shallowness (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shallowness) wrote2022-03-06 02:16 pm
shallowness) wrote2022-03-06 02:16 pm
Entry tags:
Mostly Scorpion season 4 disc 4
I’ve seen the trailer for Fantastic Beasts 3: Dumbledore’s Something, and I’ve got two thoughts:
First, will we end up wondering why they didn’t cast Mads Mikaelson in the first place? I remember feeling, even before the domestic abuse stuff came out, that we were trading down from Colin Farrell to Johnny Depp.
Second, where were all the women? There must have been a glimpse of Tina and there was a glimpse of Queenie, and I’m glad Minerva had some lines, and there was a new character, but it was mainly all men, and if Newt is the main character of the franchise and you’ve got your Canonical Slash Pairing and decide to make little guy/ordinary Joe/muggle Jacob a big part of this fill, that will crowd out all the women (and fantastic beasts.)
Having said that, I doubt that I’ll see it in the cinema – I’m going to miss The Batman and the opportunity to rank it among the other Batman films, even though it features Catwoman and an intriguing cast. But it sounds like its aesthetic is not very me friendly ATM.
But disc 4 of Scorpion season 4:
I liked ‘Wave Goodbye’ less than ‘The Hunker Games’ and ‘Lighthouse of the Risng Sun’, and I liked ‘Nerd, Wind and Fire’ more than the other three.
‘The Hunker Games’ handled Walter’s issues with his ‘dream’ well; he felt guilty, and was awkward, not quite following Toby’s advice and ended up freaking Flo out and enraging Paige.
A crazy AI locks the smartest members of the team, Flo (and it’s unknown whether she’s a genius) and a married couple (I’ll get to them) in a bunker. Walter had created his own (annoying) AI, which would satisfyingly get smashed by a hammer.
Cabe has issues with the fitness test he’s required to take to regain his job as Homeland liaison and ensure it doesn’t go to someone younger, so the jock of the team, Paige, is helping him. Meanwhile the belated Quintis honeymoon did not go as well as Toby had hoped, so he’s disgruntled not to get invited along to the latest high-paying job (he turns up anyway) because the clients have their own behavioural expert, who just happens to be the man who stole Toby’s ex-fiancée, who is also there, all gorgeous and making Happy feel inadequate. They’re the couple.
The bunker’s AI recognises Toby as a threat and goes into lockdown, meaning that those stuck inside have to work together to try to escape before the air runs out. Then some ‘help’ from Paige and Cabe makes the AI get offensive and the danger ratchets up. Toby’s nemesis is a jerk, while Toby’s ex reassures Happy that she isn’t a consolation prize for Toby.
Teamwork and exceptional bravery from Toby save the day. Quintis aren’t going to be the married couple divorcing after this ep, and Happy is particularly ace. There’s more than enough conflict and silliness going on.
I hearted ‘Lighthouse of the Rising Sun’ a lot, although it’s daft. Ralph is trying to impress Patty, Walter reluctantly has to wrangle that situation and ‘the science kids’ in the garage.
Quintis and Cabe/Allie have double booked the same romantic lighthouse. Quintis are trying to make a baby, while Cabe has FINALLY reached the point where he’s working up to telling Allie he loves her.
Paige has been a bit short with Flo after Walter’s unfortunate revelation that in the alt world his brain conjured up, he was married to Flo and kissing her. After Paige rightly lectures Walter and Sly for their terrible childminding, Sly rightly calls her out on bullying Flo because of her own insecurities. Those kids are from the science club Alderman Sly was all for establishing, and Walter is trying to do one of his explaining a science thing videos with them. One of them, called Meatball, is particularly not intellectual, but becomes a quasi-Ray figure (and the one person who will spoil Waige alone time after the chaos has subsided.)
A solar storm hits SoCal, Scorpion offer to help the authorities however they can and Homeland asks them to bring down a seaplane safely, because normal systems are out. It turns out it’s being flown by a teenager trying to impress his girl!best friend (they are cute) with barely any expertise in landing or night flying. Things are falling off the plane after their first attempt at landing, using all Sly’s old stuff and the lighthouse can offer.
Despite some insensitive truth bombs, mainly from Walter, Ralph, 13, slightly impresses Patty, now 16. The flyboy inspires Cabe to declare his feelings for Allie, who reciprocates (don’t call her ‘kid’, though, Cabe.) Young Meatball comes through with a spectacular way of saving the kids, when he isn’t demolishing food, and Paige apologises to Flo.
