Then, Link goes into a supply closet and pushes a cart into the wall to let off some steam. The scene cuts back to Schmitt finding Blue attempting to save Max’s life. He tells Blue not to intubate because that is not what Max wanted. Blue informs Schmitt that Max has a collapsed lung and was fine one moment and coded the next. He begs his boss to help him save her, and Schmitt caves and asks the nurses for a chest tube tray.</p><p>Downstairs, Lucas is still sitting with Toby and talking to her when Simone comes running into the hospital in her wedding dress with a desperate look on her face. She locks eyes with Lucas through Toby’s room’s window and walks slowly toward him. Lucas gets up and goes out to meet her. Simone calmly tells him that she didn’t get married. Toby tells them to go and that she will be fine by herself. Lucas and Simone start walking down the hall and straight into an on-call room. Simone locks the door behind her, and Lucas immediately kisses her. She turns around so he can take off her dress. As the dress falls to the ground, they kiss again. Simone takes off Lucas’ scrub top, and they continue to make out. Lucas carries Simone to a bed, and the rest is left to your imagination. It’s about time these two got together, and we will see more of how it plays out in the second episode.</p><p>The first episode ends with Nick taking a taxi to Mer’s new house in Boston. He takes a deep breath and knocks on the door. A man answers the door, and Nick, along with the audience, is quite stunned. Nick asks if Mer lives there, and the man replies that she is at work. He introduces himself as Michael and says he will let Mer know he came by, but it is probably best if Nick texts her. It is quite surprising to see a man answer Mer’s door, but don’t forget that there are multiple reasons he could be there. This would have been a fantastic cliffhanger to a normal weekly episode, but thankfully, we don’t have to wait a week to find out what happens next.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidG0U_KCXTF9Al9EK16O_zUISCqkjRHucjXVsP2eXCArL5qZdyvnLunU0yB4ORzpugsLok9KuD8rRvql13BJVtWuEvsXK6m3HT6c3yX41CftM_2XRhWey4KYX62Knibj2bs0J8NAr1KFYQa-eQ3S4irUlGsmhTo0G3HrN0UhjqMuyutexfAiLdapISig/s1200/mer.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="676" data-original-width="1200" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidG0U_KCXTF9Al9EK16O_zUISCqkjRHucjXVsP2eXCArL5qZdyvnLunU0yB4ORzpugsLok9KuD8rRvql13BJVtWuEvsXK6m3HT6c3yX41CftM_2XRhWey4KYX62Knibj2bs0J8NAr1KFYQa-eQ3S4irUlGsmhTo0G3HrN0UhjqMuyutexfAiLdapISig/s320/mer.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><b>“Happily Ever After?”</b></span></p>
<p>The second hour opens in Boston, where Nick is drowning his sorrows at his hotel’s bar. He thinks Mer has moved on with a new man, but he can’t wallow long because he gets a text from Mer asking him to go to her lab, stat. We then see potential new lovebirds Simone and Lucas lying in bed after sleeping together. Lucas asks what happened at the wedding, but Simone wants him to stay in the moment as long as they can. They start kissing and are interrupted by Lucas getting a page. He groans when he sees that Schmitt needs him to cover the ER. Simone says she should check on Toby anyways, and they kiss before parting.</p><p>Jo then goes to check on Sam. His friend Kwame has returned and shows him photos of his new baby boy. He tells Sam that they named the baby Sam after him, which was his wife’s idea. Kwame says he will be back the next day and leaves. Mika comes in to tag out Jo per Link’s order. Jo protests, so Mika tries to tell her that since she is wearing black scrubs, she is currently an OB resident, which means Link outranks her. Jo sternly replies that she outranks Mika no matter what color scrubs she is wearing and sentences the intern to cover the pit. After Mika leaves, Sam comments that Link doesn’t want Jo alone with him and asks what the story between them is.</p><p>Over in Boston, Nick arrives at the hospital Mer works at and finds Bailey, Richard, and Amelia walking toward Mer’s lab too. They deduce they all got the same text from her. Mer, who is wearing her Dartmouth sweatshirt, is on the floor trying to figure something out and talking to herself. She says that everything is wrong and that they need to question everything they know about Alzheimer’s if they are going to cure it. Understandably, the group is quite confused.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Blue and Schmitt talk about the Max situation after they save her life. Blue tells Schmitt that Max was perfectly fine before she coded, and he isn’t sure why her pressures aren’t rising after reinflating her lung. Schmitt wants Blue to report what he did to Teddy and document everything for the committee that will be looking into it. Jules comes into Max’s ICU room and wants to know what happened. She angrily asks who intubated Max when she has a DNR, and Blue owns up to saving her. </p><p>Owen is working in the pit and sees Helm walk in. She tells him that she was in the getaway van and since she is at the hospital, she will change and start working immediately. Owen seems happy to have Helm back, but he is immediately forced from his reprieve when an ambulance pulls up with a car crash victim with a left arm injury. When the gurney comes out of the ambulance, we see that the patient is Trey. Lucas comes out to help too and mutters, “Oh shit” under his breath when he realizes who he has to help.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">STRONG REACTIONS</span></h4><p>Up in the ICU, Schmitt explains to Teddy and Jules what happened and why he and Blue saved Max. Jules, who is still angry, says that Max was clear with her wishes. Teddy states that Schmitt and Blue need to speak to Max’s medical proxy to decide what happens next. Blue looks at the paperwork and sees that Jules is the proxy. Teddy tells them that it is Jules’ choice to put Max on pressers or to take the tubes out. Jules asks Teddy if Max will survive if they extubate her, but Teddy can’t answer the question. Jules agrees to the medication and asks Blue to not talk to her. Teddy then asks Schmitt to look at her tooth for any sores, which is a comical scene. Schmitt doesn’t see anything and respectfully says that he isn’t a dentist.</p><p>Elsewhere in the ICU, Jo tells Sam about her and Link’s history. When she is done, Sam says he gets why Link is acting the way he is and tells her that Link loves her. Jo immediately disagrees, but Sam argues that no guy does all of the things Link has done for a person who is only a friend. Jo is tired of explaining their status to people when she doesn’t think it is like that between them. Clearly Jo is just lying to herself at this point. Sam tells her that Link had years to figure out what he knew in minutes and that he plans to sweep Jo off her feet like she deserves when he is out of the hospital. Jo says she needs to check on other patients and leaves because Sam hit a nerve.</p><p>Downstairs, Simone has decided to stay and work for the rest of the day. She meets Toby to go to the OR for her surgery and tells her patient that she wants to be there because her failed wedding is enough for one day. Lucas comes around the corner and tells Simone they need to talk. He tells her that Trey is in the hospital as a patient with a minor arm fracture from a car accident. Simone sprints off and leaves Lucas to chase after her once again.</p><p>Blue then finds Jules in the intern locker room to tell her that Max is stable now and the drugs are working. He tells her about how he chose to save her life. Jules tries to explain that being kept alive by machines isn’t life according to Max, which is why she had legal papers drawn up and signed. Jules says, “It’s not for you to choose. Do you know the position you put me in?” She hates that she might have to decide to unplug her favorite person in the world, which must be the real reason she is upset. Blue is also visibly upset. </p><p>In a trauma room, Trey asks Owen, Link, Helm, and Mika if Simone is in the hospital. He explains that he knows what his injuries are because he is a second year surgical resident in Baltimore. Owen and Link clearly don’t know who Trey is, and the women don’t tell them. Link explains that Trey needs surgery to repair his arm. Simone and Lucas rush into the room, and Trey immediately realizes that Simone must have left him for Lucas. He gets out of bed and punches Lucas square in the face with his unbroken arm.</p><p>In Boston, Mer tells the group that top scientists believe in plaque therapy to treat Alzheimer’s and that they use medications that are approved to remove plaque. She says they can no longer trust what is being published about the disease and its treatments because a doctor in Tennessee found evidence of tampered images. Nick asks Mer the last time she slept was. Mer doesn’t answer and says that Jackson had to go to London, which means she is probably working around the clock. It seems odd that Jackson would be in London when the Catherine Fox Award is handed out, but I guess that was the best excuse the writers could come up with for Jesse Williams’ schedule. Mer says that she gathered everyone who knows her best to show them her new Alzheimer’s theory before telling the world what she found.</p><p>In the hotel, Maggie sees Winston in the hallway and asks him to help with her dress. Winston is blown away by Maggie’s dress and new hairstyle. They go into Maggie’s room so he can help zip up her dress. Mer is blowing up Maggie’s phone, but Maggie is in no rush to answer. She instead congratulates Winston for becoming chief of cardio at Grey Sloan Memorial, and he sarcastically replies he was left with a messy department. Winston gets the door for Maggie and they start to walk out. Midway, Maggie turns around and kisses Winston, and they go back into the room to reunite.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">REUNIONS</span></h4><p>In the hospital ER, Mika cleans up Lucas’ face and says that she is on his side, but she doesn’t want to get dragged down in a fight between him and Simone. She doesn’t want to live in a house like that either. Owen asks Mika to help with Trey’s surgery, so Mika asks Lucas to look after Sam for her. We see Simone looking out the window of Trey’s trauma room at Lucas to see if he is okay. Trey thinks Simone and Lucas were having an affair. Simone tells Trey there was no affair and that she didn’t leave him for another man. She felt that she had changed and wanted different things. He doesn’t understand why she said yes and moved up the wedding if that’s the way she felt. Trey asks if any of their relationship was real, post-Baltimore. Simone admits it was real, so Trey says he will move to Seattle so they can figure out their relationship. She apologizes for letting it drag on, but she wanted to do the right thing and was confused. She now knows what she wants. Trey thinks her whole life will change if she is with Lucas because he has a family name to fall back on, while Simone has nothing. Trey says that he won’t be there to clean up the pieces when it gets messy.</p><p>Schmitt finds Blue taking a break outside to tell him that Max is doing better. Blue wonders what will happen if she doesn’t wake up and is also surprised that Schmitt isn’t yelling at him. Schmitt tells Blue how he killed a patient the year before when he was sure he knew how to save him and didn’t. He learned more from the mistake and the wounds that ate at him, not from someone yelling at him. Schmitt knows he didn’t have to yell because he has been in Blue’s position</p><p>We then see Winston and Maggie in bed together. Winston decides to rapidly fire questions at her for fun. He asks what she would name a dog, and Maggie replies Ruth, which makes them both laugh. The next question is what she would buy with a million dollars, and Maggie wants new boots. She asks the same questions to Winston, who answers: Marlon and a time machine. He wants to go back in time to tell his mom that he was nominated for a Catherine Fox Award. Maggie knows Winston’s answers were much better than hers and decides to get dressed so she can finally check in with Mer before the award reception.</p><p>At the Boston hospital, Nick, Bailey, and Richard are shocked after finding out Mer’s thoughts on Alzheimer’s. Richard tells Mer that she will be written off as crazy, not cutting edge, and will jeopardize her reputation with the foundation, which could destroy her career. Mer wants to know if Amelia sees what she sees and wants her sister-in-law to say that plaque may not be causing the disease after all. Amelia is still a bit stunned, but she isn’t happy that Mer’s findings insult Derek’s work as well. Richard wants Mer to keep her discovery to herself but Mer doesn’t want to lie and let science catch up to her. Richard thinks she should do the Alzheimer’s work on the side and not make it public in order to maintain the respect she has built for herself.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">GO WITH YOUR GUT</span></h4><p>Not long after, Nick is looking around Mer’s lab and she comes in to chat. He knows all the equipment because he did a lot of research as an intern. Mer reveals that Lucas told her that Nick has been very supportive, which makes her happy. Nick doesn’t think they need to do small talk when she has moved on, is happy in Boston, and has broken new ground. Mer asks Nick what he would do if he were her. Nick asks if she came to Boston to follow rules, and if she did, that would upset him more.</p><p>At the hospital, Lucas finds Simone as she finishes calling Trey’s mom to let her know that her son is in surgery. Simone says Trey’s family is mad at her and that Trey was on his way to GSM to see her when he got into the accident. She doesn’t think it would have happened if not for her. Lucas reminds Simone that she can’t marry someone she doesn’t love, but she doesn’t want to be let off the hook because she hurt people. Lucas decides to leave to check on Sam and tells Simone to text him if she needs him.</p><p>Blue finds Jules sitting with Max in her ICU room. He tells Jules that he understands what she loves about Max. He knows Max isn’t just a funny, sweet old lady, but she is also brave and generous with advice. She reminds him of his own mother and says he has never met anyone like her. Jules says Max is always worried about her in ways that her parents never were. Max wakes up and tries to pull her breathing tube out. The interns try to tell her to relax and that she is okay to make her stop.</p><p>Maggie and Winston show up to the award ceremony together and go straight to the table they are sharing with Richard, Nick, Bailey, Amelia, and Mer. Richard wonders aloud why Maggie didn’t come to Mer’s lab and Maggie lies about the reason, which Bailey doesn’t buy. Catherine comes over to their table to steal Mer for two minutes to talk to donors and give them an update on her work. Amelia is looking up the validity of Mer’s research on her phone and walks away after Bailey tells her to put the phone down at the table. Catherine and Mer go over to a table of donors, and one tells Mer that his mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s a year ago. He is happy to have hope from her research. But Mer tells the donor that scientists are focusing on the wrong thing so his money is not being well spent. Catherine tries to silence Mer before she digs her own grave.</p><p>Jules and Blue have gotten Max to calm down and stop fighting them. Max asks for a pen and writes a note to them asking to take out the tube. Blue tells Max that she isn’t dying and how he had to make a decision to save her. He thinks she was wrong about it being her time to go and wants her to give them 24 hours to let them help her and stay on the vent. After that, they will do whatever they want. Max agrees to Blue’s plan, and this scene epitomizes the amount of growth Blue has had in a single season.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">AND THE WINNER IS...</span></h4><p>Lucas goes to check on Sam, who immediately sees the wounds on the intern’s face and asks if the other guy looks worse. Lucas explains he was hit by a disgruntled patient and tells Sam to rest. Sam doesn’t want Lucas to withhold a juicy story. Lucas tells him there is a girl, and Sam stops him and says he doesn’t need to finish because he knows the rest. Sam starts to feel funny and immediately crashes. Lucas calls for someone to page Teddy and jumps into action.</p><p>Trey’s surgery is finished and is successful. Link tells Helm that Trey doesn’t want pain meds, but that might change. He tells her it is good to have her back and walks away. Mika comes over and asks how it is to be back. Helm replies she is coming down off a high from their date and is happy to be back at Grey Sloan Memorial. She is happy they got to spend the day together too. Mika gets a 911 page for Sam and runs off. She and Teddy arrive in Sam’s room at the same time. He is bleeding out into his chest, and Teddy knows his aorta must have ruptured.</p><p>Jo finds Link outside in the rain and asks him what he is doing. He decided to take a break and was enjoying the quiet. Jo asks if she should leave, so Link counters by asking if that is what she wants. Jo wants to know what is going on and Link asks what Jo wants. She stutters and then asks him to move out. Jo has been thinking about it for a while because she thinks it is confusing for the kids if they keep living together. Link wants to know if it is really about the kids or if it is about Sam. Jo wants to meet someone and isn’t comfortable bringing people home like Link is. Link proclaims that he has been too busy changing his whole life to revolve around Jo and “us” and hasn’t brought anyone home in months. Jo replies that she didn’t ask him to change his life. Their conversation is cut short by a change to another scene, which is annoying. </p><p>But at least it is changed to a good scene: it’s time for the presentation of the Catherine Fox Award. Catherine goes up to the podium to introduce the award and how it is given to a surgeon who shows excellence in the field while pushing boundaries. She introduces the most well-known boundary push, Meredith, and Bailey feels slighted and overlooked since she was supposed to present the award. Ben arrives and sits down next to Bailey, which surprises her. Mer tells the room that for the first time ever, Catherine decided that this is the year to break rules and give the award to a non-surgical project and a non-nominee. Bailey wants to know what is going on, but no one at the table answers. Mer says that in the midst of a national public health crisis, one doctor is trying to change it one procedure and one trainee at a time. She is thrilled to present Bailey with the Catherine Fox Award for significant contribution to medicine this year. Bailey is beyond shocked, and Ben pushes her to the stage. She doesn’t know how to react, and Mer thanks Bailey, who is getting a standing ovation. Bailey is beyond overwhelmed and tries not to cry as she tells the room of doctors, “It has been such a long year.”</p><p>Afterward, Maggie debates the logic of a non-nominee winning, and Winston is confused why she is questioning it. She decides that she is happy Bailey won and if she had to lose to someone, she is glad it was Bailey. Maggie asks Winston to get a drink with her, and he wants to know if that is what they are now. Winston randomly asks if they should get divorced, so Maggie quietly asks if that is what he wants. He wants to excel at his job and break new ground. He doesn’t want this to be his last nomination, rather the beginning of many. Maggie suggests they start with that and figure out the rest later. </p><p>Bailey hugs Mer, and Ben tries to get his wife to go take pictures. Bailey is upset that she ugly cried in front of a room of big time surgeons. Mer says that she, herself, is going to cry on her way home because she is going to lose all her funding. Bailey assures Mer that she won’t lose anything because she is too stubborn. Amelia comes back into the ballroom and tells Richard that she missed Bailey getting an award. She wants to go to an AA meeting and asks Richard to join her. Richard admits he almost took a drink on the plane and that is the only thing he can think about. They both know they aren’t like everyone else and can’t take the edge off the same way. Richard wants to stay behind and wait for Catherine, so Amelia decides to find a meeting and text him the address. After Amelia walks away, a waitress puts a vodka tonic down in front of Richard, which he ordered. We don’t see if Richard breaks his sobriety, which might be the most surprising cliffhanger of the episode.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">END OF THE SEASON</span></h4><p>Mer goes upstairs and slips a letter under a hotel room door. As she walks away, Nick opens the door and asks what the letter is. He reads it, but doesn’t understand it. Mer explains she did pretend not to hear him because she was tired, overwhelmed, scared, and thought she should focus on her kids. She is still tired, scared, and overwhelmed and may have blown up her career, but she tells Nick she misses him. Nick reveals he met Michael. Mer smiles and says Michael is wonderful and great with the kids. She tells Nick that Michael is Zola’s tutor. Mer didn’t know Nick went to her house and wants to know why he didn’t mention it earlier at the lab. Nick replies that Mer was in mad scientist mode and he didn’t want to talk about it. Mer assures Nick that Michael exclusively dates men. Nick tells Mer he thought he was going to die earlier on the plane and realized how badly he wants to live. He spent years trying to avoid pain and went to Mer’s house to never let her walk away. Nick says he wants to live a whole life out of love and pain and her. Mer happily says “okay” and kisses him with a big smile on her face.</p><p>Blue checks on Max again, who is sleeping. Jules is still sitting next to her and tells Blue that Max is on minimum vent settings, which he says is good news. Jules is still mad at him and proclaims that Blue is the most selfish, arrogant, impulsive, enraging person. She doesn’t think he cares about anyone else and what they feel or want. He put her in an impossible situation and hates him for that. Jules says she is going to cry to express anger, which will make her hate Blue more for letting him see her cry. She finishes by saying that the worst part is that he saved her favorite person, so she has to love him too. Blue hands Jules a tissue as she cries.</p><p>Sam is in the OR for emergent surgery, and Teddy tells the doctors and nurses the surgical plan. She says they will need to stop the blood loss before doing the aortic repair, and everyone will need to work quickly and anticipate what could go wrong. Teddy then faints, and Mika calls for a crash cart.</p><p>We then finally get to see the rest of Link and Jo’s fight/conversation. Link is yelling at Jo about how many times he has changed his work and Scout schedules to be there for her and Luna. Link says he cares about the two of them and wants to know if they are just roommates like she told Sam. Jo replies, “What was I supposed to say?” and claims it was semantics. Link says it isn’t semantics, rather it is love. Link finally proclaims, “I’m so completely in love with you, Jo. How don’t you see that?” He talks about loving her since they were in high school and worked at a restaurant together. Link wanted to tell her a hundred times and says it all the time to himself. He knows he should have said it out loud sooner, but he didn’t want to freak her out. Link concludes with, “I love you, and I’m gonna love you forever.” Jo smiles and replies, “You unbelievable dummy. I love you too.” Link is shocked that they both feel the same way. They stare at each other for a second, and Jo walks over and kisses Link. The whole story of Jo and Link getting frustrated at each other and then proclaim their mutual love would have worked better if it was one full scene, not spread out.</p><p>The season ends in Sam’s OR. Teddy is passed out on the ground, and Mika is telling her to wake up. Simone comes in and finds Sam bleeding out. Teddy now has no pulse, and both she and Sam are critical. Lucas decides he is going to do Sam’s surgery himself because they paged all the attendings and no one is coming. He and Simone know they have to do whatever it takes to save Sam and Teddy. Simone asks a nurse for a gown and gloves, and Mika protests Sam’s surgery because her name is on his chart, so it will be on her. Lucas and Simone start operating on Sam, and we see a nurse get Owen in the ER and tell him to get to the OR immediately. Owen runs, and we get a quick glimpse of Jo and Link kissing in the rain. They are soaked and don’t care as they smile at each other. The happiness is fleeting as Teddy is crashing when Owen arrives. Mika has to shock her, but it doesn’t work. Owen then takes the paddles and tries, while the Lucas and Simone continue working on Sam. Owen begs Teddy to stay with him and shocks her again. There is no response on the monitor, and the episode abruptly ends. </p><p>Normally this would be a pretty massive cliffhanger, especially with not knowing when the next season will air. There are two reasons why this isn’t the shocking ending the show wants it to be. First, Teddy’s constant tooth problem over the two hours should have clued you in that something bad was going to happen to her. Second, casting announcements for next season were announced the same night the finale aired. So if you want the spoiler of whether Teddy lives or dies, you can see if Kim Raver signed on for season 20 with a simple Google search. </p><p>It will be interesting to see where everything goes for all the potential new couples next season as <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i> enters its third decade.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-65723195106616868162023-05-22T21:44:00.002-04:002023-05-22T21:44:58.441-04:00The Flash 9x12 Review: "A New World, Part Three" (Cross Road Blues) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI1uuo8Bo_HrKWjNvfCmqajjbOtelE8edsLhclrR1KuCSwXy3-mWYG7oIj8UyJEYpOemBwV40NAp6azam9VybkoB2Cg3lshrxo3ZtFKRVP0Hyh-Tyg17GQKFrBgCkbLo_XWNvFz0TvBh5TRKftAf658A65e7GwG1YN3ox5X4FXraLFMiYVtNBjUgLmNg/s512/unnamed%20(3).png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="341" data-original-width="512" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgI1uuo8Bo_HrKWjNvfCmqajjbOtelE8edsLhclrR1KuCSwXy3-mWYG7oIj8UyJEYpOemBwV40NAp6azam9VybkoB2Cg3lshrxo3ZtFKRVP0Hyh-Tyg17GQKFrBgCkbLo_XWNvFz0TvBh5TRKftAf658A65e7GwG1YN3ox5X4FXraLFMiYVtNBjUgLmNg/s320/unnamed%20(3).png" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“A New World, Part Three”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: May 17, 2023</div><p>It’s the penultimate episode of the season and the series, and this is usually when <i>The Flash</i> drops the pacing ball and deflates all the tension that’s been building but I’m happy to say that isn’t the case! “A New World, Part Three” is probably the weakest of this final arc so far because of few logic fumbles and some bizarre choices, but it’s still not bad. And I’m still pretty interested in seeing where all this goes. Accept a polite golf clap and a hum of interest from me, <i>The Flash</i>, because I remain intrigued.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PART THREE: CHANGES</span></h4><p>We start right where we left off, with Eddie having just dug a bullet out of his chest to prove his identity (hope that form of identification doesn’t catch on) and Captain Korber trying to make sense of whatever’s happening. “I believe you,” she says, “but this city is a lightning rod for insanity. You could be a clone or a cyborg.” I guess a few decades of comic book nonsense does wonders for a Central City citizen’s self-awareness. Before Korber can rein in the still-reeling Eddie, though, she gets sucked into a blue vortex in the sky. Lightning rod for insanity, you say?</p><p>Back at present-day STAR Labs, Team Flash is trying to figure out how to get Barry back before his baby is born but they don’t have much to go on. Thankfully, Speed Force Nora is able to drop in briefly, explain that Barry’s in 2049, and that Barry’s death means the destruction of the entire timeline. Too-da-loo! Wait, is that last part true just for this occasion, or all occasions? Like, will Barry die of old age and destroy the world?</p><p>Team Flash of 2049 is celebrating a victory while Nora (daughter-Nora, not Speed Force Nora or mom-Nora) leads the team in her father’s off-world absence. They should also be celebrating the fact that none of them appear to have aged at all in the almost thirty years that have passed. Either the costume and makeup departments decided to take the week off when they were filming the future episodes or The Flash is implying some stuff about anti-aging technology within the next three decades.</p><p>Searching for the Flash leads Eddie to the Flash Museum, which is of course right on top of Team Flash’s “secret” headquarters. Eddie starts to freak out because a screen in the museum breaks the sad, sad news that his season one death was all for naught, but he’s interrupted by Nora in a blonde wig, claiming she’s his daughter. Okay, the goofy blonde wig is definitely a point toward the theory that costuming just wasn’t around for the filming of this episode and everyone had to make do. Another vortex appears and Blonde Nora tries getting Eddie to follow her in, but Actual Nora speeds in and saves him, bringing him to Team Flash for investigation.</p><p>“Eddie Thawne died 34 years ago. How is he alive and why hasn’t he aged a day?” asks Allegra, who also hasn’t aged a day in almost thirty years. None of you have aged a day! I’m pretty sure Chester still has the exact same hairstyle! Whatever. The team thinks Eddie is triggering the vortexes with his emotions while the writers’ dedication to returning again and again to the Eobard Thawne well gives poor Eddie an existential crisis, since he realizes he died “to stop a supervillain that didn’t stay dead.”</p><p>The blue crystal gets Nora just in time for Barry to show up in 2049, but Team Flash of the past has a plan to figure out what’s going on in the future by projecting Cecile into the body of her future self. The plan encounters a hiccup when Cecile learns she no longer spends time with her family in the future, freaks out, and bounces back to the present. This gives Negative Speed Force Nora some time to manipulate Eddie a little bit, fight Barry a little bit — generally cause an echo-voiced ruckus a little bit.</p><p>Barry stops Eddie from taking the blue crystal from Nora and they end up in the West home, where Eddie had been living as Malcolm Gilmore. Barry picks up an award for Gilmore that glows blue and briefly shifts into an award for Joe West, which Barry recognizes as a sign of negative tachyons. He theorizes that everything in the life of “Malcolm Gilmore” is made of negative tachyons, as part of the crystal’s plan to make Eddie the avatar for the Negative Speed Force. Why create Malcolm Gilmore in the first place, though? Why not just drop Eddie into the future? I suspect the writers wanted a nod to some comic book Cobalt Blue canon and didn’t fully think that one through, but we’ll see.</p><p>While Barry is optimistic that Eddie will work with him to defeat the Negative Speed Force, he underestimates the power of angry disembodied voices and rejection from Iris West. After Eddie looks up 2049 Iris (the only cast member who gets a gray wig, although that’s as far as the aging makeup goes) and she tells him she’s sticking with Barry, a red lightning storm rolls in and he’s stuck on the villainous path.</p><p>With her doubts about her future assuages thanks to a pep talk from Chester, 2023 Cecile inhabits her 2049 body again and manages to push the Negative Speed Force out of Nora before Barry has to hurt her or she manages to hurt him, but again the crystal disappears and there’s still that red lightning to deal with. Chester explains that it’s the timeline fracturing, and Cecile promises to warn the team in the past while Barry is pulled away by that glowy blue light once more.</p><p>Meanwhile, yet another cover of “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” plays as Eddie rages against fate and then finally succumbs to the voice in the crystal, which has appeared in a glass box in Malcolm Gilmore’s lab. It shows Eddie his potential life, with goofy blonde Nora and Iris, and then shows him all the speedsters of the past. He reaches toward it and opens a swirling blue vortex. Boy, I sure write weird sentences when reviewing this show. I’m gonna miss that.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I will admit to a brief moment of finding Mark endearing when he said he loved Barry. Cute.</li><li>“If by this you mean, just go on and astrally project myself into my future body, protect Barry from the Negative Speed Force, and save all of temporal existence before coming back and teaching Jenna her multiplication tables...” Jenna’s on multiplication tables? Isn’t she like five?</li><li>Rick Cosnett is a much more charming actor than I remember him being. Some of his facial expressions in this episode are brilliant.</li><li>It is very sweet how Barry immediately hugs Eddie when he sees he’s alive again and there’s no real awkwardness about the whole Iris thing. And when the awkwardness about the Iris thing does set in, it’s implied that’s mostly because of the angry crystal voice growling at Eddie. Both of them are good dudes.</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-22785613852003467762023-05-22T21:30:00.000-04:002023-05-22T21:30:12.212-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x18 Recap: “Ready to Run” (Vulnerability) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXEVphdtwsAnGTK84HpoeWux-VhAjnnaza2r-zL1shR6WDxzV_9HvqYvBj2Suka78VE1dm5pAWb8eFtnhMxMikr7Nu2edt4cvx80mzIr069JrhtyRiYcydMqgy_VVplR-DxBFszC3vcFn7x_VE0uDMBGhwJV-vbhctr4Ac315LXEqqepqOAjYNbtcblw/s2560/ready%20to%20run.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1707" data-original-width="2560" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXEVphdtwsAnGTK84HpoeWux-VhAjnnaza2r-zL1shR6WDxzV_9HvqYvBj2Suka78VE1dm5pAWb8eFtnhMxMikr7Nu2edt4cvx80mzIr069JrhtyRiYcydMqgy_VVplR-DxBFszC3vcFn7x_VE0uDMBGhwJV-vbhctr4Ac315LXEqqepqOAjYNbtcblw/s320/ready%20to%20run.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Ready to Run”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: May 11, 2023</div><p>Catherine Fox Award nominees, family injuries, and love struggles are the highlights of this week’s episode of <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i>. This episode is a mixed bag of emotions to set up what should be a big last bang after stalling on many storylines during the second half of the season. With only a two-hour season finale left, <i>Grey’s Anatomy </i>is queueing up a collision course for several characters as we rush toward the finish line.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">GREAT NEWS</span></h4><p>The episode begins with good news all around. The hour opens with Simone trying on her wedding dress at the intern house while Mika helps her with alterations. Lucas walks into the room and is stunned at how beautiful Simone looks. He asks his friends if they saw that Richard has a big announcement to make and wonders what it could be. Mika tells him to go shower since they have to leave for work in five minutes. Outside the hospital, Schmitt and Helm meet at the coffee cart before work. Schmitt wants Helm to come back to Grey Sloan Memorial and tries to convince her using some weak attempts at making his job look appealing.</p><p>Inside, Richard and Teddy tell a lobby full of doctors that the hospital hasn’t had a Catherine Fox Award nominee in a while, but this year, they have two doctors nominated: Nick, for his xenotransplantation, and Winston, along with Maggie, for the partial heart transplant. The award ceremony will be in Boston, which immediately upsets Nick. Richard congratulates both men for the nominations. Amelia congratulates Winston, but he still won’t talk to her even after her apology at the end of last episode. Richard approaches Nick to tell him they will have the final travel plans later that day. However, Nick tells Richard that he doesn’t want to go to the ceremony.</p><p>Owen, Link, and Mika then go check on Sam Sutton, the military veteran who sustained over 90 fractures from a wind suit flight gone wrong last episode. Mika presents the case and tells the attendings that Sam’s nerve signals are strong and he has no signs of infection two days after the miracle surgery Link pulled off. Owen and Link tell their patient that they are planning to write an article on him for a medical journal to help other doctors with similar cases. Sam asks them where Jo is, and Link gets very upset when he learns Jo told Sam that she is single. Sam makes it clear that he intends to continue flirting with Jo and is interested in her.</p><p>Bailey and Blue are on their way to see Max in the ICU when Jules approaches them and asks to be on the case. Bailey thinks Jules is too close to Max to be involved, but Blue volunteers to switch with Jules and be on Amelia’s service for the day. It is surprising that Bailey doesn’t stick to her gut and allows the interns to switch services. Jules and Bailey go into Max’s ICU room and are happy to find out that the delirium has gone away and Max is feeling a lot better. The patient wants to tell Jules a few things about her wishes in case she gets delirious again. Max asks Jules to feed her cat, cremate her and sprinkle her ashes over the Grand Canyon, and let her go and not resuscitate if she codes. Jules assures Max that she will be able to go home in a day or two and isn’t dying. They are downgrading her to a regular room, but Max wants Jules to hear her out anyway. Bailey assures Max that her wishes are noted and she will get the official DNR paperwork for her, much to Jules’ chagrin.</p><p>Lucas and Simone are on Teddy’s service for the day and walk quickly down the hall with her. Teddy has a patient named Ray with an abdominal aortic aneurysm that could rupture at any second, but won’t consent to life-saving surgery. Ray is panicking about the procedure and rushes out of the room, so Teddy tells the interns to run after him.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">DOING THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT YOU SAY</span></h4><p>Jo finds Link and tells him how Scout had an annoyed face like his father when Luna got a hedgehog toy that he wanted in daycare. A nurse comes up and tells Jo that Sam is looking for her. Link gives Jo the annoyed face she was just talking about and says that it was inappropriate of her to tell a patient she is single. Jo thinks Link’s disapproval is misplaced chivalry and assures him that she can handle herself.</p><p>Teddy and the interns run after Ray and catch up to him. Ray is worried about the potential surgical complications mentioned on the consent forms, so he doesn’t want the surgery anymore. Teddy tries to explain what will happen if the aneurysm bursts and says he has a 10% chance of it rupturing at any moment. Ray knows the forms say he could die a dozen different ways if he has the operation, so he would rather take his chances without it. He doesn’t want to be forced into it and leaves. Teddy turns to Simone and Lucas and says they can’t force a patient to consent, so they should go to the skills lab and wait for a page if anything comes up.</p><p>Jo goes to see Sam, who lies about paging her to ask a question about a plate in his arm. He actually wanted to thank her for saving his life and was bored and wanted to flirt with her. Jo says she doesn’t have a boring day and tells him about her dual specialties. She asks Sam what he does now, and he replies that he is still a pilot and is a simple guy. Jo stalked Sam’s social media to find out what wing suiting was after he took a clear interest in her. Mika comes into the room, and Jo uses her presence as an excuse to go back to OB.</p><p>Lucas finds Ray signing a form that he is leaving the hospital against medical advice and asks to talk to him about the surgery. He tells Ray that it is his decision, but he wouldn’t be able to sleep without knowing Ray was fully informed about the procedure. Lucas asks to walk out with him, and Ray agrees to the company.</p><p>Jules excitedly wheels Max into her new hospital room and is happy to announce the room has a window. As they go into the room, Max’s two best friends jump out from behind the door to surprise her with a visit. Jules will only let them stay for an hour, and Max is glad they brought her crochet bag and toiletries. Max walks to the bathroom on her own and winds up falling and hitting her head. Jules rushes to her side and is shaken by seeing Max’s head bleeding.</p><p>Richard finds Winston and Nick and asks the former if it will be awkward seeing Maggie in Boston. Winston says yes and will still go to the ceremony since so few Black men have been nominated for the award. Richard is proud of Winston and his mindset and turns to Nick to tell him that the award means something and if Winston can rise up and see Maggie, then Nick can see Meredith. Nick still doesn’t feel the need to go to Boston for a dinner and turns down Richard’s request for his attendance at the event. Richard says that it will be a smear against Grey Sloan Memorial if Nick doesn’t go to the ceremony and, in not so many words, he highly suggests Nick attends.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A NEW APPROACH</span></h4><p>Back in Max’s room, the elderly patient isn’t sure how she fell. Bailey and Jules find that Max has a broken rib and order a CT scan and neuro consult. Jules tells Max she will stay with her and will call her friends with updates after Max tells them to leave. Meanwhile, Mika and Simone get work done in their new skills lab. Simone is doing wedding planning in between research, and Mika tells her that she does not have a plus one and that Lucas will not be going to the wedding. She asks why the wedding was moved up, and Simone replies that her grandma is getting worse, so they moved it up for her sake. Simone reveals her grandma gets excited by wedding conversations and is herself when they talk about it. Helm pops in to take a look around the new space. Mika is mad at Helm for causing the surgical chiefs to have a meeting about her. She tells Helm that she needs to be mad for a minute, so Helm leaves. Simone thinks Mika and Helm have chemistry, but Mika refuses to make the first move after past embarrassments. </p><p>As they walk outside the hospital, Lucas talks to Ray about the latter’s job as an illustrator for graphic novels. Ray tells Lucas about how he had a very vivid dream when he was little where his grandpa, who had died before Ray was born, told him they would be together when he turns 30. Ray doesn’t want to die and has been really careful his whole life because of the dream. Lucas doesn’t want Ray to die either. He knows statistics freak Ray out, so Lucas suggests they draw the surgery. Lucas explains the procedures through some bad drawings and promises that it has been tested over and over. He assures Ray that they can address any potential problem in the OR, but they can’t be with him if the aneurysm ruptures at home.</p><p>Back inside, Max gets a brain CT scan with Bailey, Amelia, Jules, and Blue waiting for the results. Amelia asks Max if she got dizzy before she fell, and Max doesn’t think so. Max talks about how it might be her time to die, and the scans reveal she has a brain bleed. Jules asks to scrub in, but Bailey turns down the request because Jules and Blue traded services. Bailey also thinks Jules is too close to Max and essentially gets Jules to confirm that she considers Max family. Bailey kicks Jules off the case even though Blue offers to switch spots again, which is very unlike him. It seems like he might be finding those emotions he so desperately has been trying to avoid all season.</p><p>Elsewhere, Lucas finds Teddy and tells her that he got Ray to consent to the surgery and sign the forms. His different approach worked and convinced the patient that the surgery is the best way to go. Teddy is glad Lucas got through to Ray and tells him to get the patient to radiology for new scans before he bolts again.</p><p>Jo goes back to Sam’s room to see how he is faring when she gets a break in her schedule. Sam needs help with an itch, so Jo sticks a tongue depressor down his right hand’s cast. They flirt and bond before Jo gets paged to deliver twins. Jo is obviously playing with fire because Link told her not to and neither is capable of telling the other about their repressed feelings for one another.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A LITTLE LATE</span></h4><p>In the OR wing, a group of hospital workers applaud Winston for his Catherine Fox Award nomination. Owen and Amelia see the commotion and complain about not getting recognition for their work. Bailey tells them to stop complaining before she complains herself. It’s pretty funny as she goes on about her own accomplishments and why she should get a nomination. Owen and Amelia stare at her in disbelief.