Kyle’s Review

Archer has made and remade themselves countless times in the last couple of seasons. They don’t hold back when it comes to placing their characters in compromising positions. This week’s episode was the conclusion of “Drastic Voyage,” and to make a long story short, it didn’t end well for the ISIS gang. Sterling went off on a self-indulgent rampage, Ray got crippled again, and Lana didn’t get the support she needed from Sterling, or Malory, as a new mother but just when the show looked like it might fall into familiar ground, we caught a glimpse of what might be another complete reboot like last season’s Archer: Vice.

I admit. I got lulled into a false sense of here-we-go-again, and then everything turns upside down. The gang’s out of options and they turn to Archer for wisdom—never a good idea—and he says that he has some ideas. What a cliffhanger. I can’t wait to see what cockamamie plan—or plans—Sterling comes up with for next season. Just when Archer started to show some wear, it proved it still has legs.

Verdict:

A great twist ending leaves me hungry for the next season of Archer.

Kyle’s Review

I think this Wesen of the week played better than last week’s—but not that much better—while the ongoing stories grew stale. We’ll get to the Wesen of the week in a bit but let’s check in with Juliette, Adalind, Renard, and Nick first.

The Juliette and Nick story marked time. Juliette officially moved out but she was already gone before this week, so this wasn’t a surprise. I still don’t buy her animosity toward Nick. I guess she blames Nick for becoming a Grimm again but she was the one that insisted he regain his Grimm powers. He’s trying to make it work, while she’s pushing him away after all they’ve been through. It doesn’t work and I see the creative team thrusting the two back together artificially in the not so distant future. Then, I wonder who cares about Adalind’s baby?

With Adalind pregnant with Nick’s baby, she’s all but abandoned her missing child for trying to find a sugar daddy. Thankfully, the royal family put the kibosh on that but Renard already doesn’t want to find their child and now it looks as though Adalind doesn’t either. That leaves the royal family as the only ones giving a squat about the Adalind and Renard kid. Of course, we got more of Renard’s near-death experience this week but this story never worked for me. Juliette’s hexenbiest side effect happened close to enacting the spell but Renard’s spell side effects took half a season. Sure, this is a fantasy but fantasies aren’t devoid of logic: they have their own internal logic and Grimm abandoned it with this story line.

Finally, we come to this week’s Wesen. She’s a tragic one—and that’s always preferable to the mean-spirited Wesen—but Grimm took on battered women again. That’s not a bad thing but the show has done this story once, or twice, every season, so it had to bring something interesting to the conversation and it didn’t. The resolution was too on the nose and the woman finds love after losing her Wesen-ness, which in turn, made her look like she had a face tattoo and the only person who could love her in return was a man with a face tattoo. Again, this was a little too on the nose. While Grimm shouldn’t retire the battered woman story, they should find a new angle for it. And I must say that I loved Grimm’s story arcs against bigotry this year. I can’t help but see moments where they could reintroduce Monroe and Rosalee’s turbulent lives into a story, because the Wesen of the week lends itself to drawing parallels to these two, and this week was no exception. My only hope is that Grimm doesn’t tease us with this all year with no follow through. It doesn’t have to be right away. I can wait until the season finale.

Verdict:

One of the weaker episodes this season, let’s hope Grimm finds a way to make their ongoing arcs relevant and reintroduce one that worked well earlier this year.

Jim’s Review

Well, last week’s Arrow was borderline bad. The Suicide Squad plot was tacked-on, and Ray and Detective Lance behaved erratically, and without believable motivation. This week was a much better episode, but unfortunately, I’m still struggling with Detective Lance’s character development. I get that he’s angry that his daughter’s death was kept from him, but he’s continuing to let anger cloud his judgment, and that can only go so far before it affects the way an audience will see him. His refusal believe the Arrow is being set-up makes no sense, really, and it’s hurting the show.

With that said, the big development with Ra’s and Detective Lance represents a big chance the show is taking, and that’s going to help keep things fresh. Of course, Roy changed things in the end, but it was still enough of a bombshell to know that things with Team Arrow can’t be the same anymore. It’s risky storytelling, and even if it doesn’t go where we may be hoping, risky is interesting.

