fun for all the (found?) family
Nov. 23rd, 2013 02:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessAgents of SHIELD The Hub
Aww, Fitzsimmons.
I enjoyed May’s non-expressions and the tai chi/conversation with Coulson, ending with an eye-roll.
Fitz and Ward go off on a mission, while Skye and Simmons come up with their own little mission – predictable interactions are predictable.
Simmons has leapfrogged Coulson in my affections, apparently.
As for ‘the critique’ of ‘Big Brother’ aka ‘The System’ aka ‘SHIELD’, they lost me with Fitz throwing about ‘socialist’ like that. Try harder.
At least we know that Coulson probably isn’t a robot, seeing as they used it as a throwaway joke. Bless him if he thinks that Fury doesn’t know he’s looking into Tahiti (and the rest of it).
Emphasising Skye’s orphaned status doesn’t make her less irritating. On the other hand, a Scottish accent make some jokes fly. I was on Fitz’s side over the sandwich issue (it was in a plastic bag) and, in an episode with half an eye to the slashers, I decided to believe that Ward was jealous because he’s not on sandwich getting terms (and Skye’s way of letting him know she likes ‘her boy’ is to punch him.)
At least May deserves to me in the same episode as a mention of Agent Romanov.
The one after
I was even less impressed with this one. The tidying up after Thor 2 stuff was a bit of a token gesture. All we got were a few opportunities to snigger about dreamy aliens in human hands and then the main story took a bit of a side-step; I would have liked something that tied in even more to the plot of the film.
I spent a lot of time wondering why the nasty and nice Norwegians were speaking English to each other.
I enjoyed Peter McNiccol doing a Tom Hiddlestone in his scenes with Clark Gregg somewhat, but after the Asgardian! Reveal, Beserker!Wade felt a bit like a wander into Hulk territory with a smidge of Captain America taking it out on the punchbag. I sort of feel like saying stop trying to make Wade happen, show! (Why I got so excited about Simmons/Wade was that with her he was laughing with her at her laughing at him. That’s attractive!) At least there was bite when he raged at Fitzsimmons and Skye, except it also felt a bit like puppy kicking.
As I spent so many scenes going ‘this would be better if Melinda May were in it’ I can’t complain with what she got – the stuff with the staff would have been awesome except I think it was partly motivated by them trying to avoid the visual of Ward fighting the Norwegian woman. I didn’t quite see the build-up for the invitation to her room – and really, when the show’s so earnestly pro Ward/Skye stance, trying to throw some ambiguity there, because there’s no way it’ll get forgotten and buried, feels forced, although Ward does play a liminal position between the grown-ups and the kids.
Blah blah Couldson’s Tahiti nightmares. From stuff like spelling out the obvious proving it doesn’t trust its audience, the still jarring comparison with the movieverse and even that one much better episode they did that they keep referencing, it’s such an effort. I would like someone to tell me when it’s going to improve.
Apparently the next episode will give us some of May’s backstory – although I’m afraid, based on this episode, that it’ll be a letdown.
Atlantis - 1.8 The Furies
I chuckled at the music reference to Westerns, said ‘how very Greek of you’ when Pythagoras’s dark secret was revealed and wondered at how long dawn takes to break in Atlantis.
There was no Medusa except being referenced as a figure in Hercules’s dream BOO.
Hercules was an idiot, but right; Jason was a hero and I wanted to pat his curly head every time that he was heroic, IDEK, but I do; and Pythagoras was the most interesting character. The guy they cast as his brother looked the part, but the part was a bit underwritten. I’m yet to be sold on these episodes where they end up with a gang of other people – and nobody exactly mourned the tough guy guide whose only fault was playing down the Furies as the desert so that they didn’t panic. Balkus was mildly interesting, at least, I got excited when it turned out she could fight, but instead of delving into why this thief was headed for Helios she rather obviously diverted the bridegroom from his bride. I mean, it was appropriate that she backed up Jason’s calls for mercy, but again, underdeveloped.
Still, in the end, the chosen family of Jason-Pythagoras-Hercules is tight. (That is what we care about as regular viewers. I mean, I wish that Medusa was officially one of them and they’d cut out the Hercules/Medusa.) But I was amused and entertained and not too disappointed.