</p><p>Blue has a nice conversation with Max as he brings her to the OR for brain surgery. He tells Max that Jules loves living with her. Max talks about how she rarely sees her son Pete and that she thinks she raised him to be too independent. She is happy to have adopted Jules as her honorary child and give her lots of attention and care because Jules didn’t have that as a child and needs it now. Blue thinks Jules is lucky to have Max, but Max believes she is the lucky one.</p><p>While Ray gets a CT scan, Teddy asks Lucas how he convinced the patient to change his mind. Nick pops his head into the room to thank Teddy for helping the residents out. Before they can chit chat, Ray’s aneurysm bursts, which throws the doctors into immediate action. They call a code blue, activate massive transfusion protocol, and realize that they can’t get to the OR in a matter of seconds. Teddy tells Nick, Lucas, and Simone that they will need to open Ray up on the CT table. Nick and Teddy start operating while Lucas and Simone trade off chest compression duty. </p><p>We then get a montage of Amelia and Blue operating on Max’s brain mixed with Ray’s impromptu surgery. Ray is heavily bleeding in his abdominal cavity. They try to shock him after repairing the aorta, but there is no response. After another round of compressions, Nick tells Teddy that they need to stop. Teddy doesn’t want to stop because Ray is only 29 years old. Nick knows they did everything they could and that Ray can’t be revived. Teddy stops compressions and calls time of death as Lucas stands still in shock.</p><p>Schmitt finds Richard in the hallway and wants to know how his conversation with Helm went. He is hoping Helm will come back and asks what her demands were. Richard reveals that Helm’s requests weren’t unreasonable, so Schmitt talks about how Helm is a proven asset since Richard trained her and that they need her back. Schmitt tells Richard that the hospital needs more senior residents and begs him to give Helm whatever she wants.</p><p>Lucas has the tough task of calling Ray’s mother and giving her the bad news. Nick watches and tells Lucas that it is never easy to make that call. He goes on to say that people with ADHD feel losses harder and that it matters that they fought for Ray. Lucas says that Ray knew he was dying, which upsets him. He also reveals that he always felt he was different and not lazy like everyone always said. Lucas went down a rabbit hole online after Nick mentioned he thought the intern had ADHD, and now Lucas feels he has every symptom. He doesn’t get why his family of doctors didn’t see the signs. Nick feels Lucas’ family didn’t think to look for anything wrong they were blinded by wanting him to reach their high standards. Lucas tells Nick that he wants him to win the award, but Nick says the award doesn’t mean anything... which was the wrong thing to say when the kid that looks up to you is trying to tell you that you matter to him.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">STEPPING UP</span></h4><p>We then check back in with Sam, who asks Mika how long a delivery takes. Mika tells him to take it easy and not be so aggressive with his flirting. Jo waltzes back in and says the twins weren’t ready to come out yet. The two doctors check the nerve impulses in Sam’s right leg, which turn out to be weak. Jo opens up the bandages around Sam’s knee and finds a lot of fluid in the repaired flap. She tells Mika and Sam that they have to fix it then and there if he wants to keep his leg. Without morphine and with him awake, Jo slices into Sam’s leg to relieve the pressure, while Sam tries not to scream from the intense level of pain he is experiencing. </p><p>Elsewhere, Blue finds Jules in an on-call room and brings her the flowers she got for Max so she can take care of them while Max can’t. He tells her that the surgery went well and Max is in the ICU now. He hopes Max won’t be there long so she and Jules can both go home. Blue tells Jules that he also knows the fear, anger, and grief of sitting next to the hospital bed of someone you aren’t sure will make it. He wants Jules to know it is okay to have those feelings and that he is there for her. Jules coolly says that she is fine, so Blue leaves. As soon as the door shuts, Jules breaks down and cries as the emotions from Max’s situation finally overwhelm her. </p><p>Back in Sam’s room, the patient thinks it is cool that Jo sliced into his leg and saved it. Mika makes a comment about being the third wheel in the room, which annoys Jo. A page comes in that the twins are finally ready to be delivered, so Sam tells Jo that she is his hero and would like her to sign his cast before she goes. They continue to flirt as Jo signs his cast and leaves the room. After Jo leaves, Sam tells Mika he was right about asking Jo to come to his room all day.</p><p>Downstairs, Richard finds Nick to tell him he cares deeply about the residency program and feels that a Catherine Fox Award nomination for the hospital’s residency director is a big deal. Nick says he wanted to find Richard too in order to ask for a seat on the plane to Boston. He has decided to put aside his feelings if there is still room for him to go. Richard is happy to arrange it and gets what he wanted.</p><p>Schmitt goes to Joe’s Bar after work and thinks it is funny that he is now a regular there. Helm tells him that she gave notice and is coming back to Grey Sloan Memorial. She tells her friend that resident wellness is important to her and wants to help her fellow residents with burn out and mentorship. She agreed to come back only if Richard made her co-chief resident with Schmitt, which she is surprised he agreed to. Schmitt gives Helm a big hug and is very excited to have her back and as his co-chief resident. He feels the job is too much for one person and is happy to have help. Helm also reveals that she will be getting eight weeks of vacation, which shocks Schmitt. Mika walks into the bar and right up to Helm to ask her to be her plus one to Simone’s wedding. Mika reveals her feelings to Helm and says it is okay if she is not interested, but at least she asked. She wants the wedding to be a date. Helm tells Mika that she is about to become her boss, and Mika understands that it would be inappropriate for them to go on a date. However, Helm says since the wedding would pre-date her employment at Grey Sloan Memorial, she will go to the wedding with Mika.</p><p>Jo checks in on Sam again to see how his knee is doing. Sam is doing better and asks Jo to scratch an itch on his neck. Link comes by and isn’t happy to see them flirting. He very pointedly tells Jo that he will pick up food for them on his way home. Sam asks if they live together, and Link says they do at the same time Jo says they are roommates. Link isn’t happy with the difference in answers, and Jo tells him she will see him later and stays with Sam.</p><p>The episode ends with Simone working on wedding favors at home. Lucas walks in the door and asks if Mika is home, but Simone tells him she is at the bar. She apologizes for the loss of Ray, but Lucas doesn’t want to talk about it. Lucas tells Simone about how he probably has ADHD and overthinks things because he can’t get out of his head due to thinking of all the possible complications of every thought. Out of nowhere, Lucas asks Simone to not get married. He knows he might be too late, but he couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t say something while she could change her mind. He tells her that he sees her and that Trey doesn’t. Lucas ends with, “I love every single thing I see.” Simone doesn’t know what to say and is stunned into silence as a tear rolls out of the corner of her eye. Will Simone actually tie the knot with Trey in the season finale? I personally don’t think she will go through with it and leave her fiancé at the altar next week.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-90308515305018142222023-05-19T23:05:00.000-04:002023-05-19T23:05:59.380-04:00What the Heck Has Happened to Ted Lasso? [Contributor: Jenn]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIhNNUYX1xvv4E7ijUmOUEWPa0ss-7bVfeLgkymk0uVw3UBuW_mqHlYBTuK-_OeL9MYAnnsMpTis5QwGWaeSZOVZoGBx0tSHF4xjhNsTk2WZlU90CVwr0umlZSmt-aAuY6ZacJVrYuGbR_kiPDtHooDhLWcMeKcTAHE2nYrwbc1ATpT0Ho3omAxibdlg/s2932/ted-lasso-season-3-1674165595.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1945" data-original-width="2932" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIhNNUYX1xvv4E7ijUmOUEWPa0ss-7bVfeLgkymk0uVw3UBuW_mqHlYBTuK-_OeL9MYAnnsMpTis5QwGWaeSZOVZoGBx0tSHF4xjhNsTk2WZlU90CVwr0umlZSmt-aAuY6ZacJVrYuGbR_kiPDtHooDhLWcMeKcTAHE2nYrwbc1ATpT0Ho3omAxibdlg/s320/ted-lasso-season-3-1674165595.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><p>In March of 2020, the world shut down. We all went into lockdown, trying to find toilet paper at a grocery store was like being in the arena in <i>The Hunger Games</i>, we were wiping down groceries with Clorox, and making masks out of whatever scarves and fabric we could find. It was bleak and isolating, and it lasted a lot longer than we all hoped it would. When COVID-19 shook us, it shook some of us hard. I vividly remember sitting on my bedroom floor, crying, as I watched a 4K video of Magic Kingdom Park’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7FFFENv6i4">“Happily Ever After” firework special</a> on YouTube. I missed people. But most of all, I missed emotional connection.</p><p>Enter: <i>Ted Lasso</i> on Apple TV+. That summer, the comedy series debuted to near-unanimous acclaim. Its first season was the bright spot of joy, hope, and positivity that so many of us needed. I have to believe that part of the attraction to the series — and perhaps a large part — was because it seemed to be exactly what we were missing in our personal lives. We were able to emotionally connect to characters, their arcs, watch them grow, and be reminded that goodness and hope are possible to find in the world. </p><p>That first season was near-perfect gold.</p><p>Season two of the series was mostly good, in my opinion, but did suffer from the dreaded “sophomore slump.” If you’re unfamiliar, it’s a pretty common phenomenon in television: when shows start their series strong but inevitably begin to teeter in their second season. I knew <i>Ted Lasso</i> had the potential to pick up the broken pieces of the show and repair them. In fact, I was excited to see exactly how they’d do it in season three.</p><p>Well, folks, it’s season three — almost the end of the season, actually — and like <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2023/05/10/ted-lasso-season-3-is-collapsing-before-our-eyes/70195946007/">many</a>, <a href="https://www.dailydot.com/unclick/ted-lasso-season-3-backlash-issues/">many</a>, <a href="https://www.themarysue.com/ted-lasso-has-gone-off-the-rails/">many</a> other people on the internet from fans to TV critics alike, I have no idea what the show is doing. So I write this because I need to process my feelings in something longer than a tweet. And I write to highlight the show’s weaknesses because I know its strengths; like many of you, I was enamored with this series and I’m just so baffled by what it’s become.</p><p>As a brief aside, criticism is pointing out flaws in a piece of media because you care about it — what it is, what it was, and/or what it could be. “Hate” is simply dunking on something because you dislike it, want it to fail, and want to shout that dislike from the rooftops. For example, I hate <i>Glee</i> (a collective fever dream if there ever was one) but I am critical of <i>Community</i>! If you love this season of <i>Ted Lasso</i>, then good for you. I will not stop you from loving it. But I will say that if your love of anything prevents you from ever being able to notice its flaws, that’s not love — that’s infatuation. Those rose-colored glasses prevent you from seeing red flags. </p><p><b><i></i></b></p><blockquote><b><i>In TV criticism, like most things in life, two things can be true: you can love something and also want it to do better.</i></b></blockquote><p></p><p>For me and my journey with <i>Ted Lasso</i>, the rose-colored glasses of infatuation have been removed. And I dearly love this series that I believe could — and should — do better. Before we get into some of the mistakes the show has made this year though, I’d like to take a moment to note that Phil Dunster should be in Emmy consideration because his evolution of Jamie over the years — particularly this season — has been phenomenal. If you’d have told me in season one that by season three Jamie would be my favorite character, I doubt I would have believed you. But today he is! He has had all of the best writing, character growth, and some of the best scenes in the season (the Amsterdam bike ride and the Uncle Day scenes alone are top-tier). He has done nothing wrong, and I am so happy he’s gotten to shine. This article is not about him.</p><p>So with that said, let me attempt to pinpoint where I think <i>Ted Lasso</i> has gone awry this season and what can be done about it if the show continues next year.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1l753f6uQ6xnfus4Gvs6H9V2Dnyo1EVjGvkkVsh8CX3woB5lfRKKzJmJg915Bm5R2uTySdwIpVZaeqUDthgYMTdCTHiB0nOiPEYEkBOCD8T5YZ7fAR1R8O9MvXKlZ9Yz2-9GMjDv-E2gwP4aRDb1OuxycVKhUBarcLJj7S6Oxg3FYUMtSRJh8H8p4fQ/s7275/1f613297-c5ad-43a1-8122-ae9c23134a9c_7275x4297.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4297" data-original-width="7275" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1l753f6uQ6xnfus4Gvs6H9V2Dnyo1EVjGvkkVsh8CX3woB5lfRKKzJmJg915Bm5R2uTySdwIpVZaeqUDthgYMTdCTHiB0nOiPEYEkBOCD8T5YZ7fAR1R8O9MvXKlZ9Yz2-9GMjDv-E2gwP4aRDb1OuxycVKhUBarcLJj7S6Oxg3FYUMtSRJh8H8p4fQ/s320/1f613297-c5ad-43a1-8122-ae9c23134a9c_7275x4297.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">THE BLOATED EPISODES</h3><p>The longest episode of <i>Ted Lasso</i>’s first season clocked in at 34 minutes. The longest episode (so far) of the current season clocked in at 66 minutes. When you take a show that, if it was on a network, would be labeled a “half-hour sitcom” and suddenly turn it into an hour-long dramedy, it just doesn’t work. The tone naturally shifts. The pacing gets rushed in places and dragged out in others. And, in points we’ll cover momentarily, we lose character development and plot threads from episode to episode because they’re naturally unsustainable. </p><p><b><i></i></b></p><blockquote><b><i>In fact, the show becomes a series of self-contained episodes at that point, with plots naturally just resolving within the course of 60 minutes.</i></b></blockquote><p></p><p>If <i>Ted Lasso </i>had debuted as an hour-long dramedy, I would have fewer issues with this season. As it is, more doesn’t always equal better. More screentime means more storylines. More storylines means more plot development to cover. But if those plots won’t carry from episode to episode like they have in previous seasons, then what’s really the point? I believe if the show was forced, like network TV series are, to cut their episodes to 20-ish or even 30 minutes, the writers would have had to make some hard decisions this season. It might have resulted in actual tighter storytelling though. Did we really need a departure episode with five separate storylines that, combined, took up 63 minutes of our time? Or could we have narrowed the storylines down to the essential ones that had seasons-long implications — perhaps including a few brief scenes of the others? (We could have. We should have. And I know which ones I would have cut!)</p><p>Comedy series don’t always naturally lend themselves to an hour-long format. For a season and a half, <i>Ted Lasso</i> managed to keep its show in the roughly 30-minute range. Only around the midpoint of season two did things start to shift into 44-45 minute territory. And honestly, when your cast expands and your show’s episode length expands in an unprecedented way, things can go south pretty quickly.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQhJgiFnTaZNsDdhYPDr-n7FW3J-MeFN0nqdXi2_BLzVn9LRf2GjyxWyNlNVE7im1iJ7ISFc3h5yzncWPIJYxwpCXOq5gDNj2h8mYTT5GX53JutRahXrrxAEi1UT3bgR3K27YWmGfnGBXJWxBtw-sDvHWvRCOVel82nWvXomQlBt24gx8Hxj1ARCtd2A/s1200/ted%20cast.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQhJgiFnTaZNsDdhYPDr-n7FW3J-MeFN0nqdXi2_BLzVn9LRf2GjyxWyNlNVE7im1iJ7ISFc3h5yzncWPIJYxwpCXOq5gDNj2h8mYTT5GX53JutRahXrrxAEi1UT3bgR3K27YWmGfnGBXJWxBtw-sDvHWvRCOVel82nWvXomQlBt24gx8Hxj1ARCtd2A/s320/ted%20cast.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">TOO MANY CHARACTERS WITH NO SUSTAINED FOCUS</h3><p><i>Ted Lasso</i> has always had a lot of characters; that fact has never been an issue for me because for the first few seasons, we spent significant quality time with only a <i>few </i>of the footballers: mostly Roy, Jamie, and Sam. Later on, Dani and Isaac became more prominent figures. This season, Colin joined that list. In an ensemble cast, that’s natural — sometimes a show will discover that their once-side characters are actually more interesting as primary characters and they bump them up from a “recurring” to a “series regular” role. </p><p>Allow me a related tangent for a minute: For those who are fans of <i>Community</i>, this happened naturally with Dean Pelton (played by Jim Rash). As the seasons went on and some of the series regular cast members departed, Jim Rash got a more prominent role to play in the group. He’d been around since the pilot so it made sense to integrate him more into the show’s stories and bump him up to a series regular role. Some might argue (like me) that Dean Pelton works better as a side character who pops in and out of scenes, delivering jokes or one-liners, instead of becoming a main cast member. But the writers, for the most part, knew the appropriate balance of a character we were used to seeing on the sidelines suddenly incorporated into an A-story.</p><p>Not so with <i>Ted Lasso</i>. Let’s just start out by noting that the football team alone is huge. Besides Jamie, Isaac, Colin, Sam, and Dani — who were all series regulars — we also saw these characters in some capacity each episode in scenes of significance: Roy, Keeley, Rebecca, Ted, Beard, Higgins, Nate, Trent Crimm, Rupert, Nate’s girlfriend we’re meant to care about now (Jade), Keeley’s ex-girlfriend we were meant to care about for a few episodes there (Jack), Will, etc. </p><p>(Also: did we all also forget the focus that Zava took up for the first part of this season too?!) </p><p>I don’t think <i>Ted Lasso </i>needs to suddenly drop-kick characters out of its universe. </p><p><i><b></b></i></p><blockquote><i><b>But what I do think is that it is very, very unsure who — besides its titular character — the show is actually about</b></i>. </blockquote><p></p><p>And because it is unsure, it is trying to spend too much time, equally, on everyone. It’s why Colin became a focus for a few episodes, but then Sam was the focus of another storyline. It’s why you’re beginning to see some of the recurring football players in stories (like Van Damme). But that’s also why the series is struggling: because it doesn’t know, beyond Ted, who is <i>actually </i>the center of the story. To me, it is always a show about Rebecca.</p><p>But do you see how things begin to bleed together rather unfortunately? If you have a season of long episode runtimes with no real direction and a huge cast, you can make episodes about anything you want! But that doesn’t mean you should, and that doesn’t mean they serve an overall purpose in the arc of season. It means you are creating a bunch of self-contained storylines that have no bearing on the overall narrative.</p><p>At the beginning of <i>Ted Lasso</i>’s third season, I began to think that we were headed into an interesting theme, asking the questions: “When is it time to go? How do you know you’re ready to leave? And what are the consequences if you stay somewhere too long?” Unfortunately right now, most of the stories in these episodes aren’t answering this central, thematic question at all. </p><p>It’s like the show began on a highway, driving toward a destination. But along the way, all these side roads and off-ramps began to pop up. Some of them were paved, some were just dirt and rocks running through fields. But the show decided that every road was equally important and split off on vehicles, driving into them all. The issue here is that the writers have forgotten how to navigate back to the central highway. Some of those roads abruptly stopped shortly after they started, and some are still winding and weaving around curves, parallel to the highway — close but not quite back to where we need to be.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwJY7VfY67oSP2_bW3bDWQ5bJvA6BMzWF-9HlTN6i__049c7uixs_KRJZaYCZC9VTiwNeGv_HBqEmttgF7j5cM7ntDFAH26BdN2i7E-NnIhxb6-sZDZiH8KCj6DRdlVuoRzVpsB9h8UF77a7bx0rdpL9e4bmKTG5Bycp0G3-xdRJEtLR7WhR6ygOqT2Q/s1014/rebecca%20sunflowers.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="1014" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwJY7VfY67oSP2_bW3bDWQ5bJvA6BMzWF-9HlTN6i__049c7uixs_KRJZaYCZC9VTiwNeGv_HBqEmttgF7j5cM7ntDFAH26BdN2i7E-NnIhxb6-sZDZiH8KCj6DRdlVuoRzVpsB9h8UF77a7bx0rdpL9e4bmKTG5Bycp0G3-xdRJEtLR7WhR6ygOqT2Q/s320/rebecca%20sunflowers.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">MISSING: ALL THESE REBECCA PLOT THREADS</h3><p>Sometimes (maybe three times) there’s a green matchbook. </p><p>But is that really important this season, do you think? It was for an episode! It seemed like Rebecca had some real complex emotions over discovering she can’t have kids early in this season. So when a psychic tells her that she will become a mom, Rebecca is incredibly hurt by what she believes is the psychic taunting her. </p><p>And even though we’ve seen the matchbook a few times this season — presumably as red herrings like the show did last year with the Ted/Rebecca texting — nothing else has resulted from that in terms of Rebecca’s overall character depth. We have spent very little time on any sort of self- </p><p>This is when the old adage “show, don’t tell” could actually be inverted: I want to SEE how Rebecca is actually feeling about all of this. If this story is so important, why not devote time and an actual arc to it? Why not make it a central point in the season and build the stories around it? Why not show Keeley and Rebecca together more, processing the perils of wanting things as a woman, the expectations of motherhood, the desire — or not — to have children? Why not show Rebecca processing it with Dr. Sharon? Something! Anything to tell me the show remembered Rebecca actually had a really rough time with that news and that it is a core part of her character like they say it is! So far this season, that one episode is the deepest we’ve gone with Rebecca’s core desire of: “Wants to become a mother.”</p><p>This week’s episode, “International Break,” also delivered the end of a semi-baked storyline that could have been much better handled for Rebecca’s character: her desire to beat Rupert. After it has been hammered into the coaches and us all season that Rebecca just cares about getting ahead of her ex-husband, the resolution to this story — that suddenly Rebecca is reminded of why she loves football and that it doesn’t matter whether she beats Rupert or not — felt... quick. Too quick to be believable. Suddenly Rebecca feels comfortable enough around Rupert to be smiling and laughing (don’t get me started on the show making Rupert mistake that for some sort of romantic affection, ugh), then walking away from him and convincing everyone to not join Akufo’s Super League?</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuxGc8CSrEudCkW5WS6KaGuXBPB8pHhUZUgd-GwR0B5GZS3_QdAOxlrRQpj8Z6EGfftsVQD1VwMy7sBRr-8NYLbiWwtYHXvfTsDYQ8ZQPiAcwHpbzX2gfBcOQoc4cKoOu-gg4somL9WWGOSdRru-Lp1Jbw31faKoGEWc-AkeVvhO-ISOAiaMtCgnHMSQ/s1978/Screen%20Shot%202023-05-19%20at%2010.35.57%20PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1124" data-original-width="1978" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuxGc8CSrEudCkW5WS6KaGuXBPB8pHhUZUgd-GwR0B5GZS3_QdAOxlrRQpj8Z6EGfftsVQD1VwMy7sBRr-8NYLbiWwtYHXvfTsDYQ8ZQPiAcwHpbzX2gfBcOQoc4cKoOu-gg4somL9WWGOSdRru-Lp1Jbw31faKoGEWc-AkeVvhO-ISOAiaMtCgnHMSQ/s320/Screen%20Shot%202023-05-19%20at%2010.35.57%20PM.png" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; text-align: left;">Power poses and little green army men can only do so much legwork for storytelling. </span></p><p>I had actually really liked where I thought the story was going though in the beginning of the episode: Rebecca is put off by the Super League invitation, believing they only want her there because otherwise it is a bunch of old white men who own football teams and she’s a woman. Higgins, actually, is the one to convince Rebecca to attend the meeting by telling her that it doesn’t matter why she was invited — if she gets a seat at the table, she should take it. And then she can decide what to do with it. </p><p>Before the lunch meeting, Rebecca has a slight anxiety/panic attack in the mirror, but when she pictures herself as a little girl, she actually begins to calm down. It’s almost as if she remembers what she affirms later on: the kid part of us that wanted to be accepted is still inside us. So she does her power pose which is mimicked by little!Rebecca in the mirror. It was a beautiful little moment about anxiety and seeing yourself for who you are. </p><p>This is then slightly undercut by the fact that the lunch’s real purpose was not that Rebecca faced her anxiety with courage, but that Rebecca was willing to let the notion of beating Rupert go. (Rebecca and Keeley discuss it later on in the episode where Keeley tells Rebecca that her ability to do that was a huge step in progress... something I’d believe if I’d seen more of a story thread connecting this all.)</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVLJQ0iPTpcAiBQfryumXNreWg1bpZnc4E-G7NSB-_yEkls2kNP5Y7UzQC6rGXF8FgLI8Ej_7NQi2sklwKEGUYgnZnnicXIW_4cSySb9H0S2Kb2ZvTzxRx2SzWfN742lR8BsiFmGog5DUiTZTMXxoIUrB02lHnZ1vi3eyGHGivaXo074SmUlNYAon_Xg/s1200/michelle.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1200" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVLJQ0iPTpcAiBQfryumXNreWg1bpZnc4E-G7NSB-_yEkls2kNP5Y7UzQC6rGXF8FgLI8Ej_7NQi2sklwKEGUYgnZnnicXIW_4cSySb9H0S2Kb2ZvTzxRx2SzWfN742lR8BsiFmGog5DUiTZTMXxoIUrB02lHnZ1vi3eyGHGivaXo074SmUlNYAon_Xg/s320/michelle.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">MORE PLOT THREADS THAT ARE MISSING IN ACTION</h3><p>And then we have all the things with Ted and Michelle suddenly appearing again. Ted doesn’t, seemingly, care that much about Michelle’s dating life for most of this show. It stings, of course, but he’s slept with Sassy (I miss her) and seemed to be in a good emotional place after his sessions with Dr. Sharon (I miss her) last season. But now, without warning, Ted is panicked about Michelle moving on — with fans speculating that perhaps this will lead to a reconciliation where Ted chooses to go back to the U.S. to be with her and Henry. There’s no real reason for the show to do this, other than the fact that it remembered Michelle existed, and it would be a regression in Ted’s character to seek after a woman he has let go of. So where’s this plot even going? Who knows!</p><p>Also what is happening with Sam and the woman who works with him (whose name genuinely escapes me)? Were they setting them up to be close friends or something romantic (Rebecca’s little bit of jealousy suggested the latter)? What are the long-lasting consequences of his restaurant being attacked? Because we spent an entire episode with him and that story — only for the show to really never speak of it again. That’s the consequence of a season with bloated episodes: stories only matter in the episode they happen in, then very little matters after the episode concludes.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_n9RBSwgvL-U6dh88Fq5sKGs_hFP4EUQB1PCCapyyaR4K5CYJidoFJbwQZtZhsQVax5qvucBrLy13BP3WmXmLBdtflppQlpBZSi5rPmRdzNHLY8KgMI4TZD_SGrA-ZkN3hRRvC16wRF80W8DnHSVZfue-jc9H9RTByWZ5CpXWmExBROfGsYI8nKGXnA/s2000/roy%20and%20keeley.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="995" data-original-width="2000" height="159" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_n9RBSwgvL-U6dh88Fq5sKGs_hFP4EUQB1PCCapyyaR4K5CYJidoFJbwQZtZhsQVax5qvucBrLy13BP3WmXmLBdtflppQlpBZSi5rPmRdzNHLY8KgMI4TZD_SGrA-ZkN3hRRvC16wRF80W8DnHSVZfue-jc9H9RTByWZ5CpXWmExBROfGsYI8nKGXnA/s320/roy%20and%20keeley.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">ROY/KEELEY: MISSING PLOT THREADS TOO</h3><p>Meanwhile, the whole Roy/Keeley of it all truly bothers me — and I loved them as a couple for the last few seasons. “International Break” finds the pair reconciling... though is it healthy? The ironic dialogue Keeley is delivering to Rebecca as the latter spies Roy in Keeley’s robe suggests otherwise!</p><p>Roy and Keeley were such a core part of the series by the end of last season. When their breakup was announced at the beginning of this season, it was unclear why they broke up in the first place. In the show’s most recent episode, the two reconcile. But there’s nothing in the middle of these two episodes that suggests Roy did sufficient work on himself and/or realized he was being an idiot. Instead, the show learns on Phoebe’s teacher as the one to deliver an “a-ha” moment of emotional catharsis for our favorite curmudgeonly footballer. Which apparently involves Roy apologizing for not treating Keeley right or not valuing her as the amazing person she is? (It makes no sense; there is literally no real evidence I can find for that.)</p><p>So the choice to hinge a couple we seemingly all rooted for getting back together via a throwaway line from a woman who once flirted with Roy? A bit odd to me. Have Roy and Keeley even significantly interacted prior to this episode? Really? (I’m not counting the moment he approaches her about the video she made because that conversation ended with Roy NOT saying something helpful.)</p><p>But I think the Roy/Keeley issues are a symptom of <i>Ted Lasso</i>’s larger problem: there is simply too much happening to devote a significant amount of time to any of it. So the show is asking us to suspend our disbelief and accept plots that don’t quite make sense. And if the series hadn’t been so tightly written with their plot threads in past seasons, I might be willing to look the other way. As it is, I don’t even have to try to find plot holes or fraying threads now; the show is offering them up to me pretty obviously.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLLPAthEwLAAVhQAakxX_YN3X7k7L16UrcjIUkHZ5RSq9I7uEeKI6NN2g_mPtPkDx5f77awCJ-GVrBVtC1A7E1l4kjp85OBtzZiLy9JFf1OC0t677XMlvu2p78F3jxsQEtHeCZeL4TF2ve8PVJgEGKsi8tvBgAD6-lkYK58Crusu1mBXgJkMFodTTkQ/s1200/keeley.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1200" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLLPAthEwLAAVhQAakxX_YN3X7k7L16UrcjIUkHZ5RSq9I7uEeKI6NN2g_mPtPkDx5f77awCJ-GVrBVtC1A7E1l4kjp85OBtzZiLy9JFf1OC0t677XMlvu2p78F3jxsQEtHeCZeL4TF2ve8PVJgEGKsi8tvBgAD6-lkYK58Crusu1mBXgJkMFodTTkQ/s320/keeley.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">KEELEY DESERVES THE WORLD, BUT WAS TREATED LIKE GARBAGE</h3><p>Separating Keeley and Rebecca this season was a bold move — and it was a bad one. Instead of Keeley being a confident boss like we saw at the end of season two, she’s being love bombed by her boss (HER BOSS, Y'ALL!!! A WOMAN IN A POSITION OF POWER OVER HER IS ALSO HER LOVE INTEREST) and not noticing that anything is awry at all. (Also “love bombing” as a psychological term is actually emotional manipulation. It is often a symptom of someone’s narcissistic personality disorder or abusive behavior, so I will need the writer who decided to make it a lighthearted joke instead of taking it seriously in a timeout corner ASAP.)</p><p>I’m glad the show decided to explore Keeley’s bisexuality. But I wish it hadn’t been right after she very clearly stated she wasn’t over Roy. Oh, right, and I wish it wasn’t WITH HER BOSS. (If I had a nickel for every time <i>Ted Lasso</i> did that storyline, I’d have two nickels. Which is not a lot but it is weird it happened twice, right?)</p><p>Not only does her BOSS start a relationship with someone she has power over, but her BOSS then uses said power and tries to shame Keeley into apologizing for a sex tape that got leaked without her consent. When Keeley will not, Jack breaks up with her, leaves for another country, ghosts her, pulls her funding, and “apologizes” with a shady text. All while Keeley is just... accepting this. She even pines over Jack by sending an extremely long wall of text messages. KEELEY JONES? There is only a shell of the woman we knew in seasons one and two in this storyline and I’m so mad that Keeley is one of the characters this season to suffer the most. She deserved to have better writing and she deserves the chance to shine. Instead, the show isolated her and shrunk her power down for the sake of a very bad story.</p><p>Keeley was isolated on her own PR island where she was apparently struggling to tell people what to do. I would have loved if the show chose to explore her imposter syndrome a little bit deeper than it was. I am all for realism in people struggling with new jobs, positions of power, and responsibilities. But it just seemed like at every turn, Keeley was shrinking in her confidence, incompetent, and overzealous. Her PR firm storyline was <i>barely</i> a story in the end.</p><p>What, exactly, did separating Keeley from the whole cast do? Nothing. The best scenes of the show work because of the dynamic between the characters, as evidenced in the Rebecca/Keeley dynamic which is truly lightning in a bottle. This PR/Jack story just made Keeley — a confident character whom Roy and Rebecca affirm in “International Break” multiple times — feel like a helpless, lost, unsteady woman instead of the confident boss she really is. It’s as if the show didn’t know who she was without the rest of the cast. I’m glad that it seems like she’s being incorporated back into the fold now but it’s almost too little, too late for me after what they chose to do this season.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj03_uP5OTFyyUIVywoFGXt4W_fBNzPM3NC8JiEof5IWaaHZxpD9sJP-UyZp9jOQYak4ednQG1DtLR5iksf8kE0Jp8HEXBPmzKAfjy6bHlotOguTphzUjNs7vdpVbNyE89pmnbdLG6TnDZhsx7doiuE1y7wb0YRXtv2BWwcFUR-lClXgn-MBR786817IA/s1014/ted-lasso-season-3-edyta-budnik-nick-mohammed-1014x570.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="1014" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj03_uP5OTFyyUIVywoFGXt4W_fBNzPM3NC8JiEof5IWaaHZxpD9sJP-UyZp9jOQYak4ednQG1DtLR5iksf8kE0Jp8HEXBPmzKAfjy6bHlotOguTphzUjNs7vdpVbNyE89pmnbdLG6TnDZhsx7doiuE1y7wb0YRXtv2BWwcFUR-lClXgn-MBR786817IA/s320/ted-lasso-season-3-edyta-budnik-nick-mohammed-1014x570.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">THE NATE OF IT ALL</h3><p>My issues with Nate are pretty much everyone else’s issues with Nate. I wasn’t a huge fan of making him the villain of season two, but if we got the chance to see some sort of arc or growth in season three, I figured it would all be worth it. And, as you might have guessed, I was wrong! There is no Nate redemption arc! There’s really not even growth! </p><p>Let’s rewind for a minute, shall we? Nate’s villainy stemmed from his deepest insecurities. Everything he does and everything he did was based on those feelings of inadequacy. He felt abandoned by Ted and he lashed out. He got the slightest taste of power and used it to hurt and humiliate Will. He believed he was entitled to his position because he worked hard to get there and thought Ted did not. He assumed that if he just succeeded, he could earn the love and adoration of other people and maybe — just maybe — that would be enough to make him feel like he was something. But no acclaim and no accolades can fill the void in Nate’s heart.</p><p>Unfortunately Nate learned very little after season two. Until the most recent episode where he quits West Ham, he’s perfectly fine with mocking and humiliating Ted Lasso and his former teammates to earn the acclaim and approval of Rupert (anyone else see a pattern here?). He doesn’t apologize to Ted in the elevator. He mocks him in a press conference. He becomes Rupert’s shadow and when Rupert apologizes for the fact that Ted, Henry, and Beard are at a West Ham game, Nate deletes the response saying that it was okay and sends exactly what Rupert wants to hear.</p><p>After one conversation with his father — a very brief one at that — we’re supposed to believe Nate is going to turn a corner? Because he played the violin and his dad said all he wanted was for Nate to be happy? One brief conversation does not erase years of family trauma, especially if the only progress that has been made on this relationship happened in this scene alone.</p><p>Also, I’m sorry: a card apology to Will and a clean/laundered Greyhound locker room does not make up for the horrible way Nate treated him. There is nothing the show can do within the next two episodes that will suddenly make Nate’s “redemption” arc an actual thing. The show should have spent the entire season showing us Nate realizing that chasing fame and adoration is wrong. Instead, we just get more scenes of him scrolling social media and news articles looking for validation. The show could have shown us what happens when you choose to follow a morally bankrupt leader instead of a flawed, kind one. Instead, the writers decided that the moment Nate realized Rupert didn’t actually want to hang out with him for a guys’ night was the last straw. Not, you know, anything else horrible Rupert did that Nate knew about from working at Richmond all those years. Ugh. Y’all, this whole character “arc” is not an arc at all. It’s a bunch of random dots on a scatter plot.</p><p>The worst part of it is that the<i> Ted Lasso</i> writers put Nate together with Jade — a woman who found Nate bothersome and then suddenly, with no explanation, has decided that she wants to date him. We don’t have time to unpack all of that so I’ll just breeze right past it and ask: Are we supposed to care more about Nate now that he has a girlfriend? Does the show think that this will soften him for us and/or erase our memories of how Nate outed Ted’s mental health crisis to everyone? Is there actually a point to any of this meandering story? (No.)</p><p>Isolating Nate in his own storyline this season was necessary, but the problem is that the writers didn’t devote the necessary time and effort to making Nate grow as a person. There is no reason for me, Ted, or any of the Greyhounds to believe Nate has learned anything at all between the time he left Richmond and now. </p><p>Because he hasn’t.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKMdueUu4qfEQ4zY4nBOn8KzVBzMUjmrKwSsb1YYmlvC4YW4bjs8GhGCembBivrqzwnGJ6lhJbup_hVlwWC4YllIAXY40uwPq7VXl8SF6HqGA2v9V61xvK7RF608H6k4YiByDMH14mB6RDLDPLBk5sdn08LiGoqapS3fo42XFkoetXUHyJKVD5x1q11g/s3000/ted%20and%20henry.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1688" data-original-width="3000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKMdueUu4qfEQ4zY4nBOn8KzVBzMUjmrKwSsb1YYmlvC4YW4bjs8GhGCembBivrqzwnGJ6lhJbup_hVlwWC4YllIAXY40uwPq7VXl8SF6HqGA2v9V61xvK7RF608H6k4YiByDMH14mB6RDLDPLBk5sdn08LiGoqapS3fo42XFkoetXUHyJKVD5x1q11g/s320/ted%20and%20henry.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h3 style="text-align: center;">MOVING FORWARD</h3><p>Do I think that all hope is lost for <i>Ted Lasso</i>? No. I wouldn’t write this if I didn’t think there were things that the show is doing well or that it could improve. I just hope that the show realizes where its strengths are (concentrated, tight stories with a few characters as a focus) and where its weaknesses are too. At the end of the day, I’m still rooting for Richmond and I know that so many others are too.</p><p><b><i></i></b></p><blockquote><b><i>Because it is okay to like something and still want it to be better.</i></b></blockquote><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-80700467355203541112023-05-18T14:27:00.000-04:002023-05-18T14:27:46.609-04:00The Flash 9x11 Review: "A New World, Part Two" (Crystal Blue Persuasion) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVB8ePo2j4JqPKkbqqT8Hvzt-xsa5iCYUbNTgFAbD4t3wkfpUDjanOjQravP5r51-rLowMexHm4KDnc7F4ueCKdnvdOjPP7antmYoKtrmFyCDKMvF5L2AAnWf7FCYbmgVDPX0rxZLMTubYJMSkFxmgl_ezP_ZW9iVpr2CLaF6mI99GZPo5tDPkmkd5Gg/s1200/FLA911fg_0016r.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="589" data-original-width="1200" height="157" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVB8ePo2j4JqPKkbqqT8Hvzt-xsa5iCYUbNTgFAbD4t3wkfpUDjanOjQravP5r51-rLowMexHm4KDnc7F4ueCKdnvdOjPP7antmYoKtrmFyCDKMvF5L2AAnWf7FCYbmgVDPX0rxZLMTubYJMSkFxmgl_ezP_ZW9iVpr2CLaF6mI99GZPo5tDPkmkd5Gg/s320/FLA911fg_0016r.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“A New World, Part Two”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: May 10, 2023</div><p>Time for part two, and everything is still blue! <i>The Flash </i>continues to deliver some interesting stuff this week, and while the blue theme isn’t as in-your-face as it was in Part One, it’s definitely sticking around. Considering the buzz on the internet about where this final arc is going, I’m thinking things are staying blue until the end. I only hope I’ll have enough song references for the subtitles of these reviews.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PART TWO: THE BLUES</span></h4><p>Our blue Dr. Malcolm Gilmore pays a visit to CCPD, searching for answers about Eddie Thawne. Several officers clearly recognize him and look on, bewildered. I’m surprised anyone in Central City law enforcement has the capacity for bewilderment, considering everything that goes on in this town. Despite a lack of title card indicating we’re in the future, it’s made very clear that’s where Gilmore’s storyline is taking place: Korber, the only background CCPD officer with a name, is now Captain and a brief flash of Gilmore’s ID places his date of birth in 2017. I know I probably should have assumed a future timeline last week when all the computer screens were super advanced hologram looking things, but to be fair the technology in this show is silly and futuristic by default.</p><p>While the events surrounding Dr. Gilmore are the more compelling bits of the episode, the meat of the episode unfortunately revolves around Team Flash trying to figure out Barry’s disappearance. It is interesting that this episode seems to be the other side of last week’s episode, though, including some moments (like Iris thinking about Barry while Barry’s thinking about Iris during his fight with Negative Speed Force Joe) that line up nicely.</p><p>Chester picked up radioactive cobalt isotopes where Barry disappeared and says they can all assume he was taken. Well, yeah, dude. I doubt sucking loved ones away within a glowing blue light happens naturally, even in Central City. Mark suddenly appears to help the team track Barry down, except he’s actually possessed by the Negative Speed Force so he’s really just hangin’ around to cause trouble. Spoiler alert, yeah — but they don’t waste much time before the glowy-eyed reveal, so I don’t feel like I’m jumping the gun too much.</p><p>Like Joe last week, Mark picked up that blue crystal at some point during his travels and got possessed by the Negative Speed Force, who is now trying to knock off Team Flash members one by one in order to get to Iris and, subsequently, Barry and Iris’s unborn child. He irradiates Allegra first, then drives Khione away by calling her an abomination after she turns a couple CCC Media employees into PlantSims. When that’s done, he distracts Chester so he can take out all the progress being made on tracking cobalt isotopes, knocks Cecile out, and finally has Iris cornered when Speed Force Nora shows up to scare him off. Ah, making use of that actress while you can, eh?</p><p>Speed Force Nora explains that everything is the fault of the Negative Forces, and I get flashbacks to those awful Forces storylines of seasons past. Just... the worst. Anyway, she’s being attacked on the cosmic plane so she can’t stick around to help, but Khione can. Nora summons Khione from wherever she’d gone and pep talks her into realizing she has the power of a goddess and if she just embraces that power, she’ll be able to help the team and help get Mark back to his old self. Do we really want that, though?</p><p>Apparently Khione does. She meets up with Mark at her apartment, destroying her door for the sake of a dramatic entrance, and gives the Negative Speed Force one last chance to leave. He shows Khione that the blue crystal is embedded in his hand and as long as he has it, he’s in charge — so Khione removes the crystal. By disintegrating Mark into a pile of dust and then rebuilding him. It’s a very neat special effect but a very over-the-top solution to the problem. Like, jeez, girl, I feel like there was an easier way to rip that crystal out of his palm that didn’t involve reducing your friend to a fine powder first.</p><p>But reduced and recycled Mark was, sans blue crystal and, therefore, sans Negative Speed Force. The crystal itself is on the floor afterwards, but just like with Joe’s crystal, it disappears before either Mark or Khione can grab it.