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minkhollowFirst order of business: Quinn and I are considering running a Warehouse 13 prompt fest. Watch this space!
Second order of business: We finally watched the last three episodes of S4 over the holiday weekend. Quinn got drunk for it; I stayed sober (more because I don't like the taste of alcohol than anything else).
4x18: I like the pirates thing! Pirates are cool! Oddly, what I was most dubious about in that plot line was a pirate running around in 1914 - but no, he was an actualfax guy who was actualfax pirating the actualfax Great Lakes in actualfax 1914. Show's history research remains top-notch.
However. While Nick is one smooth operator, I have... Issues with Claudia being conned by a 500-year-old 15-year-old. Some of those stem from RP background in which she wouldn't bring home a stray now, and I haven't taken her into S3 yet (such as I'm going to; she's AU as of "Reset" because "Reset"). (ETA: And RP or not, it really bothers me that Claud didn't listen to her best friend when he told her Nick was a LYING LIAR WHO LIES.)
And Another Thing: Okay, sure, you may not want to get into all of the details of why Evil Giles was bronzed on the computer file (and really, why does the bronze sector have such shitty records? I'd think those were the important ones). But would it be that hard to say 'yeah, the dude straight-up murdered hundreds of people For Science'? (I am glad he didn't emerge from the bronzer speaking modern English, but Quinn says it was modern German, not middle German, which would've been more accurate. Also, how is it Helena needed a recovery period and he was more or less okay?)
4x19: ...I couldn't even watch Claud the Crumbling Statue. Like, rocking in a ball on the couch couldn't watch.
Pete, Myka's treatment options are up to her. Myka, stop talking about cancer treatments like you're considering an abortion. Both of you, WHY DIDN'T YOU CALL DOCTOR VANESSA?
I am really not sure what to make of Abigail's sudden importance in the Warehouse's overall hierarchy? I mean, it's a neat idea, to be sure. But, Thing One, why is the Warehouse trusting something as important as ITS ENTIRE HISTORY to a 'once in every generation, a Slayer is born deal? What if you get someone who doesn't want to help or uses that information for Evil, and then you're screwed for a generation? And Thing Two, it really cheapens the 'cake and counseling will be available' aspect of her showing up. As it was introduced, she needed the Warehouse as a place of healing as much as the people there needed her to help them heal from Evil Artie. But with this twist... I don't know, man. It makes it not work as well from the beginning.
The what's-it-called room with the runes is pretty neat! But... Quinn got hung up on the fact that the Warehouse has pretty much never been in a place that used runes while they were in use; she thinks it should've been heiroglyphs. Maybe the runes were because of Evil Giles somehow??? I dunno.
(MORE ABOUT THE BADASS LADY WHO PUT A SWORD IN EVIL GILES' FACE PLS.)
4x20: OH MY GOD, WHAT. This only works if everyone holds the Idiot Ball.
1) Okay, sure, you can't disconnect Evil Giles from the Warehouse that easily now, but couldn't they have disconnected him in 1541 when they first caught him? And if Evil Giles of course knows what chemicals to ingest to counteract bronzing, why did he not keep himself on a steady diet of them in the first place?
2) PETE. PETE. YOU DID NOT BUY THIS 'ARTIFACTS CAN SAVE THE WORLD' LINE FROM MACPHERSON. WHAT MAKES IT DIFFERENT NOW????????? For fuck's sake. I believe Myka about her condition far more than I believe a guy who just murdered several cancer wards for his own personal gain. I mean, I guess if nothing else it confirms he's a Hufflepuff, but... they could have done that without him being a dumbass...
3) Dear Artie: Since when has keeping major secrets ever ended well for you? No love, me. (We'll get to the exact nature of the secret in a moment, because I have 99 problems with it and a lack of logic to the setup is ALL OF THEM.)
4) I know it was a bit of an emergency, but I feel like Claudia finally becoming Caretaker deserved a little more... ceremony than that. I do look forward to the beatdown of Evil Giles, though. (Holy shit her face at the end. YOU HAVE ANGERED THE BADGER.)
finally) As I said above, I have 99 problems with Claire Donovan's existence.
*This is not a bombshell you drop four seasons in.
*It doesn't really work with Joshua in the picture, even taking Artie's '...EVADE' face when Claud asked if Joshua knew into account. Why would he agree to keep that information from her?
*If Claud's seen graves from this, but not necessarily bodies, are one or both of her parents still alive?
*If Claud was important enough to the Warehouse that Artie knew about this when he went after the compass, why the hell did they leave her to her own devices in what canon wants to say was a shitty foster situation followed by time on the streets? (I don't buy either; her damage has never seemed to run quite that deep, to me. But that's beside the point.)
