The 100, Season 1, Episode 8: Day Trip

The Grounder is still a prisoner and still not popular

Clarke talks to the Ark council and Jaha and Kane give her directions to somewhere where the 100 can shelter over winter. New councilwoman and clear baddy Diana thinks they should just wait until the grown ups arrive – but they’ll probably freeze in the process. Jaha also has a word alone with Clarke – there’s a queue of parents who want to talk to their kids and Clarke’s mother Abigail wants to join that; but Clarke still isn’t over the whole murdering her dad thing.

But Commander Shumway (who is definitely evil – since he put Bellamy up to kill Jaha) jumps the queue to talk to one of the 100 called Dax, a murderer. He has a mission for him and in exchange he’ll make sure Dax’s mother gets to the surface. He wants Dax to kill Bellamy.

Octavia and Bellamy are still spilling sibling drama everywhere. Clarke, Raven and Finn have love triangle drama. Clarke heads out to check the supply depot with Bellamy because it’s so wise to take the two leaders out at once – the convoluted excuse for this is that Clarke is feeling arsey and would rather take it out on Bellamy than someone she likes. Dax follows them, conspicuously sheaving a knife.

With all the distractions, Octavia sneaks up to see Abbalicious, the Grounder, gives him water and rubs all over those abs (she’s cleaning him, honest). He tells her his name is Lincoln which mean I can’t call him Abbalicious any more, but it also calls into question why he pretended he couldn’t speak English for so long when it was really really unhelpful for everyone, himself included. He thinks he’s going to die – she wants him to tell the others he’s not the enemy – but he says he is. Oops.

Octavia tries to torment Raven with the idea that Finn’s into Clarke but Raven refuses to play that game. But she does go in and have some “MAH TERRITORY!” make out with Finn. He tries to stop her because he thinks he should tell her about Clarke first – but she says she knows and they will never speak of it again. Now back to the territory claiming!

Clarke and Bellamy hike while Clarke tries to convince Bellamy Jaha is totally going to forgive being shot (this is not 10 minutes after her “I will never forgive you!” speech to Jaha about her mother). They check out the bunker which is filthy, damp, leaky and has very little in the way of supplies (and isn’t likely to be a good place to shelter during the winter). But it does have guns.

And because we apparently don’t have enough material for this episode – Monty and Jasper accidentally discover narcotics. Octavia happily gives narcotic food to Miller, the guy guarding Lincoln. And at the bunker, Bellamy’s also snacking on the narcotic nuts while playing with firearms. Clarke also realises that Bellamy took so many supplies because he intends to run and leave Clarke in charge because when Jaha gets to the ground he thinks he will be very very very dead.

HALLUCINATIONS FOR EVERYONE!

Revolution, Season 2, Episode 20: Tomorrowland

Truman reports to the president who is very very very unhappy with him. The assassination attempt in Texas going so badly wrong all because of Miles and Monroe (I love how we’re actually pretending these 2 are an effective resistance). Truman shows some spine and blames the president – he kept sending in people to take over his job while tying Truman’s hands. Which is pretty true. The president (after making a comment about him having “a pair like Hillary’s”) gives him one chance. And it seems he still wants to provoke a war between Texas and California.

Charlie finally finds the much battered Miles.

Truman returns to Willoughby and is told that an informant has found Miles and Monroe’s camp – and he takes the opportunity to send someone to fire Neville.

At said camp, Aaron is getting frustrated that Nano-Priscilla isn’t actual Priscilla and Miles has decided he’s all better and doesn’t have to stay in his hospital bed; both Rachel and Monroe do their own form of fawning over him. An ominous flock of birds appears and Nano-Priscilla tells Aaron to run since he’s slower than everyone else; he does warning everyone else and Monroe throws in a random insult over his weight – before they see a creeping yellow gas.

Those caught by it choke and die – it’s mustard gas. Thankfully they’re in a chemical plant with lots of climbable things; but as they climb men in gas masks emerge from the gas and shoot people

I personally would not trust a gas mask that has been literally decades without proper maintenance.

Miles finds a sealed truck for all the important people to hide in, though Aaron wants to find Priscilla and save her despite her actually being god at the moment. They hide while outside the men massacre everyone. Except Nano-Priscilla who walks calmly through the gas. Some of the masked men fire bullets into the container – but inside they plug the holes.

The survivors gather up and Monroe wants to hit back – steal mustard gas and release it wherever he can do the most damage. And he shouts down any argument, he’s tired of moral quandary and argument – even if they have to destroy Willoughby, their inaction is killing them. Miles agrees – while Rachel stares at him. He waits for her to complain but she says that she’s tired of competing with what’s between him and Monroe and they’re done.

As they walk off Miles asks what Monroe’s plans are for the Monroe Republic and Mornoe is vague but Miles realises he plans to take Georgia as well, the whole Eastern Seaboard. He promises it will be different and he wants Miles to join him.

Truman returns to where he’s staying with Marion before leaving. She checks the drawer he used and finds a false bottom – in which is a gas mask and some paperwork which horrifies her. She goes to see her dad’s gave that night and Gene and Charlie kidnap her.