</p><p>Meanwhile, Iris has been dealing with the disappearance of Barry and possibly living through the timeline in which she raises Nora alone, all thanks to this Negative Speed Force and its vendetta against the Allen family. She’s only more upset when she goes into labor and laments Barry not being there to support her. But no sooner has she spoken than Barry appears, flashing into STAR Labs in a blue light just in time to hear he’s about to be a dad.</p><p>The team takes Iris to the hospital and, while they wait for her to go through that whole labor thing, Barry explains that the crystal seems to be traveling through time, trying to kill everyone in all timelines at once. Ludicrously, Mark volunteers to search for the crystal. He just said it travels through time and space, Mark. What are you gonna do, take out a Craigslist ad? “Lost: Mysterious Blue Crystal, Defies Physics, Evil. If found, please contact Chillblaine.” Khione also has her doubts, and it seems like she might assist Mark on his search since she says she’s meant for bigger things than protecting the city, but Barry disappears again before she can explain more. Wish he’d stop doing that.</p><p>Meanwhile, Malcolm Gilmore is digging up Eddie’s grave because growling voices only he can hear telling him to “find her” and random flashes of Eddie’s life with Iris have driven the man to the brink of insanity. Captain Korber catches him and pulls her futuristic gun on him, but he insists he needs to see Eddie’s body. He gets more flashes, takes a little break to laugh like a crazy person, and finally opens Eddie’s casket to reveal that it’s empty. He remembers shooting himself in the chest and when he looks down at his own chest, there’s a bloodstain.</p><p>Gilmore declares that he is actually Eddie Thawne, and to prove it he digs the bullet out of his gaping chest wound. Bro, I do believe you because narratively I have to, but that is a truly unhinged way to prove anything and I don’t think it serves as legally viable identification.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I’m like 99% sure that <i>The Flash </i>writers did not have Gilmore working in Mercury Labs because Sailor Mercury is the blue-themed Sailor Scout from Sailor Moon, but it’s fun to think they did.</li><li>Wait, Eddie’s body got sucked up into a vortex or whatever when he died, so the casket being empty isn’t even a big deal. There was never even a body to bury. Which makes me wonder why they bothered to bury an empty casket in the first place?</li><li>Unrelated, but Rick Cosnett was giving 80s David Bowie vibes this whole episode and I can’t fully explain why.</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-3532513641270486592023-05-09T11:57:00.002-04:002023-05-09T11:57:58.587-04:00The Flash 9x10 Review: "A New World, Part One" (Everything Is Blue) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVlcvy6qAhk-U_prez9SIgoKJgFAc_RRe5xoZCk510i5cKV2o3WcPdnPYKi5tlYAx8cSJ72Bcv3wqkfXsGTr-mAWNKtD-uKgguhYLJiV7_aa7W-YhmpQ4FhkumX9AGzDtynf_sHDebwxoy1MTLqY7lR1QpJkhGzQOp4a7BSiK4G2FjAgWK391A8G-rVg/s512/unnamed%20(2).png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="341" data-original-width="512" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVlcvy6qAhk-U_prez9SIgoKJgFAc_RRe5xoZCk510i5cKV2o3WcPdnPYKi5tlYAx8cSJ72Bcv3wqkfXsGTr-mAWNKtD-uKgguhYLJiV7_aa7W-YhmpQ4FhkumX9AGzDtynf_sHDebwxoy1MTLqY7lR1QpJkhGzQOp4a7BSiK4G2FjAgWK391A8G-rVg/s320/unnamed%20(2).png" width="320" /></a></div><span><br /></span></div><span><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“A New World, Part One”</b></div></span><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: May 3, 2023</div><p>It’s the beginning of the end! We’re in the home stretch now, with the first part of a four-part arc that will close out the season and, ultimately, the series as a whole. And I’m happy to say that we’re off to a good start with this part one episode, which delivers some intriguing mysteries, decent emotional moments, and enough of a complete storyline to make it feel like both the start of a multi-parter and a decent story in its own right. Also, there’s a lot of blue. For reasons.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PART ONE: REUNIONS</span></h4><p>The episode opens on a bouquet of fake blue flowers, then pans over to a man in a blue suit getting ready and singing an off-key rendition of “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” by Elton John. We don’t see the man’s face, but he’s leaving from the West family house. He arrives at his work and it’s more obvious that the color grading has a distinctly blue hue to it. The building security guard hands over the man’s forgotten ID badge, which is also blue. That’s when we get the big reveal that the guy’s played by the same actor as Eddie Thawne.</p><p>We get some quick scenes of our usual characters which don’t factor much into the episode, but I do want to mention that Khione’s scene heavily leans on blue and green, including a strange and obvious fade to green transition. Her hair is blue, her ice powers are blue, but her apartment is painted green and has a lot of green plants. I mention this because green also comes into play throughout the episode, though not as obviously as blue. Just thought it was noteworthy.</p><p>It’s been nine months since the start of the season and Iris is now super pregnant. As Barry explains that he’s meta-baby-proofing the loft with dampeners, Iris gets the notification of her Pulitzer nomination. Before they can celebrate too much, Barry is transported by a blue light to the year 2000. “What’d I do this time?” he asks upon arrival. Well, we can’t say he’s not self-aware.</p><p>Attempting to travel back to the future by super speed yields poor results, so Barry goes to CCPD to get Joe to help him find Dr. Tina McGee. While Barry’s acting suspicious and contemplating a fake name to give Joe, he looks over at a desk calendar and sees that it’s March 18, 2000 — the day his mother was killed by Eobard Thawne. Is killed? Will be killed? Time travel is really hard to write about.</p><p>Trying to call Professor Stein from a payphone also doesn’t get Barry anywhere, but the payphone does happen to be located across the street from where his parents are walking. Barry starts toward them but a speedster blur knocks him into the road, unconscious. The Allens see him and Henry runs to stop a car from hitting his future-son, while Nora comments that Barry looks just like her father. Nora calls 911 on a flip phone. Those were the days.</p><p>Waking up in the hospital, Barry starts freaking out because his parents are still hanging around and he doesn’t want to upset the timeline. Dr. and Mrs. Allen invite the anxious, sketchy stranger they found in the middle of the road out for pizza, which Barry can’t help but accept because when else would he get the chance to have pizza with his dead parents?</p><p>Meanwhile, CCPD investigates Barry’s accident site and Joe hears a disembodied, growling voice. He turns to find a blue crystal, and when he picks it up his eyes glow blue.</p><p>After dining on pizza, Nora and Henry invite the anxious, sketchy stranger they found in the middle of the road to stay at their house for the night. I know they’re probably overwhelmed by “this is our son from the future” vibes but holy moly, guys. Inviting people you don’t know to crash at your place is not safe behavior, especially when you have a kid at home.</p><p>Barry flees, stopping in an alley — where he’s found by Eobard Thawne. It’s Original Face Thawne, too! That’s a nice surprise. In the heat of the moment, Barry threatens to kill him with the ol’ vibration hand but stops for hero reasons. Thawne takes Barry out for a beer, which is actually pretty funny. As is his wont, Thawne tells Barry he’s going to kill him and there’s nothing Barry can do about it. Barry agrees, which seems to throw Thawne for a loop.</p><p>Upon finding his parents in the hospital room where he’d woken up, Barry tells them how grateful he is for their love and how it made him the man he became. Well, he frames it as something his alias “Bart” would say to his dead parents, who are actually his dead parents, who are actually alive to hear him say it. It’s confusing but it’s sweet. The Allens and Barry say goodbye, and Barry hears the same mysterious growling voice that Joe heard earlier.</p><p>He finds Joe standing in an empty hospital hallway, lights flickering ominously overhead and speaking in a way that indicates he’s aware of Barry’s time travel mess. Despite all signs pointing to this being a bad situation, Barry is relieved that Joe knows who he is and only realizes something’s wrong when Joe’s eyes glow blue. “You’re not Joe,” he says. Duh-doy, Barry!</p><p>At first, Barry thinks he’s the Negative Speed Force Avatar, but Not-Joe says he isn’t because Barry killed that entity. Instead, he’s “the real deal” — the actual Negative Speed Force — and he’s going to make Barry pay for what he’s done. Not-Joe blasts Barry into a wall, which is heard as an explosion in the rest of the hospital. In a cute little bit of continuity, the doctor who helps evacuate the hospital by calling a “code green” (told you there were green mentions as well as blue!) is Rachel Rosso, mother of Ramsey “Bloodwork” Rosso.</p><p>More blasts and tremors happen throughout the hospital as Barry and Not-Joe fight. Barry can’t kill Not-Joe because it would mean killing actual Joe, but Not-Joe really wants to kill Barry. As Not-Joe is about to make the killing blow, Barry uses the power of love (i.e., remembering Iris and baby Nora on the way) to channel his speed and blast the Negative Speed Force out of Joe. Barry sees the blue crystal that had possessed Joe next to his unconscious body, but the crystal disappears before he can investigate further. Joe gets a superspeed trip to his patrol car, where he comes to in understandable confusion, hands shaking.</p><p>Barry runs to cut off Thawne in front of the Allen residence. Thawne thinks he’s there to save himself, but Barry declares that he’s there to save Thawne, which earns him an incredulous look in response. Barry brings up Thawne’s absolute joke of an evil origin story: 170 years in the future, Thawne wants to make his debut by saving a crowd but gets usurped by Barry and henceforth declares the Flash his nemesis. Barry apologizes (even though it’s stupid) and asks Thawne to simply walk away, or else risk losing everything. </p><p>Of course, Thawne doesn’t and Barry’s own origin story proceeds, with Thawne attacking and killing Barry’s mother in a scene we’ve seen dozens of times since the series began. We even get Barry encountering himself from one of those other instances of him traveling back in time, which is a nice touch.</p><p>Thawne runs from the house, but his speed has been depleted. Barry finds him in the street and Thawne figures out that Barry living and his mother dying is a fixed point, which Barry already knew about. He also knew that Thawne would wind up trapped in Barry’s timeline. While Thawne rages at Barry for being a big mean meanie, Barry thanks him for giving him one last day with his parents. I guess Barry still thinks Thawne was the one who sent him back in time? The blue transportation light hits Barry again, ripping him out of the year 2000.</p><p>In the final scene, the man from the cold open is listening to a cover of “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” while working in his blue-tinted office. Thunder rumbles and the power goes out. He walks to the window, where a distinctly Speed Force-y storm is brewing, and is struck by lightning. When he wakes up, he finds a classified police file for Eddie Thawne and wonders who that man with his face could be.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Another mention of blue this episode: Cecile says Joe feels like he’s “singing the blues inside.”</li><li>I love the delivery/timing of Barry’s “I call everyone Captain. Hey, Captain. Morning, Cap. It’s a weird thing I have.” bit. Grant Gustin’s comedic chops should’ve been utilized more on this show.</li><li>The lighting for the section of the hospital where Barry and Not-Joe are fighting is graded green and blue. Thematic! But why?</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-32837939366818618282023-05-09T11:50:00.000-04:002023-05-09T11:50:02.586-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x16 Recap: “Gunpowder and Lead” (Fact Meets Fiction) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIgC49SueyFQ62MEO4xZOMfEFE0gsKwG7wg6b6PBLmfSrmB785_5q9im7BM7aHki5IrySCAquTmc60BV7enEylzP0Hs_YQVxGSXlH2uqJFdVeU7eyPD8crl-XMn_1BW30vnBvg5HZGsnPxwE66FleiYqHmiGQHWULQGpLnhmBMrUCtBJX_Bvz3XHtMQQ/s2000/image.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIgC49SueyFQ62MEO4xZOMfEFE0gsKwG7wg6b6PBLmfSrmB785_5q9im7BM7aHki5IrySCAquTmc60BV7enEylzP0Hs_YQVxGSXlH2uqJFdVeU7eyPD8crl-XMn_1BW30vnBvg5HZGsnPxwE66FleiYqHmiGQHWULQGpLnhmBMrUCtBJX_Bvz3XHtMQQ/s320/image.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Gunpowder and Lead”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: April 20, 2023</div><p>With Meredith and Maggie leaving Seattle, there is no longer a Grey as a main character on <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i>. This week, the focus turns to their sister, Amelia, who is spiraling after a trio of departures, and Bailey’s ongoing struggle to fight for women’s rights. Addison returns for a one-day visit too. There have been several strongly written episodes this season, but “Gunpowder and Lead” is hands down one of the best written hours of TV so far this year. It features knockout line after knockout line in a story that mirrors two of the most talked about topics in the U.S.: abortion rights and mass shootings. I hope ABC submits this episode for Emmy writing consideration because it is a truly powerful script. In fact, if you haven’t watched it, go turn on the episode instead of reading about it, as it is a can’t-miss hour.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">BUDDY BUDDY</span></h4><p>As the episode opens, Mika and Simone are nearly ready to leave the house for work in the morning. Mika is doing exercises to keep herself awake after getting home at 3 a.m. Lucas comes in and shows Simone two ties that he wants to wear at her wedding. The bride nixes both and decides to take Lucas shopping for a better one. The three interns leave together. At Grey Sloan Memorial, Jules is getting coffee at the coffee cart when Blue finds her and asks her to go to a bar with him that night. Jules thinks it sounds like a date, but Blue counters that it’s two coworkers getting a drink. She says no thanks and that she’d rather hang out with her older roommate, Max, when he makes a joke about it. </p><p>We then see Link, Jo, and their kids get to work. Scout and Link show Jo and Luna they were learning the ASL alphabet, and Jo is upset since she hasn’t come to terms with her daughter’s hearing loss yet. She is waiting for Luna’s MRI and genetic testing results but it’s odd that she is offended by Link trying to support and help her.</p><p>Bailey and Ben walk through the halls of the hospital together. Ben recounts breaking his left arm and two ribs from falling through the roof of a burning house on the same night’s episode of <i>Station 19</i>, and he is at the hospital a few days after the event to visit the man he saved. Bailey happens to spy Addison through the NICU windows while passing by and is very surprised to see her friend. Addison tells her that she needed to restock the PRT and decided to stop by and say hi. She is in the NICU visiting baby Connor, fellow Tia’s baby from Addison’s last episode, who is getting stronger every day.</p><p>Jules and Lucas go to an exam room where Schmitt is looking at patient Matt, whom he has just cleared from a C-spine injury. Matt tells the interns he was hit in the throat with a foam sword while LARPing (live action role playing). Schmitt is concerned that the swelling in Matt’s trachea could harm his airway, so he tells the interns to watch him. Matt wants to go back to the game and would be willing to take the risk that he could stop breathing if the odds are right. Lucas thinks it is about a girl, and he is correct. Matt says her name is Princess Astrid, and it was love at first sight. He has loved her for six years and wants to declare his feelings today. Matt believes, “She is my destiny,” which makes Jules believe him less.</p><p>Richard and Mika are in a pre-op room with their patient, Russell, and his wife. Russell is at the hospital for a colonoscopy even though he is 31 years old because he has a family history of colon cancer and has been having some odd mental fog symptoms lately. Russell is incredibly nervous about the test, so the doctors try to calm his nerves. Out of nowhere, Russell has a fit of amnesia and freaks out when he learns he is in the hospital. He starts panicking, doesn’t recognize his wife, rips off his hospital gown, and runs to the corner of the room to get away from everyone. Richard tells Simone to forget about the colonoscopy, orders a head CT scan, and wants Amelia paged.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">TROUBLE AROUND EVERY CORNER</span></h4><p>In the ER, Blue goes over to see a man complaining of nausea and pain on his right side. The patient states he has always had trouble with his kidneys and clearly makes up having had a kidney removed when he “forgets” which kidney it was. He asks to see Bailey, as he saw online that she is the best doctor at Grey Sloan Memorial for kidney problems. Blue says he will page her but she is very busy, and he will run labs and imaging in the meantime. Everything about this guy screams “don’t get Bailey involved” especially since she is constantly being harassed by anti-abortionists. </p><p>While Russell is getting his CT scan, Mika does jumping jacks to stay awake. Richard is quite confused at her behavior, but shrugs it off to figure out what is going on with their patient. The blood test reveals minor renal impairment and no toxins, and they are confused as to why he is having brain fog until the scans come up and reveal three bullets in Russell’s chest. They ask him why he has bullets in him, and Russell tells them that he is a mass shooting survivor. He went to the grocery store eleven years ago, and someone shot up the store while he was there. The bullets make Richard and Mika believe that their patient is suffering from lead poisoning, and they go to rush another set of labs.</p><p>The scene goes back to Bailey and Addison catching up. Bailey talks about how she is still getting tons of spam calls, and she shakes every time her phone rings. She doesn’t know what to panic about first these days. Bailey tells Addison that her phone never stops ringing and that she wants the lunatics to move on before she has a second heart attack. Addison stops her because she didn’t know about Bailey’s first heart attack. Bailey assures her that she is fine, and then says that nothing is fine. Addison retorts that babies and old friends help fix wounds, which makes both women smile.</p><p>Owen and Richard go see Russell and his wife. The second blood test confirms the lead poisoning diagnosis, and the doctors say that it explains all of Russell’s symptoms. Russell says that his surgeon said removing the bullets was worse than leaving them in after the shooting. Owen says they now need to remove them, which will make his symptoms improve. However, there are no guarantees about the mental confusion. Russell isn’t sure he should go through it and recounts being in cereal aisle when gun shots went off. He couldn’t hide, so he got down on knees and prayed to get out alive. Owen tells him he is also a victim of a shooting and “too many of us are.” He wants to take away some of Russell’s physical pain to help with his other pain too. Russell agrees to the surgery after Owen’s words encourage him that it will be a good outcome.</p><p>Amelia is hiding out in her home, lamenting being left by the three closest people to her. Mika knocks on her apartment door and tells her Owen says she can’t leave without her. Amelia wants no part of going to work, so Mika tells her that there is a patient with a bullet in his thoracic spine that Owen says only Amelia can remove. Amelia agrees to help, but she refuses to go in Mika’s van and decides to drive herself.</p><p>Schmitt goes to the OB ward to check on Jo. She tells her friend she is still waiting for Luna’s test results to find out if her hearing loss is from an underlying disease. Jo is worried she might have huge decisions to make that will affect the rest of Luna’s life. She feels her job as a mom changed in the blink of an eye and isn’t sure if she will be good at it. Schmitt knows that Jo will keep being a great mom, which lifts her spirits. He also gets her to laugh by showing her the few ASL signs he knows. </p><p>Amelia gets to the hospital and immediately runs into Addison. She gives Addison a big hug, but is confused and thinks Mer told her former sister-in-law to check on her. Addison admits that she is at Grey Sloan Memorial because she was worried about Bailey and asks why she should be worried about Amelia too. Amelia simply states that Mer and Maggie moved and Kai left, so “I’m abandoned by everyone. You know how well I do with abandonment.” She quickly leaves for her consult before Addison can respond.</p><p>Winston, Owen, and Simone start looking at Russell’s scans. Amelia and Mika come in, and the former is annoyed they started without her. Winston assumes Amelia can remove the bullet in Russell’s spine, which makes Amelia very snarky due to his word choice of “assume.” Once the bullet in the spine is out, they will flip their patient to remove the other fragments. Winston is in charge, and they will go with his plan. Amelia leaves in a huff.</p><p>Elsewhere, Jules and Lucas check in on Matt, who claims he is great and wants to leave. They say he needs to stay longer for observation. Matt details how he fought to live after getting hit by the sword to tell Astrid how he feels. He reveals that he doesn’t even know her real name. Lucas and Jules have opposite views of Matt’s situation, and Jules does not want to encourage him. Naturally, Lucas is pro-love, while Jules wants to squash Matt’s every line about the topic, which leads Matt to say, “You look like a princess, but you have the heart of an ogre.” Jules burns him back by responding, “Correction, I look like a goddess, and I have the heart of a person who tells sad men the whole truth.” Jules takes Matt’s shoes and personal belongings so he can’t leave and will hold them hostage until she is ready to discharge him</p><p>Blue finds Bailey to tell her about his patient. The labs and scans showed no kidney stones, that he clearly has two kidneys, and no surgical scars. Blue tells her that the patient asked to see her, so even though she is unsure why, Bailey goes to see him with Blue tagging along. Things go south pretty quickly when the two doctors arrive in the ER. The patient tells Bailey he was looking forward to meeting her and asks how her kids are. Bailey asks if she treated him before, since she is immediately confused as to how he knows she has kids. He replies that he is just a fan of hers and asks how her new place is. Bailey starts to realize that the patient knows too many details about her and is bad news. Since the ultrasound was also negative, Bailey bluntly tells Blue to discharge him and starts to leave. The patient asks Bailey if she only gives common courtesy to other murderers and gets out of bed and to go after Bailey as she tries to walk away. He says, “I’m not done with you” and runs after Bailey. Blue tackles the man before he can get to Bailey and pins him to the floor. Blue shouts for someone to call security, and the man shouts at Bailey, “This isn’t over.”</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">EMOTIONAL COLLAPSE</span></h4><p>Amelia is scrubbing in for Russell’s surgery, and Winston comes into the scrub room to confront her. He thought “we were friends, or at least colleagues who respected each other.” He wants to know what is going on with Amelia, so she reveals she is mad that Winston let Maggie move to Chicago. He says no one let Maggie move. Amelia thinks his ego killed their relationship, and Winston understands Amelia’s side because she is Maggie’s sister. Amelia tells him Maggie will keep rising to do greater things, and he will always be in her shadow. She can’t forgive him even if Maggie can because Maggie meant too much to her.</p><p>Downstairs, Teddy tells the hospital’s security guards that they need to be with Bailey at all times. Security has the attacker restrained in a room. Blue comes over to apologize for attacking a patient and breaking rules. Teddy says the patient wasn’t attacked; rather, he fell while attacking Bailey. That’s the story she knows and will stick to, which means Blue is off the hook. Ben comes in enraged. Teddy tells him Blue took the guy out, so he should go thank him. Ben wants Teddy to “tell that bastard that Dr. Bailey’s husband is a firefighter who breaks into houses with his axe for a living, and I’m going to find out where he lives.” Teddy calmly says she has the situation under control.</p><p>Russell’s surgery starts with Amelia, Mika, and Owen trying to remove the bullet in their patient’s spine. Mika accidentally drops a retractor as it is being handed to her by a nurse. The mistake sets Amelia off, and she kicks Mika out of the OR. Owen asks if it is necessary and tries to defend the intern. Mika apologizes, but Amelia says Mika is no longer welcome on her service. Mika leaves the OR rightfully upset. </p><p>Simone goes to give Russell’s wife an update in the waiting room. She says the bullet has been removed from Russell’s spine, so Winston will start on fragments in his lung. The wife starts crying and tells Simone she never knew what happened when Russell got shot. She only knew a guy opened fire in the grocery store, but he never told her the details because he didn’t want to talk about or feel it. Russell wouldn’t talk about having kids after that day either. His wife tried many times to talk to him about the tragedy and felt he had trauma inside of him. She always worried it was eating away at him emotionally and didn’t realize it could kill him physically. Simone sits and listens sympathetically, which is another sign that she will make a great doctor.</p><p>Addison finds Bailey outside and brings her hot chocolate for “good juju.” Bailey violently throws the cup on the ground and cries and says she thought that would make her feel better. Addison tells Bailey to yell at her and pretend she is the attacker and all the people that are harassing her to get some of her anger out safely. Bailey goes on a wonderfully written rant that is directed at Addison as if she is the man who attacked her. She talks about how the guy knew her daughter’s full name and threatened her child. She rhetorically asks, “Who would hurt a four year old girl in the name of life?” Bailey rants about how the harassers don’t care about anyone but themselves. She goes on to say, “You are what is wrong in this world, not me. Not my family, not my child, you sick son of a-!” Bailey calms down and stops herself from cursing and tells Addison that her mom always told her to kill people with kindness. She wishes she could kill him with the truth. Addison thinks there might be a way to do both. </p><p>Back inside, Blue tells a nurse the story of how he tackled the attacker and says he only thought about saving Bailey. Jules and Lucas overhear the humble brag. Lucas thinks Jules is jealous based on her reaction, but she denies it. It’s clear that they are both pining for people and won’t admit it, which makes Jules and Lucas more alike. All of a sudden, Matt’s trachea starts closing and he can’t breathe. They run into his room and find that his airway has completely closed. Matt crashes and has no pulse, so they start CPR. Lucas tries to intubate him, but there is too much swelling to get the tube in. Lucas says they need to tracheotomy, and he can’t wait for an attending. He needs to save Matt’s life, and Jules is worried they will be fired for doing a procedure on their own. However, Jules can’t wait either and tells Lucas to put a saline bag under Matt’s neck for support, which she saw Owen do. Since there is no sign of Schmitt, Lucas starts the tracheotomy on his own, and Jules asks him not to kill Matt.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE PROBLEMS WITH THE WORLD</span></h4><p>In the OR, Winston is ready to start the second stage of Russell’s surgery. Amelia leaves as Simone and Winston take over with Owen. Winston tells Owen that Amelia is mad that Maggie left him. Owen explains that when Amelia is mad, she is never fair. Winston allows Simone to do part of the procedure that Maggie would never let her do. Simone questions if she can do it, so Winston says Maggie doesn’t work there anymore and that she is ready. Winston teaches Simone what to do when some bleeding starts from a staple she put in, lets her think it out, come up with a solution, and fix it herself. Winston has come a long way and is proving to be a great teacher. </p><p>Schmitt arrives to see how Lucas did with Matt’s tracheotomy and sternly tells him and Jules that their job is to do nothing until he gets there. They argue that Matt would have died if they waited. Schmitt tells them that if Matt doesn’t make it, Lucas’ career is over, and in the future, they need to wait two minutes for him to get there. Jules tells Schmitt that if Lucas didn’t step in, Matt would be dead. Schmitt tells Lucas he did it well and saved his patient’s life. He is admitting Matt to the ICU. Schmitt tells them to remember the fear they are currently feeling next time and wait. The interns are relieved, and Lucas thanks Jules for standing up for him. Lucas thinks she is anti-love, so Jules tells him why she is the way she is. She had a crush on a guy at med school and failed her gross anatomy class because she was at his birthday party instead of studying. He didn’t even know her name and made out with Jules’ friend. She was encouraged by her parents to choose love over grades, which is why she is in a residency program for rejects. </p><p>Elsewhere, Teddy finds Owen in her office. He isn’t okay after removing bullets from a mass shooting survivor and tells her while they were in the OR, two more mass shootings occurred. Owen lets out a big sigh and quietly says he doesn’t recognize the country anymore. No one blinks or is horrified anymore when a mass shooting occurs because they are happening too often. He feels that nothing changes, which makes him feel hopeless. Addison knocks on the office door and comes in to reveal an idea she thinks Owen and Teddy will either love or hate, but more on that shortly.</p><p>Mika waits for Amelia outside the OR and wants to apologize again for dropping the retractor. Amelia is very cold and tells her to apologize to the unconscious man on the table. She tells Mika that surgeons have to focus when helping vulnerable people. They have to give them everything they’ve got and stay alert. Addison sees Amelia going after Mika and stops her. Richard sees Addison and wants to say hi, but she says she will find him later as she pulls Amelia into a supply closet to talk. Addison asks if Amelia is high. Amelia says no and that she is not using. She can’t sleep and is a wreck though. Addison throws down the gauntlet and gives one of the most bluntly honest speeches in Grey’s history. She starts by saying, “I’m going to go ahead and love you enough to tell you to pull your head out of your self-obsessed ass and get to an AA meeting because the world is already on fire and we don’t need you burning anything else down.” </p><p>Addison knows Amelia is in pain, but she feels her friend needs to get to a meeting, eat, and “be of service to the broken world instead of adding to everyone else’s pain.” She knows Amelia’s spiral, “starts with you trashing everyone else and ends with you back in rehab if you are lucky.” Addison tries to make Amelia understand that no one has abandoned her; everyone is doing the best they can and barely surviving too. She wants Amelia to make the decision to stop the spiral and get someone to help her do it if she can’t do it herself. Addison repeatedly tells Amelia that she loves her to let her message sink in and asks her to do everything she said before it is too late. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">KILLING THEM WITH KINDNESS</span></h4><p>Teddy calls a big group meeting with all the doctors, including Bailey, to talk about what Bailey is going through. She tells everyone that what the attacker did is somehow not against the law. She discusses how it is easy to hurt a stranger and has Blue hand out lists of Bailey’s most frequent callers to everyone. Teddy wants everyone to call the numbers and talk to the people that pick up. They should be respectful and kind and familiar, and maybe those people will think twice of calling again. We see the interns start calling people, and they tell people that Bailey is busy but she is okay with their views. Even Vic, Maya, and Carina from <i>Station 19</i> help make phone calls. The doctors, and Addison, help too and say things like their prayers are received and Bailey is praying for them too. Everyone is killing the people on the other end with kindness. It’s amazing to watch everyone come together. Ben asks Bailey how she is feeling while watching everyone make calls, and she says she is a little bit better.</p><p>A lady walks into the ICU and finds Jules. She’s looking for a patient, but she doesn’t know his name. Jules asks if she is Princess Astrid, who is happy Matt talked about her. Jules explains that Matt is sedated right now but will be very happy to see her when he wakes up. Astrid takes a seat next to Matt’s bed and holds his hand, which shows Jules that she was wrong. </p><p>In a recovery room, Russell asks Richard and Owen if the bullets are gone. Owen says they are all gone and that they got every last piece. Richard tells Russell he will be okay. Russell lets out his emotions and cries because the bullets are finally gone. </p><p>While walking through the hall, Jo gets a call with Luna’s test results. She hangs up and runs upstairs and through the halls until she finds Link. She is happy to report that Luna is okay, is healthy, and doesn’t have a tumor, cancer, or any diseases. Jo knows technology has come a long way and is open to learning sign language. She apologizes for being rude to him, and it seems she was in a tizzy because she thought Luna had a disease, not just normal hearing loss. Link gives Jo a massive hug, and they make up.</p><p>In the intern locker room, Lucas and Simone brag about the procedures they did. Simone gets a call from Trey and goes to take it, but she says she wants full play by play of Lucas’ tracheotomy when she gets home. Lucas turns to Jules and says, “I need you to be Simone’s maid of honor.” Jules quickly turns him down, so Lucas offers to do all of her scut work until the wedding. Jules thinks Lucas must really love Simone to make that offer. Blue comes over to where Jules is, and the nurse he was talking to earlier walks in. Blue looks a little conflicted, but he leaves with the nurse. Jules looks pretty jealous again. We then see Mika go to Joe’s Bar. She very sadly puts her head down on the bar, which Helm sees.</p><p>Teddy gets a knock on her office door from Winston. He wants to know if he is being considered for the chief of cardio position because he wants it. Teddy says she will consider him and goes to leave. She is stopped by Helm, who barges in guns blazing. Helm has come to stick up for Mika because when she burned out, no one stood up for her. She doesn’t want the same thing to happen to Mika. Helm explains that Mika can’t afford her student loans and food, and she has no time to sleep while learning how to save lives. She knows something is wrong with the system, and she feels there is no good reason not to fix it even though the system has been broken for a long time. Helm yells at Teddy to solve the problem and storms out. She makes a very good point, and it seems like it is one Teddy will take to heart.</p><p>In the parking lot at night, Richard video chats with Maggie. She likes Chicago, is making friends, and has a really nice apartment. Richard sees Amelia walking by and tells Maggie he needs to go tend to her. Maggie thanks him for looking out for Amelia and ends the call. Richard goes over to Amelia and tells her he is also in a spiral about abandonment and could use a meeting. Amelia hugs him, which indicates Addison got through to her.</p><p>Bailey is helping Addison pack up the PRT and says she can’t believe Addison came out for one day when she could get supplies shipped. Addison says they are in this together, so she had to visit to check on her. Addison sees a note with her name on it in one of the boxes. When she opens it, Addison sees it is a handwritten note with the letterhead of the Klausman Institute on it. The message reads, “This should keep you in business for a while. Keep fighting, Yang.” Cristina’s note should give you all the feels after a very emotional episode. Addison and Bailey smile and keep loading supplies into the PRT as the episode comes to a close.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-65314937728364379782023-05-02T21:21:00.007-04:002023-05-02T21:21:56.321-04:00The Flash 9x09 Review: "It's My Party and I'll Die If I Want To" (Hello Again!) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrBBcfOiqV_xQ1OTIy2YiUmRKQsB9iYhiZZRC-FL8Wo7-ZNvUry9yfLRqu7ZQH2Mo0zcoW1EdLeXQEJK01PuXIJwNajT2HTQMxOJq3flE-LdhVPfM_iu4T-z-6K4lOvqoGCDK_QEaU0OlHJ6H9T1hFou6ou0TXKeQZdoAT-mi127xSsft83pLJS6r_zg/s512/unnamed%20(1).png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="341" data-original-width="512" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrBBcfOiqV_xQ1OTIy2YiUmRKQsB9iYhiZZRC-FL8Wo7-ZNvUry9yfLRqu7ZQH2Mo0zcoW1EdLeXQEJK01PuXIJwNajT2HTQMxOJq3flE-LdhVPfM_iu4T-z-6K4lOvqoGCDK_QEaU0OlHJ6H9T1hFou6ou0TXKeQZdoAT-mi127xSsft83pLJS6r_zg/s320/unnamed%20(1).png" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“It's My Party and I'll Die If I Want To”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: April 26, 2023</div><p><i>The Flash </i>producing two episodes with titles that get songs stuck in my head was unexpected for this grand finale season, but here we are. This week: some familiar faces, a lot of angst, and just a sprinkle of nostalgia makes for an episode that’s more thoughtful than fun but still pretty entertaining.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">OH, WHAT A BIRTHDAY SURPRISE</span></h4><p>We open the episode with the reminder that — thanks to some de-aging gamma rays last season — Barry is only twenty-nine on a cellular level and about to turn thirty for the second time. His friends want to throw him a surprise birthday party, which should open the doors for some shenanigans but, unfortunately, I was right on the money when I predicted the previous episode to be the last bit of levity for the season. How did this show manage to take a throwaway gag about Barry gaining a few extra years and make it into such a bummer?</p><p>Good news, though: the guests at the party include Wally West and John Diggle! We haven’t seen them in forever, so that’s nice. Well, it would be nice if Dig didn’t bring the vibes down by presenting Barry with dead Oliver Queen’s bow. Then he reminds Barry that Caitlin and Frost are also dead. Jeez, Dig, who taught you how to celebrate a birthday, the Addams Family? You wanna take over the A/V system and run a whole “In Memoriam” segment listing all the people in Barry’s life who kicked the bucket?</p><p>While everyone else makes a valiant effort to keep the festivities actually festive, things really go downhill when they all toast to Barry and pass out after a single sip of champagne. Probably thanks to speedster metabolism, Barry and Wally are the only ones left standing when the culprit, Ramsey Rosso, a.k.a. Bloodwork, arrives to boast. Bloodwork’s still singing the same old song as before: he wants to save people from grief by stopping death. It doesn’t make sense in so many ways, but we’ve already set the theme for the episode on “death” thanks to Dig’s awful birthday party etiquette so, sure, why not. </p><p>Oh, Chester is also still around, since he didn’t toast with the rest of the party! He’s left to deal with everyone turning into Bloodwork zombies while Bloodwork takes Barry and Wally on some mental guilt trips. Thus proceeds a disjointed series of scenes in which Bloodwork berates Barry for all the people who have died around him and turns Wally against him hard enough that Wally phases his hand into Barry’s chest and kills him.</p><p>Barry wakes up outside and we get another surprise: Oliver Queen is in this episode too! Apparently Oliver’s afterlife is that island he spent years stuck on, which sounds like it really sucks. He’s still all in tune with the multiverse or whatever thanks to being a Spectre, though, so he probably doesn’t care? Anyway, Oliver tells Barry that the multiverse is back, Wally’s been connecting to other worlds and not other timelines like originally thought, and Bloodwork wants to use his connection to Wally to spread his “lifeblood” across all universes. Ugh. There’s something so gross about the way they keep calling it his “lifeblood.”</p><p>Barry’s upset because he got three extra years while his loved ones died. Oliver tells Barry that people will always die, but he should honor their sacrifices and continue being a “guiding light” and a hero for everyone. It’s what Barry needs to hear in order to become more sure of himself and give Oliver the power to bring him back to life. Which Oliver does by punching Barry in the face.</p><p>Barry wakes up on the floor of STAR Labs and is helped to his feet by Oliver, who gets a temporary trip to the land of the living because the multiverse is in danger. Barry accuses Oliver of having missed him, but Oliver mostly seems to have missed his bow, which he retrieves from the case that Diggle brought. He dramatically invites Barry along to “go kick some ass.” Before the commercial break, there’s a cute bumper graphic of the Arrow green arrow surrounded by The Flash lightning flashes.</p><p>Bloodwork’s caused a breach in the sky over Central City that’s infecting the multiverse, and Barry says they need an ultraviolet pulse to clear the infection. Bloodwork appears, with Wally under his control, and Barry’s attempt to get through to his brother-in-law fails because Wally now “worships at the altar of Bloodwork.” Again, the name makes it sound like Wally has a religious fervor for diagnostic testing.</p><p>Wally zips Barry away while Bloodwork sics his zombies on Oliver, who makes some hilarious annoyed expressions before diving into a quick fight sequence against the zombie horde. Yeah, Ollie, I also find zombies to be severely overplayed in pop culture.</p><p>Meanwhile, back in STAR Labs, Khione has found a way to freeze the Bloodwork zombies and manages to clear the “lifeblood” (ew) out of Diggle’s system. Chester and Khione recruit Dig to help Barry out by handing over his Spartan helmet. I think? I’ve had to look up so much Arrow-related stuff in order to understand what’s going on in this episode, people, so I’m only like 50% sure I’m right about anything.</p><p>After a quick speedster chase sequence through the city, Barry gets through to Wally by apologizing to him and telling him he’s strong enough to fight whatever darkness he feels is inside. We know it’s working because we get several heartwarming flashbacks to previous Wally moments in the show, and then Wally is himself again. Huzzah! He apologizes for killing Barry. Barry’s pretty chill about it.</p><p>Oliver wins a fight against more zombies, but then Bloodwork himself challenges him... only to be blasted away by Diggle. Oliver and Diggle hug. There’s sweeping music and everything; it’s very sweet, but is interrupted by Bloodwork in his “gross giant monster” form. Barry and Wally arrive to lasso Bloodwork with speed lightning, giving Oliver the opportunity to tell Bloodwork that he has “failed this city” and then shoot the breach with a glowing green arrow. I would normally mock how Oliver’s “You have failed this city” catchphrase makes no sense in this context, but you know what? I’ll give it a pass for nostalgia’s sake.</p><p>All the Bloodwork zombies are gone, and even Bloodwork is no more: Oliver cleared the entire multiverse of his evil cells, making him just regular ol’ Ramsey Rosso again. Ramsey’s upset because it means his HLH will kill him, but Oliver barks that he took care of that too. I don’t know if it stands out because it’s been so long since I watched Arrow or what, but the way Stephen Amell delivers some lines in this episode is absolutely hilarious. He keeps saying things like the director told him to act like consonants cause him physical pain.