*How old is this chick, anyway? Older than Joshua, stretching the plausibility of Claud's mom's fertility? Somewhere in between? Evil twin?
*If Claire was so very dangerous at the time of the car wreck (which was a few years before Joshua's teleportation accident, so Claud was fairly tiny) that the Warehouse decided separating the two of them and telling each the other was NOPE TOTALLY DEAD IN CONCLUSION DEAD, why didn't they just bronze her? There's a kid in the bronze sector; it's not like there's no precedent. It's a big gamble to assume a kid as young as Claud was would end up at the Warehouse at all, and it's not like she spends her free time poking around the bronze sector working out why everyone's there. (I would have this problem even if Claud had been presented as an only child to this point; that would have circumvented most of my other gripes.)
So they knocked the legs out from under everything that the show is built on. Pete fell for a line he saw through in S1 because a bad guy told him his friend's life was on the line. They broke the trust between Claud and Artie for no fucking reason. They made major changes to the underlying mythology that take the wind out of a perfectly good story line.
I'm almost glad there's only six episodes left.
As a matter of interest, Evil Giles is the first Big Bad I can't tie into my Unified Theory of MacPherson Was Trolling Everyone From Beyond the Grave, unless he bumped into Professor Spike or Charlotte at some point (unlikely).
Overall effectiveness of Big Bads:
1. MacPherson (he actually out-thought everyone)
2. Evil Artie (because he was in fact whammied)
3. Evil Giles (he's chilling, yes, but this all only works because of the Idiot Ball)
4. Sykes (he's too unrelenting for me to see a compelling cause)
5. HG (no. just... no)
Second order of business: We finally watched the last three episodes of S4 over the holiday weekend. Quinn got drunk for it; I stayed sober (more because I don't like the taste of alcohol than anything else).
4x18: I like the pirates thing! Pirates are cool! Oddly, what I was most dubious about in that plot line was a pirate running around in 1914 - but no, he was an actualfax guy who was actualfax pirating the actualfax Great Lakes in actualfax 1914. Show's history research remains top-notch.
However. While Nick is one smooth operator, I have... Issues with Claudia being conned by a 500-year-old 15-year-old. Some of those stem from RP background in which she wouldn't bring home a stray now, and I haven't taken her into S3 yet (such as I'm going to; she's AU as of "Reset" because "Reset"). (ETA: And RP or not, it really bothers me that Claud didn't listen to her best friend when he told her Nick was a LYING LIAR WHO LIES.)
And Another Thing: Okay, sure, you may not want to get into all of the details of why Evil Giles was bronzed on the computer file (and really, why does the bronze sector have such shitty records? I'd think those were the important ones). But would it be that hard to say 'yeah, the dude straight-up murdered hundreds of people For Science'? (I am glad he didn't emerge from the bronzer speaking modern English, but Quinn says it was modern German, not middle German, which would've been more accurate. Also, how is it Helena needed a recovery period and he was more or less okay?)
4x19: ...I couldn't even watch Claud the Crumbling Statue. Like, rocking in a ball on the couch couldn't watch.
Pete, Myka's treatment options are up to her. Myka, stop talking about cancer treatments like you're considering an abortion. Both of you, WHY DIDN'T YOU CALL DOCTOR VANESSA?
I am really not sure what to make of Abigail's sudden importance in the Warehouse's overall hierarchy? I mean, it's a neat idea, to be sure. But, Thing One, why is the Warehouse trusting something as important as ITS ENTIRE HISTORY to a 'once in every generation, a Slayer is born deal? What if you get someone who doesn't want to help or uses that information for Evil, and then you're screwed for a generation? And Thing Two, it really cheapens the 'cake and counseling will be available' aspect of her showing up. As it was introduced, she needed the Warehouse as a place of healing as much as the people there needed her to help them heal from Evil Artie. But with this twist... I don't know, man. It makes it not work as well from the beginning.
The what's-it-called room with the runes is pretty neat! But... Quinn got hung up on the fact that the Warehouse has pretty much never been in a place that used runes while they were in use; she thinks it should've been heiroglyphs. Maybe the runes were because of Evil Giles somehow??? I dunno.
(MORE ABOUT THE BADASS LADY WHO PUT A SWORD IN EVIL GILES' FACE PLS.)
4x20: OH MY GOD, WHAT. This only works if everyone holds the Idiot Ball.
1) Okay, sure, you can't disconnect Evil Giles from the Warehouse that easily now, but couldn't they have disconnected him in 1541 when they first caught him? And if Evil Giles of course knows what chemicals to ingest to counteract bronzing, why did he not keep himself on a steady diet of them in the first place?
