Tuesday, August 7, 2018

Wynonna Earp, Season 3, Episode 3: Cold Weather




Dolls died this episode and one thing the show is making a major point of this episode is emphasising just how much he meant and how devastating this was. Which, as we’vesaid before, is very very important when actually valuing the death of acharacter, especially a marginalised character. Even the theme tune was changed to make it sadder. I approve.

Though I’m still not happy with him being dead at all

So Wynonna is raging and drunk and drunk and raging and everyone’s kind of trying to manage her, give her time and space and generally hope she doesn’t explode or commit suicide by Revenant or do something else equally unwise.

We also have a really awesome moment with Doc and Wynonna which is full of grief and Doc’s voice cracking just perfectly with unshed tears and I applaud. I applaud.

That leaves Waverley and Nicole to be both awesome together (as always) and make practical arrangements. Like the funeral (and poking the funeral director who asks after their husbands and, yes, that’s EXACTLY what i would have done) and learning that a) Nicole wants to have a sky funeral and be eaten by vultures. She also learns that there’s no plot for her in the family graveyard which obviously gets Waverley’s feels all up there

They also do practical things like check out Doll’s hotel room for appropriate funeral clothing for personal effects etc - in which Waverley finds a letter from Dolls to Wynonna and Nicole talks about her own connection with Dolls. How she was a survivor of the cult of Bulshar as a child, a massacre Black Badge covered up and she only recently remembered though she had traumatic memories all her life and nightmares. Dolls was helping her with that and I like this in that it’s building the idea that Dolls had other relationships.

Doc is visiting Kate - yes the vampire. She’s still around, playing with tarot cards and getting under Doc’s skin and mentioning their big big history. Which is complex. Kate makes things further complex by stealing Waverley’s bag - with the letter to Wynonna in it which, of course, causes ISSUES., (Though Nicole and Waverley agree on their hotness)


When Wynonna hears Jeremy may be autopsying Dolls she goes raging to stop him - but he isn’t because he knows what killed Dolls: the drugs Black Badge gave him to control his dragon-ness were unstable and killed him. His death was inevitable. Wynonna is mega pissed by this because Jeremy didn’t tell her (respecting Doll’s wishes) and Wynonna has a full rage moment and decides to kick Jeremy out of the scooby gang.

Doc has other issues causing him to lash out - namley his whole “we’re going to hell” speech he gave Dolls like hours before his death which is the sort of thing that gives you like ALL THE GUILT.

We also have the introduction of Roman. Roman Quinn. He arrives at the bar and he and Doc have a Mexican standoff with guns. Then Roman gets tied up with twinkly lights (I love how bemused Wynonna is) and they drink whiskey talking about Dolls

Ok, info dump! Roman was part of Black Badge. He was part of a unit with Dolls and all his fellow dragon people all of them have died and died and died and died giving Roman a big case of the Sads. Roman and his Sads have come to the Wake for Dolls and I do not care because Wynonna and Waverley and Doc and Nicole all have plenty of perfectly awesome Sads for this scene; I do not need New Guy Sads to add pathos. We have pathos. I also don’t need New Guy Sads to explain that Dolls was experimented on by Black Badge and how Black Badge was evil

I have been paying attention to the last 2 seasons. I am aware. Also Dolls was taking drugs and breathing fire - you didn’t actually have to sit down and have New Guy declare he was experimented on. We can extrapolate

Well Sads Guy as the Sole Survivor also has all the Guilts (again, Doc and Wynonna have already sewn up the Guilts, we do not need new Guilts. Get out of here with your Sads and your Guilts) and wants to bring down Blackbadge in a blaze of glory. I mean, assuming Black Badge even exists any more. That’s all kind of shaky. So he wants the drugs that Jeremy has synthesised so he can become his own dying dragon man

Oh we know the drugs are around because some revenants steal them, drink them, crash the wake and are duly massacred by Wynonna who is just soooo calm about all this.

Wynonna intervenes while Roman is torturing Jeremy to basically… well not really care about Jeremy - but give Roman an epic speech about pain and loss and grief and the guilt of surviving when others died but how going all kamikaze doesn’t actually bring them back. It’s a good speech and Roman may be here just so Wynonna has someone to tell it to

Another good speech is Nicole interventional Wynonna and her rage grief to firmly but kindly remind her that she doesn’t have a monopoly on grief here and they’re all grieving so make some damn mourning room already. And also that she’s using anger to mask what she’s really feeling because anger is easier - which comes with an admission that maybe she was kind of a dick to Jeremy. She goes to make amends (and he insists that he never did the evil science thing) and they decide they need to cremate Dolls so his body doesn’t become fodder for Evil Science.

While this is happening, Waverley and Doc go to see Kate and we learn - surprise - Kate is Doc’s wife. And she’s been doing these shenanigans since she wants in on the group. Despite her vampireness Waverley is kind of open to that (though she does think “liking selfies and sliding into my DMs” would have been more polite). Which is a bit weird. I mean wasn’t Kate part of the whole Bulshar massacre cult? Or at least hitching a ride? The same cult that had members who nearly killed and deeply traumatised Nicole? Shouldn’t there be issues here?

Also since Doc and Kate rekindle their romance I can’t help but think someone on the writer’s team suddenly realised “ZOMG THERE ARE NO LOVE TRIANGLES?! WE MUST HAVE LOVE TRIANGLES PRECIOUS!!!!!!!!!!”

Still Kate is snarky so I think even if her introduction is clumsy she will be interesting.

We drop Roman on a bus and get him out of there

And the envelope to Wynonna is a nice picture of the whole group reminding her they need to go on and stick together. Also she and Waverley talk funerals and it’s cute.


When Roman appeared I admit my hackles went up because this had “replacement Dolls” written all over it which I’m very glad we’re not going with. Instead Kate looks like she’s going to be the new series regular. I could call T-Dog chain but the characters have been developed in their own ways and fill very different niche and characters (beyond being supernatural beings which is a stretch).

I did like that they established Nicole and Dolls has a relationship. Too many shows take your protagonist as the hub and everyone else is spokes on their wheel - they don’t always connect well with each other unless that other is an addition to them (so Waverly and Nicole connect because Nicole is a +1 on Waverley as a love interest rather than part of the central group). But with scenes like this, and Nicole reaching out to Wynonna there’s a clear attempt to make those connections in the group, across the wheel rather than just all being connected to Wynonna.