Aww, Fitzsimmons.
I enjoyed May’s non-expressions and the tai chi/conversation with Coulson, ending with an eye-roll.
Fitz and Ward go off on a mission, while Skye and Simmons come up with their own little mission – predictable interactions are predictable.
Simmons has leapfrogged Coulson in my affections, apparently.
As for ‘the critique’ of ‘Big Brother’ aka ‘The System’ aka ‘SHIELD’, they lost me with Fitz throwing about ‘socialist’ like that. Try harder.
At least we know that Coulson probably isn’t a robot, seeing as they used it as a throwaway joke. Bless him if he thinks that Fury doesn’t know he’s looking into Tahiti (and the rest of it).
Emphasising Skye’s orphaned status doesn’t make her less irritating. On the other hand, a Scottish accent make some jokes fly. I was on Fitz’s side over the sandwich issue (it was in a plastic bag) and, in an episode with half an eye to the slashers, I decided to believe that Ward was jealous because he’s not on sandwich getting terms (and Skye’s way of letting him know she likes ‘her boy’ is to punch him.)
At least May deserves to me in the same episode as a mention of Agent Romanov.
The one after
I was even less impressed with this one. The tidying up after Thor 2 stuff was a bit of a token gesture. All we got were a few opportunities to snigger about dreamy aliens in human hands and then the main story took a bit of a side-step; I would have liked something that tied in even more to the plot of the film.
I spent a lot of time wondering why the nasty and nice Norwegians were speaking English to each other.
I enjoyed Peter McNiccol doing a Tom Hiddlestone in his scenes with Clark Gregg somewhat, but after the Asgardian! Reveal, Beserker!Wade felt a bit like a wander into Hulk territory with a smidge of Captain America taking it out on the punchbag. I sort of feel like saying stop trying to make Wade happen, show! (Why I got so excited about Simmons/Wade was that with her he was laughing with her at her laughing at him. That’s attractive!) At least there was bite when he raged at Fitzsimmons and Skye, except it also felt a bit like puppy kicking.
As I spent so many scenes going ‘this would be better if Melinda May were in it’ I can’t complain with what she got – the stuff with the staff would have been awesome except I think it was partly motivated by them trying to avoid the visual of Ward fighting the Norwegian woman. I didn’t quite see the build-up for the invitation to her room – and really, when the show’s so earnestly pro Ward/Skye stance, trying to throw some ambiguity there, because there’s no way it’ll get forgotten and buried, feels forced, although Ward does play a liminal position between the grown-ups and the kids.
Blah blah Couldson’s Tahiti nightmares. From stuff like spelling out the obvious proving it doesn’t trust its audience, the still jarring comparison with the movieverse and even that one much better episode they did that they keep referencing, it’s such an effort. I would like someone to tell me when it’s going to improve.
Apparently the next episode will give us some of May’s backstory – although I’m afraid, based on this episode, that it’ll be a letdown.
Atlantis - 1.8 The Furies
I chuckled at the music reference to Westerns, said ‘how very Greek of you’ when Pythagoras’s dark secret was revealed and wondered at how long dawn takes to break in Atlantis.
There was no Medusa except being referenced as a figure in Hercules’s dream BOO.
Hercules was an idiot, but right; Jason was a hero and I wanted to pat his curly head every time that he was heroic, IDEK, but I do; and Pythagoras was the most interesting character. The guy they cast as his brother looked the part, but the part was a bit underwritten. I’m yet to be sold on these episodes where they end up with a gang of other people – and nobody exactly mourned the tough guy guide whose only fault was playing down the Furies as the desert so that they didn’t panic. Balkus was mildly interesting, at least, I got excited when it turned out she could fight, but instead of delving into why this thief was headed for Helios she rather obviously diverted the bridegroom from his bride. I mean, it was appropriate that she backed up Jason’s calls for mercy, but again, underdeveloped.
Still, in the end, the chosen family of Jason-Pythagoras-Hercules is tight. (That is what we care about as regular viewers. I mean, I wish that Medusa was officially one of them and they’d cut out the Hercules/Medusa.) But I was amused and entertained and not too disappointed.