In Fiction, No-one is Forced by Circumstance

When a book or TV show is fiction, it’s made up. Everything within it is created.

I can see your bemused expressions now - why have I started stating the obvious? Well, by a lot of the excuses people make for various issues we criticise in books, it feels like some people aren’t grasping it.

In particular, this happens when we describe a character as being problematic in some way - maybe they’re a stereotype or trope, maybe they have bigoted attitudes, maybe their relationships are a hot mess of problems, maybe everything’s just a wall-to-wall hot mess. But we describe the problematic issue and someone counters “but X forces them to be/do/think that!”

But this forgets that “X”, whatever X is, only exists because the author put it there. The author isn’t a historian presenting their research, or an anthropologist loyally relating their observations. The author is the storyteller, the author is the one who built this world, every aspect for it, and if they have created an element that “justifies” some prejudiced, bigoted or problematic element then that has been their choice to do so. We cannot pretend or act like this is out of their hands.

There are so many examples of this - let’s take werewolves. Female werewolves are often super-duper rare - making the few female werewolves highly desirable and hunted by the male werewolves (like Elena in Kelley Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld) or making female werewolves so rare they have a very male dominated cast (Patricia Briggs’ Mercy Thompson Series) or there just cannot be female werewolves for REASONS - which are probably related to werewolves being so traditionally masculine and aggressive and hairy (Eileen Wilk’s World of the Lupi series, Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series).

The scarcity of female werewolves is used over and over as a justification for women living in a sea of men, or for women being super-precious and hunted or needing lots of aggressive “protection”. It’s not a trope! It’s just the rarity of women! It’s just how werewolves ARE!

Except for the fact that werewolves are not actually real. If this is just how the werewolves are, then it is because the author chose to make them that way - you can’t excuse a problematic story element by creating a problematic world element.

We see this repeatedly when supernatural Alpha Male “heroes” are aggressive, violent, angry, “protective” and controlling, the excuse is usually that this is part of their nature. Werewolves are possessive and violent. The vampires latch on to their mates (in the Black Dagger Brotherhood) or can’t control themselves (Twilight). There are any number of abusive tropes that are justified because the man gets a supernatural pass - the abusive nature is part of their werewolf/vampire/weremanatee nature.

These creatures are not real, these creatures do not have to be this way. Their natures are conscious choices on the part of the writer and, as such, cannot be a “get out” of tropes they embody.

While supernatural creatures are a classic example, we can also see a lot of similar excuses arising from the cultures created in the books.

Again, Patricia Briggs’s Mercy Thompson series has the werewolf pack that is deeply misogynist and homophobic. Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments Series has a homophobic society. George R R Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire has a society that is such a hot mess of misogyny that I don’t think they have any industry other than prostitution. It’s the first society ever whose economy is entirely reliant on war on sex-work. Again, all of these cultural bigotries are choices of the author - these are fictional societies, subcultures and often entirely new worlds with new religions (and dragons); there is nothing forcing the bigotries of our world onto their societies beyond authorial choice.

Chosen by Fate (Para-Ops #2) by Virna DePaul

(spoilers ahead)

After returning from Korea with the para-ops team, Wraith isolates herself from everyone else.  Though she has always been moody and standoffish this increases.  Wraith knows that her undead life is running short. Finally, she decides to be proactive and demands to know who she was but with three felines being raped, Wraith's needs are put on the back burner.  Though Wraith agrees to work on the rapes, she cannot ignore the changes to her body.  Suddenly, she is becoming more human and it's no longer painful to be touched. Still the pain of who she was haunts her and though she manages to hide it all from the team, she cannot hide it from Caleb.

For a paranormal romance, DePaul crams Chosen by Fate with a lot of world building, mystery and spirituality.  The Goddess Essenia is still very much considering the annihilation of every single living creature and as Mahone works to stop it, the weight of the responsibility is beginning to wear on him. There is a secret organization that is attempting to end the peace between the humans and the Otherborn. Even the Para-Ops team who is trying desperately to bring about a balance is struggling with their own issues.  For all of the things happening in the book, it never feels confused.

Chosen by Fate's largest problem is that DePaul piles fail upon fail into the story and absolutely none of it is necessary.  It's so bad that I almost don't know where to begin.

Caleb is the main love interest in this story and he is half Indian and Half Irish.  This makes the relationship between Caleb and Wraith subversive because inter-racial relationships aren't often portrayed in this genre. What ever gains DePaul made in this regard were lost when she made Caleb a drunk. He even snarks when Mahone finds him in a bar, "Didn't you do your intel? I'm half-Indian and half-Irish.  You had to know the chances of finding me shit-faced was esp ... est ... extremely high."  Of course he's an alcoholic, everyone knows that if you're Irish or Native you cannot control your drinking.  Yes, I'm rolling my eyes.