I can’t say I’m very invested in the romance angle between Felicity and Ray, and their subplot was mostly forgettable, but the league’s interference in Starling City, and Ollie’s changed standing with the SCPD may be the sort of kickstart this season has needed.

Kyle’s Take

Last week’s episode wasn’t borderline bad, it was a 100%, genuine-article bad, and I guess it’s better late than never to have a kickstart to Arrow’s season. But kickstarting the season this late reminds me of the Star Wars prequels. (Paraphrasing George Lucas) You have enough story for one movie and you put three-quarters of the story in the last film.

Having The Atom occupy the same city as The Arrow is risky storytelling—and it’s not working. The Atom possesses similar clout (as Green Arrow) in the DC Comics Universe, owns Ollie’s business, has proven talent Brandon Routh portraying him, and wants to convert Starling City into Star city—I know they dropped this story arc, but for how long?—and the Star City Palmer has planned won’t include The Arrow.

The only reason The Arrow exists is because the show’s named Arrow and he has to exist. The creative team doesn’t have a lot of options, so they threw in a lot of turns to try and reboot the show, but a TV show isn’t NASCAR. You can’t drive really fast and make a lot of left turns in order to get to the same place you were when the race began. That’s not even how NASCAR works, really, so you end up with the nonsensical Detective Lance and an ill-fated League of Assassins story.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Arrow pulled a Spartacus and have every member of Ollie’s team claim that they’re The Arrow, and then the entire Glades joins them: “We’re the Arrow.” This show and The Flash have a lot of cast members from TV’s Spartacus. Despite all that, I do like that they’ve taken all of these chances—even though most of them haven’t worked—but there’s little chance this arc ends well. I’ll try to erase it when we enter season four (and I think that’s what the creators are trying to do with these NASCAR turns).

Well, there is a precedent in the comics for Ollie giving up his identity in a public forum–you’ll have to check out our secrets page–and I hope that Ollie turning himself into the police sticks. If the Spartacus thing I described actually happens in the coming weeks, I may have to change my underpants.

Verdict:

This week’s episode was better than last week’s but that’s not saying a whole lot. Let’s hope that Team Arrow can right the ship.

Do you want more Arrow? Check out our Arrow Secrets page.

Jim’s Review

This week’s episode was a pretty nice balance between the villain-of-the-week format and the sort of show that advances the bigger plot threads. Mark Hamill did well as The Trickster. Let’s face it, the character is not easy to portray without being over-the-top campy, or a complete Joker rip-off, but Hamill was good. The, “I am your father” Easter Egg was surely a thrill for some, but I have to admit I cringed. It’s not that I’m dead inside, it’s just that I thought it was a bit of a reach for that one.

Barry coming to suspect Harrison Wells feels a little sudden, and I’m not sure how well they’ve sold it. Barry’s realization that Wells was speaking of the speed force from experience was relatively well-executed, but I have a hard time buying that Wells would have slipped quite that easily.

Finally, the revelation about Wells’ origin, his true identity and the reason for his sketchy past were a genuine surprise. I’m really not sure what they’ll do for (or to) the long-term plot of the series, but it’s definitely interesting. If nothing else, it’s the sort of significant development that makes me excited for what’s left of the season, and it was another solid installment of the show.

Kyle’s Take

I chuckled when I saw that Mark Hamill would reprise his role as The Trickster months ago. I figured that the inclusion of a character as zany as The Trickster would mean that The Flash wouldn’t take itself too seriously, and it hasn’t—for the most part. I agree with Jim. Hamill did a good job, and I groaned when I heard Hamill deliver the “I am your father” line. They only did that to tie into the up-coming Star Wars movie. Ugh.

The balance between the villain-of-the-week and the larger story arc worked, but I wanted more. I’ve gotten used to The Flash’s formula, and we are getting toward the end of the season, so I’d like to see this one-trick pony show us a different trick. You don’t have to break the entire series, and it’s okay to continue with this formula through the end of this season, but I’d like to see at least a small shake up at some point. The Flash has some villains running loose—Gorilla Grodd and The Pied Piper—and I think these could be more than just villains-of-the-week. But enough about the weekly baddies, let’s talk about the ongoing story arc.