</p><p>Even though Oliver can really only be alive so long as the multiverse is in danger and it’s no longer in danger, he sticks around for the rest of Barry’s party. It seems happier than the first attempt, but we still get some emotional little moments, like when Diggle talks to Oliver about Felicity and the kids and Oliver says he can’t visit them. Diggle’s just glad he can tell Oliver goodbye this time, and the two hug again. Aw!</p><p>Before the episode ends, Oliver and Barry share a drink at O’Shaughnessy’s and we get a cute little moment where Barry says he’s saved Central City 180 times, the current episode count for <i>The Flash</i>. The meta continues, with Barry giving Oliver all the credit for starting his path as the Flash. Before disappearing, Oliver wishes Barry a happy birthday.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>How does Bloodwork know everything that’s happened in Barry’s life? Has he been watching the show?</li><li>“If you’re really here, that means I’m—” “You’re dead. Otherwise why would I let you hug me that long?” Hee. Did Oliver gain a sense of humor after dying?</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-84153457317702309962023-04-26T18:57:00.000-04:002023-04-26T18:57:21.150-04:00Jenn's Pick: If You Like This, Watch That! [Contributor: Jenn]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUXJpyihnURaVZ5ZzVPTuSiTsDsPFLS38wHySGcjnU6Pyw7JPrrGbhW4F60VJbS0t2m4QYiM4Wgz8uMrswR26QZMjw2QxjWDmur_ZL2A42mhRnsu8ftRAlv9yFph0JwCVS2l3wTT3xY9j4WyMq4hyhcgYVcobOOa6iJYSQIMGmHddxtYHrBa6KAGgL_A/s1640/Jenn's%20Pick%20My%20Top%2022%20TV%20Series%20of%202022%20(1).png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="924" data-original-width="1640" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUXJpyihnURaVZ5ZzVPTuSiTsDsPFLS38wHySGcjnU6Pyw7JPrrGbhW4F60VJbS0t2m4QYiM4Wgz8uMrswR26QZMjw2QxjWDmur_ZL2A42mhRnsu8ftRAlv9yFph0JwCVS2l3wTT3xY9j4WyMq4hyhcgYVcobOOa6iJYSQIMGmHddxtYHrBa6KAGgL_A/w640-h360/Jenn's%20Pick%20My%20Top%2022%20TV%20Series%20of%202022%20(1).png" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I feel like every year I write an article about how we’re in a season of peak TV. And the truth is that every year, I’m technically right — with more and more streaming services developing their own content in addition to cable networks continuing to create their own, peak TV is constant. With so much content available to consume, you might feel a little bit overwhelmed. Where do you even begin? </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I thought it would be helpful to create a little “if/then” guide for you: “If you like ___, then you might like _____.” The categories below feature mostly shows I haven’t discussed before or ones that are newer (though you can always check out lists of <a href="http://www.itsjustaboutwrite.com/2022/11/jenns-pick-my-top-22-shows-of-2022.html" target="_blank">some of my 2022 favorites</a> if you want discussions about how great <i>Abbott Elementary</i> and <i>Mythic Quest</i> are). </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">So let’s dive in, shall we?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE ENSEMBLE SHOWS, WATCH …</h3><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQjz38FsJkRePwUXLmrYYJfbEdVSaIt_zs6wVxeKcdbYhfTyWlehPJKLqMFziL4lI3u4-li8yb8VnIMd83qqHG9TeRogfMj2KKVlrC_HfQuG_js8TglnN_HTngTVJywgWsxlZuW62Ksiup84FilSqSm6D7Bcuw9ruqG6v-X8NFxWhJ0bthNSxnxG1GeQ/s3000/ghosts%20cbs.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1688" data-original-width="3000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQjz38FsJkRePwUXLmrYYJfbEdVSaIt_zs6wVxeKcdbYhfTyWlehPJKLqMFziL4lI3u4-li8yb8VnIMd83qqHG9TeRogfMj2KKVlrC_HfQuG_js8TglnN_HTngTVJywgWsxlZuW62Ksiup84FilSqSm6D7Bcuw9ruqG6v-X8NFxWhJ0bthNSxnxG1GeQ/s320/ghosts%20cbs.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Ghosts</i> (CBS/Paramount+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I have talked about <i>Ghosts</i> before but I feel like it’s important to reiterate just how fun this CBS show is and what a stellar ensemble cast it has. The tricky thing with ensemble shows is that some characters get left behind storytelling-wise. But <i>Ghosts</i> strikes a really intricate balance with a cast of 10 people — and most of them are the ghosts! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The show manages to tell compelling, funny, character-based stories while depicting different combinations of characters each week. Whether we’re meeting Trevor’s parents, watching Sas have a love story, or joining Alberta on her quest to discover who killed her, each week of <i>Ghosts</i> is something different and fun. Everyone should be watching this charming series!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT8ldtoVKKgFJWvybWk4tcVfPUyzD21dL6yfvgECy80uBvuptr7tPBnD8OhGFclrWmlUs1SAsNclocdk4Wy-RGkxY9Ojeg6U3QzJaOpNiYnm7sEKxYJ2N4wf7xNC9XTmVSJSZY-oMyO6-XghJvcu3p7AEI6gGgKw6XrU5nfyQPkA2N-_2xos-bIkr47w/s1825/grand%20crew.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1217" data-original-width="1825" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT8ldtoVKKgFJWvybWk4tcVfPUyzD21dL6yfvgECy80uBvuptr7tPBnD8OhGFclrWmlUs1SAsNclocdk4Wy-RGkxY9Ojeg6U3QzJaOpNiYnm7sEKxYJ2N4wf7xNC9XTmVSJSZY-oMyO6-XghJvcu3p7AEI6gGgKw6XrU5nfyQPkA2N-_2xos-bIkr47w/s320/grand%20crew.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Grand Crew</i> (Peacock)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">A true ensemble, <i>Grand Crew</i> is a story about shenanigans and wine. I could stop right there and most of you would already be sold, but I’ll elaborate: this series is all about supporting your friends through career highs and lows, relationship disasters, family issues, and misunderstandings. And it also features wine! The whole cast is stellar and they all have their own specific comedic strengths, but for me personally it’s been really fun to see Nicole Byer and Echo Kellum play siblings. If you’re looking for your <i>Happy Endings</i>/<i>Cougartown</i> successor, this is the series for you!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPCVw1IJJNKmSF0RwzN3RFdtcWdeFZdr8_TO-QpMhezWZB-Uc_FsXoumTAOv0fNppPySAar-O_S0wbqA-mzQzQAmSsibN13A78K5hDay-gaqLRYyHxdlQ7WMkmfGx5WOLeQwNPA07ZL5tL-25EvEcceCvNwSCsInJ8I1aCW7EuE54CFE0DBE6KRjhOfQ/s1280/the%20bear.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPCVw1IJJNKmSF0RwzN3RFdtcWdeFZdr8_TO-QpMhezWZB-Uc_FsXoumTAOv0fNppPySAar-O_S0wbqA-mzQzQAmSsibN13A78K5hDay-gaqLRYyHxdlQ7WMkmfGx5WOLeQwNPA07ZL5tL-25EvEcceCvNwSCsInJ8I1aCW7EuE54CFE0DBE6KRjhOfQ/s320/the%20bear.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>The Bear </i>(Hulu)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I really enjoyed <i>The Bear</i> when I binged it this past year. I wouldn’t classify it as a comedy (I know awards rules dictate that it is), but it’s a really powerful show about grief, pursuing your dreams, and complex familial — and coworking — dynamics. Jeremy Allen White is a fantastic lead who is dynamic and compelling and heartbreaking, but Ayo Edebiri as Sydney truly blew me away. What stands out most to me in shows is when they refuse to depict characters as flawless — <i>The Bear</i> is great at depicting characters’ flaws and complexities. It’s also an unexpectedly tense show that makes you feel on edge whenever there is a kitchen-related crisis. (Or maybe I just feel stressed whenever I see people rushing and struggling to complete a task in a certain timeframe, or witness their failings.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i>The Bear </i>will be back for a second season, so be sure you binge the first season on Hulu before it returns.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiUJ5wasXFlFS7yBXAgEOjGcFLLiFZVd3a-BgCU2KRGyTikZa674xyhlClX5ogdyLFXZ5gnbRHLUA0QWyiSq8aAailvQ3vaAeWfppbSN7_fqArPwSOQyYmVyiX88MxF97VK2LMQSIAmRQjFDO4aPM3SxGOvJ0iD6uD4zzz0TtRBPQ52hh0RKhYgew7-g/s678/loot.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="381" data-original-width="678" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiUJ5wasXFlFS7yBXAgEOjGcFLLiFZVd3a-BgCU2KRGyTikZa674xyhlClX5ogdyLFXZ5gnbRHLUA0QWyiSq8aAailvQ3vaAeWfppbSN7_fqArPwSOQyYmVyiX88MxF97VK2LMQSIAmRQjFDO4aPM3SxGOvJ0iD6uD4zzz0TtRBPQ52hh0RKhYgew7-g/s320/loot.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Loot </i>(Apple TV+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Talk about a show with an incredible ensemble: Maya Rudolph, Michaela Jaé Rodriguez, Nat Faxon, Joel Kim Booster, and Ron Funches lead the cast (with a recurring Adam Scott in an unlikable role!). <i>Loot</i> follows billionaire Molly who receives a massive settlement after her divorce and decides to invest it — and herself — in a charitable foundation she forgot she’d founded. The first season is so great, balancing individual stories and pairings with the overarching narrative of Molly trying to figure out who she is and become the best version of herself. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I like that <i>Loot</i> is unafraid to make Molly unlikable or craft stories where she makes mistakes. The joy of it all is watching Molly slowly become passionate about the other people in her life and the foundation that she runs.<i> Loot</i> is a fantastic ensemble show that I wish more people watched. Catch up before the second season now! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE ADAPTATIONS, WATCH …</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH5qQJEpBWkBk-xX8LEupVcFcAI7Vp6Qk6usmSNYn-7UKrJ03FcQxsQm9tGsiXEgdeQz3bq2hnpKWeJQiS6Yddm-pctKj_U8lxtoGfqmpk192GLjP3pGNMzj1pRWe1OHojGw36P8nvLnov0vCLS0C33akFrI6DEzZEkHMYApOp3jqBT6851-jCDCn6yg/s1500/daisy%20jones%20and%20the%20six.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1500" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH5qQJEpBWkBk-xX8LEupVcFcAI7Vp6Qk6usmSNYn-7UKrJ03FcQxsQm9tGsiXEgdeQz3bq2hnpKWeJQiS6Yddm-pctKj_U8lxtoGfqmpk192GLjP3pGNMzj1pRWe1OHojGw36P8nvLnov0vCLS0C33akFrI6DEzZEkHMYApOp3jqBT6851-jCDCn6yg/s320/daisy%20jones%20and%20the%20six.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Daisy Jones & the Six</i> (Amazon Prime)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I read “Daisy Jones & the Six” in two days. Why, you ask? Because I knew the Amazon Prime series had just dropped and was already getting a serious case of FOMO. Even though there are a few things that the series changed from the book (and only one I didn’t care for), the TV version of <i>Daisy Jones & the Six</i> is so good and compelling. The show stars Riley Keough as the titular Daisy who joins a band and skyrockets to fame with them — only to have the band dissolve in a short period of time. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Both the book and series are framed as a “behind the music” interview. And this leads to such a great exploration of memory and complex relationships. Sex, drugs, and rock and roll take center stage with dynamics between band members ranging from distrust and petty jealousy to affection and love. Daisy and Billy’s relationship is tumultuous and so captivating because of the chemistry between Claflin and Keough.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Even though Claflin did a great job playing a character who is often unlikable, making decisions that serve his own self-interest and desire for control at all costs, Keough is truly what sells the series to me. She depicts Daisy’s addiction with such vulnerability and raw power. Daisy Jones is a talent and a star, but there’s a part of her that is leaning on her alcohol and drugs in order to survive the voices in her head and the people in the world who don’t believe she is enough.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The music in the series is fantastic and catchy (I definitely downloaded most of the Aurora album), and I’d be truly surprised if the series didn’t get nominated for an award in some capacity this season.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9-fmCMd8ydgdfKckkb1Z60sq4g8KzZ6cFBfylo3BJCyzUu8Kdi2LAq7NkGlQvXnLp3uISgbCQnfjHXhGgXYWQdIGL1cdfny5Owso1FwIAyuGf5TAR69fyK3-Pcij4TckgBjOMRLiQD3znLpmr_84Txw-Ub-zFcTrw2et8BpuAKIePzE4R8PPmgsbQkQ/s2000/the%20last%20of%20us.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1125" data-original-width="2000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9-fmCMd8ydgdfKckkb1Z60sq4g8KzZ6cFBfylo3BJCyzUu8Kdi2LAq7NkGlQvXnLp3uISgbCQnfjHXhGgXYWQdIGL1cdfny5Owso1FwIAyuGf5TAR69fyK3-Pcij4TckgBjOMRLiQD3znLpmr_84Txw-Ub-zFcTrw2et8BpuAKIePzE4R8PPmgsbQkQ/s320/the%20last%20of%20us.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>The Last of Us</i> (HBO Max)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I heard the buzz for <i>The Last of Us</i>, but knew relatively nothing about the series apart from the fact that Pedro Pascal was in it, it was adapted from the popular video game of the same name, and was being adapted by Craig Mazin (who I knew as a writer and actor from one of my favorite series, <i>Mythic Quest</i>). After consulting with trusted friends that this show was not too scary or gory for me, a 34-year-old baby, I checked it out. And I was hooked.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I knew I’d be hooked because of Pedro Pascal (what a dreamy man), but truly everyone in the series delivers: no one, perhaps, more than Bella Ramsey as Ellie. The quick recap is that a fungus-based (Cordyceps) apocalypse has destroyed the world as we know it. Once you’re infected with the fungus, it takes over your body, essentially using you as a host while you mutate into various forms. Except if you’re Ellie. Ellie is apparently immune. And that means she may be able to help find a cure. Enter the grumpy Joel (Pascal) who lost his daughter early on in this world-ending disaster and hasn’t been the same in the 20 years since. He desperately tries to not form an emotional attachment to Ellie, who he’s tasked to deliver to a group who is researching the cure, and ends up treating her like his surrogate daughter.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The world-building in <i>The Last of Us</i> is incredible. The scope of set and production design is immaculate, as well as the prosthetics and makeup on the infected/Clickers, etc. is impressive. But the storytelling is truly what makes this show top-tier. I knew from mass positivity that I’d love the episode “Long, Long Time” (and not just because it had Nick Offerman). And I did. I found the ability for the show to tell stories of love and tenderness and longing within such an intensely traumatic backdrop really inspiring. I can’t say enough good things about the show’s ability to craft character-centered content, so just go and check it out for yourself! You won’t be disappointed.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE <i>THE GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF</i>, WATCH …</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWlZIfoFZcNdTPhMNqN0FYAbDd5OhOd4k5jmLeTY0U8Lf6l6q4unHVAf91-dx0YszAqMAh1_JGzvTeXDGfI7JD3Oa6sqjbxwr8AwqMO5F8BeJHkKKt8bRKcE97HkBkm5bJCVmglLbsFerRB7MAObmPY1oeeM9qRsLmfrUoELjtYdcTeOR6XuAS7Xw6xQ/s1500/the%20big%20brunch.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1500" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWlZIfoFZcNdTPhMNqN0FYAbDd5OhOd4k5jmLeTY0U8Lf6l6q4unHVAf91-dx0YszAqMAh1_JGzvTeXDGfI7JD3Oa6sqjbxwr8AwqMO5F8BeJHkKKt8bRKcE97HkBkm5bJCVmglLbsFerRB7MAObmPY1oeeM9qRsLmfrUoELjtYdcTeOR6XuAS7Xw6xQ/s320/the%20big%20brunch.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>The Big Brunch</i> (HBO Max)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">When I heard that Dan Levy was going to be hosting and judging a brunch-related show, I was immediately in. So if you’re looking for a charming, fun competition show... <i>The Big Brunch</i> is the one for you! I don’t know how much I really need to sell you on it (10 competitors battle it out by creating intricate brunch dishes) but it’s got incredible food and fun challenges. All the chefs are great and it made me want to go out to brunch. You’re welcome!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyAh5d5Ehp6WwzGw6dfp1k3QYrI7AIayUy-OVcHrPWu-KO3qCm2vkTwzOWQpXIY8ZhtOOkNyZzAVdszCg0hPRCR5aMiSP5DkR0AXk3E8nbL0ZUSqI2LBSIMR3f4Q1WWwG1uqnchbKiZIUwiVoDUE_H7y71QgyaWJ5K6YrkjmlAF6R1OnORr9CCeH6ZRQ/s735/selena.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="405" data-original-width="735" height="176" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyAh5d5Ehp6WwzGw6dfp1k3QYrI7AIayUy-OVcHrPWu-KO3qCm2vkTwzOWQpXIY8ZhtOOkNyZzAVdszCg0hPRCR5aMiSP5DkR0AXk3E8nbL0ZUSqI2LBSIMR3f4Q1WWwG1uqnchbKiZIUwiVoDUE_H7y71QgyaWJ5K6YrkjmlAF6R1OnORr9CCeH6ZRQ/s320/selena.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Selena + Chef </i>(HBO Max)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Selena Gomez is a treasure and a delight. And in the midst of the pandemic, she created and starred in her own cooking show, <i>Selena + Chef</i>. It was a clever, wonderful concept to get us through social distancing: Selena wanted to learn how to cook and professional chefs sent her all the ingredients she’d need each episode to make a good meal. They’d video call into Selena’s house (where she was staying with her grandparents and roommates) and they’d walk her through how to cook the meal while they cooked it in their home. “Cooking a good meal together, apart” was pretty much the tagline and it was truly great.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Selena’s skills have improved so much over the course of the seasons, and we’ve gotten the chance to see so many amazing appetizers, entrees, and dessert recipes cooked on screen (available on the HBO Max website, by the way). Better still is that Selena donates money to the charity of the chef’s choice at the end of every episode.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Silly and fun, featuring hilarious appearances from Selena’s close friends and family, this is not a cooking competition show but it’s 100% worth watching anyway!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGdj8CnEFAV9PkUE08_x7eg1dzxTKueT1I-9OIYD8J0lkCHTRr63QDOSEylHyVVSyXwJUDxGLKN82tb7juT0MqMvboG_Q14bYRkqgV8NX_ToOsaSs2XO8VYwAgXCjNDfrJU9Uwa8m1r6osiEmc08YT6lNbz7unRoBmyfTcc6OXOWI78FoKNQAn26AWgA/s1920/pottery.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGdj8CnEFAV9PkUE08_x7eg1dzxTKueT1I-9OIYD8J0lkCHTRr63QDOSEylHyVVSyXwJUDxGLKN82tb7juT0MqMvboG_Q14bYRkqgV8NX_ToOsaSs2XO8VYwAgXCjNDfrJU9Uwa8m1r6osiEmc08YT6lNbz7unRoBmyfTcc6OXOWI78FoKNQAn26AWgA/s320/pottery.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>The Great Pottery Throw Down</i> (HBO Max)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">By the way, I didn’t intend for these all to be from HBO Max but here we are! From the same universe that brought you <i>The Great British Bake Off </i>comes a pottery competition show with the same spirit. I love watching shows where people practice skills that I don’t even remotely have (hence why I love dancing series). This show is exactly what it sounds like: competitors participate in two challenges each week just like <i>The Great British Bake Off</i> — a small challenge and then a “main make” which is the main challenge. The judges are so sweet and encouraging, the amateur potters are so supportive of one another. If someone finishes early, there’s a chance they’re helping other contestants. They truly become a little family and it’s precious. Get your happy tears out while watching this British competition series!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE MUSICALS, WATCH …</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoLT-Hs_lyvI5yywdcoAhE66sVibzpnii8cCiJE0GGOfXs5fpHUiwCIOjesbUgOh1kM2TknrLfLhuCCv6picLQc6u1brkBswu6pJXPGVuroZSx45dBInfEXHbsQje7m4g_q-60pAFx8ZZNDJptGqH3G5zRjqZvp3ldbDeOdIksw7Yq6SScpaDDoqBcZA/s980/schmigadoon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="551" data-original-width="980" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoLT-Hs_lyvI5yywdcoAhE66sVibzpnii8cCiJE0GGOfXs5fpHUiwCIOjesbUgOh1kM2TknrLfLhuCCv6picLQc6u1brkBswu6pJXPGVuroZSx45dBInfEXHbsQje7m4g_q-60pAFx8ZZNDJptGqH3G5zRjqZvp3ldbDeOdIksw7Yq6SScpaDDoqBcZA/s320/schmigadoon.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Schmigadoon!</i> (Apple TV+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">If you’re even a casual lover of musical theatre and haven’t yet watched <i>Schmigadoon!</i>, please stop reading this article and immediately remedy that. The first season of the show is a star-studded affair — starring alongside leads Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key are Ariana DeBose, Kristin Chenoweth, Fred Armisen, Martin Short, Aaron Tveit, Ann Harada, Alan Cumming, Dove Cameron, Jane Krakowski, and Jaime Camil. The show follows a couple, played by Strong and Key, who are at a crossroads in their relationship and stumble into a small town stuck in a 1940s musical vibe.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">There are parodies of <i>The Music Man</i>, <i>The Sound of Music</i>, <i>Brigadoon</i>, <i>Oklahoma!</i>, and many more in the first season. The second season takes the majority of the cast — while adding icons Tituss Burgess and Patrick Page — and transports them into the gritty “Schmicago” (of course parodying darker musicals like <i>Chicago</i>, <i>Sweeney Todd</i>, as well <i>Hair </i>and <i>Godspell</i>). The music is fantastic. The jokes are so layered and clever. The characters are nuanced. And truly it’s one of the best shows on TV that more people need to be watching.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTwk0ByFVYliJM72J6HccsZQxb2AevSa5Zl23y_gFHSHAI8WF9_zMOfXqZQLobDr43VXUSyBHl7WmWDtJJBYrIfVpLc2XLR6DE06tVe5gMoTEBf7zRmSEDe6BVOzQoJfIkvFGUt8xCQj-tLEKg_NXQTaQszmttAfodRXHD-phu0XJ7hcG-Whw2iyjZXg/s7922/rise%20of%20the%20pink%20ladies.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="5282" data-original-width="7922" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTwk0ByFVYliJM72J6HccsZQxb2AevSa5Zl23y_gFHSHAI8WF9_zMOfXqZQLobDr43VXUSyBHl7WmWDtJJBYrIfVpLc2XLR6DE06tVe5gMoTEBf7zRmSEDe6BVOzQoJfIkvFGUt8xCQj-tLEKg_NXQTaQszmttAfodRXHD-phu0XJ7hcG-Whw2iyjZXg/s320/rise%20of%20the%20pink%20ladies.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies </i>(Paramount+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">If you’re looking for fun musical camp, look no further than the new show on Paramount+ with a familiar title. Because while <i>Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies</i> will give viewers some little Easter eggs for fans of the initial film, original members of the Pink Ladies are front and center in the series. Four young women are outcasts at Rydell High and band together in order to find their own place in school and make a difference for people who are outsiders. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">There’s Jane (Marisa Davila) who is the studious “good girl” whose reputation is soured thanks to her ex-boyfriend and the high school rumor mill. Cheyenne Isabel Wells is Olivia who hangs with the T-Birds (her brother is a member) and has been shunned at school for an alleged affair. Speaking of the T-Birds, Ari Notartomaso (who does go by they/them/he when they are not playing their character) plays Cynthia. And Cynthia is desperate to be in the T-Birds gang but they shut her out because she’s a girl. Rounding out the Pink Ladies is Tricia Fukuhara playing Nancy — obsessed with fashion and dramatic and witty.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The show is, as I’ve alluded to, a musical. The songs are catchy and fun and it’s the kind of show bursting with fun energy and choreography, 1950s wardrobes and sets. It’s got a lot of representation and new, young talent which is refreshing to see. If you have Paramount+ and are looking for something to tap your foot along to, check out <i>Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies</i>!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE COMEDIES THAT WILL ALSO MAKE YOU CRY, WATCH …</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCqPU5Pl1zSBJsI_dMPYVWGDtkL1R-DnnSUaZqq8Q7EWnhnWLEkW1qGzNDkliv01_Rzueao30ZzxuJiJQAhyu0zVM691tWGXPUye8yjZvsv_uxBAvJ7PTRol3xyHVe6LdR76_Gnvgc0DzH5lsMISXfgl-KL7zjGV_d5f2U-q5k20H9hp2cSFYTIHDjw/s1200/shrinking.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="630" data-original-width="1200" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWCqPU5Pl1zSBJsI_dMPYVWGDtkL1R-DnnSUaZqq8Q7EWnhnWLEkW1qGzNDkliv01_Rzueao30ZzxuJiJQAhyu0zVM691tWGXPUye8yjZvsv_uxBAvJ7PTRol3xyHVe6LdR76_Gnvgc0DzH5lsMISXfgl-KL7zjGV_d5f2U-q5k20H9hp2cSFYTIHDjw/s320/shrinking.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Shrinking</i> (Apple TV+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">There’s one comedy on TV right now that’s vying for <i>Ted Lasso</i>’s spot as a show that “claims to be a comedy but makes you cry a whole lot” and it’s the new series, <i>Shrinking</i>. Honestly it should be no surprise that this show gives you similar vibes as it’s co-created by Bill Lawrence, Brett Goldstein, and Jason Segel. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i>Shrinking</i> is a show about a therapist named Jimmy (Segel) who’s mourning the loss of his wife and making pretty unhealthy decisions due to the pain of that loss. He’s stopped parenting his daughter, Alice (Lukita Maxwell), leaving his neighbor Liz (Christa Miller) to pick up the slack. He gets frustrated with his clients one particular day and gives them impulsive advice — which seems to actually help a client who he couldn’t get through to before. This leads Jimmy to believe that he needs to rethink his approach to his clients. Not everyone is thrilled with this idea, especially Jimmy’s curmudgeonly mentor Paul (Harrison Ford). Meanwhile Jimmy’s friend and therapist colleague Gaby (Jessica Williams) is also navigating her own divorce and clients.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The reason that <i>Shrinking</i> is so wonderful is because it combines everything that I have come to know and love about a Bill Lawrence show (silly comedy and zany moments, with some of the absolute best occurring between Jessica Williams and Harrison Ford) while also incorporating some bite (Jimmy is wholly unlikable on many occasions! Characters are mean and things don’t get resolved neatly in the next episode! Grief is depicted as all kinds of things and not just sadness!) and some unexpected twists.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Honestly, I hope every actor in this cast is up for an Emmy nomination this year. Everything about the first season worked for me, and I look forward to seeing how the show plays out in season two!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu1dbk33uct0QAzFDSdlDoyFW0k6QFoPv4q9h9txwETDMPiYqIuN0dVjl4sqFLgBvtPU_PTXLA_3WCfBbYclHuYKcKPGK19RBQsH6Ab0QXjBwfinFVAzd11nrB1IzCNvF4vtLMknImvtPTF4J0tK0wib2mELoKZswKb16atXBAZlfFg_IBYWnwcpvr8A/s1200/trying.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="630" data-original-width="1200" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu1dbk33uct0QAzFDSdlDoyFW0k6QFoPv4q9h9txwETDMPiYqIuN0dVjl4sqFLgBvtPU_PTXLA_3WCfBbYclHuYKcKPGK19RBQsH6Ab0QXjBwfinFVAzd11nrB1IzCNvF4vtLMknImvtPTF4J0tK0wib2mELoKZswKb16atXBAZlfFg_IBYWnwcpvr8A/s320/trying.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Trying </i>(Apple TV+)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I’ve talked about <i>Trying</i> and I will keep yelling about it until more people I know watch this Apple TV+ gem. A British comedy, <i>Trying </i>is about a couple: Nikki (Esther Smith) and Jason (Rafe Spall) who want to have kids but can’t. Thus begins their journey to adoption. Along the way they face personal and professional hurdles, deal with their wacky family and close friends, and discover what it means to be parents.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Honestly, it’s a comedy that made me cry multiple times. It’s heartwarming and sweet, hilarious and just the perfect antidote to bleak shows (some of which you’ll find on this list). If you want something that will make you feel hopeful and remind you of the idea that family is what you make it, watch <i>Trying</i> now!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><h3 style="clear: both; text-align: center;">IF YOU LIKE SOLVING MYSTERIES, WATCH …</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4akTvLAsgRUZZYPv8iI8RUOlkO9DDyT0cWpeTZMwKuGKNDUFfgUKl91__GmxDh9Rw8fEp2L4K-M7NSOH4jA3S08jAosHmsvNDymJqQEXB0I8O_zin_iVu74KmDNzM8nJSp44tC7fDAq9DNgoor0HrBs2_taUVBPcXlv8YBgpAbVX4q8osENNo2eKRbg/s1500/you.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1500" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4akTvLAsgRUZZYPv8iI8RUOlkO9DDyT0cWpeTZMwKuGKNDUFfgUKl91__GmxDh9Rw8fEp2L4K-M7NSOH4jA3S08jAosHmsvNDymJqQEXB0I8O_zin_iVu74KmDNzM8nJSp44tC7fDAq9DNgoor0HrBs2_taUVBPcXlv8YBgpAbVX4q8osENNo2eKRbg/s320/you.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>You</i> (Netflix)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Look, <i>You</i> is one of those shows I binge watched so I could keep up with internet discourse. At its best, it’s an interesting look on things like class systems, obsessions, and power. At its worst, it’s just a hot mess. But sometimes that’s exactly what you need to watch in order to pass the time. Season four of <i>You</i> was something else. The audience spent half the season convinced they knew what was happening, only to have their perceptions shattered by reality. Penn Badgley was working overtime to bring the most unhinged parts of Joe to life. And he really delivered on that. This season’s first half was more like a mystery than others which was fun to explore because it put Joe in the unprecedented situation of being the “mouse” in a cat and mouse game.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">For those who are unaware of the premise, <i>You</i> is about Joe Goldberg (Badgley) who... well, he’s a serial killer. But he wouldn’t categorize himself that way at all. He’d tell you he’s a book-loving hopeless romantic who just happens to get himself wrapped up in the worst situations with no way out. Oh, and he narrates the entire series. Season one is fine, but seasons two and three get to showcase Joe delivering more sarcastic monologues (and playing opposite powerhouse Victoria Pedretti helps bolster those seasons in my opinion). <i>You</i> is dark, but it’s at its best when it doesn’t stray too far into unbelievable, convoluted territory.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">This season’s ending (and the reveal that the next will be the show’s last) made a vast majority of us question exactly where the show could go and it’ll definitely be interesting to see how the series wraps up.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pbSsSBDTJzTGXzrHFoC3i-3IN6CUv6s9ErMs2xPsXSPeUpPp8bxMXc9bbo3Ed_2Oqk0LrmfUmuNUMfaW0p_4BGYjJ7KTRf1HTwYkNSWXlyQVanLuj7gx88GbZdHLUvKaKOC9HB7-p4Rk8VY1io_dll7oM29UpLzgOV9AhA1_PU2Vwa9gDnN9Gu6qYg/s1200/poker%20face.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9pbSsSBDTJzTGXzrHFoC3i-3IN6CUv6s9ErMs2xPsXSPeUpPp8bxMXc9bbo3Ed_2Oqk0LrmfUmuNUMfaW0p_4BGYjJ7KTRf1HTwYkNSWXlyQVanLuj7gx88GbZdHLUvKaKOC9HB7-p4Rk8VY1io_dll7oM29UpLzgOV9AhA1_PU2Vwa9gDnN9Gu6qYg/s320/poker%20face.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Poker Face</i> (Peacock)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I was talking to our podcasting friend Gavin (from <a href="https://themixedreviews.libsyn.com/" target="_blank">The Mixed Reviews</a>) a while back and he described the difference between a “whodunnit” and a “howcatchem” (the latter of which I didn’t realize was a genre). Of course, a “whodunnit” is a story that many of us are familiar with because it’s been serialized a million times over: a crime happens, and we spend the rest of the TV/movie with the characters as they (and we) try to figure out who the perpetrator is. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">But with a “howcatchem,” like <i>Poker Face</i>, the audience already knows who committed the crime at the top of the episode. We see the perpetrator(s) commit the act, and then we spend the rest of the episode alongside Charlie (Natasha Lyonne) as she solves the crime. You might ask, “What’s the allure of that kind of story?” And I’d tell you, “Uncovering the missing components and watching someone piece it all together.”</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i>Poker Face</i> is a brilliant series from Rian Johnson (you know him from <i>Star Wars</i> and/or <i>Knives Out</i> fame) that follows Charlie, a human lie detector, who is on the run across the country from a casino boss. Along the way, she encounters various people she connects with and takes a variety of jobs — all which, of course, lead her to have to solve some mysterious deaths. Charlie can’t just let something go if it sits wrong in her gut, and that’s the crux of the series in a nutshell.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Dramatic, silly, funny, suspenseful, and featuring an incredible line-up of guest stars (Hong Chau, Judith Light, S. Epatha Merkerson, Tim Meadows, Luis Guzmán, Joseph-Gordon Levitt, David Castañeda, Clea Duvall, and Rhea Perlman among others), <i>Poker Face</i> is totally worth your watch. I can’t wait to see where the show goes in season two!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF4Z4_mfQM__TrECdh_OfDX2tgv6yqJvUyJC7FsMzvr7ZMMegiTf7ACsfaEC5rySDVMXKBkcTxBUMVn69iPGgv7oo3eoenlc8yJeBg-hgNDIBpGHJ1IMsRe4qpvU5qkqwZReGUH5MyVJR_KhJ5iaL8K53fZ0iypzus5PvdLZLCMKygdr04O6g_T3JIqQ/s3840/mrs%20davis.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2160" data-original-width="3840" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF4Z4_mfQM__TrECdh_OfDX2tgv6yqJvUyJC7FsMzvr7ZMMegiTf7ACsfaEC5rySDVMXKBkcTxBUMVn69iPGgv7oo3eoenlc8yJeBg-hgNDIBpGHJ1IMsRe4qpvU5qkqwZReGUH5MyVJR_KhJ5iaL8K53fZ0iypzus5PvdLZLCMKygdr04O6g_T3JIqQ/s320/mrs%20davis.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Mrs. Davis</i> (Peacock)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Even if I wanted to spoil the new, wild sci-fi series <i>Mrs. Davis</i> for you, I don’t know that most of you would believe me. I checked it out because I love the two leads: Betty Gilpin (justice for <i>GLOW</i>, always) and Jake McDorman (I loved him in <i>Greek</i> and <i>Limitless</i>, so why isn’t he in all my TV content?!). The show looked weird, so I wasn’t sure how long I would be able to stick around. As it turns out, the show is VERY weird but also the exact kind of weird that I like. It’s quirky and silly, campy and fun, dramatic and showcases the actors’ wide-ranging talents. It’s religious while being interesting and not preachy, and it’s futuristic while also being pretty dang relatable.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The quick summary is: A nun (Gilpin) sets out to confront an all-knowing AI known as “Mrs. Davis” and destroy it while also being tasked to find the Holy Grail. (If the summary sounds weird, it might also behoove me to inform you that Damon Lindelof is one of the creators.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I love <i>Mrs. Davis</i> already though. It’s so compelling, so engaging, and definitely leaves you yelling: “WTF?!” at your screen. In my book, that’s fodder for some great television.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_6LA9o23JH-EGc6hbpm5vifP5yx6gy6EXv_f2aWEJAI6WQo8hpLRKZvr310sukzjfvkIAW7pQQ9J51b8mA67Mkxt6dYYwex8Me61drCBb2L8jx-qFCZc0C5_BRzTwELSV4D9cRY8Dl2JNVEFAotUoZ2mrgxSpJweFYPKlUwCvtRF2pN88bCPTR4K9KQ/s2700/outer%20banks.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1800" data-original-width="2700" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_6LA9o23JH-EGc6hbpm5vifP5yx6gy6EXv_f2aWEJAI6WQo8hpLRKZvr310sukzjfvkIAW7pQQ9J51b8mA67Mkxt6dYYwex8Me61drCBb2L8jx-qFCZc0C5_BRzTwELSV4D9cRY8Dl2JNVEFAotUoZ2mrgxSpJweFYPKlUwCvtRF2pN88bCPTR4K9KQ/s320/outer%20banks.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i>Outer Banks</i> (Netflix)</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The best way I can describe <i>Outer Banks</i> is “fun, but totally unhinged; suspend your disbelief at the door.” And every season that seems to get more and more accurate. At its core, it’s a mystery, teen drama. Following two distinct social classes in the titular location in North Carolina, <i>Outer Banks</i> is a story about John B. (Chase Stokes) whose father disappeared. As he and his friends JJ (Rudy Pankow), Pope (Jonathan Daviss), Kie (Madison Bailey), along with his John B.’s girlfriend Sarah Cameron (Madelyn Cline) dig deeper into Big John’s disappearance, they realize that he’s connected to a treasure — and something way bigger than themselves.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">The show is a bit bonkers but a whole lot of fun. Nearly every episode ends with you wondering how the teens will get out of the mess they’re in and survive. But what I do enjoy about the show (even though it’s frustrating) is that the teens don’t get neat little bows on their stories where they win every season. They win some fights, they lose some others. And that’s just realistic: especially when they’re going up against wealthy, ruthless residents of the island like Wade Cameron (Charles Esten) and his son Rafe (Drew Starkey) who hold all the power, control the narrative, and can buy out anyone who would oppose them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">But if you’re into a teen-centric treasure hunting show that features a lot of mysteries (the biggest among them is: “How bad do these kids smell if they’re running around North Carolina in the summer without changing their clothes?”), social class dynamics, teen romance, and action sequences, then <i>Outer Banks</i> is the show for you!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">I hope that you found some use in these recommendations, folks! Happy viewing! </div></div></div><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-61719060391966921302023-04-22T21:08:00.000-04:002023-04-22T21:08:02.688-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x14 & 19x15 Recaps: “Shadow of Your Love” and “Mama Who Bore Me” (Goodbye, Maggie!) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinVaaHCxVDDSL1WvWiVJnQhs4Zc9xx4cQ6lBjf6S9bEdbSBpkqBEIDSJn2m7vpH-KzDSXEc1RFXeHdj531ov9_J3EoAYMEkJX5g2cyWjKGJY6HtJy2vSZ0hOgNsr32B5z6cOUDZZwW8as2xkpxeNMvbYAd3zIwG95A7_Q7NRraGxGYcCDVf6s7dCYAHQ/s1014/greys%20season%2019-14.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="1014" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinVaaHCxVDDSL1WvWiVJnQhs4Zc9xx4cQ6lBjf6S9bEdbSBpkqBEIDSJn2m7vpH-KzDSXEc1RFXeHdj531ov9_J3EoAYMEkJX5g2cyWjKGJY6HtJy2vSZ0hOgNsr32B5z6cOUDZZwW8as2xkpxeNMvbYAd3zIwG95A7_Q7NRraGxGYcCDVf6s7dCYAHQ/s320/greys%20season%2019-14.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Shadow of Your Love”</b> & <b>“Mama Who Bore Me”</b></div></span><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: April 13, 2023</div><p>After nine years, Maggie Pierce is scrubbing out of Grey Sloan Memorial for a fresh start in Chicago. The wunderkind cardiothoracic surgeon will be heading a research project in the Windy City, and she will be leaving husband Winston behind in Seattle. If you are sad about Maggie leaving, she will be back for the season finale in a few weeks. In the meantime, let’s say goodbye to a long-term character with a proper two-hour sendoff. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">LAST DAY SURPRISE</span></h4><p>The day starts with Maggie finishing packing up her home, but she has left her wedding photo on an end table. When she looks at the photo, she sighs. Winston is jogging around the hospital probably to distract himself, and Richard is perplexed when he sees Winston running through the parking lot. Kai takes an earlier flight to Seattle and knocks on Amelia’s apartment door. Amelia is excited to see Kai and happily announces she took the day off.</p><p>When Simone and Lucas get to work, they see a flier slandering Bailey on a car. Simone rips it off, and the scene cuts to Ben, Bailey, and Pru arriving at the hospital. Ben wants Bailey to change her cell phone number and email address now that her private information is out in the open. Bailey doesn’t want to since she’s only ever had one phone number. She gets another random call, which furthers Ben’s point that things will only continue to get worse. Bailey thinks Ben wants to move, and he reveals he would like them to get an Airbnb for six months until things calm down. Bailey shuts him down by saying it will blow over and she will have an intern babysit her phone.</p><p>Blue finds Mika sleeping on a bench in the intern lounge, and she says she worked the closing shift at Joe’s Bar. Simone and Lucas come in and are excited for their cake tasting that evening. The interns are aware that it is Maggie’s last day, and Mika tells them she heard at the bar that Winston is staying in Seattle. Jules goes on a rant about not liking marriage, which Simone isn’t thrilled about.</p><p>Teddy and Owen get in an elevator when they arrive at Grey Sloan Memorial, and Jo and Link pop into the same elevator. Jo is happy to tell her bestie that she got them a reservation at a pizza place that Link has been wanting to go to because she thought they could use a night out. Teddy can’t believe how weird Jo and Link are acting and when they leave the elevator, she tells Owen that the pair needs to get a room. Owen doesn’t know what she is talking about, so Teddy tells him that Jo and Link “basically just had sex in front of us.”</p><p>After that funny moment, we get to meet two patients. First, Mika and Lucas arrive at an ambulance with a patient named William in it. William tried to mail himself to his girlfriend in Florida and got hurt when the box imploded on a conveyor belt. Next, two women named Viv and Nola come into the lobby and run into Jules and Simone. Viv states they want to speak to Maggie and won’t leave until they do because Nola has a giant tumor crushing her heart. They drove 400 miles to Grey Sloan Memorial and want to be seen immediately even though they don’t have an appointment.</p><p>Richard finds Maggie packing in a lounge and wants to talk. Maggie knows her move is happening fast, but she got a huge opportunity. Richard thought the hospital meant more to her than a stepping stone for her career. He gives a speech about how in his day, doctors worked where they did their fellowship until they retired out of loyalty. Richard doesn’t get her lack of loyalty when she has started her research in Seattle. Maggie knows he is upset, but she gets interrupted by Viv paging her over the hospital’s intercom. When she makes it to the lobby, Maggie is bombarded by Viv, who presses Nola’s scans on her phone to the doctor’s face. Maggie asks the interns to bring Nola and Viv upstairs for a consult. Jules tells Maggie she thought she was leaving, and Maggie replies that she will push her flight. Maggie also tells the young doctor to listen to her patient next time before calling security.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">BECOMING A MAN</span></h4><p>Richard, Schmitt, and Blue are working together for the day, and they are looking after a long-time patient of Richard’s. Grayson is a thirteen year old suffering from ulcerative colitis. He landed back in the hospital after having lots of pain and collapsing in the bathroom. Grayson is hoping to avoid surgery and losing part of his colon, and Richard wants to order tests and give him some pain medication to make the boy more comfortable before making any decisions on further treatment. After they leave the room, Schmitt asks Richard if they can find a time to talk about fellowships and attending positions. Richard is perplexed as to why Schmitt hasn’t applied for fellowships yet and sternly tells the chief resident to get his act together. </p><p>Elsewhere, Viv is extremely excited to meet Maggie and practically fangirls out. Simone and Jules are helping Maggie tend to Nola, who we learn has a tumor growing alongside her heart and vasculature. The tricky placement has led every heart surgeon in the Pacific Northwest to not want to operate according to Nola and Viv. Nola is having a hard time breathing as well. Viv and Nola tell the doctors that they have been friends since elementary school and are also in a band together. They are each other’s ride or die, and it’s nice to see that kind of friendship on-screen. Maggie orders new scans to see Nola’s current condition.</p><p>Back in the ER, William tells his team of doctors (Link, Teddy, Owen, Lucas, and Mika) that he thought it would be a grand romantic gesture to mail himself to his girlfriend, Rose. After the attendings leave, Teddy quips that the lesson is that romance can be fatal. She jokes about Link and Jo being an item, which Link immediately refutes by saying they are only friends. Teddy replies, “Yeah, friends that slept together.” Owen didn’t know that info, and Link isn’t sure how Teddy knew.</p><p>While Grayson gets a scan, Blue asks Schmitt how he doesn’t know which specialty he wants to choose. Schmitt thinks the combination of the pandemic and the residency program being shut down threw him off course. Grayson complains that the room is too hot and dark, so Schmitt suggests humming or singing as a distraction. He starts chanting Hebrew verses from the Torah, which leads Schmitt to realize Grayson is studying for his bar mitzvah. Unfortunately, the scans show the teen has severe colitis.