2) PETE. PETE. YOU DID NOT BUY THIS 'ARTIFACTS CAN SAVE THE WORLD' LINE FROM MACPHERSON. WHAT MAKES IT DIFFERENT NOW????????? For fuck's sake. I believe Myka about her condition far more than I believe a guy who just murdered several cancer wards for his own personal gain. I mean, I guess if nothing else it confirms he's a Hufflepuff, but... they could have done that without him being a dumbass...
3) Dear Artie: Since when has keeping major secrets ever ended well for you? No love, me. (We'll get to the exact nature of the secret in a moment, because I have 99 problems with it and a lack of logic to the setup is ALL OF THEM.)
4) I know it was a bit of an emergency, but I feel like Claudia finally becoming Caretaker deserved a little more... ceremony than that. I do look forward to the beatdown of Evil Giles, though. (Holy shit her face at the end. YOU HAVE ANGERED THE BADGER.)
finally) As I said above, I have 99 problems with Claire Donovan's existence.
*This is not a bombshell you drop four seasons in.
*It doesn't really work with Joshua in the picture, even taking Artie's '...EVADE' face when Claud asked if Joshua knew into account. Why would he agree to keep that information from her?
*If Claud's seen graves from this, but not necessarily bodies, are one or both of her parents still alive?
*If Claud was important enough to the Warehouse that Artie knew about this when he went after the compass, why the hell did they leave her to her own devices in what canon wants to say was a shitty foster situation followed by time on the streets? (I don't buy either; her damage has never seemed to run quite that deep, to me. But that's beside the point.)
*How old is this chick, anyway? Older than Joshua, stretching the plausibility of Claud's mom's fertility? Somewhere in between? Evil twin?
*If Claire was so very dangerous at the time of the car wreck (which was a few years before Joshua's teleportation accident, so Claud was fairly tiny) that the Warehouse decided separating the two of them and telling each the other was NOPE TOTALLY DEAD IN CONCLUSION DEAD, why didn't they just bronze her? There's a kid in the bronze sector; it's not like there's no precedent. It's a big gamble to assume a kid as young as Claud was would end up at the Warehouse at all, and it's not like she spends her free time poking around the bronze sector working out why everyone's there. (I would have this problem even if Claud had been presented as an only child to this point; that would have circumvented most of my other gripes.)
So they knocked the legs out from under everything that the show is built on. Pete fell for a line he saw through in S1 because a bad guy told him his friend's life was on the line. They broke the trust between Claud and Artie for no fucking reason. They made major changes to the underlying mythology that take the wind out of a perfectly good story line.
I'm almost glad there's only six episodes left.
As a matter of interest, Evil Giles is the first Big Bad I can't tie into my Unified Theory of MacPherson Was Trolling Everyone From Beyond the Grave, unless he bumped into Professor Spike or Charlotte at some point (unlikely).
Overall effectiveness of Big Bads:
1. MacPherson (he actually out-thought everyone)
2. Evil Artie (because he was in fact whammied)
3. Evil Giles (he's chilling, yes, but this all only works because of the Idiot Ball)
4. Sykes (he's too unrelenting for me to see a compelling cause)
5. HG (no. just... no)
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Date: 2013-09-05 06:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-05 08:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-05 08:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-09-05 08:54 pm (UTC)Don't blame you for skipping out after that twist. I mean, really, show, they didn't sign up for the normal shit! Neither did we as fans! I'm mostly still watching to see if there's anything I can cherry-pick for RP use at this point, and to see how they bow it out.
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Date: 2013-09-05 04:58 pm (UTC)Basically, all your complaints. Yes. Agree completely.
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Date: 2013-09-05 08:59 pm (UTC)But I can't see Claud bringing home a stray that readily, and I really can't see her not listening to Steve saying 'YO HE'S LYING,' and I don't know why Pete's suddenly willing to listen to an argument he knew was bad his first year on the job, and they didn't need cancer for teh dramaz when they have Artifact-whammies, and I have 99 problems with Claud suddenly having a sister. (My best theory there is that the astrolabe kicked them into an AU where the sister was a thing the whole time, and part of me wants to write something where Claud rants at Doug about this mess and he, who didn't get taken along for the ride and knows from ending up in an alternate timeline, calls her on that.)
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Date: 2013-09-06 02:55 am (UTC)Claudia bringing home a stray did ping weird for me, but yeah, she definitely should have listened to Steve. And Pete being stupid, and suddenly siblings, and surprise!cancer...just basically I hope the final season cleans up this mess somehow. I'm going with alternate timeline until then.