Perhaps fittingly, given what happens to the tsunami, ‘Wave Goodbye’ builds up energy then dissipates. Quintis and Waige are psyching themselves up for a garage-based Mr & Mrs game called ‘Query, My Dearie’. As Paige says after, they really are overinvolved in each other’s lives, because everyone has an opinion about when Waige’s first kiss was (a practice question), which Walter and Paige are counting differently. I agreed with Walter on this, but stinkeyed him when he claimed that Cabe ought to back him up as a fellow man and he was still raising it when they were in moral peril.
Toby talks himself out of going to Mexico for their job – AND LIES – because his ex is in rather contrived trouble. Sly couldn’t go because he was queuing at a book signing by Not!George R.R. Martin, which meant he saw Toby sneaking off with Amy, and eventually revealed this to Happy, who does most of the action heroics when Scorpion’s job of patching up a reactor has to be sped up because there’s a tsunami coming after an earthquake. Scorpion realise they have to stop the tsunami, using what’s only a theory, to save 10,000 Mexicans and themselves, because they wouldn’t fly out for safety.
The contrived trouble was that Amy’s identity was stolen because her now ex-husband continued to be a jerk. To help, Toby had to get back in touch with old associates AND GAMBLE, while not answering Happy’s calls. I was a bit worried about Quintis, although was Toby ever really out of control? And Happy wasn’t jealous about Amy??
Waige made up over the first kiss rift, although they failed to anticipate the incredibly obvious first question in their match-up against Quintis, and unsurprisingly lost to the initiators of the high five without looking. But that wasn’t as daft as Cabe blackmailing Not!George R.R. Martin to come to the garage to sign Sly’s book. The daftness undercut the real tension that was building up (and I’m not talking about the fundamental ridiculousness of Scorpion vs. the tsunami, which the team are almost blasé about, referencing the dam episode before the viewer can.)
They only gradually reveal that ‘Nerd, Wind and Fire’ is a Valentine’s Day episode (Paige is an absolute sucker for all the holidays, isn’t she?) She’s trying to hide the fact that she has the flu to Sly’s disgust, he’s even more disgusted when he’s ordered to stay in the garage with her to monitor wind speeds, because strong winds have trapped a helicopter carrying a superspecialist doctor who’s the only one who can save a patient’s life.)
Also in the garage is Raph, who’s been asked by Patty to tutor her date, so he’s sufferin from heart crushing. Walter (and Sly and Flo) notice Ralph is teaching bad maths to the jock (he’s so dumb, he makes Walter namecheck Drew.) Ralph sasses them back, but Walter and Sly help him with his bout of conscience
Flo has popped in to bring misdelivered roses from Walter to Paige (this is sweet, but the singing bear he ordered for Paige is just bizarre and horrifies Sly and Flo.) Flo finds out from blabbermouth Sly that Paige found out about Walter’s dream and is terrified that this will ruin her burgeoning friendship with Paige, not realising that’s what Paige’s mood the other ep was about. Sly, who is eavesdropping on their conversation (!!! But it’s clear in this ep that privacy means nothing to this lot) hears Flo describe her ideal man to Paige and thinks it describes him. It’s clear that the Sly/Flo that I thought might happen but parked might happen yet. Sly does have form with older ladies, but although he can make chemistry jokes, Flo is so awk…
Anyway, when she’s not following the team’s progress via the TV news or their comms – Paige is not good at not being in on the action – Paige finds Walter’s discarded tape of the begininngs of a love song he wrote her. (I’d come up with an angstier version of its discovery, although I don’t think I wrote it down, so I was all ‘Phew.’) The song touches her far more than the Valentine’s Day gifts, as she later tells Walter.
Quintis are on edge because their fertility test results are a little late. As Happy worried that she was the one with infertility problems, I called them hacking to get the results (because that’s what Scorpion does) and that it would be Toby who was infertile. But the scene where the team, after being in the black for the first time in months, offer them the money to pay for their treatment for the future team member (particularly nice in an episode with so much Ralph) is very touching.
And it’s not like the job lacks interest. Walter does something dangerous to help rescue the doctor and pilot. Then he finds out the helicoper’s in danger of blowing up (as if the strong gusts of wind weren’t problem enough.) So, Toby has to go to an ICU (where no one was wearing any PPE or masks or anything) and Scorpion the patient i.e. fashion a hazmat suit to give them more time. They get the doctor and pilot to safety, but one careless act puts Walter in massive danger (trapped too close to a helicopter that’s about to blow) until Sly suggests he jumps into the wind from the top of a tall building and trusts their maths for a safe landing (echoes of ‘It’s not the fall’ and Walter does a crucifix pose.) It works AND there’s a decent use of taking the comms out with the team separated and the eavesdropping going on in the ep.