</p><p>Over at Amelia’s apartment, Kai is cooking and asks her host to go for a walk to talk after eating. Kai’s meal reminds Amelia that there won’t be Sunday dinners with Mer and Maggie anymore. She complains that Maggie cooks those meals and gives her enough leftovers to last her through half a week, so now she won’t have food. Amelia discusses her history of spiraling when people leave and how she pulls away from people she loves, starts fights, and can’t sleep. Kai knows Amelia loves her sisters and that it is a big change. They affirm that it is okay to be sad, and Amelia says she isn’t sad with Kai around.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Bailey finds Mika and orders the intern to watch her cell phone under strict instructions to not answer unless the caller ID is Ben or a Grey Sloan Memorial number. Lucas sees the ordeal and tells Mika that if she doesn’t screw it up, she can watch Bailey’s tablet next. His joke will come back to bite him in the second hour. Over in Grayson’s room, Richard tells his patient that he hasn’t been taking his medications. Grayson assures the doctors he does take them, but Richard reveals his urine results say otherwise. The teen admits to stopping his medications because the pills made him tired, gave him dry eyes, and even caused him to faint. Richard starts yelling at Grayson for not following instructions and making bad decisions that have now led him to needing surgery. Richard’s behavior is unwarranted, even though it does get his point across. Grayson begs to not have surgery. Blue follows in Richard’s steps and tells Grayson the truth about his situation and treats him like an adult.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">UNPOPULAR OPINIONS</span></h4><p>Owen and Link are looking at William’s X-rays on a computer, but the latter keeps getting distracted by texting with Jo. They find William has a broken arm and a busted spleen, but Link isn’t paying much attention. He can't make a move on Jo because he isn’t sure she feels the same way. Owen has no opinion, especially because the last person he talked to about relationship advice was Winston, and now Maggie is moving across the country. </p><p>In Nola’s room, Simone and Jules question why Viv is the patient’s only emergency contact. Viv says they are platonic soulmates. When the interns leave the room, Simone goes on a rant about why Jules has a problem with marriage. She is insulted since she is about to get married herself. Jules assures Simone that she doesn’t care what her choice is, and then Nola starts crashing. Maggie arrives to help, as the interns start bagging her. The attending determines Nola has cardiac tamponade from the tumor causing fluid around her heart. They need to relieve the pressure with a needle, and Maggie lets Simone do the procedure while guiding her through it. Simone gets the fluid out, so Nola stabilizes. Maggie knows the fluid will build up again, so she transfers Nola to the CCU and pages Winston for backup.</p><p>Downstairs, William hears Bailey’s phone buzzing in Mika’s pocket while he is being transported to the OR. He thinks Rose is calling, which is quite funny. Mika picks up the phone and yells at the person on the other line for harassing her. Turns out, it is Bailey’s optometrist calling to inform her that Tuck’s new glasses are ready to be picked up. Elsewhere, Schmitt checks in on Grayson, who wants to know if Richard will still be his doctor after yelling at him. Schmitt says, “Of course!” Grayson reveals he is being bullied at school. Schmitt comforts him by saying he tried to be normal for a while, but he wound up liking himself a lot more when he stopped. Grayson decides he is ready to have the surgery after connecting with Schmitt.</p><p>Maggie is looking at Nola’s scans in a room when Winston arrives to assist on the case. He is surprised Maggie is still there, and she says she pushed her flight until the following day and quips that she is still his boss until the end of the day. She knows they don’t have a lot of time to fix Nola’s heart, and Winston notices on the scans that the tumor is shaped like a heart. Maggie is concerned about the tumor being too close to the arteries. Winston suggests an aggressive approach, and Maggie counters that they could use a bovine patch. He agrees that could yield lower margins, and they decide to go with Maggie’s plan. She wants the surgery to be just the two of them without interns to help.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">SUPPORT SYSTEM</span></h4><p>At home, Amelia and Kai lie in bed with the former crying from the start of her spiral. Amelia is sorry that she is “crying like someone died” when they hardly see each other, but she is glad Kai is there. She continues to say that she has hidden parts of herself in every relationship and is happy to be her whole self in this one. Kai pumps up Amelia’s spirits by listing all the great things she is, like a badass surgeon, amazing mom, loving sister, devoted friend, tackling her sobriety, and being an inspiration. Kai feels Amelia is a queen, not a queen of spirals.</p><p>In the OR gallery, Jules and Simone watch Nola’s surgery. Simone talks about married female surgeons who have great careers, and Jules moves over a few seats to avoid the conversation. Down below, Maggie and Winston remove the whole tumor, which makes Nola crash. As her blood pressure soars, Jules asks over the intercom why they aren’t doing anything. Nola’s blood pressure stabilizes, and Winston explains that Nola’s heart wasn’t used to all the space in her chest without the tumor and had to stabilize itself. Maggie and Winston move onto the second stage of the surgery: putting Nola on bypass so they can reconstruct her chest. </p><p>William’s surgery also goes well, and the doctors feel he will fully recover. After the surgery, the whole team gives William the good news. William is bummed because Rose dumped him after hearing what he did. He thought she was the love of his life. Owen tells the story of how he and Teddy were friends before getting married. It took years to get together, but he knew when they met that he wanted her in his life. William wants to know what took them so long to get together, and Owen replies that their timing was never right, but their friendship outlasted all their separate relationships. One day, Owen realized Teddy was the one when she was constantly popping into his mind, so he hopped on a plane to Germany and told her how he felt. Owen tells William that if he knows he wants Rose in his life, then he should try again. After hearing Owen’s story, William doesn’t believe Rose is the one for him anymore. Teddy overhears the whole thing from outside the room and smiles, while Link excuses himself and runs out.</p><p>Back in the OR, Grayson’s surgery isn’t going well because his whole colon is inflamed. Richard is upset because they had Grayson’s disease under control for years. Blue chastises the kid’s decision making skills, and Schmitt asks him if he remembers what it was like being thirteen and assures the younger doctor that Grayson knows how stupid he was. Schmitt continues to say that no teen listens to their parents and Grayson has spent a whole year working his butt off to become a man. He tells Blue that being a good doctor, parent, or mentor means listening to what the other person needs. In the other OR, Winston no longer thinks the bovine patch will work, so comes up with an idea to use part of an artery from Nola’s body. Maggie thinks they can do it and knows they are Nola’s only option. They get to work, and Winston’s plan is a success. The gallery and OR staff clap when the surgery is complete.</p><p>Elsewhere, Mika complains to Lucas about watching Bailey’s phone. She wants Lucas to throw it in the toilet, and when it vibrates one too many times, Lucas takes it and throws it in a garbage can. They are relieved until the phone rings again and vibrates louder in the metal can. Mika retrieves it right as Bailey arrives. With a shocked look on her face, Bailey asks, “What on Earth are you doing?” Mika asks Bailey to turn her phone off, and when she takes the phone back, Bailey sees that she has 248 missed calls in a few short hours.</p><p>Maggie and Winston go to the waiting room to tell Viv that Nola is alive and in the ICU. They explain that she will have a long recovery and the whole tumor was removed. Viv thought Nola was dead and knew Maggie was the person to help. For the first time, Maggie quickly says that it was teamwork and she couldn’t have done it without Winston. It might be a little too late to give him the credit he deserves, but it’s nice to see Maggie grow and realize she was wrong.</p><p>Richard examines Grayson after his surgery. The teen didn’t think it would be a big deal to skip taking his medications. Richard has calmed down and reflects on remembering Grayson’s diagnosis like it was yesterday. They reminisce about the boy being worried about missing ice cream cake at school the first time they met, and Richard says he looks forward to seeing what is next for him. He asks Grayson to not make decisions that put his future at risk because it is frustrating for those who care about him. Richard also apologizes for appearing mad earlier because he isn’t mad. Grayson also apologizes, and Richard wants him to tell him if anything is off once he is healed that way they can solve it together.</p><p>Owen finds Teddy in an elevator at the end of the night. She believes that Owen really went for his two favorite things in his speech to William: proving her wrong and getting laid. Owen claims he was only trying to help his patient, and then coyly asked if his speech worked. Teddy asks him if he saw Link’s reaction as proof. Owen knows that, but wants to know if the second part of Teddy’s belief worked. Teddy replies that his mom is watching the kids for the night, so they leave the hospital together for some alone time. At the end of the night, Simone continues to go on about married female surgeons to Jules to prove that marriage isn’t a distraction. She does, however, think that the wedding itself is a big pain because she has no time in her schedule for planning or getting dress measurements. Jules decides to take the measurements for her, and Simone is thankful for the help and says she owes Jules a drink.</p><p>Link has decided to tell Jo how he feels and practices a speech out loud at home. He muses that he should have written a song instead. Jo calls him crying about something being wrong with Luna. The daycare workers think Luna has a problem with her hearing and needs to be checked out. Link says he will come to her, but Jo tells him to stay since they are heading home. When he gets off the phone, the camera pans out to show Link had set up a romantic table spread with lots of candles and flower arrangements. The shot turns to show the whole apartment is filled with candles and flowers. Link decides to clear the beautiful display and puts all the flowers in a garbage bag, as he must think it isn’t the right time when Jo is so upset. It was a lovely scene that quickly turned south, and everyone wants to give Link a hug.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Bailey has Pru in a stroller, and Ben picks them up in the lobby. Bailey declares they are not going home because she has gotten them a rental. A photo of Tuck at school was sent to her phone and that same number called her 40 times that day, which changed her mind: she agrees with Ben about their safety issue. She wants to take the kids out of school for a few days and change her phone number and email address. In another display of support, the interns sample wedding cakes together while sitting on gurneys.</p><p>Maggie walks out of the hospital, and Winston stops her to talk. He says she picked a good way to go out, and Maggie replies that she couldn’t have done it without him, nor would she have figured out a lot of things in life without him. She says that he challenges and inspires her and she also loves his surgical skills. They go back home together, make out, and have one last tryst before she leaves.</p><p>Meanwhile, Kai and Amelia are in bed. They both had a great day, and Amelia asks Kai not to go back to Minnesota. Kai replies that they aren’t because they have been offered the opportunity to open and run a lab in London with triple the staff they currently have. They wanted to tell Amelia earlier, but waited since Amelia was so sad. Kai has already accepted the offer and is going, which makes Amelia cry to end the first hour.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4WSsiZl6tr_FI6H4ukoSWaOF-w6FeMiYRVHORNLv_jZ4CHOi6Mcxu2ws5MJyrkgc_IfaP1oOfc1AFE9Lq4bv5bqezYzKfrlm0Acy5EC9mRpFBeKG4jHRIsnXoN83WdI3HtAQRoJO9UhsPzc8xqtkkwU84VgfKZaAlBbwpftJjf6fDlsp4HsdRBVajrQ/s1014/greys%20season%2019-15.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="1014" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4WSsiZl6tr_FI6H4ukoSWaOF-w6FeMiYRVHORNLv_jZ4CHOi6Mcxu2ws5MJyrkgc_IfaP1oOfc1AFE9Lq4bv5bqezYzKfrlm0Acy5EC9mRpFBeKG4jHRIsnXoN83WdI3HtAQRoJO9UhsPzc8xqtkkwU84VgfKZaAlBbwpftJjf6fDlsp4HsdRBVajrQ/s320/greys%20season%2019-15.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">LAST DAY... FOR REAL, THIS TIME</span></h4><p>The second hour opens the following morning with Winston waking up before Maggie and getting out of bed. Maggie provides this episode’s voiceover instead of Mer, which is a nice touch. Over at the intern house, Lucas got up early and made breakfast for himself and Simone, which impresses her. Mika flies into the kitchen to declare it’s time to leave for work. Amelia and Kai arrive at the hospital, and Kai reiterates that they have been offered an incredible opportunity. They feel that they should leave based on Amelia’s attitude. Amelia replies that she is feeling abandoned and will still let Kai use the lab at Grey Sloan Memorial for the day.</p><p>The scene cuts back to Winston and Maggie’s place, where Winston has made coffee for them. Maggie wakes up and says she misses their bed. Winston talks about how they work in sync, communicate well, know what each other needs, and work great together when they are in the OR together. Maggie thinks they should be able to do all that outside the OR all the time too. She finally asks Winston to come with her to Chicago, where they can find a marriage counselor and a job for him. Winston doesn’t want her to get him a job. He is earning respect in Seattle and doesn’t want her to go. He believes they still have enough good between them to fight for their marriage, so he proposes that Maggie stays in Seattle and fight for their relationship. Maggie reiterates that she has the opportunity of a lifetime. Winston says he is steady and committed because he has worked hard to not be like his father. He argues that Maggie’s birth mom is Ellis Grey, so her genius is baked into Maggie and other opportunities will arise. He thinks Maggie also has to work hard to not be like her mother. He hopes Maggie will stay and leaves her to her thoughts. </p><p>Teddy arrives at work and sees Bailey and Pru in the lounge. Bailey tells Teddy that she got her family settled in a rental property for the time being. Teddy says she has upped the amount of security in daycare too. Bailey has decided to take Pru out of daycare due to the increased risk and will take her adorable daughter on rounds with her.</p><p>Outside at the coffee cart, Blue tells Jules that she looks terrible, and Jules responds that she hasn’t slept for two days. Blue wants out of pediatrics because he is tired of babysitting. When he gets paged to the pit, Blue leaves the line and practically runs into Amelia and Maggie, who are walking towards the cart. Maggie tells Amelia that Winston called her Ellis, but not in a mean way, and that he asked her to stay. Amelia doesn’t get how being called Ellis isn’t starting a war. She thinks she is like Winston and Kai is Maggie right now, so she doesn’t know whose side to be on. Amelia reveals Kai’s big move and is extra upset because Kai’s visit made her fall even more in love with them. Maggie thinks she might have done the same thing to Winston last night. Amelia rambles about wanting to matter and not being able to go to London since she has Scout. Maggie wants to know if Winston thinks she is cold like Ellis, and Amelia assures her that she’s the opposite and not like Ellis. Maggie wants to know if Amelia can give Kai the same support she is giving her, but Amelia doesn’t think she is capable of it. In an emotional moment, Amelia tells Maggie to go and be happy. As they hug, Amelia is clearly as emotional as the audience is when seeing the love these two sisters have for each other.</p><p>At Grey Sloan Memorial, Owen and Mika wait in the ambulance bay for an incoming trauma. He notices Mika has two different shoes on, which are also untied. The ambulance arrives with their new patient, Lindsey, who fell in the shower. They page Amelia due to a prior cervical fracture, which the paramedics think may have happened again. In the clinic, Simone and Lucas examine their female patient, Toby. She has lost sensation in her arm for her last few menstrual cycles and now has discharge from her nipple. Simone asks Lucas to get her a pen light as an excuse to get him out of the room to make Toby more comfortable. Toby thanks her and says she also switched birth control pills a few months ago. She can’t have leakage when trying to make a name for herself as a young lawyer, and Simone is sympathetic and wants to help.</p><p>Winston and Jules check in on Nola and find that Viv stayed by her friend’s side all night. Nola’s labs and vitals look great, so Winston thinks she can get out of the ICU today. Viv wants to know where Maggie is, so Winston explains that she is leaving tonight and Nola is in excellent hands. Nola wakes up and can’t talk, which causes Viv to freak out.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">NEW STRUGGLES</span></h4><p>Owen, Amelia, and Jules put Lindsey in a halo to stabilize her neck. X-rays show that the fall caused the metal from her previous spinal fusion to compress her C1 and C2 vertebrae at the top of her neck. Lindsey talks about her connective tissue disorder, which has caused bad injuries in the past. Amelia thinks the traction should keep Lindsey’s neck stable for the time being. Lindsey’s brother, Carlton, runs into the trauma room and wants to be added to her HIPAA forms since he is her primary caretaker. She tells him that she slipped in the shower, and Carlton is mad since she is supposed to sit while showering. Amelia orders a full spinal CT scan.</p><p>Upstairs, Nola has a massive blood clot around her jugular vein that needs to be fixed immediately. Winston and Jules don’t have time to get her to the OR, so they have to do the procedure in the ICU. He kicks Viv out of the room. They find that the anastomosis is leaking, so Winston cuts into Nola’s neck and rips the clot out. With it removed, it is now safe to bring Nola to the OR.</p><p>Downstairs, Bailey assigns Lucas to babysit Pru and get her a snack in the cafeteria. She tells him that Pru is not allowed to have candy, and he needs to ask Schmitt for work that doesn’t involve patients. Bailey declares that since Lucas is a Shepherd, he should know how to keep one girl out of trouble for a few hours since he is from a large family. Pru walks right over to Lucas and grabs his hand with a big smile on his face. Lucas reluctantly agrees to babysit.</p><p>It’s a pleasant surprise when Catherine walks into Richard’s office. She is at the hospital for some routine labs, but she doesn’t want Richard to go with her. Richard is upset that he hasn’t talked to Maggie since their pseudo-fight, and he hopes she doesn’t leave without saying goodbye. Catherine assures her husband that his daughter will come around because she is family.</p><p>Schmitt checks in on Grayson, who is tired of eating broth and wants real food. His cousins are arriving in Seattle for a visit, as today was supposed to be Grayson’s bar mitzvah. His parents try to tell him it is okay that they have to reschedule and leave to pick up the family members at the airport. Then, Jo brings Luna to the hospital for an audiology appointment. Jo starts to freak out, and Link shows up right on cue for support. Jo is surprised, and Link says he moved his consult to be there for her.</p><p>Amelia, Owen, and Mika do a CT scan on Lindsey, and Amelia explains that bone spurs can sometimes occur after healing from spinal fusion. They discuss how Lindsey’s connective tissue disorder presents differently in every patient. The scans reveal that Lindsey is allergic to the metal that was used to originally stabilize her spine, which means they can’t do a normal spinal fusion as planned.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">BRIGHT EYES</span></h4><p>Schmitt has come up with a great idea to help Grayson, and Blue tags along to present it to Teddy. They ask the chief of surgery if they can throw Grayson’s bar mitzvah in the hospital chapel and lobby, which they will set up themselves. Schmitt uses the argument that Greyson’s great-grandfather is visiting and won’t be in town for long, so it is perfect timing to keep the ceremony on the same day it was originally planned. Teddy agrees, which excites Schmitt.</p><p>Lucas and Pru find Simone after getting some brownies. They are surprised Maggie is at work when she isn’t supposed to be. Simone tells Maggie about Toby and how she thinks she found a lump. Maggie instructs the intern to get a biopsy. Another intern gets a mentoring lesson when Winston teaches Jules how to fix Nola in the OR. Jules is unsure how the clot happened, so Winston explains that any sudden increase in pressure could cause the anastomosis to burst open even if they did everything perfectly. He allows Jules to sew the graft and instructs her to use small, evenly spaced stitches.</p><p>Amelia finds Kai in the lab and asks if they can pretend everything is fine between them for a minute. She brings Kai to see Lindsey after they come up with a brilliant plan. They tell Lindsey that they want to 3D print a new piece of “bone” out of stem cells to stabilize her neck and allow her to move again. The cutting-edge neurosurgery is essentially making a piece of coral to fuse the vertebrae. Carlton thinks the procedure is too risky. Lindsey explains that she fell while shaving her legs when she bent over the wrong way. She had a date, which is why she was standing to shave. She doesn’t want to constantly be reminded of her disability anymore by Carlton and tells the doctors to do the surgery.</p><p>Lucas helps Blue and Schmitt set up Greyson’s bar mitzvah in the lobby. Mika passes through, and Schmitt asks her to help too. He is looking for a DJ in the hospital. Mika brags about her surgery with Amelia and Kai and goes to take a 20 minute power nap while Lindsey’s new vertebra is printing. In the audiology waiting room, Jo is worried that Luna has a tumor, virus, or worse. Link assures her it will be fine and doesn’t want her to panic. He suggests taking it one step at a time. Jo asks Link to come in for the appointment when Luna is called back.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">MENTORS</span></h4><p>Maggie helps guide Simone through Toby’s biopsy and lets the intern do the entire procedure. Maggie thinks the lump is suspicious based on the ultrasound, but wants to see what the labs say. Toby says that breast cancer is not in her life plan and doesn’t know how this is happening when she goes to the doctor regularly. Maggie assures Toby that the lump is small and might have been missed at her last exam. She also tells the patient that loving her job is a beautiful thing that makes her passionate. Maggie says Toby is not wrong for that and is not being punished because she has lots of options. She knows Toby has a good chance when finding something early, so she will be okay. After leaving the room, Simone tells Maggie that if it is cancer, she can’t be the one to tell Toby. Maggie encourages Simone that she can do the tough task because she connects with patients, which makes them trust her. Maggie tells Simone how her mom died of breast cancer and that she’s really missing her right now. She hopes she is doing her mom proud, and Simone replies that Maggie is one of the best teachers she has ever had and hopes to learn from her again. </p><p>Elsewhere, Owen tells Kai that Lindsey is lucky to have them in town when she fell. Amelia and Kai disagree about their patient being oppressed by love, which is really just a conversation about their own relationship. In the lobby, Schmitt puts up a sign that says, “It’s a boy!” Lucas “loses” Pru and freaks out, but he doesn’t see the toddler hiding behind a desk in the lobby. Owen comes to the lobby to find Mika, and Blue lies about not knowing where she is. He says he can scrub in if Owen is looking for an intern and goes to operate.</p><p>Winston and Jules tell Viv that Nola is okay and will remain in the ICU. Viv thanks them for saving Nola twice. Jules is glad Winston is staying and wants to be on his service a lot to learn from him. We then see Maggie walk into Richard’s office while yelling about not apologizing for being ambitious. However, he is not there, and she finds Catherine there instead. Maggie talks about Winston calling her Ellis, and Catherine reveals she didn’t really know Maggie’s birth mom. Catherine recounts that Ellis didn’t have enough time for friendships or comradery, but she did save a lot of lives. She knows that Maggie is more than Ellis’ pure ambition and lists all the great qualities about her step-daughter, which Maggie realizes she got from Richard. Catherine tells Maggie that there isn’t a day that goes by where Richard doesn’t think that he and Ellis could have overcome their fears and been together. Maggie wishes she had known Richard longer as her animosity washes away.</p><p>Schmitt goes back to Greyson’s room, where the teen asks for solid food again. The chief resident has something better for him and says that since all his family is there, they shouldn’t postpone Greyson’s bar mitzvah and will throw it at the hospital. Greyson shoots down the idea instantly, which dismays Schmitt.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">MISSING OUT</span></h4><p>Mika’s alarm goes off while she is sleeping in an on-call room, and she runs off toward the operating wing. In the OR, Owen asks Amelia if she is ready for the fusion. He knows she is angry and doesn’t want it to affect their patient. Amelia tells Owen and Blue about Kai leaving, and Owen spots Mika scrubbing in while she is talking. He slightly shakes his head at her to silently tell her not to join them. I feel bad for Mika, but she is causing her own problems by burning the candle at both ends.</p><p>Unfortunately, Simone tells Toby that the biopsy shows that she has breast cancer. Toby doesn’t know what to do, and Simone tells her that there are options and she knows what to do. While Toby cries, Maggie watches from outside as Simone stays with her patient. Luna’s appointment doesn’t go much better. The audiologist mistakes Link and Jo for a married couple. She explains that premature babies have an increased risk of later complications and thinks that Luna has progressive hearing loss. She wants to run another test, but Jo zones out with tears in her eyes and doesn’t hear everything that is being said.</p><p>Greyson argues with Schmitt about his bar mitzvah. He wanted to show his family and friends how proud he is to be Jewish and doesn’t feel like he can do it in the hospital. Schmitt tells him things can’t always happen the way you want them to, which is also part of becoming a man. He suggests Greyson have a joint bar mitzvah with his great-grandfather, who didn’t get to do his bar mitzvah as a boy in Germany. Greyson likes the idea, and they go to the hospital’s chapel. We get a great montage of the double bar mitzvah, where Greyson and his great-grandfather both do readings. All of Greyson’s family and friends are in attendance, as is Schmitt.</p><p>At night outside the hospital, Maggie tells Winston she heard Nola is doing well. Winston recalls crushing it in the OR today and wishes Maggie was there to see it. She tells Winston that he has nothing to prove to her. Maggie goes on to say that she thought about everything he said and realized that Ellis staying with her husband made her bitter. Ellis was ambitious beforehand, but became cold when she stayed in Seattle, which made everyone miserable. She says her adopted mom did the same thing. Neither mom followed their hearts or guts and didn’t bet on themselves. They stayed for peace and to make others happy. Maggie’s heart is in her work, which doesn’t make her cold. She also admits that she doesn’t think Winston is a coward and that she believes they did the best they could and neither is to blame for things falling apart. She says, “I love you, but I have to go.” Winston nods and says that he loves her too, but he has to stay. They hold hands in resolve to cap the tender reconciliation. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">SEE YOU SOON, MAGGIE!</span></h4><p>Amelia and Owen tell Carlton that Lindsey’s surgery went great and she will be okay. Carlton talks about following his sister everywhere as a kid and now he lives next door to her. He wants to do whatever it takes to take care of her, which the doctors understand. Carlton also knows Lindsey wants and needs independence, but he still wants to fix her. Afterwards, Owen tells Amelia she should talk to Teddy because Kai would be a good fit at the hospital.</p><p>At the bar mitzvah lobby celebration, Jules tells Blue he did a good job on the decorations as a slant and brags about her surgery with Winston. Blue fights back with his spinal fusion, and Mika comes over to declare he stole the surgery from her and that she is coming for him. Owen goes up to Mika and tells her to get her act together and that she will be out of the OR for the next week. </p><p>Maggie finds Richard at the party and is happy for a chance to talk. Richard explains that he was caught off guard by her impending departure and knows she has every right to pursue her career. Maggie is happy to have his support, and Richard gives her a very sweet gift. Maggie opens it to reveal a business card rack that is a miniature version of the bench where he learned he had a daughter and his life forever changed. It is the single most loving moment in years on this show, and the scene is heart wrenching. Richard asks Maggie to remember him when she looks at the mini bench, and Maggie assures him that she doesn’t need a bench to remember him. They hug to cap the beautiful moment. We see Lucas get himself and Pru some punch, only to find his charge dancing with Blue. All the doctors are now partying in the lobby. Richard tells Schmitt that the bar mitzvah is great and that he should consider a career in pediatrics because he connects with kids and cares, which is rare.</p><p>As they leave the hospital, Link tries to show Jo a brochure about invisible hearing aids to show her it isn’t as scary as it seems. Jo shuts him down by saying it is extremely scary and that she is trying to balance out the doom clock in her head. She is worried Luna is going deaf and doesn’t care about technology when her girl has been through enough already; she shouldn’t have to go through this too. She needs to wrap her head around it all before she can accept Link as her cheerleader. But Jo thanks him for being there.</p><p>Amelia finds Kai and tells them London is too far for a long distance relationship. She talked to Teddy, who is expecting extra research funding. Kai could work at Grey Sloan Memorial and not leave. Kai tells Amelia that their relationship works so well because they are long distance and Amelia's two paths of mother and partner don’t overlap. They say that since they revealed the big news, every moment has been about Amelia instead of their accomplishment. Kai feels it is about both of them being at very different places in their lives. Kai says, “I love you, but...” and Amelia cuts them off to say, “That’s what people say before they abandon you.” It doesn’t seem like this relationship is going to work out, which is a huge surprise.</p><p>Catherine finds Richard at the lobby bar mitzvah party and tells him the tests went okay, which she promises is the truth. Richard hates that Mer and Maggie left and can’t fathom losing his wife too. Catherine hopes to be around for a long time and wants to dance with Richard right now. Maggie grabs her bags and catches an elevator in the lobby to leave. She smiles at Richard and Catherine from across the hall as a final farewell. Inside the elevator, she imagines both of her moms standing next to her knowing that she isn’t either of them and making her own path. Even though Maggie is leaving Grey Sloan Memorial, she will be back for the finale and might pop in for a visit from time to time.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-76708184658705144622023-04-20T15:52:00.000-04:002023-04-20T15:52:33.996-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x13 Recap: “Cowgirls Don’t Cry” (Fighting Words) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU9AIgsV8uBE3AGybkh63nhnKtRrMe29Kzqr528TOXOeBAhA7FgqPv2yf7v6HhWkOQLXgs2K-WMPAepgXqDqBBzwBs5QqkH_Sc2tvxzndR-uG-rgzblH1vTkYblJEjeth0vexH8onrL5O8Ek4oOF8GISBUGxpKsg_fuo0kyyOGR1eMzKJUJZk0Tl61tg/s2028/greys%20season%2019.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1140" data-original-width="2028" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU9AIgsV8uBE3AGybkh63nhnKtRrMe29Kzqr528TOXOeBAhA7FgqPv2yf7v6HhWkOQLXgs2K-WMPAepgXqDqBBzwBs5QqkH_Sc2tvxzndR-uG-rgzblH1vTkYblJEjeth0vexH8onrL5O8Ek4oOF8GISBUGxpKsg_fuo0kyyOGR1eMzKJUJZk0Tl61tg/s320/greys%20season%2019.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Cowgirls Don’t Cry”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: April 6, 2023</div><p>If you are looking for something happy and fun, you are in the wrong place because this episode of <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i> is the opposite. You may or may not agree with what occurs in the two main storylines involving the final implosion of Maggie and Winston’s marriage and a young rodeo bull rider nearly trampled to death who wants to keep riding. While there are two bright spots, with Lucas showing his medical chops and Link and Jo maybe taking a step toward becoming a couple, there isn’t much to smile about by the end of the hour.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">SEARCHING FOR THE ANSWER</span></h4><p>The episode opens with Maggie and Winston at their first marriage therapy appointment, which they have sorely needed for months. Maggie is worried she will say the wrong thing, so the therapist assures her that there are no wrong answers in the session. The therapist asks them to say one thing they love and appreciate about each other. Maggie says Winston is kind, and Winston says he loves that Maggie came to the appointment because that means she admits they need help communicating. He also appreciates how hard she works, but Maggie takes it as a slight.</p><p>Link goes into Jo’s bedroom and finds her still in bed even though they are supposed to leave for work. He got the kids dressed and ready for the day, but Jo says she feels awful and needs sleep. Link volunteers to take the kids to daycare and leaves. We then see Ben driving Bailey to work. He has the day off and is taking two extra trips to spend more time with Bailey and secretly make sure she is safe, since he is extra worried about her safety after the protestor attack. When they arrive at the clinic, they see that the security perimeter has been extended around the entrance and extra officers are on duty, which makes Bailey feel safe. </p><p>Before going to work, Mika goes to a donation center to give plasma for $75. However, the nurse says she is three pounds underweight and can’t donate. At the hospital, Schmitt video calls Carlos and asks to meet up if he has a break. Carlos reveals he is in Phoenix for his next job. He didn’t tell Schmitt he was leaving because he felt Schmitt was more interested in alone time in on-call rooms than talking. Carlos tells Schmitt to let him know if he is ever in Phoenix, which leaves Schmitt heartbroken.</p><p>The interns, minus Lucas, are walking through the halls of the hospital, and Simone is trying to find a maid of honor. She sort of asks Jules, but the latter doesn’t think she would be good at it. Lucas rushes in and asks Simone why she left him behind. Simone, Blue, and Mika all say that Lucas is always running late and that’s why he misses the group carpool. Mika grabs a donut out of a box thrown in the trash when she thinks no one can see her to gain weight, but Teddy sees her and is perplexed. Amelia comes up to Teddy as she hangs up her cell phone and asks if she is having a bad morning. Teddy didn’t realize part of her job is to be a reference for other doctors that hospitals want to poach. She is getting tons of calls about Maggie due to her article. Amelia doesn’t think Maggie would leave Grey Sloan Memorial, but she does look worried.</p><p>Owen is running the ER and in charge of the five main interns for the day. A trauma case is coming via the helipad, and Owen selects Blue to help him. The other interns are mad that they don’t get to help. A man named Seth comes stumbling into the ER asking for help, so Simone and Lucas run to claim him as their patient. Blue and Owen go to help a rodeo rider who was stomped on by a 1,000-pound bull. The medivac arrives with Georgia, a young woman who is very injured from the trampling. </p><p>Back in the therapy session, Maggie reveals she has gotten lots of offers from other hospitals, which she gets any time she publishes an article. She talks about wanting to be part of a research project in Chicago to make artificial hearts. Maggie thinks it would be great, but Winston is against it. She wants to consider the offer, but Winston states he already moved across the country once for her and since Maggie lost all respect for him, he doesn’t want to move again. Maggie gets paged to help with Georgia, which annoys Winston. He is mad because he waited weeks for Maggie to agree to help and now she’s going to walk out in the middle of their counseling session. She sternly states that she is on-call for traumas, shows him the page for proof, and abruptly leaves.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">SOLVING PROBLEMS ONE STEP AT A TIME</span></h4><p>Link took the kids to daycare and decided to take a personal day himself in order to be with Jo, figuring she would want the company. He brought her a latte and little donuts with pink frosting, which are her favorite. He knows she isn’t fine, and Jo still insists she is sick. Link disagrees and thinks Jo’s body aches are so she will rest and stay in bed. Link continues to make his case for most supportive man ever, and I found myself wondering why Link and Jo aren’t a couple yet every time they were on screen in this episode.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Richard is examining Seth with Lucas and Simone watching. Seth says he has intestinal pain and came to Grey Sloan Memorial because it is the best hospital. Richard orders labs and a CT scan. In a trauma room, Owen, Amelia, and Blue are trying to help Georgia when Maggie arrives with Jules in tow. The worst of the injuries are a torn liver, unstable spinal fractures, and a massive hematoma in her chest. Georgia, who we learn is a teenager, asks them not to tell her parents because they freak out when she has bad injuries. The doctors are surprised to learn she has sustained severe injuries from bull riding before, and they argue over the best course of treatment. Amelia knows that without spinal surgery, Georgia will be paralyzed. Maggie doesn’t think she can operate on the hematoma because it will rupture. Amelia isn’t sure she can do her surgery if Maggie doesn’t do hers because it is too risky, which puts them at an impasse.</p><p>Elsewhere in the ER, Mika checks on an elderly woman who is coughing and has wheezing in her left lung. The intern orders a chest X-ray, but the patient declines because she can’t afford it. She doesn’t have medical benefits from her job and can’t afford health insurance. Mika is worried that her patient has pneumonia and can’t tell if it is serious without imaging. The patient says she can barely afford antibiotics, so Mika asks her to stay while she tries to get help.</p><p>Schmitt goes over to Joe’s Bar to complain to Helm about Carlos leaving without telling him. He feels that he was used for sex and doesn’t get why Carlos essentially ghosted him. Helm understands Carlos’ side and knows what the interns say about Schmitt. She doesn’t think he is the nice guy that he thinks he is and feels Schmitt might have been the one using Carlos.</p><p>Back at Grey Sloan Memorial, Georgia’s parents arrive, so Owen, Amelia, and Maggie go over her injuries with them. They feel the safest option is to monitor Georgia in the ICU and not do any surgeries. Owen explains that Georgia might not walk again, but she will live. The parents understand the hematoma could rupture at any moment and decide to do the spinal surgery against medical advice because they want to save Georgia’s ability to ride again.</p><p>Richard and Lucas look at Seth’s scans, and the intern immediately says nothing is wrong. Richard tells Lucas that he is looking at it too quickly and needs to sit with the images longer and take a deeper look, which will come in handy later on. Simone finds out that Seth has been to five ERs in the past three weeks and left all with scripts for pain medication. The three doctors confront Seth about his history of drug use, which they also found in the records from the other hospitals. Seth says he doesn’t have a problem and explains he used Adderall back in the day to help him with his job. He didn’t tell them because he didn’t want the doctors to write him off and insists he doesn’t use the pills anymore. The scans come back clean, and Richard tells Seth he talked to the doctors at the other hospitals, who also didn’t find anything wrong. Richard is willing to do one more round of tests, but if nothing is wrong, he will discharge Seth. Lucas suggests sitting on the scans a little longer, but Richard doesn’t want to take his own advice.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">LISTEN TO YOUR INTUITION</span></h4><p>Georgia is prepped and ready for surgery in the OR. Before they begin, Amelia asks Maggie why she didn’t tell her about the job offers. Maggie brushes it off, saying she gets plenty of offers when she publishes articles. Amelia says it doesn’t matter where Maggie is, but rather what she is doing. She suggests that Maggie doesn’t have to move to do the next big thing because Teddy and Richard can get her whatever she needs to do it in Seattle. Maggie says nothing and gives no type of response to her sister.</p><p>Downstairs, Lucas bounces ideas about Seth off Simone. She says the second round of labs came back negative and wants to discharge him. Lucas fights to keep Seth admitted, as his gut is telling him something is wrong with Seth and the patient is telling the truth. He asks Simone to have his back just this once since he always has her back. Simone reluctantly agrees to help him go down the rabbit hole.</p><p>In the OR gallery, Mika asks Teddy about her patient who can’t afford a chest X-ray and if it would be possible to get it pro-bono. Teddy tells her to bring it to accounting and fill out the proper paperwork, but it might take a day to get approved. Mika argues that she can’t wait that long, and Teddy sternly tells her that they cannot break the rules for even one patient. The intern states that she just wants to take care of her patient and isn’t looking for a handout. Mika also explains that she was eating a donut from the trash to gain weight in order to donate plasma because she too is broke. Teddy kindly says that she keeps protein bars in her office and Mika can take them whenever she wants. Down below, the doctors can’t believe Georgia’s parents approved the spinal surgery against their advice. Maggie asks everyone to stop bickering so they can all focus while Amelia begins to repair Georgia’s broken vertebrae.</p><p>As Simone and Lucas walk through the halls talking about what could be wrong with Seth, they are stopped by Schmitt, who tries to be friendly and ask how they are and what they are up to. The interns don’t know how to react and start explaining everything about their patient. They request more time to study the case. Schmitt immediately goes off on them and demands they discharge Seth and not question Richard again. Bailey overhears the encounter and realizes that Schmitt is acting just like she did when she was chief resident in a fun full-circle moment.