I agree in spirit with what Jim said about Barry and Wells, but I think we need to make a distinction. The Flash has sold Barry suspecting Wells as a not-so-nice person (as soon as Iris’s mentor started tailing Wells, he died), but it hasn’t sold Wells as the Reverse-Flash—that’s the sticky widget. I agree that Wells wouldn’t have let the Speed Force slip that much and Barry shouldn’t know that Wells is the man who killed his mother, yet.

I’m also not as on-board with Wells’ origin as Jim. It didn’t add anything we didn’t already know. So what if Thawne killed Wells and then took over his face and role? He assumed an identity instead of creating one from scratch. Big whoop. I guess he upset the space-time continuum by killing Wells and his fiancée, but we knew he did something or things already. He’s been talking for months about restoring and upholding the timeline. And let’s not forget that the item Thawne used to take Wells’ identity was the same one he used to merge Firestorm’s two personalities into one body. I hope I’m wrong and that there’s more to this.

Verdict:

Another great episode that leaves enough reserved but built toward the season’s climax.

Check out our The Flash secrets page here.

Kyle’s Review

We learned what happens when a zombie goes several days-weeks without eating brains: they turn into the mindless monsters we all know and love. Unfortunately, that meant that Live had to rid the world of one of those brutes, a friend she knew from medical school, and she didn’t even feel remorse because of the brain she ate for dinner earlier.

I like that we saw a negative effect from one of the brains Liv consumed. Up to this point, the inclinations she’s gained from others have proven to be, at worst, mild inconveniences. This week’s sociopath of a hired gun’s brain made her heartless toward others. While this helped with her deal with the rejection from her former fiancée (I’m still not sure he’s the love interest that others have hinted at in this show), she alienated her friends and killed her former friend-turned-mindless-zombie with no remorse. As you can imagine, Liv had visions from the killer’s point of view and that was a nice twist.

Well, the killer whose brain Liv ate killed this week’s victim, but he was hired by another character. Liv has to deduce who the financer is and brings him to justice. She does so, but not before mucking up her unlife.

I continue to enjoy iZombie. It isn’t heavy stuff but it doesn’t have to be.

Verdict:

Another strong episode with a good twist.

Kyle’s Review

Powers took a reflective step back this week. They built up Wolfe for a couple of episodes and now that he’s in The Shaft (superpower prison) again, the creative team has the time to see how his escape has affected the other major players. That’s a risky move. Viewers have grown accustomed to Powers’ fast pace (from episode three and beyond) and to Wolfe as an unspeakable evil, but to remove both at the same time—when both are working—took guts. And it worked—for the most part.

I’m glad I was wrong and that Triphammer’s still kicking. He put a fine point on depending too much on the drainer that saps the supervillains’ powers, while sowing the seeds of a new threat. Powers is playing this new baddie close to the vest, but it could be worse than Wolfe—or somehow connected to him. We’ll have to see how this plays out.

We got a lot of airtime and background from Johnny Royalle’s clone-popping henchman Simons and we see why he’d give the potentially life-threatening Sway to Calista. I also liked the focus on Krispin. His power hate serves as a good counter-weight to Calista power worship. But outside of these three developments, the rest of the episode was either just good or flat.

Sharlto Copley (Agent Walker) and Susan Heyward (Agent Pilgrim) have zero chemistry. That’s a shame. I liked Copley in District 9 and I can tell that Heyward’s a good actor too, but they don’t go well together. It’s painful and it makes me wonder what in the audition process made you think that these two actors played off each other well? Wolfe (Eddie Izzard) sounded wooden at episode’s end. I’m not sure how that’s possible and that could be the first time I’ve ever seen Izzard that lackluster—I think the dialogue had a lot to do with that. And the whole A-lister powers versus lesser ones didn’t sit well. The exchanges between characters felt clunky and I could’ve done without that much exposition.

Still, Powers retained some momentum as they only have a few more episodes until the finale. I hope we see more Johnny Royalle.

Verdict:

Powers took a bit of a step back this week but it’s still not as bad as its first two episodes.