The ending, where Walter (arm in a sling) gets YET ANOTHER CALL from Cabe, I’ll let slide.
First, will we end up wondering why they didn’t cast Mads Mikaelson in the first place? I remember feeling, even before the domestic abuse stuff came out, that we were trading down from Colin Farrell to Johnny Depp.
Second, where were all the women? There must have been a glimpse of Tina and there was a glimpse of Queenie, and I’m glad Minerva had some lines, and there was a new character, but it was mainly all men, and if Newt is the main character of the franchise and you’ve got your Canonical Slash Pairing and decide to make little guy/ordinary Joe/muggle Jacob a big part of this fill, that will crowd out all the women (and fantastic beasts.)
Having said that, I doubt that I’ll see it in the cinema – I’m going to miss The Batman and the opportunity to rank it among the other Batman films, even though it features Catwoman and an intriguing cast. But it sounds like its aesthetic is not very me friendly ATM.
But disc 4 of Scorpion season 4:
I liked ‘Wave Goodbye’ less than ‘The Hunker Games’ and ‘Lighthouse of the Risng Sun’, and I liked ‘Nerd, Wind and Fire’ more than the other three.
‘The Hunker Games’ handled Walter’s issues with his ‘dream’ well; he felt guilty, and was awkward, not quite following Toby’s advice and ended up freaking Flo out and enraging Paige.
A crazy AI locks the smartest members of the team, Flo (and it’s unknown whether she’s a genius) and a married couple (I’ll get to them) in a bunker. Walter had created his own (annoying) AI, which would satisfyingly get smashed by a hammer.
Cabe has issues with the fitness test he’s required to take to regain his job as Homeland liaison and ensure it doesn’t go to someone younger, so the jock of the team, Paige, is helping him. Meanwhile the belated Quintis honeymoon did not go as well as Toby had hoped, so he’s disgruntled not to get invited along to the latest high-paying job (he turns up anyway) because the clients have their own behavioural expert, who just happens to be the man who stole Toby’s ex-fiancée, who is also there, all gorgeous and making Happy feel inadequate. They’re the couple.
The bunker’s AI recognises Toby as a threat and goes into lockdown, meaning that those stuck inside have to work together to try to escape before the air runs out. Then some ‘help’ from Paige and Cabe makes the AI get offensive and the danger ratchets up. Toby’s nemesis is a jerk, while Toby’s ex reassures Happy that she isn’t a consolation prize for Toby.
Teamwork and exceptional bravery from Toby save the day. Quintis aren’t going to be the married couple divorcing after this ep, and Happy is particularly ace. There’s more than enough conflict and silliness going on.
I hearted ‘Lighthouse of the Rising Sun’ a lot, although it’s daft. Ralph is trying to impress Patty, Walter reluctantly has to wrangle that situation and ‘the science kids’ in the garage.
Quintis and Cabe/Allie have double booked the same romantic lighthouse. Quintis are trying to make a baby, while Cabe has FINALLY reached the point where he’s working up to telling Allie he loves her.
Paige has been a bit short with Flo after Walter’s unfortunate revelation that in the alt world his brain conjured up, he was married to Flo and kissing her. After Paige rightly lectures Walter and Sly for their terrible childminding, Sly rightly calls her out on bullying Flo because of her own insecurities. Those kids are from the science club Alderman Sly was all for establishing, and Walter is trying to do one of his explaining a science thing videos with them. One of them, called Meatball, is particularly not intellectual, but becomes a quasi-Ray figure (and the one person who will spoil Waige alone time after the chaos has subsided.)
A solar storm hits SoCal, Scorpion offer to help the authorities however they can and Homeland asks them to bring down a seaplane safely, because normal systems are out. It turns out it’s being flown by a teenager trying to impress his girl!best friend (they are cute) with barely any expertise in landing or night flying. Things are falling off the plane after their first attempt at landing, using all Sly’s old stuff and the lighthouse can offer.
Despite some insensitive truth bombs, mainly from Walter, Ralph, 13, slightly impresses Patty, now 16. The flyboy inspires Cabe to declare his feelings for Allie, who reciprocates (don’t call her ‘kid’, though, Cabe.) Young Meatball comes through with a spectacular way of saving the kids, when he isn’t demolishing food, and Paige apologises to Flo.
Perhaps fittingly, given what happens to the tsunami, ‘Wave Goodbye’ builds up energy then dissipates. Quintis and Waige are psyching themselves up for a garage-based Mr & Mrs game called ‘Query, My Dearie’. As Paige says after, they really are overinvolved in each other’s lives, because everyone has an opinion about when Waige’s first kiss was (a practice question), which Walter and Paige are counting differently. I agreed with Walter on this, but stinkeyed him when he claimed that Cabe ought to back him up as a fellow man and he was still raising it when they were in moral peril.