</p><p>We then get to check back in on Jo and Link, who are lying in bed. Jo wants to go to GSM to check in on Tia and her baby, but Link assures her that he already did and both of them are fine. He tells Jo that she needs a day off after such a traumatic experience. Jo doesn’t understand why it is so hard for her to rest and wants to know how Link knew she wasn’t sick before she realized it and how he knows her favorite donut. Link simply replies that when you know someone for a long time, you start to notice things over time. He tries to make Jo feel better by telling her how he finds it hard to rest because he associates resting with misery due to listening to his parents fight through his bedroom walls when he was stuck in there while fighting cancer as a child. Jo thinks Link has trouble resting when he is not taking care of someone else because he learned to take emotional care of the people who were trying to take care of him. She thinks when he isn’t taking care of someone else, he doesn’t feel safe and that makes him anxious. Link thinks Jo can’t rest because she never had anyone take care of her and she stays busy all the time to compensate for that. When she is still, she feels the pain of not having anyone. They both hit the nail on the head, and the scene ends with a nice moment. Jo wants to nap, but she doesn’t want Link to leave. He brushes a strand of hair behind Jo’s ear and lays down next to her.</p><p>Lucas and Simone look at Seth’s scans and aren’t getting anywhere. Lucas juggles a soccer ball with his feet to help him unwind. Simone is happy to learn something new about him and reveals that she wants to get married without pomp and circumstance. She thinks it is sweet that Trey is a romantic and wants to make their wedding a moment they will always remember, but that doesn’t matter to her. Her words give Lucas an idea: he realizes the scans are frozen moments in time. He rearranges the images in chronological order on the screen to see if there are any small differences between each moment.</p><p>In the OR, Georgia’s hematoma bursts, causing her to instantly crash. Maggie says they have to flip her now to stop the bleeding immediately, but Georgia’s spine is still exposed. Amelia doesn’t want to leave it open, but has no choice. When they flip her over, Blue starts chest compressions. Maggie gives Blue and Jules instructions to switch on and off cardiac massage duties when she cracks the patient’s chest. Maggie opens Georgia in the front, leaving both sides of the teen wide open. We get a montage of the surgery, Georgia’s parents waiting, Lucas looking at Seth’s scans, and Winston worriedly watching from the gallery. The doctors find the hepatic vein injury just in time as Georgia becomes more acidotic. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">SUGGESTING ANOTHER PATH</span></h4><p>Mika gets back to the ER and finds her patient ready to leave after getting antibiotics and an inhaler. She can’t wait around because she has to get to work. She can’t afford to miss a shift. She doesn’t think Mika understands because she is a doctor with a cushy salary. Mika explains that she is a surgical intern making minimal money because the government pays her salary. She goes through all her various debts and talks about selling her blood for money too. She tells her patient that if it was her, she would get the X-ray, and so be it if the bill went to collections because at least she would still be alive. Her impassioned speech convinces her patient to stay and get the chest X-ray after all.</p><p>Bailey finds Schmitt in the ER and tells him how people used to call her the Nazi, which he finds very insensitive. Bailey explains that as chief resident, she thought she had to overcompensate and become someone people didn’t like. She realized her idea of herself became out of sync with who she had become. Bailey tells Schmitt that he is no longer an underdog and shouldn’t see himself that way. She tells him to be himself with the interns and bring pleasure and joy and not just be the muscle all the time.</p><p>Lucas and Simone have gotten Seth’s scans in order and find slight differences through some of the films. They see flare ups in his intestines and believe a foreign object could be in there. Richard comes in and is very angry that his patient has yet to be discharged. The interns have some explaining to do.</p><p>Maggie and Amelia tell Georgia’s mom that her daughter did well in surgery given the circumstances. She is recovering in the ICU, and they want to speak to the mom about Georgia’s bull riding, as they think she should give it up. The mom explains that the male members of the family are all champion riders and Georgia wanted to be like them. When she suffered a crushed trachea, the parents told her no more riding. Georgia became too depressed and couldn’t function, and the mom knows taking away her dream now would kill her. After the mom leaves, Amelia tells Maggie the mother needs to be a parent in this situation. Maggie sees the mom’s point and asks Amelia if her mom could have stopped her from doing drugs, which Amelia admits wouldn’t have happened. </p><p>They see Georgia wake up and pull out her breathing tube in a panic. They rush into her ICU room, and Maggie tries to get the teen to put on an oxygen mask. Georgia wants to know when she can ride again, and Maggie replies that she could be walking in 4-6 weeks. Maggie and Amelia tell her not to go back to the rodeo, but Georgia doesn’t think they would tell her to quit if she was a man. Maggie understands Georgia’s point and switches gears. She understands Georgia’s focus and passion and knows what it is like to be a woman in a man’s world. She asks Georgia to stop fighting their help, and in that moment, I think Amelia knows her sister isn’t sticking around Seattle.</p><p>Richard, Lucas, and Simone do a colonoscopy on Seth. They find that he has a toothpick impacted in the wall of his intestine, which has been causing his pain. Richard is shocked that Lucas was right and explains that Seth’s pain will be gone after they remove it. As they remove the toothpick, Richard tells Lucas that he made an incredible save.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">HARD TRUTHS</span></h4><p>At the end of their shifts, the interns are all in the locker room trading stories about their day. Blue is excited that he had a beating heart in his hand, while Mika proudly says she convinced a patient to get a chest X-ray. Lucas thanks Simone and tells her that he has her back if she needs anything. She immediately takes him up on the offer and asks him to be her man of honor at her wedding because she needs a friend to get through it. Honestly, it’s a terribly cruel gesture when she knows the boy is in love with her. Lucas reluctantly agrees to the role. Schmitt pops in and says he heard all the interns did incredibly today. He invites them out for drinks at Joe’s Bar, and they think there must be a catch. Schmitt tells them to meet him at Joe’s, and the interns decide they are down for free drinks.</p><p>At Joe’s Bar, Mika asks Helm if they could use another bartender. Helm says the manager is hiring and will put in a good word for her, but she is concerned about when Mika would sleep. The interns sit at a table with Schmitt and do shots. Lucas reveals his man of honor status, so Schmitt takes the opportunity to be friendly and ask about Simone’s wedding. Blue asks Jules if she wants to get out of there, but Jules is apprehensive about having sex with him. She knows their rule was no feelings, and now she finds Blue hot. Blue says what if he has no feelings, and that’s enough to make Jules crack and leave with him.</p><p>Winston finds Maggie and asks if she wants to get take-out. She already ordered food, which makes Winston say, “Of course you already decided.” As he walks off, Maggie calls for him to stop. Maggie starts a monologue blaming Winston for their marital problems by saying, “I need to look at you when I say this. You invited me to dinner with your family and abandoned me when things got tough.” She says Winston left her with his family, which she didn’t like. Maggie continues to say that when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. She didn’t want to see that Winston is a person who retreats when things get tough, and he protects himself no matter what it costs anyone else. She feels that a marriage can survive a move to Chicago, but she feels he doesn’t want them to survive. Maggie accuses Winston of taking his love and retreating and states that she is right here and he is gone. She is irked that he couldn’t even think of saying something nice about her at the therapy session. The real kicker comes when Maggie tells Winston that she views his desire to switch specialties as him giving up on conflict and being a coward. She has decided to go to Chicago and use her passion to build hearts to save lives. Winston can, “Stay here and pretend you were the one who was abandoned, but we both know the truth,” Maggie concludes.</p><p>On a lighter note, Link picked up the kids from daycare and put Luna to bed to allow Jo to rest. He grabs Scout and brings him over to Jo, who is eating Chinese food on her bed and smiling at how great of a father Link is. Jo admits she is feeling better and clearly wants to say more to Link about her real feelings but chooses not to. The writers are really dragging their inevitable relationship out, and it is agonizing that Jo can’t admit her real feelings to Link.</p><p>Richard and Amelia attend an AA meeting at the end of the day. The former looks at his sobriety coin while the latter brings him a coffee and asks about his day. Richard admits he missed a diagnosis and almost lost a patient, but he was bailed out by a Shepherd, which makes Amelia smile. Amelia tells Richard that she is afraid of losing another sister, which appears to be news to Richard too.</p><p>The episode ends with Ben waiting for Bailey in the Grey Sloan Memorial parking lot. Someone puts a flier on his windshield, which makes Ben get out of his car to chase the person down. He doesn’t catch the culprit and is shocked to see that the flier has a large photo of Bailey with the words “Baby Killer” written over her face. Their address and Bailey’s personal phone number are also on the paper. Bailey comes out and asks Ben what is wrong. He shows her the flier and says, “We are not fine.” It seems the anti-abortion protestors are now coming after Bailey in a similar fashion to what they have been doing to Addison. Like Ben, we should all be a bit frightened of what is to come for our beloved Miranda Bailey.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-77885622736723341862023-04-15T15:09:00.000-04:002023-04-15T15:09:11.895-04:00The Flash 9x08 Review: "Partners in Time" (A Magnet for Trouble) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiiES9bkTKAs_zwh9BD7_bD4NrwnuohbEGCo3gFeTp4TYpYdqnX8DobjfhAydo4_BnsO1X0AsMpnk6bWy1XLPgpnM-CW-4ySIB5c4yZZ4yE3Y6zrZxYkrREoMwIsh4Yk4RbVpzv_VbzmoV6MXaZD_5hbZ3BZb0rP1mPRF47MtSklWDG9NgpUmO2xvI7Q/s730/iris.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="487" data-original-width="730" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiiES9bkTKAs_zwh9BD7_bD4NrwnuohbEGCo3gFeTp4TYpYdqnX8DobjfhAydo4_BnsO1X0AsMpnk6bWy1XLPgpnM-CW-4ySIB5c4yZZ4yE3Y6zrZxYkrREoMwIsh4Yk4RbVpzv_VbzmoV6MXaZD_5hbZ3BZb0rP1mPRF47MtSklWDG9NgpUmO2xvI7Q/s320/iris.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Partners in Time”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: April 5, 2023</div><p>This week on <i>The Flash</i>, we get what’s probably my favorite of these little interlude episodes before another season arc is due to begin. What “Partners in Time” lacks in plotty significance, it makes up for in quirky cuteness and all-around fun. We get echoes of the time loop that opened the season, with Barry and Iris locked into the A-plot together — but while that episode was weighed down in slightly frustrating emotional character stuff, this one’s all silliness and showcases the West-Allen duo being a charming team. Basically, this week is probably a last hurrah before angst barrels down on us for the last half of the season.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">LET’S DO THE TIME WARP AGAIN</span></h4><p>We start off a hundred years in the future, where an unknown someone is sneaking around the Flash Museum and sets off an alarm while trying to access the weapons vault. Why is there a weapons vault in a publicly accessible museum? Between this and the treadmill that can send you back in time, I’m starting to think that museum was a bad idea.</p><p>One April 5, 2023, Barry has finished the baby’s crib seven months ahead of the due date and already stocked the freezer with (adult) Nora’s favorite ice cream. Again, the show seems way too certain that the baby who’s about to be born will be Nora despite being off schedule by three months, which makes me assume this will not be the case. I’m betting it’ll end up being the comics-canon Tornado Twins, but I’m usually wrong about these things so don’t take that bet.</p><p>What Barry has also done in preparation of having a child is schedule a mold inspection for STAR Labs, since he’s certain he’ll want to bring an infant to that incredibly dangerous location where everything goes wrong constantly. Just after Barry meets his friends’ worry over handling the inspection on his own by declaring, “I’m the Flash. I’m pretty sure I can handle one mold inspector,” complete with cheesy grin and a farcical camera pan-in, a whole inspection crew arrives. Calling in the mold inspector apparently triggered code enforcement, since the lab has been operating without permits for the entirety of the series. Wow. Sounds illegal.</p><p>“What’s a speed lab for, anyway?” the lead inspector asks. Speed, bro. Duh-doy. All the inspectors are weird characters, with a stoner mold guy, an electrical inspector who doesn’t know what a breaker box is, and a nerdy-prim radiation scientist. Iris even says they all seem like characters from a sitcom, and I think it’s meant to be a bit of obfuscation since a whodunnit mystery is coming up and the new characters should all be suspicious, but the episode really doesn’t try all that hard. And that’s just fine.</p><p>Things start going wrong when Barry and Iris direct the inspectors out of the speed lab, only for them to end up back in the speed lab. They try to laugh it off as a joke, but another trip out only leads them back in again — this time, an antique grandfather clock that looks brand new is also sitting in the room. Then, after Barry tries zipping to the future to find out how they can escape, everyone’s clothing changes to random historical costumes.</p><p>Barry shows back up wearing a knock-off <i>Star Trek: The Next Generation</i> uniform (which Iris says is “Star Wars” — adorable, you little anti-nerd, you) and it’s clear they can no longer pass off what’s going on as a prank. The running joke that is Barry’s secret identity continues as Barry immediately admits to this bunch of absolute strangers he’s the Flash. Granted, he becomes the voice of authority on Weird Time Stuff as soon as he does, so it’s justified in this case.</p><p>Our timestuck heroes quickly figure out what’s going on: they’re being trapped by a time magnet, stolen from the weapons vault that the speed lab will become in a hundred years. In the vault, the time magnet would have had a stabilizer to avoid this very thing, but the thief failed to steal the stabilizer along with the magnet so they’re trapped with the rest of them. Thus begins the brief mystery concept of the episode: who’s the thief?</p><p>Said mystery lasts through one iffy radiation test before people start turning into statues and the electrical inspector who didn’t know what a breaker box was is revealed to be Lady Chronos, “the greatest thief time has ever known.” Her costume’s dumb as hell, by the way. She’s got clock hands stuck to her forehead.</p><p>Anyway, Lady Chronos threatens Iris with the time magnet to get Barry to help her get out, but Barry’s just as stuck as she is and asks how she got there in the first place. She has a “chrono belt” that lets her jump through time to a single location. She used it to go back to 2023, disguise herself as an inspector on the date of STAR Labs’ last inspection before becoming a museum, and backdoor into the vault to swipe the time magnet but, alas, she forgot the stabilizer and got stuck. Now her chrono belt is out of charge and they’re out of options, until Barry offers to use his speed energy to charge the belt.</p><p>Lady Chronos returns to 2123 and a wave of reality-fixing glowiness passes through the speed lab, returning everything to normal. The inspectors — including the actual electrical inspector — arrive without any memory of what happened while under the influence of the time magnet. The real electrical inspector is wearing an eyepatch, by the way, which is perhaps the weirdest trait they could’ve given an utterly inconsequential non-character. I’d like to know more about that guy.</p><p>After debriefing with Khione and the three of them having dinner together, Iris and Barry spend the denouement eating ice cream at home and contemplating the future. Being trapped in the same time taught Iris a lesson about not only looking at the past and Barry a lesson about not only looking toward the future and the two have decided to pay more attention to the now. I thought that was the same lesson they learned from the time loop but, hey. Learn and learn again, I guess.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>This episode only raises more questions about STAR Labs’ legitimacy, how they finance stuff, what sort of access the public has...</li><li>A weird amount of camera attention was paid to the magazine with Barry’s father on the front. Will it play into future episodes? Were they just proud of that prop and the ad for a comically 1990s computer on the back? I guess we’ll see.</li><li>Iris: “Barry’s not even a funny guy, like, at all.” Since season three, at least.</li><li>I love Iris giving the radiation inspector the squinty eye when she asks to study Barry’s “quantum biochemistry.”</li><li>Apparently the Flash museum has unbeatable security. Right, just like STAR Labs security is totally unbeatable.</li><li>Allegra and Chester once again get their plotline relegated to the Other Things section. They love each other now, yay! The little drama between them was only slightly annoying rather than very annoying like the four-episode-long will-they/won’t-they nonsense at the start of the season.</li><li>Wait, this inspection is the last one before STAR Labs becomes a museum, so the time for the Flash Museum happening must be coming up really soon. Either that or they only do inspections for dangerous nuclear facilities once every so often in this universe, which doesn’t seem that smart — oh. Yeah, it’s probably that last thing.</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-31595578495375818432023-04-05T20:27:00.000-04:002023-04-05T20:27:12.871-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x12 Recap: “Pick Yourself Up” (Part Two: One Wild Ride) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhliAe5Buhj3CWrWmODfIfbbwo3sLh5H_iMgpVoqUjDVyD5LAY_PtH7_DFQF7GLiSRRZKRWqhtlJmxnvbLm5UGQVLRTjEb8dkjwaLNREIPmdEXVchJXvF7V9gkn5MOj09JAbgdKX_6NlROxkF0Lgi8HdvJnMF5ftmJr1w1_v5oElY7xfgOSl-zz3lDfqg/s2048/greys%20ep12.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhliAe5Buhj3CWrWmODfIfbbwo3sLh5H_iMgpVoqUjDVyD5LAY_PtH7_DFQF7GLiSRRZKRWqhtlJmxnvbLm5UGQVLRTjEb8dkjwaLNREIPmdEXVchJXvF7V9gkn5MOj09JAbgdKX_6NlROxkF0Lgi8HdvJnMF5ftmJr1w1_v5oElY7xfgOSl-zz3lDfqg/s320/greys%20ep12.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Pick Yourself Up”</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span>Original Airdate: March 30, 2023</span></div><div><p>After the horror of watching Addison and Tia get hit by a protestor in a speeding car at the end of last week’s episode, anything is game on <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i>. The conclusion of the two-episode arc is even more fraught than the first as the doctors frantically work to save their own. This two-parter has been an incredible ride and reminded me why we all fell in love with this show in the first place. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">EVERYTHING, EVERYWHERE, ALL AT ONCE</span></h4><p>The episode starts at a fast pace where if you blink, you will miss exactly what is going on. Most of what follows is either shown in very quick succession or in long one shots without cuts. Ambulances arrive at the entrance of the clinic to assist with Addison and Tia’s injuries and to help get them over to the ER in the safest manner possible. Richard finds Amelia in the lobby and tells her about Addison. She immediately runs off with a look of shock and horror on her face. Owen, Schmitt, Lucas, Simone, and Jules await the ambulances in the ER, while Teddy manages the police at the scene of the crime. The police have also held back the protestors and set up a perimeter.</p><p>The first ambulance contains Tia, and Carina and Jo are riding with her. Bailey rides in Addison’s ambulance, which arrives right behind them. Teddy puts the hospital on lockdown and declares that only employees and incoming trauma patients will be allowed in. Addison tells the doctors that she was clipped and only her shoulder is hurt. She calls for Bailey and asks her to check on Tia. Schmitt has set up the OBGYN ward as overflow for clinic patients. Nurse Carlos finds Schmitt in the ER and wants to make sure he is safe as he was worried. Schmitt doesn’t have time to socialize, but he does appear slightly happy to have someone care about him.</p><p>Most of the doctors are now treating Tia, who has a lot of free fluid in her abdomen. Carina tells the group that she needs to check the baby before they can take her up to the OR. Tia knows how bad her injuries are and says that it is a bad day to be a doctor. She talks about naming her baby Connor and how she doesn’t want him delivered because his lungs still need more time to develop. The baby goes into distress, and Bailey shouts that they need to get her upstairs immediately. Tia starts to crash and has decreased breath sounds. They decide to intubate her and have to shock her a few times when her heart stops.</p><p>Amelia and Link examine Addison and find that her dislocated shoulder should be reset under sedation. Blue drops a tray on his way over, and Amelia rushes over to ask what happened to him when she sees the bandage on his head. After he recounts getting hit in the head with a brick, Amelia forces him to go get a scan to check for head injury. Addison shouts at Link to pop her shoulder back into place so she can go help Tia. Link pops it in with Simone supporting Addison’s back, and the OBGYN screams. Addison immediately gets out of her gurney and tells Simone to come with her to help Tia. </p><p>Addison wants to prep Tia for a C-section because she believes the baby won’t survive otherwise. Owen and Bailey tell her that Tia has been down for two minutes, they have tried everything to bring her back, to no avail, and Tina is bleeding out through her abdomen. Addison says she won’t let the person behind the wheel take away two lives. Carina calls for an intern to page the NICU, and the group preps to do the procedure right there in the ER. Addison holds her arm, which isn’t even in a sling, and continues ordering everyone around. They stop compressions on Tia, and Carina starts the C-section. </p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">NOT TODAY</span></h4><p>The pulse-pounding action doesn’t stop there or at any point during the hour. After seeing the C-section happening, Mika goes back to the main area of the ER with a fraught look on her face. Schmitt tells her to help other patients if she isn’t needed on Tia’s case. Tia is still bleeding profusely, and Lucas asks why they are going to pack her if she is gone. Owen tells him that they have to do everything to try to save her life before giving up. Baby Connor is born, and Bailey starts compressions on Tia again. Addison and Carina work to save Connor and intubate him, while the rest of the team is ready to get Tia to the OR.</p><p>Maya Bishop and Ben Warren from <i>Station 19</i> have both run to Grey Sloan Memorial to check on Carina and Bailey, respectively, after not being able to get a hold of their spouses. A security guard won’t let them into the hospital since the building is on lockdown, but they get lucky when Teddy walks by at that exact moment and sees them. Teddy lets them in and tells them their spouses are okay. She also says that if anyone gives them any trouble, have them page her directly. Maya and Ben are grateful for the help and run upstairs to find Carina and Bailey.</p><p>Elsewhere, Amelia and Jules give Blue a CT scan. This episode is full of great quotes, but one of the best belongs to Jules, who says, “Remember when being a doctor was considered heroic?” She doesn’t understand who could be capable of violence against doctors. The scans reveal that Blue has no bleeding, fractures, or traumatic brain injuries, but Amelia feels he could still be concussed and that he should go home for the day. Blue protests that he can’t go home on his own and would rather stay. Amelia agrees as long as someone is supervising him, gives him regular neuro checks, and doesn’t allow him to work on patients and only do notes. Jules doesn’t want the responsibility, but Amelia forces Blue to become her charge.</p><p>Winston finds Maggie and wants to check in with her. She starts discussing patients, so he stops her to rephrase that he wants to check in on her. Maggie asks if everyone is okay, and Winston admits that Tia might not be. Maggie can’t process the horror and wants to focus on her patients to take her mind off things. Winston poignantly says that the world doesn’t make a whole lot of sense right now. He then changes to a happier tune to announce that he got the magazine that their article is published in and that he left a copy for Maggie in the lounge. He unfortunately didn’t get to read it yet, but it seems like he wants this to bring them back together. Maggie thanks him for checking in on her, and for a moment, it looks like they might actually be able to work things out.</p><p>Jules is paged to the ER, and Blue follows along. The interns find Schmitt with elderly patient Norma and her friend, Maxine, who has been asking Schmitt to page Jules. Norma needs a knee procedure and reveals that Maxine has a burning sensation when peeing. Jules scolds her for not saying something sooner and says it could be another UTI. Blue thinks that Max is Jules’ grandma, but Jules reveals that Max is actually her mystery roommate!</p><p>We then see Bailey video chatting with Tia’s husband, Brandon, while scrubbing in for surgery. He asks for the truth about his wife. Bailey tells him everything, and he is surprised to find out that Connor was born. Brandon says he will catch the first plane and asks Bailey to do whatever it takes to save them both. She gives him her word and hangs up to start operating on Tia with Owen. Ben and Maya walk into the gallery and wave to Bailey, who signals to Ben that she is okay, to his great relief.</p><p>In the NICU, Addison and Simone are helping baby Connor when he starts to crash. Addison starts compression even though she is clearly in a lot of pain. She tells Connor not to give up and that he is not allowed to stop fighting today. Connor stabilizes, which makes Simone more than relieved.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">AN OUTSTRETCHED HAND</span></h4><p>Jules does a neuro check on Blue in the ER and deems him fine after asking him a tough medical question. He wants to know why she would want to live with an elderly lady. Jules explains that Max is 81 years old and that she was friends with her grandson in med school. Max allows Jules to sublet a room for one-third the price of anywhere else. As a bonus, Max can’t hear what Jules is up to late at night after she takes out her hearing aids, so it’s a win-win for the intern. The interns go back over to Norma and Max when Link arrives to inspect the former’s knee. Link tells Norma that she doesn’t have a fracture, but there is fluid that needs to be drained. Blue wants to learn how to aspirate a knee, but Jules stops him and gets to learn from Link. Norma and Max joke about Link’s good looks, which is a quick reprieve in an otherwise fraught episode.</p><p>Maggie finds Teddy and asks if she can walk with her. While walking, Maggie asks Teddy how she is holding up. Teddy replies that she is good in a crisis, but no matter how many she has been in, it never gets easier. She complains about not eating in hours and how she might walk out if she hears the words “risk assessment” again, but she is feeling better other than that. Maggie gets to the point of the discussion by asking for advice. She reveals to Teddy that the article in the magazine quoted her saying that she had highly skilled assistants, including her husband, helping her with the partial heart transplant. Maggie knows it looks like she is taking all the credit and insists that’s not all she said. She claims that she told them Winston is a brilliant surgeon and sang his praises, but they cut all that out. Maggie wants to issue a correction and was wondering if Teddy could help with that. Teddy says she will try, but she insists Maggie shouldn’t wait for the hospital to issue a statement before she talks to Winston. Teddy explains that she and Owen didn’t talk for months and it almost killed them, so she urges Maggie not to make the same mistake.</p><p>Elsewhere, Ben and Maya stop by the hospital’s daycare to see Pru. Maya stays for a second before running off to find Carina. We then see Link and Amelia watching Addison and Simone in the NICU. Link asks Amelia how things are going in there, and Amelia says that Addison is being her typical stubborn self. He knows that Amelia means a lot to her, and she says Addison means everything to her. Amelia talks about how the universe gave her biological sisters that she never got along with and then eventually gave her Addison, Meredith, and Maggie. When Amelia gets paged away, Link says he will stay to help Addison and keep an eye on her. Link assures her that he’s got Addison, so Amelia goes.</p><p>In a hallway, Mika is having a panic attack, and Richard comes across her in a bad state. Mika doesn’t think she is okay, so Richard decides to tend to her. The scene cuts to the OR, where things are not going well for Tia. She needs a splenectomy and is still losing a lot of blood. Bailey recounts how Tia was the first applicant for the fellowship program, and Jo remembers how they thought Tia’s pregnancy would make it more challenging for her to come. Owen tries to give support by telling Bailey that no one could see this coming. Bailey says Tia came while pregnant to help other pregnant women, and the fellow codes on the table. They get Tia’s spleen out as Brandon tries calling Bailey, who can’t answer. Tia is bleeding everywhere, and Owen frantically tries to fix all the bleeders. Owen refuses to give up on Tia, but Jo doesn’t think Tia will make it out of the OR if they keep going. Bailey decides to take Tia to the ICU and give her a break before continuing at a later time.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PART OF BEING HUMAN</span></h4><p>Maya runs around the hospital until she practically runs into Carina. Maya is happy that her wife is okay, but Carina has a patient that is 6cm dilated and needs to go deliver a baby. She thanks Maya for coming and runs into a room. </p><p>Mika is now in a room panicking, and Richard brings her a cold towel to help ground her in the present and break the shock. He tells her to look around the room and name five objects she sees. Richard counts the items and Mika names them, but she stops at number three because she is mortified that she froze earlier. Mika says surgeons can’t freeze, and Richard calmly states that they aren’t in the OR. She says it could have been any of them getting attacked, and she says it could have been her. Richard tells her not to apologize for her reaction to a traumatic event and that what happened isn’t what the job is supposed to be. He tells Mika to take whatever time and space she needs and that her reaction is what makes her human. Mika nods and starts to calm down, and Richard proves yet again that he is the best person ever. </p><p>In the ER, Max and Norma’s labs are in. Jules asks Max to come with her, but the ladies say that whatever the doctors have to say can be said in front of both of them. The doctors announce that both women have gonorrhea, and it has settled in Norma’s knee as a form of arthritis. The doctors say the women will have to call all their sexual partners to alert them to get tested. When the women pull out their phones to call their partners, they not only find out each one was sleeping around, but they are sleeping with the same guy. Schmitt appropriately comments, “Well, this is awkward.”</p><p>Ben and Pru find Maya waiting outside the room Carina is in. Maya calls Carina “a miracle worker” and “barer of life” to Ben. He aptly talks about how this is what it must feel like to be married to first responders. Maya is confused, so Ben explains that they both ran there and had to know their spouses were okay and that’s what they do to their spouses on a daily basis. He wonders if their spouses knew what they were getting into when they each got married, so Maya reminds Ben that he was still a doctor when Bailey married him.</p><p>Back in the NICU, Addison is happy that Connor’s vitals are stable for now. Simone tells Addison that she was in this NICU when she was born and she is amazed that someone like Addison saved her life. Connor starts having trouble breathing again, and he has no breath sounds. Addison uses a pen light to look through his skin and at his lungs. She sees he has a pneumothorax and calls for a syringe. She relieves the pressure with one hand and gets him breathing again. Addison starts struggling more as the baby stabilizes.</p><p>Bailey and Jo are in the ICU with Tia when the former dismisses the latter. Bailey starts to let the emotion of the day hit her and calls Brandon. She has to leave him a message detailing how they transferred Tia to the ICU to rest for a few hours before going back to the OR to finish repairing her injuries. Like the good doctor she is, Bailey vows not to leave her patient’s side.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">RISE TO KEEP GOING</span></h4><p>The man that both Max and Norma were sleeping with, Hal, is now in the ER after the women call him. They start yelling at him for sleeping with both of them. Jules, Blue, and Schmitt try to calm them down and say that Hal’s test results should be back soon. They want to give him treatment because they think he might be the source of the disease. Hal needs to contact all his sexual partners too, and he reveals that he is sleeping with a 98-year-old and at least four additional women, including Max and Norma. Schmitt tells Blue to call the retirement home they all live in to report the outbreak.</p><p>Lucas pops into the NICU to give Addison and Simone an update on Tia. He also reports that Link is waiting for Addison to examine her shoulder again. Lucas was sent with a message that if Addison wants to operate again, she needs to come see Link now or Lucas will have to pay for it personally. Addison begrudgingly agrees to leave, so Lucas decides to stay to help with Connor. He tells Simone he overheard Tia say the baby’s name, and she is happy to know his name is Connor.</p><p>Mika walks around the ICU until she finds Bailey in Tia’s room. She apologizes for disappearing earlier and asks what she missed, to which Bailey gives her a look that says “everything.” Mika asks if she can sit with Tia so Bailey can take a break. Bailey notices at that moment that Tia is hypotensive and tachycardic, which means she must be bleeding from her abdomen again. Bailey calls to get an OR team up to the ICU immediately, as there is no time for them to get to the OR. Mika is bewildered that Bailey wants to open up Tia in the ICU, and Bailey snaps the intern out of it by saying she needs Mika’s hands and needs to move now.</p><p>After giving her an MRI, Link tells Addison that she needs to wear a sling for four weeks and do physical therapy no matter how exhausted she is. He also advises her to keep moving her hand and wrist around and that it wouldn’t be a terrible idea to take a break from the road for a few weeks. Amelia, who was in the corner of the room, sits next to Addison after Link leaves the room. Addison says that she is exhausted from the disaster that is her work and that she can’t take a break from it. She doesn’t know who would do it if she didn’t. Amelia quips that she thought Addison was going to throw a tablet at Link for suggesting she take a break. </p><p>Jo runs into Tia’s ICU room to help with the impromptu surgery, where Bailey has found the fellow’s liver is bleeding. They need to perform a massive surgical procedure to save Tia. Bailey gives Jo and Mika various instructions to help and even goes as far to shove Mika’s hand into Tia’s abdomen to hold her liver. Bailey and Jo are able to sew off the bleed, allowing Tia to stabilize. Bailey tells Tia she isn’t allowed to die yet because too many people need her, and the message seems to get through.</p><p>Back in the ER, Jules tells Max to not have sex for a week in order to allow the antibiotics to work, as she doesn’t want a sick roomie. Schmitt and Jules both say they are sorry Hal turned out to be a jerk. Before leaving, Max tells them that women have always been judged for every decision they make. She has learned that women become invisible around the age of 60, which allows them to “do whatever the hell you like because no one cares.” Max has no regrets, except waiting so long to live her best life. </p><p>Maggie finds Winston in what appears to be an attending lounge and tells him that the magazine cherry-picked her quotes and took them out of context. She vows to fix it and says Teddy has agreed to help. Maggie continues that she told the magazine she and Winston were equals and that he is an incredible surgeon. Winston is a bit more upset than I expected him to be and says to Maggie that she still said the quote, so she should take some responsibility for it. Maggie argues that she can’t control what other people say about her. She wants to know when they stopped giving each other the benefit of the doubt. Winston counters that it stopped when Maggie said she didn’t respect him when he first mentioned changing specialties. He feels that the article drives home that she doesn’t respect him. Maggie really wants to fix the unintentional damage and asks how she can fix their relationship. In a moment of brutal honesty, Winston says that there is no fix, just feelings. He continues, “Say you’re sorry. Say you got some things wrong. Say you didn’t mean to hurt me. Say you understand how I feel. Say you love me and mean it. Say you respect me and mean it.” Maggie says she respects him, but Winston doesn’t believe her.</p><p>Teddy finds Bailey in the ICU to let her know that the police caught the hit-and-run driver and that she has lifted the hospital lockdown. Teddy is fine with keeping the clinic closed for a few days too, but Bailey is fully prepared to open the clinic in the morning. Lucas brings Brandon up, so Bailey tells him Tia is stable for now. She doesn’t give him any guarantees, but she is hopeful Tia will wake up because she is strong and determined. Bailey lets Brandon go inside Tia’s room to sit with her. We get a time lapse to show Tia healing throughout the day, Brandon meeting Connor, and Tia going for her second surgery. We also see Carlos bring Schmitt a coffee the next morning, which is a nice moment.</p><p>Addison is ready to leave Seattle, so Richard, Bailey, and Ben see her off. She is sure Tia will wake up and Connor will make it out of the NICU. Richard thanks Addison for coming, and Bailey tells her to be safe out there. We see that the outside of the clinic is being repaired before the action goes back indoors. Bailey makes her way back to the ICU to see that Tia is off the vent with Simone and Jo watching her. Tia then wakes up and immediately freaks out. She asks if Connor is okay, so Brandon tells her their baby is doing well. </p><p>Jo has to leave the room as she can’t stop herself from crying. She walks to the elevator, which opens to reveal Link inside. Jo gets in, and when the door closes behind her, Link tells her to not hold the emotion in anymore and that he is “right here” for her. Jo collapses on the floor of the elevator in tears. When it stops at the next floor, Link stops other staff from getting in to give Jo space. Back in Tia’s room, Simone tells the fellow that someone wanted to meet her and shows her a live video call of Connor in the NICU. The episode ends with Addison finding where she stored the PRT, climbing into the driver seat, and starting the engine. As Meredith’s voiceover says, Addison finds a way to rise to keep going and drives away to conclude the most powerful two-parter in years. </p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-2883747940878310342023-04-03T18:53:00.002-04:002023-04-03T18:53:49.975-04:00The Flash 9x07 Review: "Wildest Dreams" (Sleepwalking) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmolW6ngaYZiT8-t6Klq7VWiJotb9TH4g2dPAnDuTnRxF0NJ3i5NICKaMmIyNnZAXhl-UNPSq5csw7CHbcBRB6LtJ26SpRXmI-88Q39xAuarSmoXizgO-ehSYFRNo6EQMULLJ5g6Hh1BBPm2WX59UVtUrFf7IrpuHWlR8D4bc1yHZOazJb-VtLLRRx1A/s1200/the%20flash.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="595" data-original-width="1200" height="159" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmolW6ngaYZiT8-t6Klq7VWiJotb9TH4g2dPAnDuTnRxF0NJ3i5NICKaMmIyNnZAXhl-UNPSq5csw7CHbcBRB6LtJ26SpRXmI-88Q39xAuarSmoXizgO-ehSYFRNo6EQMULLJ5g6Hh1BBPm2WX59UVtUrFf7IrpuHWlR8D4bc1yHZOazJb-VtLLRRx1A/s320/the%20flash.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Wildest Dreams”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 29, 2023</div><p>This week on <i>The Flash</i>: the title of the episode gets a song stuck in my head that I only know the chorus to! Oh, and some superhero stuff happens. Nia, a.k.a. Dreamer, from <i>Supergirl </i>pays a visit, she and Iris end up in mortal danger, but we get to go on some exciting dream adventures that I kinda wish were a lot weirder. At least one of these dreams should’ve involved Iris desperately trying to remember her high school locker combination because she’s late to a final for a class she forgot to attend all semester.</p><p>It’s nonetheless a solid little interlude episode with some good character stuff for Iris and (although it’s slightly wasted since she’s not actually a regular on this show) Nia and I can’t complain too much.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">DREAM A LITTLE DREAM FOR TWO</span></h4><p>The opening of the episode is adequately creepy, with Nia-as-Dreamer walking through a large warehouse while a crowd of people stare at her and project spooky imagery of spiders, ravens, and graveyards into her head. A cloaked figure with glowing eyes stands out from the rest of the crowd, and suddenly Iris is there to tell Nia “it’s about control” before dying, apparently at the hands of Glowy Cloaked Figure. Nia wakes up in a Jitters coffee shop in National City and runs to Central City to talk to Iris about this troubling development.</p><p>Meanwhile, Iris is on the cusp of publishing the article that Barry’s mapbook says will win her a Pulitzer, but learning that it’s a preordained event has her second-guessing everything again. I know it’s necessary to supply Iris with some drama this season, but I am really not compelled by her desire to dodge “destiny” merely because it’s supposed to happen. It gives me “you told me to do something and now I don’t wanna” vibes that don't gel with Iris’s generally pragmatic approach to things. Anyway, Nia shows up to tell Iris about her dream and, just as I’m wondering if Nia and Iris met on the show at some point and I’d forgotten, it’s revealed that Iris, Nia, Kara, Alex, and Ryan all had brunch together off-screen. Boo! I want to see superheroes having brunch!</p><p>Nia’s Dreamer powers are gone after her encounter with the Glowy Cloaked Figure and she thinks Iris is the key to getting them back, but before she can say much more, Glowy Cloaked Figure sends both of them to sleep. The two end up in a shared dream where they’re police officers and Iris is Captain, and Iris starts to wonder if she should’ve become a cop like her dad instead of a journalist. Iris is intrigued by this alternate path in her life, but Nia is adamant that they find a way to wake up. Luckily, a blue door appears to seemingly provide one.</p><p>Going through the door spits them out into another of Iris’s dreams, this time one where she, Barry, Chester, and Nia all work as baristas at Jitters. Have the writers of The Flash been checking out some coffee shop AU fanfiction and getting inspired? Things at Jitters start to go wrong but Iris, having actually worked as a barista in the past, takes control and feels good about being able to solve a problem and then clock out to enjoy her life instead of dedicating all her time to chasing down stories and running a media outlet. </p><p>Although Iris seems to be having fun in her dream what-if scenarios, the two ladies start feeling some negative side-effects to traipsing through dreamland. Nia diagnoses it as “angry sleep” and says that if they experience it for too long it’ll put their bodies through too much trauma. Out in the waking world, Barry has found Iris and Nia passed out and delivered them to STAR Labs, where Chester has equally bad news about the state of things should they fail to wake up soon.