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Date: 2013-09-06 03:41 am (UTC)As for HG... she's never been normal. Why start now? Aside from her chasing Christina's ghost, it doesn't really add up for me. But I do agree that by now they should've either truly committed to Myka/HG or truly shot it down in text (I don't consider Nate to be that, especially with confirmation she'll be back at least once in S5).
The reason Evil Giles came in so low on my Big Bad rank is that Steve was pretty much the only person who didn't end up with the Idiot Ball at some point; I don't could the Mesmer magnet whammy because that was in fact a whammy. If your Diabolical Plan only works because everyone else is being a dumbass, it's not a good Diabolical Plan.
Quinn and I had this lovely theory going when all we'd heard about the finale was vague murmurs about Claudia's sister, in which the sister in question was Olivia Jinks. (It'd explain why they look so much alike! And Steve's mom only has pictures of her, Olivia and Steve - they could easily have two different fathers.) That was a lovely theory and I wish they'd gone with it, though obviously if they wanted her to be alive after all it'd take some Explaining (Artifacts being what they are, though, it could be done).
'Kicked into an AU' is the best I've got. Part of why I want to see(/maybe write) a thing where Doug goes 'wait, what sister, you've literally never mentioned this before, it's not even in your personnel file that I totally didn't save off your mainframe when I was there what are you talking about... ANYWAY.'
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Date: 2013-10-10 08:19 am (UTC)I am willing to wait and see how all this plays out before I start getting mad, but it had better be good. Watching the four eps in succession left me totally blown away, but I suspected that, much like the midseason finale, the application of logic would leave it a touch wanting.
First off, surprise!sister wtf. When Artie dropped the bomb, I was like, "Wait, there was a sister? Did I forget about this?" because it seems like something I would forget about if it were mentioned like once and never again. But NOPE. Surprise!sister. There had better be some seriously epic plot payoff from this or I'm going to end up pretending it never happened.
And I actually kind of like the cancer thing? The show's always dropped little reminders here and there about how the real world will always find ways to intrude on the world of the Warehouse. "Holy shit, this regent we're meeting is my mom," "Oh my god, my sister is having a baby," "Oops, the sheriff is my ex-boyfriend." Now, cancer. Warehouse agents aren't any more invulnerable to terminal illness than anyone else. I definitely see why it's obnoxious in terms of "Hey, this is my SCIFI SHOW FUCK," but I think the shock of it is the point.
I also think it's a valid explanation for Pete's turn with the Idiot Ball. Pete is trained and ready for a lot of things. Guns, hostage situation, Artifacts. He is not trained for his best friend (his sister, really) having cancer. He can't negotiate with it, he can't Tesla it, he can't stick it in a bag. I think the way he was so pushy and overbearing about Myka's treatment options was both totally in character and excellent foreshadowing. Pete can't smash cancer? Here is a man who can smash cancer! Pete will make sure the man smashes the cancer! Paracelus plays him like a violin and, because Pete is in a state of shock and desperation and can't see beyond "must save Myka," it works. This is pretty much the only thing you objected to that I firmly believe made sense.
Other than that, I am on board with your Astrolabe AU theory. Maybe that's how it really works! It doesn't turn back time, that would be silly. It just creates a split in the timeline and takes its user into the "right" one. And hey, that kind of thing can't be done perfectly, so sometimes you'll get shit like a random sister and maybe someone's cells rebelling and going all funky inside them. And everyone losing a few IQ points. BLAME THE ASTROLABE.
EDIT because ALSO ALSO that song choice at the end. I . . . am not sure anyone involved has ever actually listened to that song? Because it basically says, "I cannot deal with your shit, just tell me what you want to hear so I can say it so you don't leave. Asshole." Which I do not think is the overall theme of that particular scene. Except maybe for the "asshole" part.
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Date: 2013-10-10 04:35 pm (UTC)Oh, I can see Pete making stupid decisions in this situation. And I can somewhat see why they liked the cancer arc in the first place. I just. If your diabolical plot depends on someone holding the Idiot Ball that much (and, as someone else pointed out else-Internets, basically relying on Myka having cancer in the first place - what would he have done if none of them had been sick?), it's a bad diabolical plot. I expect better from a guy who murdered an entire village For Science.
...wow, that is some epic music-choice fail, there. XD
Most of why I want the astrolabe theory is for Doug to go 'wait, since when do you have a sister, that's not in your personnel file that I... totally didn't copy off the Warehouse server after I met you what are you talking about. >_>' Because Doug's a dork like that.
I'm just glad they got some space to tie all this up. (And from the look of stuff that hit twitter as they were filming the series finale, we get TAP DANCING CLAUDIA, and that alone promises to be epic.) But I'm worried they have too much they need to do justice to in six episodes.
And I have 99 problems and Claire Donovan is all of them.