Toby talks himself out of going to Mexico for their job – AND LIES – because his ex is in rather contrived trouble. Sly couldn’t go because he was queuing at a book signing by Not!George R.R. Martin, which meant he saw Toby sneaking off with Amy, and eventually revealed this to Happy, who does most of the action heroics when Scorpion’s job of patching up a reactor has to be sped up because there’s a tsunami coming after an earthquake. Scorpion realise they have to stop the tsunami, using what’s only a theory, to save 10,000 Mexicans and themselves, because they wouldn’t fly out for safety.
The contrived trouble was that Amy’s identity was stolen because her now ex-husband continued to be a jerk. To help, Toby had to get back in touch with old associates AND GAMBLE, while not answering Happy’s calls. I was a bit worried about Quintis, although was Toby ever really out of control? And Happy wasn’t jealous about Amy??
Waige made up over the first kiss rift, although they failed to anticipate the incredibly obvious first question in their match-up against Quintis, and unsurprisingly lost to the initiators of the high five without looking. But that wasn’t as daft as Cabe blackmailing Not!George R.R. Martin to come to the garage to sign Sly’s book. The daftness undercut the real tension that was building up (and I’m not talking about the fundamental ridiculousness of Scorpion vs. the tsunami, which the team are almost blasé about, referencing the dam episode before the viewer can.)
They only gradually reveal that ‘Nerd, Wind and Fire’ is a Valentine’s Day episode (Paige is an absolute sucker for all the holidays, isn’t she?) She’s trying to hide the fact that she has the flu to Sly’s disgust, he’s even more disgusted when he’s ordered to stay in the garage with her to monitor wind speeds, because strong winds have trapped a helicopter carrying a superspecialist doctor who’s the only one who can save a patient’s life.)
Also in the garage is Raph, who’s been asked by Patty to tutor her date, so he’s sufferin from heart crushing. Walter (and Sly and Flo) notice Ralph is teaching bad maths to the jock (he’s so dumb, he makes Walter namecheck Drew.) Ralph sasses them back, but Walter and Sly help him with his bout of conscience
Flo has popped in to bring misdelivered roses from Walter to Paige (this is sweet, but the singing bear he ordered for Paige is just bizarre and horrifies Sly and Flo.) Flo finds out from blabbermouth Sly that Paige found out about Walter’s dream and is terrified that this will ruin her burgeoning friendship with Paige, not realising that’s what Paige’s mood the other ep was about. Sly, who is eavesdropping on their conversation (!!! But it’s clear in this ep that privacy means nothing to this lot) hears Flo describe her ideal man to Paige and thinks it describes him. It’s clear that the Sly/Flo that I thought might happen but parked might happen yet. Sly does have form with older ladies, but although he can make chemistry jokes, Flo is so awk…
Anyway, when she’s not following the team’s progress via the TV news or their comms – Paige is not good at not being in on the action – Paige finds Walter’s discarded tape of the begininngs of a love song he wrote her. (I’d come up with an angstier version of its discovery, although I don’t think I wrote it down, so I was all ‘Phew.’) The song touches her far more than the Valentine’s Day gifts, as she later tells Walter.
Quintis are on edge because their fertility test results are a little late. As Happy worried that she was the one with infertility problems, I called them hacking to get the results (because that’s what Scorpion does) and that it would be Toby who was infertile. But the scene where the team, after being in the black for the first time in months, offer them the money to pay for their treatment for the future team member (particularly nice in an episode with so much Ralph) is very touching.
And it’s not like the job lacks interest. Walter does something dangerous to help rescue the doctor and pilot. Then he finds out the helicoper’s in danger of blowing up (as if the strong gusts of wind weren’t problem enough.) So, Toby has to go to an ICU (where no one was wearing any PPE or masks or anything) and Scorpion the patient i.e. fashion a hazmat suit to give them more time. They get the doctor and pilot to safety, but one careless act puts Walter in massive danger (trapped too close to a helicopter that’s about to blow) until Sly suggests he jumps into the wind from the top of a tall building and trusts their maths for a safe landing (echoes of ‘It’s not the fall’ and Walter does a crucifix pose.) It works AND there’s a decent use of taking the comms out with the team separated and the eavesdropping going on in the ep.
The ending, where Walter (arm in a sling) gets YET ANOTHER CALL from Cabe, I’ll let slide.