</p><p>But Nia has the vague outline of a plan. She says they can wake up if they figure out what they’re meant to be dealing with in the dream, since “dreams always reflect back to us the problems of our everyday lives.” I once had a dream where I was a door-to-door potato salesman. I’d really like to know what problem that one was meant to be reflecting back at me.</p><p>Before Nia and Iris can dig too deeply into issues Iris might be dealing with, they find themselves in the nightmare warehouse from the opening scene. They run from the Glowy Cloaked Figure and the crowd of people and, in the real world, their fevers start spiking dangerously high. Following the warehouse nightmare is an Iris-centric nightmare in which all her employees dismiss her qualifications as a journalist, and Iris confesses to Nia her misgivings regarding her mapped future.</p><p>Nia talks some sense into Iris about the concept of destiny and choice, and how destiny only exists due to a lifetime of choices. I think I would appreciate this more as a philosophical moment if I didn’t find Iris’s urge to rebel against her future so silly. It’s clear they’ve cracked the meaning of Iris’s dreams, but she and Nia are still asleep — so now it’s Nia’s turn.</p><p>In the waking world, Cecile declares the Glowy Cloaked Figure to be a “kind presence” so Iris and Nia will be fine. Meanwhile, a door covered in spiderwebs has appeared in dreamland and Iris tells Nia that maybe the key to her dreams is learning to give up the control she’s been fighting for and just let whatever’s going on guide her. It fits with dream-Iris’s message to Nia at the start of the episode and Nia, inspired by Iris, goes through the door alone to meet with the Glowy Cloaked Figure. As it turns out, said figure is the first Dreamer, and letting go of control is what Nia needed to fully embrace her Dreamer powers.</p><p>Iris and Nia wake up and all is well again. Nia has her powers, Iris publishes her award-winning article, and hopefully Iris is over her wariness of destiny now that she understands she’s been writing it all along.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The B-plot of the episode involved Khione and Mark dealing with the latter’s continued obsession with getting Frost back, this time in the form of socializing Khione into being more like Frost. It’s an okay little storyline and I like that it occasionally ties back to the dream theme of the episode, but it’s otherwise very separate and therefore much harder to include in the main review. The culmination of it is that Mark learns a lesson and decides to leave so he can deal with his grief properly, and Khione finally displays her ice powers. They seem to be tied to her emotions.</li><li>Okay, Mark tearing off his apparently breakaway shirt and declaring that he “hates shirts anyway” was pretty funny. You get one smile out of me, Chillblaine.</li><li>I have no idea why the writers decided to have a bunch of extras at O'Shaughnessy's Bar pepper snide remarks about how lame Mark is into his fight with Khione, but it’s the funniest thing they could have done and I applaud them for it.</li><li>I sure am glad I’m mostly over my old arachnophobia, because all the spider imagery in this episode would have done a number on me.</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-23126011517545970872023-03-30T12:41:00.000-04:002023-03-30T12:41:37.241-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x11 Recap: “Training Day” (Part One: The Horrible Truth of Reality) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRGhVfaJ4XYoyFxrXkeR757XhbpGGaO1ivOw7X78HAYebScYC6Wk6Ufi-DGCjhSuIwYaMS-xl3DAe39j5HiUs9Uhbx8pxaJuRJtZCyBWKqpqnpYy9jjoVnhvg30GBCvCxecLoacEF-zKYgdR9LmqojufFI-YYy08jRfYjldI8B82RIxWgw3KXAA1i2xQ/s1200/greys%20training.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="1200" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRGhVfaJ4XYoyFxrXkeR757XhbpGGaO1ivOw7X78HAYebScYC6Wk6Ufi-DGCjhSuIwYaMS-xl3DAe39j5HiUs9Uhbx8pxaJuRJtZCyBWKqpqnpYy9jjoVnhvg30GBCvCxecLoacEF-zKYgdR9LmqojufFI-YYy08jRfYjldI8B82RIxWgw3KXAA1i2xQ/s320/greys%20training.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Training Day”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 23, 2023</div><p>One of the most divisive topics takes center stage again this week on <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i>. Addison checks back in for the first day of a new fellowship program plagued by a group of hostile protestors outside of Grey Sloan Memorial. Nick finally returns as well and has a lung transplant on his plate that quickly gets derailed when the living donor gets into a car accident and suffers blunt chest trauma on his way to the hospital. This powerful, eye-opening first of a two-part storyline showcasing the current horrors of the real world is truly well done in every way and packs quite the shocking gut punch at the end.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">STRUGGLING FROM THE START</span></h4><p>The episode begins with Bailey chasing Pru around her house in the morning when the little girl doesn’t want to brush her teeth. Bailey complains that she has a big day ahead of her and starts singing to get Pru to cooperate. We then see Simone and Mika start their day at the intern house. Simone gets out of bed when Trey FaceTimes her to talk about wedding plans. He has been looking for wedding venues in the Baltimore area and found a great one that is typically sold out. They have an opening for the beginning of June, but they would have to book in the next few days. Simone walks into the bathroom to brush her teeth while Mika takes a shower after running. Apparently the girls are that close now. Mika complains that there isn’t any hot water.</p><p>Owen, Teddy, and their kids are walking into the hospital via the ambulance bay ER entrance when an ambulance pulls up and stops them in their tracks. Teddy says she will take the kids inside and let Owen go save a life unsupervised. Owen jumps right in, and it appears that the couple is finally in a better place based on the nice way they are communicating. Inside, we catch up with all the interns in their locker room, where Lucas has just finished taking a hot shower. Blue and Mika bombard him with insults about not paying the gas bill and having to spend more time at the hospital to shower since they don’t have hot water at home. Jules watches with a smirk on her face as Lucas apologizes.</p><p>Teddy finds Bailey outside on a balcony, and Bailey says she made her another pie, which is in the lounge. Bailey knows the hospital budget can be difficult, so she really appreciates the support for the clinic. She asks if Teddy saw the article circulating online about Addison and the PRT. Teddy alerts Bailey that people are trolling the article. Addison arrives looking very exhausted and overrun. She is still herself and cracks a joke about selling the PRT in Illinois because she was low on cash. The shocked look on Bailey’s face is priceless. She flew to Seattle and hid the PRT until the bad press slows down. They go inside and are joined by Carina and Jo to help welcome a class of OBGYN fellows from states that have banned abortions. They are there for a clinical rotation to learn about abortion care. Addison tells them she has been to some of the states they are from and has seen the desperation and heartache of women there and has even seen lives lost due to abortion restrictions. The fellows are excited to begin, while Mika and Blue watch from the other side of the room and discuss wanting to join to work with Addison.</p><p>Elsewhere, Lucas is presenting a patient named Jessica to Nick and Maggie. Jessica has pulmonary fibrosis and is having a single lung transplant from a direct donor, who happens to be her boyfriend. Yes, Nick is finally back after a three-episode reprieve, yet they never mention why he hasn’t appeared the last few weeks. Jessica tells the doctors her boyfriend offered to donate his lung to her, but her mom doesn’t think it is a good idea. Maggie tells Lucas to alert her when the donor finally arrives.</p><p>Down in the ER, Owen asks the nurses why the way the department is run has changed. Winston walks up and admits he changed some things while he was running the ER. Owen tells everyone that he wants to return to his old triage protocols and filing systems immediately. One of the nurses tells Owen that Winston bought them all lunch every Friday and asks if that will still occur. Owen says he is not opposed to Winston continuing to buy them lunch and walks away to help patients. </p><p>In the clinic, security officer Marcus tells Bailey that there are protestors blocking the entrance to the hospital. Bailey brushes it off since they typically get a few peaceful protestors a day, but Marcus takes her outside to show a troubling scene of a non-peaceful mob screaming at the hospital while hoisting harshly-worded signs in the air. The day just went from decent to horror show without any of the doctors realizing it yet.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">WHAT'S THE PROTOCOL?</span></h4><p>Owen and Jules are on their way to the ambulance bay to meet a patient coming in with blunt force trauma. He asks if she paged Winston, and Jules states she didn’t know she should page him now that Owen is in charge. Owen instructs her to call the attending due to the type of injury, so Jules complies. Owen meets the ambulance, and the EMT tells him the patient is 24-year-old Ryan, who has sustained multiple rib fractures from a car accident.</p><p>Blue and Mika have decided to stick around the clinic and help out there for the day. They go to help their first patient with a medical abortion and find two women playing cards on a hospital bed. The interns think the one woman, who is clearly very pregnant, is the one asking for the abortion, and they ask her how many weeks pregnant she is. The woman, Andrea, answers that she is 34 weeks pregnant, so Blue says they can only do a medical abortion in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. Mika says they can’t do a surgical abortion at this point either. The friend chimes in that the abortion is actually for her, which relieves the interns. She is six weeks pregnant and wants to abort. Mika and Blue say they will do an exam and then give her medication. The friends ask if the protests are going to happen all day, as they can eerily hear it in the background. Little do they know the shouting is the least of their concerns.</p><p>Bailey and Addison call Teddy, and the former complains that it took eight calls before the chief of surgery picked up. Teddy apologizes and says Richard is helping her with budget stuff, and we see them in her office on the call together. Addison tells Teddy and Richard that she knows the protestors are there for her. Bailey says security wants to close the clinic for the day and that there are at least 100 protestors. They want to know what they should do, which is the purpose of the call. Teddy thinks for a minute before deciding the clinic should stay open and security should call for backup. </p><p>Maggie finds Nick in an imaging suite and isn’t happy to learn Lucas hasn’t uploaded Jessica’s pre-op scans yet. She asks how he is, and Nick replies he has been good but busy. He has been picking up organs all over the country this week, which he is obviously doing to keep his mind off the Meredith moving away situation. Maggie asks if he has plans to travel to Boston. Nick wants to go to Boston and says he gets a text once a week from Mer about how she is getting lost in the city’s streets. Maggie knows Mer is overwhelmed and admits she is only getting updates from Zola. Nick blurts out that he told Mer he loved her and she pretended she didn’t hear him. Maggie assures Nick that Mer is complicated and that he makes her happy, so he shouldn’t give up on her. Lucas comes in to announce he just uploaded Jessica’s scans and apologizes for getting distracted by house things. Maggie chastises him and says he can’t get distracted if he wants in on the surgery.</p><p>Back in the ER, Winston, Owen, Simone, and Jules are treating Ryan. Winston has found displaced rib fractures and a hemothorax. Simone goes to log Ryan into the hospital’s system and finds out he was on the schedule for a lung transplant today. It turns out Ryan is Jessica’s donor! Ryan starts to crash, and the attendings announce they need to intubate and get him straight to the OR. Winston makes a pit stop in Jessica’s room before going to the OR to tell the patient the bad news about Ryan. Maggie and Nick are there too, and Jessica cries as Winston tells her Ryan’s lungs were damaged. Jessica tells them he goes by RJ and starts coughing when she can’t catch her breath. Maggie and Nick say RJ can’t give his lung to her that day and might not possibly ever be able to donate now. Jessica is only worried about RJ and not herself. She asks them to do whatever it takes to save him, while her mom doesn’t care at all about RJ and only wants to know how fast he was driving.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">STRESS LEVELS THROUGH THE ROOF</span></h4><p>We get a montage of Carina, Addison, and Bailey teaching the fellows about abortions followed by Mika giving her patient the medication for an abortion with Jo supervising. Jo tells the patient she can take time to think about it when she hesitates, but she just doesn’t like pills. She is sure that she isn’t ready for a kid yet and justifies the decision to herself by saying she can’t be a mother, but she can be a great aunt to Andrea’s baby. The patient takes the pills and is happy with her decision.</p><p>Lucas is on the phone at a nurse’s station still trying to pay the gas bill. Maggie finds him, and he quickly hangs up. She wants him to come up with a plan to help Jessica since she isn’t getting a transplant that day. Maggie states Jessica will remain on the UNOS list, and they need to send her pre-op scans and labs to them to confirm her status hasn’t changed. Amelia happens to witness the conversation and comes over to see if he is okay. Lucas explains he is overwhelmed and needs the passcode for the gas company. Amelia tells him Mer and Maggie were in charge of utilities, so he will have to ask Maggie. Lucas doesn’t want to since she is already annoyed with him and asks his aunt to ask Maggie for him. Amelia tells him no because she doesn’t want to get involved.</p><p>While Jules and Simone are scrubbing in for RJ’s surgery, the latter complains about her living situation. Jules offers to have Simone stay at her place whenever she wants, which is the first time we are hearing that Jules is not living in the intern house. Jules quips that Simone would like her roommate because she wouldn’t want to sleep with her. Simone wants to know how Jules knows about her and Lucas and admits they kissed twice. Jules says she was guessing and didn’t know until Simone confirmed it. She makes a great comment: “The kiss was that good, huh?” which gets under Simone’s skin.</p><p>Back in the clinic, Jo gives Bailey a status update on the patients. Addison then tells her that the fellows are doing great. Bailey talks about how they had 100 applicants and that one even said on the application that it would be great to be trained by Addison. She suggests they could do the program once a month if Addison wants to come back, but Bailey knows it must be hard. She knows visiting her family is a priority, but she would love to have Addison back whenever she can come. They are interrupted by a brick crashing through the window and hitting Blue in the head. It knocks him to the ground, and the stunned doctor is left with a bleeding head wound. Once they have the situation slightly under control, Teddy calls Bailey and says no one is to leave the clinic before she can come up with a strategy to safely evacuate. Richard can’t believe what is happening and asks if Blue is okay. Teddy asks what the protocol is for this type of situation, and Richard admits there isn’t one because the manual was written before Roe v. Wade was overturned and violent protests were breaking out around the country. Teddy decides to take immediate action to make sure no more bricks are thrown at the hospital or her doctors.</p><p>We then see Mika perform a neuro exam on Blue in the clinic. He must be fine because he is telling Mika that she is doing the tests wrong. He just wants a steristrip so he can get back to work. One of the female fellows comes over and apologizes for the situation. She posted a photo of herself on social media that morning with a description about the fellowship program. She thought Seattle would be a safe place because people believed in reproductive rights there. She wants to resign, but Mika gives her an impassioned speech about not letting them win by having one less doctor to help women. </p><p>In the OR, Winston, Owen, Jules, and Simone receive messages that everyone is to stay away from the clinic due to the violent protest. Winston is working to preserve RJ’s lung tissue so he can donate to Jessica at some point. Owen doesn’t think that should be the focus, but Winston wants to try a risky procedure that involves clamping off the lung to fix it. Owen urges the doctors to work quickly if they want to be successful.</p><p>Over in the clinic, Jo alerts Bailey that the patients are getting restless and that she found a trainee crying in the bathroom. Bailey calls a team meeting for all the doctors to try and settle their fears. She gives a great, classic Bailey speech that starts with why she named the clinic after her mother. She tells a story about going to the grocery store with her mom at age seven and getting stuck in line behind a young woman with a fussy baby. The woman didn’t have enough money to pay for her groceries, so Bailey’s mom paid for hers. Young Bailey asked if she knew the woman, and her mom replied that she knew her enough to know she was struggling and when we can help someone who is going through a tough time, we should. Bailey says they are all currently struggling as doctors and women’s rights advocates. They need to help one another and lift each other up because that’s how they will get through this tough time. Bailey asks Addison if she has any advice for the group since she has been on the front lines, but they are interrupted by Andrea’s friend alerting them that Andrea’s water broke. Addison quickly walks away and into a storage closet and closes the door behind her.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A HELPING HAND</span></h4><p>Nick finds Lucas and asks if he did Jessica’s discharge papers yet. Lucas completely forgot and admits as much. Nick says it is okay, and Lucas goes on a rant about not knowing what he is doing at Grey Sloan Memorial now that Mer is gone. He knows he keeps screwing up with patients, paperwork, and not paying the gas bill. It has left him wondering if he is only in the program because of his aunt and not that he deserves to be. Nick gives some great advice in saying that the things you worry about are almost never the things that go wrong. He knows Mer didn’t accept Lucas into the program out of sentimentality because she is too good for that and Lucas is too.</p><p>Bailey finds Addison crying in the clinic’s supply closet. She tells her friend about a woman who stands outside the clinic every Tuesday with a sign that says, “Please don’t do this.” The woman doesn’t yell and the sign is polite, even though it still hurts the doctors to see it. Addison rebuffs that she had to buy a bulletproof vest to protect herself. A friend also recommended getting a gun or a bodyguard because many doctors are getting attacked on the way to work. She reveals that her husband and son have to stay at his sister’s house because their house was vandalized after protestors found and leaked her personal information online. Addison says she wouldn’t do anything differently if she had the chance to and knows she can’t quit because there are patients who need the care she can provide. She feels like she is putting her family and the clinic in danger and doesn’t know how to tell new OBs that they will be okay when she isn’t. Bailey hugs and holds Addison as she weeps on the floor.</p><p>Teddy and Richard walk through the hospital’s halls and are approached by Link, who wants to know if she has heard from the clinic. Link volunteers to go check on the situation, and Teddy immediately shoots him down. Schmitt joins them, and Teddy proclaims there is too much noise for her to think. When they get to the top of the lobby staircase, they see the space flooded with people. The protestors have blocked the entrance to the clinic, so the patients with appointments for a slew of non-reproductive issues couldn’t get in. Schmitt isn’t sure what to do, so Teddy asks the group if they want to help her with a new idea.</p><p>Over in the clinic, Andrea is fully dilated and doesn’t want to push. None of the day has gone according to her birthing plan, and her best friend assures her that she is there for her. Andrea also planned for her baby to be born to sounds of joy with a curated playlist and doesn’t want the baby born with the hateful protestors screaming in the background. Bailey starts singing “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” the same song she sang to Pru at the beginning of the episode. One by one, each of the doctors, interns, fellows, nurses, and the best friend all join in, and the whole clinic eventually stops what they are doing to sing along to help out power the negativity outside too. Addison hears the joyful music from inside the closet and laughs and smiles to herself as the moment touches her.</p><p>We get a few quick cuts of all the storylines in succession to show what is happening across the hospital all at once. In the OR, RJ’s vitals are dropping, and the surgeons need to move faster to save him. Winston exclaims that there are too many tears in his lungs. Andrea’s bestie starts videoing her birth in the clinic. Jo is assisting Carina when Addison emerges from the closet to help too. She takes over when they realize the baby’s shoulder is stuck and they need to rotate her. We then see Teddy happily overseeing Richard, Link, and Schmitt giving care to the displaced clinic patients. Lucas gives Jessica her discharge paperwork to sign, but the patient wants to stick around to see RJ when he wakes up from surgery. The scene cuts to the OR, where RJ is about to code. Winston finishes the procedure just in time and removes the clamp from the lung to see if it inflates. Thankfully, the surgery is a success, much to the relief of all the doctors involved. Back in the clinic, Addison tells Andrea to push one more time and a baby girl is born. The entire clinic is thrilled that something good came out of an otherwise scary day.</p><p>RJ is now in a hospital room recovering and is still asleep and intubated. Lucas pushes Jessica inside in a wheelchair for a visit. Simone is there and tells Jessica that Winston was able to remove minimal lung tissue, meaning RJ may still be able to donate a lung to her. Jessica doesn’t care and still only wants her boyfriend to be okay. She starts talking to the unconscious RJ about their first kiss, and the camera captures a perfect awkward moment of Lucas and Simone standing next to each other. The former is definitely thinking of their first kiss and glances over at Simone, who looks like she is trying to erase the memory from her brain. Jessica tells RJ that her life changed in an instant when they kissed. Lucas swallows real hard, and Simone flees the room as it becomes too much for her.</p><p>Elsewhere, Richard finds Teddy and is happy that they didn’t have to turn patients away during the tough day. He is thrilled that Teddy never lost sight of the most important thing: keeping people safe. Richard finishes by telling Teddy she did a good job and is an excellent choice for chief. Over in the clinic, Jo gets a few texts from a harried Link asking if she is okay. She replies that she is fine and appreciates him checking. Bailey tells Jo to get Mika and Blue and the three of them need to help the incoming police stop the protestors from stampeding anyone leaving the hospital.</p><p>Upstairs, Nick finds Lucas in an imaging room. Lucas tells him the combination of medication Jessica should be on to buy her more time for a transplant, and Nick proudly tells the intern he is correct. Nick tells Lucas the story of how it took him four times to pass the MCATs and get into med school. Someone helped him figure it out, so he wants to give back too by showing Lucas the best way to present cases to Maggie the way she needs to hear it. He explains that Lucas should use fewer words, fewer details, and start with the patient’s name. It’s a nice moment to see Lucas get a new mentor, and I hope this part of the storyline continues.</p><p>As she is cleaning up for the night in the locker room, Simone gets a video call from Trey. He asks her about some wedding details, and Simone blurts out that they should get married next month. She uses the excuse of moving up the ceremony so her grandma can still come and suggests they hold the wedding in her grandma’s backyard as it would mean a lot to her and Simone. Trey is thrilled to move up the date and agrees instantly. </p><p>In the ER, Winston asks Owen if the protestors are still outside, and Owen reports that only a few are left after Seattle P.D. arrested some and pushed the rest back. Owen compliments Winston on his amazing save in the OR and suggests he stick to surgery so patients don’t suffer. Teddy walks up and Owen tells her that being chief suits her, which is further proof that these two are back on the right track.</p><p>Bailey, Addison, Jo, Carina, Mika, Blue, and the fellows go to leave the hospital for the night and are happy to see no protestors outside the clinic doors. The fellow who previously thought the brick attack was her fault stops in the middle of the street to thank Addison for teaching her. She states that she is 28 weeks pregnant herself and chose the fellowship over a babymoon. She drops her books in the street, and Addison leans down to help her pick them up. Out of nowhere, a car comes flying down the street going full speed toward the two doctors. Bailey yells at them to get out of the way, but it is too late. The car plows straight into the fellow, who rolls over the hood and roof of the car, and clips Addison, who falls and hits her head on the pavement. The car flees the hit-and-run scene, and a group of protestors come back from around the corner as the other doctors spring into action to save two of their own. </p><p>Just when I was starting to think that there hasn’t been a big medical emergency with a Grey Sloan Memorial doctor in a while, we get a shocking episode ender. I think I speak for all the fans when I say they can’t bring Addison back just to kill her off!</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-87979098794516008532023-03-23T20:43:00.000-04:002023-03-23T20:43:16.876-04:00The Flash 9x06 Review: "The Good, the Bad and the Lucky" (Just Can’t Win) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMBp20AVg4vo9dafSrlXlXL8vVDo92habGxC81lreSIOdSqng1bRSksFqi7ssjPv4PICOWjkImV7Q7D8-CiNX4ybnoDbE9gpoOdapVy_DxDqllTGt21xvMdrfWm5P841eM1k4BZS0iS89f1-jj1xNsRxB2pP9AQb5MRvxuZFkJqr6sdholMA8MlmplUg/s1200/the%20good%20the%20bad%20the%20lucky.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="1200" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMBp20AVg4vo9dafSrlXlXL8vVDo92habGxC81lreSIOdSqng1bRSksFqi7ssjPv4PICOWjkImV7Q7D8-CiNX4ybnoDbE9gpoOdapVy_DxDqllTGt21xvMdrfWm5P841eM1k4BZS0iS89f1-jj1xNsRxB2pP9AQb5MRvxuZFkJqr6sdholMA8MlmplUg/s320/the%20good%20the%20bad%20the%20lucky.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;"><b>“The Good, the Bad and the Lucky”</b></p><p style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 15, 2023</p><p>Welcome to the first of the filler weeks for this, the final season of <i>The Flash</i>! Well, I suppose calling this episode “filler” is a bit harsh. It’s nice every now and again to settle in and let the characters progress in their lives rather than focus on whatever looming threat might be holding Central City hostage. Plus, this episode is one of those ones where Barry is off screen most of the time and (as much as I like Barry) those are always a nice break from tradition.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">OH, LADY LUCK TURNED HER BACK ON ME</span></h4><p>For some bizarre reason, Becky Sharpe is narrating the beginning of this episode. This narration does not come back in any way for the rest of the hour and I have no clue why they went with this when there was plenty of opportunity to have Becky explain everything with flashbacks in linear scenes like a more typical episode. But yeah, sure, they went with a one-off voiceover at the beginning. To summarize: Becky was really lucky, her luck suddenly turned on her after she got engaged to her dream guy, and it all culminated in her fiancé getting knocked into a coma and Becky getting arrested for attempted murder.</p><p>Oh, also, Becky knows Crisis was a thing that happened, which doesn’t make sense because the Paragons from Crisis are supposed to be the only people who remember the multiverse. Gorilla Grodd and alternate-Ryan Wilder also knew about Crisis last week. I can’t figure out if the writers simply forgot that was a condition they set during the Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover or if they’re hoping we forgot. If you stop and think about it for a second, it really doesn’t make sense that so many people remember Crisis because it implies everyone is living with two realities in their heads, which I feel would cause a lot more problems.</p><p>Anyway, Cecile is called in to help Becky out with the attempted murder charge and Allegra tags along. It’s apparently been a while since the last episode, since Joe has already moved into “the country” with Jenna and it’s been long enough that Cecile has already worked out a routine for visiting them. She’s also worked up a lot of anxiety about them being away, but we’ll get to that later. Right now, she wants to quickly solve Becky’s case so she can catch a train to Joe’s place in time for Jenna’s birthday.</p><p>When the evidence against Becky stacks up even further, she, Cecile, and Allegra go to the scene of the crime: Becky’s apartment. There, the only clue they find is a poker chip that Becky says belongs to her future brother-in-law, Tony. Despite Becky already saying that Tony is the gambler in the family, he claims her fiancé, Dom, is the one with huge gambling debts and a love for the slots. He says the poker chip is from O’Shaughnessy’s Bar, which holds a regular high stakes poker game for some reason.</p><p>They go to O'Shaughnessy's but before Cecile and Allegra can investigate further, two goons show up and try to kidnap Becky. Cecile’s powers are on the fritz, which they blame on Becky’s metahuman aura of bad luck. Regardless, Becky doesn’t get kidnapped — yet. When she later overhears Cecile complaining about how Becky’s case resulted in her missing her train to Jenna, Becky gets upset, walks out, and then gets kidnapped. When Cecile and Allegra try to stop the bad guys, one of them throws a device that causes their powers to backfire and they end up getting away with Becky.</p><p>Chester figures out that the device the kidnappers used reverses dark matter metahuman abilities with some kind of crystal, but it only works once. This leads to them figuring out that Becky’s engagement ring is made from the same crystal, and since Becky never takes the ring off it’s counted as “one” use ever since she got it. I... don’t think that makes sense, but that’s not a hill I’m willing to die on. Okay, cool. They just need to get Becky’s ring away from her and it’ll neutralize the effect of the crystal and she’ll be lucky again.</p><p>But before that can happen, we have to have a character bonding beat between Cecile and Allegra. Cecile is stressed out about Joe and Jenna being out of the city and is worried that she can’t be a good mom to Jenna when she’s living away from them. She also hates how quiet the house is without them and has been sleeping in her office instead. Allegra gives Cecile the exact sort of pep talk necessary for her to solve the problems of the episode, and they head to O’Shaughnessy’s to save Becky from Tony.</p><p>Tony is playing blackjack with Becky as the dealer (why did he make her put on the dealer uniform for this?) and only one of the kidnapper dudes as the witness in this small-time “casino” set up in a bar. Why is Becky even necessary in this scenario? Why is anyone necessary in this scenario? He could just say he wins and take all the chips to cash out, or he could hold a different dealer at gunpoint and have them declare him the winner of every hand. He could just flat-out rob the place if he wanted. It’s a tiny bar with, apparently, hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash somewhere on the premises. Yeah, it’s never been more clear that the only reason why this scene is happening here is because they couldn’t afford a casino set. Which is pretty funny.</p><p>Cecile and Allegra arrive and Chester causes a distraction by shutting off the bar’s lights, giving the two of them time to run up and confront Becky and her kidnappers. Cecile uses her telekinesis to remove Becky’s ring, returning her luck to her and allowing her to swiftly overpower Tony and his goons. As it turns out, Cecile’s powers were never affected by Becky’s luck — the issues were because she was so tired and worried about her family, and Allegra’s pep talk sorted her out. Hurrah!</p><p>Allegra decides to move in with Cecile so that Cecile is less lonely. Becky’s fiancé wakes up from his coma and he and Becky presumably live happily ever after. </p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I bet the bartender (owner?) at O’Shaughnessy’s Bar really hates how popular the place is with metahumans. Sorry you own a standing set on <i>The Flash</i>, buddy!</li><li>The montage of Chester and Mark trying to figure out Khione’s powers is cute. Jaunty music and everything. Khione is an unknown, by the way. Neither metahuman nor human.</li><li>I know they don’t want to interrupt Barry and Iris’ little vacation, but Cecile worrying about getting back to Joe seems silly. Not only is Barry a call and a zip away (he can’t zoom Iris around because she’s pregnant, but he can zoom other people just fine) but Allegra can teleport. This show sure wants us to forget a lot of stuff for the sake of plot.</li><li>Khione comforting Mark and making snow fall from the ceiling was pretty! Impossible, but pretty.</li><li>“Chester, I’m gonna ask you to do something that’s a little bit shady, but, Tony’s bank records, they would be confidential—” “Got ‘em.” Hee. I love the timing on that bit.</li><li>Mmm, yeah they’re making too big a deal about knowing Nora will be Barry and Iris’s first kid. Is this when they get twins instead? Like, even The Flash can’t possibly think a child conceived three months earlier than expected would turn out to be the same child. They have to understand biology enough to get that.</li></ul><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-649303676631474492023-03-20T12:30:00.049-04:002023-03-20T12:30:00.410-04:00Great Expectations Review & Roundtable Interview [Contributor: Jenn]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN0VzVnJW4sMEBCLSouuiiE9E-8i5Wyx1Xd2tVpK2d01sid5f1PlehoZPsFqMqcAQkKCUM08PD0xyNahCUQFgUEo_KsG7uhrTK4OwzofzztO9XDWQwZe5C6Lok_2UY1YFTpCyvRBy5msrByaQJ62p5b52JdAGwq4PsuO08AjKshKJUT29UM1rttTHtXQ/s3000/GEX_102_03689r.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2045" data-original-width="3000" height="218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN0VzVnJW4sMEBCLSouuiiE9E-8i5Wyx1Xd2tVpK2d01sid5f1PlehoZPsFqMqcAQkKCUM08PD0xyNahCUQFgUEo_KsG7uhrTK4OwzofzztO9XDWQwZe5C6Lok_2UY1YFTpCyvRBy5msrByaQJ62p5b52JdAGwq4PsuO08AjKshKJUT29UM1rttTHtXQ/s320/GEX_102_03689r.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>(Photo credit: FX)</i></span></div><p>It’s a new twist on a classic tale — a coming-of-age story about an orphaned young boy who desperately wants to elevate his station in life and is given the chance to do so by an eccentric woman with seeming ulterior motives. It’s a story many of us had to read when we were in high school English class: <i>Great Expectations</i>.</p><p>As a quick aside, I did have to read <i>Great Expectations </i>in high school and have not revisited it since. Back then, in a rare English class moment, our teacher let my class vote on whether they wanted to read <i>A Tale of Two Cities</i> or <i>Great Expectations</i>. So while everyone else in the grade read the former, we read the latter option.</p><p>But whether you’ve read the book and/or seen the prior adaptations of the story, the new FX on Hulu take is one worth checking out. The miniseries kicks off on March 26, and I had the chance to watch the whole series as well as hear from its stars about the project at a press conference via Zoom. </p><p>Below is a spoiler-free look into a world that Charles Dickens built over 150 years ago and one that remains relevant today.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix5TNTXcGmRIXZlywjVim1C2VEHDmZKelFYUtVNGA3jJwP2lhXwLRBxGdp9aqyQ83EF3HXgbHoi5Q73V8vgFO_VlGftQyUlC0Xn5FFt4biEEgQq-l2Du3b8ehZMiWrbXMib1L3st_IA_2wO92hoUPkZmzB3vPiSANaxB5VJw-5_JlCr9Rl7lVRYHB-HA/s3000/01_GALLERY_PIP_0034_v4%20copy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2250" data-original-width="3000" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix5TNTXcGmRIXZlywjVim1C2VEHDmZKelFYUtVNGA3jJwP2lhXwLRBxGdp9aqyQ83EF3HXgbHoi5Q73V8vgFO_VlGftQyUlC0Xn5FFt4biEEgQq-l2Du3b8ehZMiWrbXMib1L3st_IA_2wO92hoUPkZmzB3vPiSANaxB5VJw-5_JlCr9Rl7lVRYHB-HA/s320/01_GALLERY_PIP_0034_v4%20copy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo credit: FX Networks)</i></div><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">PIP AND POWER</span></h4><p>This adaptation is led by Fionn Whitehead (<i>Dunkirk</i>; <i>Emily</i>) who brings charm and likability to the adult version of Pip while also reminding us through his performance of the dangers of acquiring power and position. We see Pip willing and able to abandon his morals for the sake of money and status as a gentleman. But there’s always a cost to his actions, and there’s always a line that Pip is unwilling to cross. That is what ultimately makes him the character we can root for and hope will discover the error of his ways before it’s too late.</p><p>Of Pip’s struggles, Whitehead said: “The thing that resonated a lot with me with Pip was this thing of … being 18 and feeling like you have to do everything on your own. And that you have to sort of forge this path and not ask for help, and not need help, and kind of repress a lot of stuff … like emotions and everything else.” He then added: “I think that is sort of a universally relatable thing for a lot of young men.”</p><p>Whitehead made some conscious choices about his character’s progression from the nephew of a blacksmith into a refined, London gentleman. “One thing I was quite keen on carrying through,” he said, “was just trying to make sure that his background came through [in] the whole piece. … For me, it felt more important to have the sort of refined gentleman speak and that way of behaving to be more of an act … that he is putting on when he’s in London. And almost trying to convince himself that he is.”</p><p>I personally think that the FX series benefits from featuring a young Pip (Tom Sweet) for the first two episodes so that we get the chance to see his evolution from child to young man and then an adult. Viewers will get the chance to see the internal and external struggles Pip has: what he wants but, most importantly, why he wants it at all. Without spoiling anything, I appreciated that the series took the time for Pip to come to terms with the person he’d become when he allowed power, status, and wealth to consume his motivations. If he was willing to get whatever he wanted, no matter the cost, who would he become? And why, even, did he want those things?</p><p>Pip’s journey is relatable, even today: we all want to be recognized and acknowledged for who we are. We all have felt shame and embarrassment at our situations. And most of us have longed for something that’s just outside of our grasp. But that’s when you realize what truly mattered to you. And what matters to Pip is love, family, and remaining true to who he is.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfcmA92NRM6GIW1M3vxK5X-VjhoUE63k3hsXT4ErbWKnRP3mTCodjyNMnZsfW1IfUh0l-62qw4b1SZ5bMogmpM7I6bsL2GqrdSB8G2lzxERG_7HVmpDnlfJbqk9lbW0GXsjEv5RRy7YDIVoJGQ59vRvQg6KsnYp76smBcEO8nYYAJ14BPQYDHjHT-dYQ/s3000/05_GALLERY_ESTELLA_0003%20copy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2250" data-original-width="3000" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfcmA92NRM6GIW1M3vxK5X-VjhoUE63k3hsXT4ErbWKnRP3mTCodjyNMnZsfW1IfUh0l-62qw4b1SZ5bMogmpM7I6bsL2GqrdSB8G2lzxERG_7HVmpDnlfJbqk9lbW0GXsjEv5RRy7YDIVoJGQ59vRvQg6KsnYp76smBcEO8nYYAJ14BPQYDHjHT-dYQ/s320/05_GALLERY_ESTELLA_0003%20copy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo credit: FX Networks)</i></div><br /><p style="text-align: center;">ESTELLA’S COMPLEXITY</p><p>The women of <i>Great Expectations</i> are complicated to say the least. Estella, played by Shalom Brune-Franklin (<i>Our Girl</i>; <i>Line of Duty</i>), is a cold, but not unfeeling, young woman who almost immediately becomes the object of Pip’s affections. In talking about how she approached the role, Brune-Franklin noted: “We really explored the idea of: you’ve been raised a certain way and told and made to believe a certain thing. But then when you start to go out into the world … for yourself, you start to see that it’s not all these things that you’ve been told. … I think there’s always sort of an internal battle of what [Estella] is feeling versus what she’s thinking she has to feel, if that makes sense.” </p><p>Estella is portrayed with this exact delicate balance in the miniseries — you can see why she speaks and approaches Pip, specifically, the way that she does because with Miss Havisham as her mother, all she’s ever known is coldness and bluntness toward men and love. This is an era where women didn’t have a say in who they married or who they became: everything was determined by status and class advantage. Brune-Franklin pointed out: “I think for Estella … pleasing Miss Havisham is her main goal. … I think that’s obviously a really toxic and horrible relationship that she’s having to navigate and grow up in.”</p><p>While there are times where Estella breaks down (because again, this is a woman with deep feelings just like everyone else), she is also doing all she can to survive a world that was not made for her — a fact even more evident in this adaptation because Estella is a woman of color.</p><p>“I think there were clues in the script,” Brune-Franklin said, “to show that [Estella] was somebody who was really hurting inside. She was somebody who was incredibly confused, had sort of been led down a very specific path, and wanted to escape from that. </p><p>“I think Miss Havisham … taught her that the colder you are and the less vulnerable you are, you’ll always have the upper hand in life. And so I think that’s how she goes to through the world. But at the same time, it’s those moments when nobody else is around [that] she allows herself to feel exactly how she’s feeling inside — which is just very, very confused.”</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1TzI5NitVlzrnsHE8QFKESNPEx0HHdl2KZ0LgDMY4x4IHxYYDSofgVdXTNNcje78o7luVYqsQUfteUh3TC30YVV11nm3z3ye6xKU9b6wfc_DBIxB9yPWMm8vI8FLY1YMLrWzvMeTswUgENf5FLOo_jwogfRACQGmBlesaTwPwDKWCS44N6jsKmw6QLQ/s3000/03_GALLERY_MISS-HAVISHAM_02_0094_v3%20copy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1769" data-original-width="3000" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1TzI5NitVlzrnsHE8QFKESNPEx0HHdl2KZ0LgDMY4x4IHxYYDSofgVdXTNNcje78o7luVYqsQUfteUh3TC30YVV11nm3z3ye6xKU9b6wfc_DBIxB9yPWMm8vI8FLY1YMLrWzvMeTswUgENf5FLOo_jwogfRACQGmBlesaTwPwDKWCS44N6jsKmw6QLQ/s320/03_GALLERY_MISS-HAVISHAM_02_0094_v3%20copy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo credit: FX Networks)</i></div><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">THE PAIN OF MISS HAVISHAM</span></h4><p>Miss Havisham, played by Olivia Colman (<i>The Favourite</i>; <i>Broadchurch</i>), meanwhile, is someone who does immense damage to those in her life because of her own pain. Her backstory is laid out clearly in the first few episodes: she was left at the altar on her wedding day and has never taken off her dress or adornments. On the costuming for Miss Havisham, Colman noted that their costume designer said: “I don’t see her as dusty; I see her as rotting from the inside.” And the costume, which is incredible, really reflects that. </p><p>Colman said that she feels sad for Miss Havisham as a woman who is unable to let go of the past and see how her anger, bitterness, and pain are hurting Estella and shaping her into a weapon to hurt others too: “I didn’t necessarily find much personally to connect with [in the character] other than I knew — I know — what it’s like to love, and I know the pain she must’ve felt when that fell apart. But I mean, to keep [holding onto] it for so long …” Colman laughed: “I mean, if she’d have a good therapist, maybe she’d have a very different life.”</p><p>But Colman was also quick to remind us that women in those days didn’t have options apart from marriage; that was the only chance to survive. “Back in those days of the full-on patriarchy … [women] were stuck. They couldn’t work, couldn’t do anything. [So to survive] it was going to have to be marriage and [Miss Havisham’s] only insight into marriage was horrendous.”</p><p>Colman concluded: “So poor Estella was sort of screwed from the offset really.”</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh07nOQExKTscp23dC9Tnt0tqgwE2b2J6KgOsgdlMNfJUT8VCxK1m8PgWfsL-X9CygsO9WOFL0XTJ7RdzSt8IpYXAy9lHdPvni8HWPgOxBTbkbmcwiym9DV74WHH35nQmghMXAWN06EfaAmbZclfvxRVHjezreyGUTkOggvq3BjduFLpnv3jRQzVvUL7Q/s3000/GEX_103_00502r.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2001" data-original-width="3000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh07nOQExKTscp23dC9Tnt0tqgwE2b2J6KgOsgdlMNfJUT8VCxK1m8PgWfsL-X9CygsO9WOFL0XTJ7RdzSt8IpYXAy9lHdPvni8HWPgOxBTbkbmcwiym9DV74WHH35nQmghMXAWN06EfaAmbZclfvxRVHjezreyGUTkOggvq3BjduFLpnv3jRQzVvUL7Q/s320/GEX_103_00502r.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo credit: FX Networks)</i></div><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A NEW ADAPTATION</span></h4><p>This isn’t series creator Steven Knight’s (<i>Peaky Blinders</i>) first stab at Dickens: in 2019, he created the miniseries <i>A Christmas Carol</i>, based on Dickens’ famous tale. It is also worth noting that Tom Hardy and Ridley Scott are credited as executive producers for this version of <i>Great Expectations</i>.</p><p>When asked about remaining true to the story while making it his own, Knight said that he set out “not to sort of deliberately … vandalize the thing in order to draw attention. Because that’s not the point. The story’s endured this long because it works. And the characters work.”</p><p>But, he also pointed out: “When Dickens was writing, he wasn’t able to write about certain things … because they were considered to be not the territory for fiction. And I wonder what Dickens would do if he had the liberty to write about the realities of what London was really like. I mean, he alludes to it in all his novels but he can never really actually go all the way into those dark places. So that’s what I tried to do.”</p><p>And this adaptation of <i>Great Expectations</i> goes dark, while taking some liberties (you’ll notice some cursing throughout the series that isn’t what you’d expect for a period piece!) with its source material. However, unlike shows that take liberties solely to shock their viewers, the changes made really enhance the storytelling. The settings become gritty, dark, claustrophobic at times. You’d be hard-pressed to find lots of hopeful sunlight in London scenes — and that’s sort of the point.</p><p>Jaggers, played by Ashley Thomas (<i>Them: Covenant</i>; <i>Top Boy</i>), echoed this about his interpretation of his character: “I think what Jaggers does is represent London.” He elaborated: “In the same way that London … and big cities, not just London, can be these cold places that people go to search and seek their dreams … you can still, in these big cities, meet people with kind hearts that love.”</p><p>Jaggers’ portrayal is so fascinating throughout this series as well. Externally calculating and ruthless, Jaggers does have a cold exterior typical of London. Pip is horrified by Jaggers’ frankness and decisions when the two first meet. But Jaggers does care — for Pip and others — and tries his best to set Pip on the right path.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNMylO9EzNYdBbLTnG_DoVITEGjSgBWZhuKZOzXbMrtMihA93XiCK3JP83CKVkH01HAup5v4pptAzLvqgMOeus2FKq4HyIKQVjexzwqHMLsySdmaDlRA5YiBAzOw0O8LW_MpJe4xaY4JemJj36BFB6XDydBKWYhYxuGkdErYdPFdCxhkTEiK8UAfisGw/s3000/GEX_102_09128r2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2250" data-original-width="3000" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNMylO9EzNYdBbLTnG_DoVITEGjSgBWZhuKZOzXbMrtMihA93XiCK3JP83CKVkH01HAup5v4pptAzLvqgMOeus2FKq4HyIKQVjexzwqHMLsySdmaDlRA5YiBAzOw0O8LW_MpJe4xaY4JemJj36BFB6XDydBKWYhYxuGkdErYdPFdCxhkTEiK8UAfisGw/s320/GEX_102_09128r2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo credit: FX Networks)</i></div><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">CONCLUDING THOUGHTS</span></h4><p>In reflecting on the series, Knight noted: “I think that when you’re writing an adaptation, you have to walk a tightrope, and I think I’ve walked that tightrope in a way that does justice to the spirit of the story while at the same time reflecting, perhaps, the way things have changed since then.”</p><p>And to be honest, I fully agree. But to know how <i>Great Expectations</i> stacks up to other adaptations and to watch these incredible performances yourself, you’ll just have to check out the series when it begins streaming <b>on FX on Hulu on March 26.</b></p><p></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-6384924833824620082023-03-16T21:19:00.000-04:002023-03-16T21:19:54.314-04:00Grey’s Anatomy 19x09 Recap: “Love Don’t Cost a Thing” (Utter Chaos) [Contributor: Julia Siegel]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEo8HxyYler1Hv4r9JBnvJ2uduwZGwbMbkvT0TXW-r1eYDHPK1mTWzXQNNOUSjySIv3PDKQyFK1XD_9BQrlSKTNnHN3mdXdNb8zYfTnZpPKSIcgPPBnBA2HoST4kzOqHrSnX3NNe6Tpr7O35CpfRiTGdAh-Qw5ncV4cP1ZXwQOOXSs9J7d9W8jtyTSng/s2100/GREYS-ANATOMY-Season-19-Episode-9-Photo-Love-Dont-Cost-A-Thing-768x512.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1400" data-original-width="2100" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEo8HxyYler1Hv4r9JBnvJ2uduwZGwbMbkvT0TXW-r1eYDHPK1mTWzXQNNOUSjySIv3PDKQyFK1XD_9BQrlSKTNnHN3mdXdNb8zYfTnZpPKSIcgPPBnBA2HoST4kzOqHrSnX3NNe6Tpr7O35CpfRiTGdAh-Qw5ncV4cP1ZXwQOOXSs9J7d9W8jtyTSng/s320/GREYS-ANATOMY-Season-19-Episode-9-Photo-Love-Dont-Cost-A-Thing-768x512.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><span><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“Love Don’t Cost a Thing”</b></div></span><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 9, 2023</div><p>Teddy is now chief of surgery, Link is dealing with the fallout from a disastrous case, and Simone’s ex-fiancé Trey is back in town. Those are just the loose ends from the previous episode of <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i> that follow through to this week. The latest hour is a complete mess and is so all over the place that it is difficult to follow at times. It is the perfect metaphor for the current season: jumping all over the place, not being able to properly service the characters and stories being told, and ultimately not knowing what direction it is heading — other than hoping repeating the past will yield positive results.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">INTERN PARTY</span></h4><p>Quite honestly, I’m not sure which of the four larger plots of the episode is supposed to be the most important. Since most scenes were so short and the story kept jumping all over the place, it is easier to lump each plot together than talk about the episode chronologically. The most time is spent with a party that Mika, Lucas, and Simone are holding at their house. The episode opens with Simone and Trey loudly arguing in her bedroom about the end of their relationship. Mika and Lucas can hear them from the kitchen and can’t believe they have been arguing for the whole 24 hours since Trey arrived. Lucas looks quite sad, so Mika urges him to keep fighting for Simone and tell her how he feels before they drink a shot.</p><p>The next scene shows Simone and Trey continuing to argue. When he says she is still too competitive, they start laughing and lay down on the bed next to each other. Simone explains she was broken when she left him and is sorry that she disappeared. Trey says he should have chased after her and wanted to. He feels he might have waited too long and asks her if he did. Simone doesn’t answer and tries to dodge the question by suggesting they go to the party and try to have fun. Trey replies that he missed her, and Simone admits missing him too. The confession prompts a make out session.</p><p>Downstairs, Schmitt and Helm are both at the party. Helm wants to get her friend laid, but Schmitt is falling asleep standing up. Mika comes over and is happy that Helm came. The camera pans through the packed house and backyard, and I was left wondering how the interns know so many people in Seattle already. Lucas goes out back and spots Simone and Trey talking. Simone asks Trey to get them drinks, so Lucas goes over to ask her to talk. She’s not sure if now is the best time and apologizes for last night. Simone admits Trey coming back is unexpected, and Lucas asks if Trey knows about Simone and himself. She assures him that she isn’t going to tell Trey anything about it.</p><p>Later on, Simone and Trey are continuing to chat outside. He comments that he likes her housemates, but he doesn’t think they are her caliber. Simone gets very defensive and asks him to not judge her people. Trey tries to explain that she is top tier and was number one in every class, so he doesn’t think she belongs in Seattle in a residency program that is falling apart. He wants her back at the top with him and thinks she could return if she stays calm and collected. Trey’s comments rightfully set Simone off, and she walks away in a huff. Lucas witnesses the storm off and follows Simone inside.</p><p>Simone locks herself in her bedroom and thinks Trey is knocking on her door. She is surprised to find Lucas there instead. She admits to not being okay, and Lucas tells her that she always looks perfect to him no matter what mood she is in. He decides to go for it and tells Simone that he knows his timing isn’t great, but even when she is upset, he thinks she is perfect. He knows how smart she is and believes she is even smarter when she is angry and goes on a spiel about his observations of her. Simone walks over and kisses Lucas. They start making out against the closed bedroom door. She takes his shirt off and then takes her own shirt off. </p><p>There’s another knock at the door, and this time it is Trey who wants to come in. Simone tells him to not come in. Trey, through the closed door, tells Simone that he loves her, and she asks if they can talk later. He continues to say that he can’t see his life with anyone else and that he will be better because she makes him better. Simone again says she will find him in a few minutes, which gets Trey to leave. Lucas dejectedly puts his shirt back on while Simone tries to explain that they were engaged and had a whole life together. Lucas asks Simone if she loves Trey, but she doesn’t answer. Lucas suggests that she talk to him and fight for him if she does love him. Simone thinks Lucas is pushing her towards Trey, but it’s not clear why she would care when she clearly still has feelings for her ex-fiancé. Lucas asks her the same question again, and when Simone still doesn’t say anything, he takes that as her answer. She tries to apologize, and he says they are good. Simone asks to make sure Trey isn’t in the hall before Lucas opens the door. When she looks, Trey is gone, so Lucas leaves. I feel terrible for Lucas, but there’s no way the sparks between him and Simone won’t bubble over at some point in the near future.</p><p>Simone comes downstairs and grabs a drink next to Mika and Helm, who are bonding over booze. Trey walks over, and Mika introduces Helm and Trey. Lucas is there too, being casual, and gets to hear more about Simone and Trey’s love story when Helm asks them how they met. Trey says he is from Baltimore and met Simone in physiology class in med school. Mika quips about hooking up with a girl in her physiology class too. Trey and Simone recall how Simone didn’t show up for class one day, so Trey brought some of his mom’s soup and notes from class to her apartment, which is when they started to fall for each other. Storytime ends with Simone and Trey going off to talk, Mika taking Helm to go see the hole in the roof, and Lucas winding up alone again. </p><p>We then see Schmitt out on the front porch sulking and trying to stay awake. A traveling nurse named Carlos comes over to talk to him and says he is only in town for a few months. Schmitt admits to not being good at parties, people, or alcohol. Carlos brought his own beer, as he doesn’t want to drink the cheap alcohol the surgical interns bought since they can’t afford the good stuff. They wind up bonding over having dramatic mothers who interfere too much in their lives. Carlos asks Schmitt for his number and to go out on a date, which Schmitt quickly says yes to.</p><p>Out back, Trey tells Simone that he will move to Seattle if that is what it takes to be with her. Simone sarcastically says his family wouldn’t forgive him, and Trey agrees with her and admits his family is snobby. He gets serious again and wants to fight to be with her. Simone says her last residency program treated her like garbage and didn’t like that he suggested she brought it on herself. Trey tries to backtrack by repeating how he hates not having her around and misses her. Honestly, he is talking in circles at this point and isn’t giving any hard facts as to why they should get back together after several months and zero attempts at contact before now. Simone talks about how it was easy for her to leave the past behind, but she did wish for a long time that he would show up at her doorstep. Trey asks what changed, and Simone looks off at Lucas quickly before saying under her breath that nothing changed. Trey gets down on one knee and proposes to Simone again. He wants her to marry him for real this time. I was surprised that Simone immediately said yes. The crowd in the backyard cheered while Lucas, who watched the proposal, took another sip of his drink and took a deep breath.</p><p>Shortly after, the party starts winding down. Lucas is sadly drinking by himself inside. Mika and Helm pop into the living room, and the intern decides to put some music on to liven things up. She starts dancing with Helm and literally drags Lucas out of his chair to get him to dance with them too. If you didn’t think <i>Grey’s Anatomy</i> was trying too hard to recreate the past, you will now after seeing a rather forced “dance it out” scene that doesn’t have a fraction of the charm as its roots. Schmitt and Carlos are making out on the porch, so we will see if that develops into anything too.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">HOW TO MAKE THE BEST DECISION</span></h4><p>The second story revolves around the most important medical case of the week. At the top of the episode, Schmitt gives Jules instructions for her overnight ICU shift before he leaves work. We see that Jules and Blue are stuck at Grey Sloan Memorial while everyone else gets to party. Blue brags about being on Maggie’s service and how he gets to scrub in on a big surgery in the morning. Richard and Maggie walk into the ICU, and Richard congratulates her on the partial heart transplant. He thinks if Maggie keeps up the impressive work, she could be a candidate for the Catherine Fox Award (formerly known as the Harper Avery Award). The interns go over to the attendings and talk over one another. Blue thanks Maggie for the upcoming opportunity, while Jules butts in that she knows all the complications of the case. Maggie tells Jules that she can also scrub in to observe the surgery if she isn’t too tired come morning.</p><p>The four doctors then go see their patient, Natalia, and her husband, Elliott, in her ICU room. Natalia has stage 2 esophageal cancer and is scheduled for a procedure to resect her esophagus. We learn that Natalia is an art teacher and has been selling her art on the side for extra money. She gets an alert that one of her paintings sold for $500, and the couple is elated at the news. Maggie explains the tests and workup that they will do that night in preparation for the surgery, and Natalia sort of protests. A few scenes later, right before Jules and Blue are about to do Natalia’s prep, the patient starts seizing. The doctors page for a neuro consult.</p><p>Richard, Maggie, Amelia, and Blue are awaiting images of Natalia’s brain. They discuss possible sudden onset seizure possibilities before seeing that the scans show a new tumor in Natalia’s brain, and it’s currently bleeding. The group talks to Natalia and Elliott in the ICU room after the scan, and Amelia explains that the brain tumor needs to be operated on immediately. Natalia and Elliott ask for a minute to talk, so the doctors exit the room. Maggie tells Richard to go home and rest, as she will stay at the hospital since she has nowhere else to be. Richard goes home for the night without complaint.</p><p>Jules and Blue go back to Natalia’s room a little while later with surgical consent forms for her to sign. Blue asks the couple how much debt they are in, as he has recognized money must be a problem for them. They explain both of their jobs cut them to part-time hours due to the pandemic, which stopped them from being able to afford health insurance. Natalia then got cancer, and they are now saddled with a mountain of medical debt. Blue suggests they consider getting a divorce to protect Elliott from inheriting the debt if Natalia dies. It might also help Natalia qualify for more aid from the state. It’s a bold statement and appears that Blue is overstepping his bounds, which is what Maggie thinks when she walks by and hears what he is pitching. After they leave the room, Maggie scolds Blue for telling them to get divorced. Blue tries to make Maggie understand that medical debt is crushing. Maggie still feels that Blue crossed a line and he should have asked her how to approach the topic first, as she could have gotten the hospital’s resources involved to help. She kicks Blue off the case for insubordination, much to his dismay.</p><p>Jules finds Elliott in a nearby waiting room and brings him a cup of coffee. Elliott tells her that Natalia asked him for a divorce, but he doesn’t want to go through with it even if it would help their situation because he takes his wedding vows seriously. Jules apologizes and can’t imagine how he must be feeling. Elliott recounts how his and Natalia’s relationship has always been easy and that they never fight. Jules says most people can only dream of having love like that. She tells Elliott that if he trusted Natalia enough to marry her, then he should trust her enough to divorce her because she is trying to protect him.</p><p>Elliott and Jules head back to Natalia’s ICU room, where Amelia and Maggie are waiting for them. Elliott brought some flowers with him, and a hospital lawyer is there too to help them file for divorce pro bono. He states he can immediately file overnight with the court. The moment is sweet enough that Natalia feels that she and Elliott are getting married again. She tells her husband that she promises to love him until her dying breath and that she is the luckiest girl in the world to be divorcing him. Elliott says their wedding vows then they both sign the divorce papers. Amelia whispers to Maggie that she has witnessed several hospital room weddings, but this is her first divorce. Natalia announces she is ready for her surgery, so the doctors wheel her away. Somehow, the divorce did feel like a wedding and was presented in a very emotionally pleasing manner.</p><p>Before the operation, Jules finds Blue and urges him to apologize to Maggie so he can scrub in. Blue refuses because he knows he wasn’t wrong, which I can’t blame him for. We get a quick montage of Natalia’s brain surgery, and it is a success. In the morning, Blue brings Natalia and Elliott some things and checks in on them. Elliott thanks Blue for his help. As he goes to leave the room, Maggie spots Blue and immediately starts yelling at him. Blue states he knows the couple's situation because he put himself through massive medical debt to save his mom, and he couldn’t see someone else go through that. Jules hears his confession from across the room and watches her friend storm off before Maggie can react. </p><p>Richard walks up and asks Maggie if everything is okay. She replies that no one is okay because everyone is in pain. She asks Richard how he knew the difference between being in a rough patch with Catherine versus it being something more malignant. Richard says he and Catherine always still had love underneath all their issues. He very poignantly states that when love dries up, that’s when you have to reevaluate a relationship. He assures Maggie that she and Winston have a lot of love and can work through their issues, but the look on Maggie’s face says she thinks the opposite.</p><p>Jules follows Blue to the intern locker room and apologizes to him for not knowing his personal connection to medical debt. Blue storms out in a huff as Mika, Lucas, and Simone walk in to start their shifts. Simone shows Jules her engagement ring and tells her the news. Schmitt pops in and yells at the interns for being late for rounds in another attempt to recreate a classic Grey’s scene. Trying to reboot a show that doesn’t need to be rebooted almost always turns out disastrous, and this show won’t last if it keeps going down this route.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">CONTENTIOUS DINNER PARTY</span></h4><p>The third plot centers on a disastrous dinner party at Owen and Teddy’s house. Teddy arrives home after her first day as chief of surgery and starts complaining to Owen about budget deficits and dealing with the fallout of Tank’s death as soon as she opens the front door. She is a bit sorry that she invited Bailey and Ben to dinner and isn’t the mood for it anymore. Owen tells his wife that Allison bit Pru at daycare again. Teddy is not mad at her daughter, but rather her husband for not telling her sooner. As they argue, the scene cuts to Bailey and Ben getting ready to leave their house. Bailey is excited to bring an apple pie that she made, but Ben isn’t sure they should bring anything since it is a big problem that Allison has bit Pru twice in as many days. While she agrees it is a problem, Bailey asks Ben if he can remember the last time they had an adult dinner with other people and without kids around. Ben quickly grabs his coat and is ready to go.</p><p>The couples exchange some friendly banter as soon as Ben and Bailey arrive. Bailey gives Teddy the pie and asks the new chief to remember the clinic in the budget. Owen asks Ben about his recent fire calls, and Ben mentions that he sits out of the larger ones these days since he has a small child at home. Owen tells Bailey that Teddy can’t stand the job they both did for years after just one day, and Ben makes his own off-hand comment about wanting a bite to eat.</p><p>Things turn back to a friendly note when the adults sit down at the table and talk about their kids while eating. Ben carries on about Tuck spending 45 minutes in the bathroom to manscape, which Bailey adds Tuck is doing because he is trying out for swim team. Bailey then mentions that Pru keeps saying she wants a dog, so Ben takes another attempt to jab at his hosts by saying they don’t need a dog nipping at their fingers and toes. Owen wants to change the conversation to adult stuff only, so he asks Bailey how the clinic has been going. She responds that it has been very busy before politely asking Owen how his medical license reinstatement is going. Bailey picked the wrong topic, as it immediately sets off Teddy, who nastily says Owen still doesn’t have a medical license and goes off on a tangent. Ben suggests they go back to talking about their kids to keep the peace.</p><p>After things calm down, Bailey accidentally brings up the wrong topic again by asking Teddy if she looked over the resumes she gave her for the open chief of trauma spot. Owen is shocked because Teddy promised him his old job back the day prior. Teddy argues that she needs to consider her options if she has to wait awhile for him to get his license back. They argue and bicker, and Teddy throws the fact that he can barely practice medicine currently in his face. Owen claps back that the chief of surgery barely practices medicine too. Teddy wins the argument by saying she is making a business decision, so he needs to grow up and deal with it.</p><p>It’s amazing that Ben and Bailey haven’t left at this point and that Teddy and Owen are still married. The latter couple bickers while they eat, which includes quips like Teddy telling Owen the hospital went under with him in charge. Ben asks Bailey if she is having fun yet, which made me laugh. The conversation turns to the biting incidents when Teddy says Allison is biting kids because she takes after her dad’s tantrums. Owen says Allison can’t take after her mom because she’s not old enough to drink. Bailey yells, “Enough!” to get them to stop and sternly tells Teddy that she can’t be chief if she can’t even handle her own relationship. Bailey rightfully points out that Teddy’s rage will quickly infect the whole hospital, so she and Owen need to get some help if Teddy wants to keep her new job. Bailey tells Ben they are leaving, and Teddy tells Owen to bite her after he mockingly suggests they have people over more often.</p><p>As they walk to their car, Bailey mentions that she has been sensing resentment from Ben for a while. She doesn’t want to end up like Owen and Teddy, so she wants to know what is up. Ben admits that he resents his wife for going back to work, which he knows sounds bad. He has never parented a little girl and is worried that he isn’t doing it right. He also misses having his wife around more. Bailey knows starting up the clinic was a big undertaking, but she has been prioritizing her family. She doesn’t understand why that isn’t enough for Ben, but we don’t get an answer on that in this episode.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A STEP CLOSER TO THE FUTURE</span></h4><p>The final plot takes place at Grey Sloan Memorial. While it isn’t totally important for this hour, it does inch us a little closer to the inevitable future that has been teased for quite a long time at this point. We start with Amelia FaceTiming with Kai and apologizing that her new place is a work in progress. She is excited that Kai is coming to visit tomorrow and finishes the call. She finds Link and asks if he can take Scout since she was just paged for a consult, i.e. Natalia’s case. Link is happy to take Scout because the whole city hates him for Tank’s death and he can’t leave without getting egged. As Link goes to make another attempt at leaving, a pregnant woman named Whitney walks into the ER and shouts that she is in labor. She was hoping her lawyer wife would be back from her trial by now. Jo comes strolling in to take over, but Whitney grasps onto Link’s hand and refuses to let him leave. She says her anxiety is usually an 8 out of 10 when she isn’t in labor and forces Link to go with her and Jo. Of course, Scout joins them too.</p><p>They get to a private room where Jo examines Whitney, who is still holding onto Link’s hand with a death grip. Scout is sleeping in his stroller, unaware of the whole situation. Jo states Whitney is six inches dilated, which makes the almost new mom even more scared about having a baby. To make Whitney feel better, Link tells her about how he is in hiding because the entire city hates him, which does seem to help.</p><p>A little later on, Whitney doesn’t think she can handle having a baby. She still hasn’t let go of Link’s hand. Link agrees with her that the world is a bad place and that parents don’t get to choose their kids. However, when he looks at Scout, he has an overwhelming feeling of hopefulness that everything might be okay. Link continues to prove he might be one of the most perfect male characters ever, and it isn’t noticed by only the viewers this time. There is a montage of Whitney giving birth, and Link stays by her side the whole time. She finally lets go of his hand after the baby is born.</p><p>The story ends with Jo and Link watching Whitney make up with her wife from outside her room. Jo comments that Link’s haircut looks nice. Amelia walks up and is surprised to see Link and Scout still at the hospital, so Link tells his ex about their night. Link decides to attempt to slip out the back door and see if he can get home this time. After he leaves, Jo tells Amelia how great Link was taking care of her laboring patient for hours like it was his job and that he didn’t even worry about his own personal crisis once. Jo wants to know how Amelia let Link go because he is perfect. Amelia responds that he wasn’t perfect for her, but maybe he is perfect for Jo. Amelia takes Scout and FaceTimes with Kai again and leaves Jo to contemplate her confused feelings.</p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-2929155155025355462023-03-13T22:03:00.000-04:002023-03-13T22:03:37.913-04:00The Flash 9x05 Review: "The Mask of the Red Death, Part 2" (Rather Rushed) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNNtumc9Rqzl2lMhuBcEut7SrMDqixsglUTmBYCDiORCrJCAcEz1RHmgV165fLon7kOvr-JSeIZE-PWTBoiBIOWjCyZ7kdaJu0vYk2rLs5DgvyLNWe-U3OeVA1ChG7gFoyx68QCZ9UDDkqWPY3B3ngNhzoXF4mDkgi594XsvJVFwKDt8ucqdTGKuzHkA/s2000/mask%20of%20the%20red%20death.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1333" data-original-width="2000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNNtumc9Rqzl2lMhuBcEut7SrMDqixsglUTmBYCDiORCrJCAcEz1RHmgV165fLon7kOvr-JSeIZE-PWTBoiBIOWjCyZ7kdaJu0vYk2rLs5DgvyLNWe-U3OeVA1ChG7gFoyx68QCZ9UDDkqWPY3B3ngNhzoXF4mDkgi594XsvJVFwKDt8ucqdTGKuzHkA/s320/mask%20of%20the%20red%20death.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“The Mask of the Red Death, Part 2”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 8, 2023</div><p>Welcome to the second part of this inexplicable two-parter, which wraps up what I thought could have been the season-long arc for the truncated final season of <i>The Flash</i>. If I needed any confirmation that this show’s pacing issues were alive and well, realizing they’re trying to fit their “Graphic Novel” split season storytelling technique (with interlude filler episodes and everything!) into thirteen episodes? Confirmation galore. I already complained last week about how they did a disservice to the Ryan character and deflated the whole Red Death storyline by not letting us get to know her first, so I’ll try to keep that to a minimum this time around.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">EVERYONE HAS A PART TO PLAY</span></h4><p>The theme for this episode is “everyone matters,” which is a kind of spiritual sequel to last week’s episode theme of second chances. Everyone gets second chances because everyone matters, see? So while the episode begins with Red Death taking over the city with red lightning, the episode actually begins with Team Flash and the Team Flash Rogues arguing over whether or not to rescue Mark, who is found to be still alive and being held captive in Red Death’s warehouse.</p><p>Khione is the one who wins everyone over in favor of rescuing Mark, since she’s powerless and like, a month old but still brave enough to volunteer to go get him. That inspires everyone else and they head to Red Death’s hideout to find Mark in bad shape. Also, it’s a trap. Of course it is. They get Mark, but Red Death shows up to zap away the rest of Barry’s speed. She also reveals how she has the psychic power to create thousands of copies of her suit around the world. She’s using them to be “judge, jury, and executioner” for anyone who breaks the law.</p><p>Okay, I lied when I said I wouldn’t complain about the plotting around Ryan/Red Death during this review. I can’t help it. The way the show has laid out this storyline is absolutely baffling. She’s obsessed with getting rid of criminals — what drove her to this? She seemed to have been working with heroes in her own universe, did a switch just flip to make her okay with murdering people left and right? It’s a zero-to-sixty situation and a lot gets left at the starting line. I think the writers figured they could get away with it by making alt-Ryan crazy, but that’s such a bad shortcut for storytelling. I mean, kudos to Javicia Leslie for playing Crazy Ryan well, but a decent performance does not a compelling villain make. </p><p>Sigh. It turns out Red Death is able to generate so many psychic copies of her suit to do her bidding because she’s partnered with Gorilla Grodd, who turned bitter toward Barry after Crisis erased his little superintelligent gorilla kingdom. What, is Barry supposed to check up on everyone he’s ever encountered to make sure the multiverse collapse didn’t negatively affect them? Barry has made many, many, many mistakes in his time as a superhero, but failing to predict how reality falls when it folds in on itself cannot be one of them. Yeah, maybe he should’ve zipped over to Africa to say hi to Grodd at some point during the last three years, but the dude’s been busy. Give him a break.</p><p>Team Flash and the Team Flash Rogues reconvene after this bombshell discovery of Grodd’s alliance and the Rogues all peace out in order to be with their loved ones while the world ends. Inexplicably, Barry takes this as a sign he was wrong to see the good in them, just as he was wrong to see the good in Grodd, and it takes a pep talk from Joe to get him thinking along more positive lines. Barry goes to talk to Grodd.</p><p>Grodd, I love that you’re making an appearance in The Flash’s final season because your existence is ridiculous and everything I adore about comics, but what are you doing, buddy? Red Death talks to you and you decide to help her take over the world with killer robots; Barry talks to you and you decide to stop helping her take over the world with killer robots. You’re the psychic gorilla version of Dean Pelton at the end of <i>Community</i>’s “Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design” episode.</p><p>Barry gets his speed back from Grodd because, and I quote: “Three years ago I gave a spark of my Speed Force to a sentient gorilla, and it was still inside his mind this whole time.” Man, I love comic book content. Where else do you get sentences like that? He heads off to fight Red Death, who is winning until the Rogues show up to help him out again. I gotta say, while the bulk of this storyline was a mess, I do really like the Team Flash Rogues. They’re easily my favorite parts of these episodes and I hope we get to see them all again before the end. </p><p>Anyway, the final person to show up and help in the fight is Ryan from this timeline, suited up as Batwoman. She’s pretty cool. It’s a shame we didn’t really get to know her within this show, but she does chat with Iris a bit so maybe they’ll become friends and she’ll show up again? Meanwhile, Red Death gets her armor taken away and she’s carted off to Iron Heights. Thankfully, this comic book universe knows how to legally handle duplicates from another timeline so the good Ryan is in the clear.</p><p>In the end, Joe decides he’s moving out of Central City (and “out to the country” that’s only a couple hours away — where is Central City supposed to be, again?) with Jenna and Cecile will visit on weekends, so they throw a going away party for him to say goodbye. It’s all very happy and the big finale is that Khione reveals that Iris is pregnant months earlier than she’s supposed to be. </p><p>Everyone is very quick to accept Khione’s diagnosis of Iris’s pregnancy as fact. Hey, guys, as far as you all are aware, Khione has no meta powers and should not know anything about Iris being pregnant. Do you want to take a trip to the drugstore before you start celebrating, maybe? Ah, who am I kidding. The script says Iris is pregnant so she’s pregnant.</p><p>See you next time!</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Goldface calls Mark “Chill-lame” and “Six-Pack Blondie” which only endears him to me further.</li><li>I encourage everyone to look up the comics version of Red Death. Much creepier, sadder backstory.</li><li>Actual Ryan: “Is it always this crazy?” All the Rogues, shrugging: “It’s a Wednesday!” Cue freeze frame. Audience applause. Tune in next week for more episodes of <i>Team Flash: Roguin’</i>. Filmed in front of a live studio audience.</li><li>Chester and Allegra finally get together. Great! Why did that take so many episodes?</li><li>If Iris is pregnant early, there’s technically no way their kid(s) are going to be the ones we know. We are all one-in-a-billion chances of existence and if timing is off by so much as a minute we cease to be, and become someone else entirely. Isn’t that interesting to think about?</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6678481478994191244.post-15012549538602996612023-03-06T19:49:00.000-05:002023-03-06T19:49:14.370-05:00The Flash 9x04 Review: "The Mask of the Red Death, Part 1" (New Villain, Old Problems) [Contributor: Deborah M]<div style="text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFxQrerpRjuRlBQ7_Qb1u4njDeIdgil6Mjoa0YaqOMEG3pa7z86DEpUeb7xSOCow78GcHKBZz4MBlMu5SbTU-BhV7Eg-Rglo0fciAEJ3h2fuEtsr8eufFkeMfcybU-MmniitVZMxYtqt0HxUcP-KmiIAB9fu6qFnZ9QfyLOLOExDzQYJyCYVpCgO7FJQ/s512/unnamed.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="342" data-original-width="512" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFxQrerpRjuRlBQ7_Qb1u4njDeIdgil6Mjoa0YaqOMEG3pa7z86DEpUeb7xSOCow78GcHKBZz4MBlMu5SbTU-BhV7Eg-Rglo0fciAEJ3h2fuEtsr8eufFkeMfcybU-MmniitVZMxYtqt0HxUcP-KmiIAB9fu6qFnZ9QfyLOLOExDzQYJyCYVpCgO7FJQ/s320/unnamed.png" width="320" /></a></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>“The Mask of the Red Death, Part 1”</b></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">Original Airdate: March 1, 2023</div><p>Is the title of this two-parter clever or predictable? It really rides the line. Just like this episode rides the line between interesting and frustrating. In “The Mask of the Red Death, Part 1” Team Flash learns a little bit more about Red Death while I start to realize that the pacing issues of this show are definitely going to last well into the eleventh hour. This one came like a thief in the night to steal my patience, let me tell you.</p><h4 style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">I HAVE QUESTIONS</span></h4><p>The episode begins with Red Death/Ryan Wilder intimidating her crew of criminals with more Batman quotes, calling them a “superstitious and cowardly lot” before going off and pulling in a random rogue to help her kidnap Barry. The new member of Team Red Death is Roy Bivolo, a.k.a Rainbow Raider, who overwhelms Barry with fear while Red Death causes a city-wide blackout. Credit to the show: the sequence of Red Death zapping out all the power in Central City is pretty cool looking.</p><p>Once nabbed, Barry gets a meta-dampening cuff and some chains to keep him in place while Red Death monologues. Barry finally learns that Red Death is female and also learns that Iris has a role to play in the scheming. Parallel to this scene of Barry and Red Death, Ryan Wilder shows up at the West-Allen apartment seeking Iris’s help with an injury she claims was caused by the EMP that knocked out Central City’s electronics. Just before the viewer can go, “Hey, wait a minute—” the Red Death talking to Barry is revealed to be a remote-controlled suit.</p><p>Okay, that’s a really neat idea, but wouldn’t it have been better if Ryan were introduced early on, making viewers doubt she was Red Death, and then doing a big reveal at an opportune moment? You could string viewer interest and intrigue along while also letting non-<i>Batwoman</i> fans get to know this character. Removing the mystery from Red Death right off the bat (no pun intended) deflates all the drama and tension from the plotline as a whole, and quickly ruins what would otherwise be a handful of compelling concepts. This is why there’s a general writing rule that your audience should not be a step ahead of your characters, which audiences of <i>The Flash </i>have been since pretty much the start of this season.</p><p>Anyway, Ryan tells Iris that she, too, was attacked by Red Death and had all her Batwoman gear stolen, conveniently explaining the Wayne technology Red Death has been handing out to low-tier villains. Iris, because she’s a smart cookie, is obviously suspicious and that suspicion only grows when Ryan starts walking around the apartment like she’s super familiar with it despite having never stepped foot in the place. Iris pulls a gun that looks like a Star Trek phaser on Ryan because her story is suspicious, and Ryan confesses she’s from another timeline where the Flash is “the world’s greatest villain”.</p><p>Ryan pleads her case, but her story is falling apart even as she’s telling it. Alternate-universe Iris and the Flash were a couple and Iris and Ryan were best friends, but the Flash went evil? But the Flash only went evil after Ryan started copying technology from heroes and villains alike? But Ryan was good the whole time even though she was playing with artificial speed forces and pre-arresting villains via time travel? Ryan was just an innocent victim of the Flash’s pointless rage and accidentally got spit out in this timeline when she tried to hide in the Speed Force but all she wants to do is return to her own timeline? Yeah, none of this is adding up and it’s no surprise that Iris doesn’t buy it.</p><p>The only thing Iris believes is that Ryan accidentally killed her timeline’s version of Iris, and when she lays out all the ways Ryan’s story is bunk, Ryan attacks and disarms her. Ryan calls her Red Death suit to her, the pieces flying in and assembling on her body one by one. I assume the show was hoping I’d be so wowed by those special effects that I wouldn’t question how the suit phased through walls to get inside the apartment. Sadly, that was not the case.</p><p>Iris gets dragged to the Red Death warehouse, where the completed cosmic treadmill is waiting for its power source: Barry, who will run himself to death and create a wormhole for Ryan to travel through. Ryan threatens Iris in order to incentivize Barry into running and if you’re wondering how they could precisely tune this cosmic treadmill to this particular Ryan’s timeline/reality, stop. Stop wondering that. Wondering things like that makes the writers uncomfortable so shhhh. Also off limits: thinking about how, if all Red Death’s crew needed was for Barry to run on a cosmic treadmill, and all they needed to do to make that happen was kidnap/threaten Iris, why did they bother building a completely new cosmic treadmill instead of using the one that already existed? </p><p>Was it, perhaps, because... the plot needed it to happen? Heyo, one of my least favorite things to write in a <i>The Flash</i> review two episodes in a row! This final season is shaping up nicely, folks.</p><p>Thanks to a little pep talk about second chances earlier in the episode, Mark double-crosses the team he double-crossed Team Flash for and overloads the treadmill’s capacitors, throwing the energy at Ryan and knocking out her artificial speed/the Red Death suit. Team Flash’s rogues show up for… really no reason, since they have to escape again right away, leaving Mark behind to (presumably) be killed by Red Death’s crew. Is he actually dead? Unclear. Would I care if he was? A resounding no. Allegra uses her teleporting powers to get Team Flash back to STAR Labs, where they proceed with the kind of tense final recapping of events only a two-part episode can deliver. The gist is, Red Death will probably hate this Barry just as much as she hates her timeline’s Barry and they should be ready for everything to get worse.</p><p>And yeah, Ryan seems pretty darn angry at the Flash. She embraces her supervillain status and decides, since Barry ruined her chances of returning to her own world, it’s time to take over this one. As one does. Look, I don’t want to get in the way of a good villain world-conquering, but once again I must remind everyone that a cosmic treadmill still exists and she could totally try her scheme again if she really wanted. It gets put on freaking display in a public museum in 2049.</p><p><b>Other Things:</b></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Note to self: add “hella awk” to my vocabulary. It’s just stupid enough to be fun.</li><li>It’s nice that so many Central City villains learned ASL so they could keep Murmur in the loop.</li><li>“Her suit’s recharging, we gotta go!” — Jaco, who literally just showed up, had no idea who Red Death was, and would not have realized the suit needed to recharge. Excellent writing, <i>The Flash</i>!</li><li>Khione to Goldface: “I do not like you.” Have him tell you about his book club, Khione. It’ll win you over.</li><li>Chester and Allegra continue to annoy me with their relationship waffling.</li><li>Well, that “Joe wants to leave Central City” plot went nowhere. Turns out they’re not moving after all.</li><li>How much do you want to bet the theme of second chances we got in this episode will circle back around?</li></ul><p></p></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0