Then we have the problems with GLBT portrayal. The problem begins with the felines who are bisexual, which is explained by their high sex drive.  Felines are also promiscuous because if they don't have sex, they experience pain.  Yes, promiscuous bisexual beings which is justified by story reasons. Further problematic is that one apparently needs "training in the art of feminine love." Feel free to dish out the side eye.

The Originals, Season 1, Episode 21: The Battle of New Orleans

Jackson and Oliver have collected a load of rocks that seem to be for Klaus’s moonlight rings and Jackson finally snaps at Oliver for constantly harping away about Hayley – when they run into a police road block. One created by Marcel and Diego.

Josh is hanging around with Davina, being a good GBF and being all reassuring of Davina’s doubts over making Marcel a cloaking spell and seeing Klaus’s ghostly daddy everywhere.

Genevieve marvels over Klaus’s mother’s spell (given that Klaus’s mother created vampires I think “gifted witch” is an understatement). The whole spell will stop wolves turning on a full moon, still leave them strong and fast and keep them with venomous fangs. Klaus… this sounds like a very very very bad idea. Even Genevieve is concerned when Klaus up his order from 1 ring to 100 rings – she objects and adds she isn’t his servant because they sleep together (oh Genevieve, you should know Klaus better), but Klaus offers her the entire grimoire in exchange for the rings. That’s…. also a really really bad idea. She realises Klaus is building a werewolf army (you think?) but Klaus brings up the fact Genevieve’s coven expects her to sacrifice herself – and he promises to protect her.

Klaus, did you brain switch with Elena?

At Camille’s bar, Francesca arrives complete with goon to clear everyone out and demand Camille hand over the special key. She has a day in which to do it. Camille goes to a property her uncle had and behind a not-very-hidden panel in the cupboard finds a whole hidden room full of files and weirdness.

Marcel asks his captured werewolves what they’re plotting with Klaus and, since they’re carrying lots of spell ingredients around with them “we’re not” is not a very convincing answer.

Klaus, Elijah and Hayley have noticed the absence of the wolves and guessed that Marcel is behind it – the vampire who they just keep forgetting to kill. And since Marcel has a spell from Davina (Klaus knows from Genevieve) he just needs leverage to use against her – yes Josh, you’re a tool and victim again, such fun (wondered why he appeared again, he does generally only show up from his plot box when useful). Klaus bites him – with his nasty vampire-killing hybrid bite. Davina tells Klaus where Marcel is.

Genevieve and Hayley worry – the main point of this is for Genevieve to tell Hayley how super special she is with her super special womb of specialness.

Elijah and Klaus find Jackson tied to a bomb (which Klaus is thoroughly indifferent about, being more focused on the stones). The explosives also seem to be the same as the ones used on the attack against the werewolves in the bayou which Marcel claimed to be innocent of. Klaus randomly open boxes triggers the many many bombs.

Being Originals, this comes under the heading of “mild inconvenience” rather than life threatening attack. They even manage to rescue Jackson. So Klaus resorts to his backup plan – call Francesca and have her deliver a bag of the stones (she and her family being organised crime means she can find odd items at short notice). Which now means Francesca knows their plans – Elijah, being the only person with a  working brain today, questions why Francesca is so happy to get on board with the whole werewolf army plan. She also wants to bring her people in Klaus’s compound to protect them in case Marcel attacks. Klaus agrees

From Dusk Till Dawn, Season 1, Episode 8: La Conquista

Flashback to begin – waaaay back this time, to the Conquistadors arriving in Mexico.

In the present, Santanico is with Richie’s wounded, maybe dead body. And by “with” I mean writhing gratuitously over it while still wearing not much of anything” because Reasons. She lets Carlos know that Ranger Freddie is still alive and she’s isn’t happy about it. The problem is that, whatever they need Richie for, it has to be his choice and desire.

When Richie wakes up he backs away from Santanico, horrified. He blames her for the women he killed and mutilated.

In the main club there’s a showdown, Seth has a knife to Freddie’s throat, Jacob’s upset about Scott being missing and has a shotgun to Seth’s head to stop him killing Freddie, Freddie has visible bite marks and they’ve already seen people turn and Freddie claims to know a way out. Lots of tension. Jacob calls on a vote for who wants to leave Freddie behind – and Katie votes for death, as does the professor. Jacob is shocked, they’re sensible – someone is bitten, they turn, they attack you.

They tie Freddie to a stripper pole before opening his “way out” the trap door to the grinder. They work their way down to a side passage, working carefully pas the grinder (Professor Sex Machine drops their weapons in it. Not useful – but, hey, if they were still drinking blood from the fountain they could get a splinter).

Freddie frees himself from the pole and grabs the Eye Knife to free his arms. But before he can join them through the trap door, Carlos arrives. They fight, Carlos with sword, Freddie with Axe (Carlos claims to have made Freddie stronger – I think to explain why Freddie isn’t dead in seconds). The fight looks well done but the cameraman has a bad case of random jerking. Freddie manages to disarm Carlos – but the axe to the face just causes wounds that heal instantly. Carlos rams Freddie onto the bar, salts Freddie’s wounds, drinks some tequila then bites him. Freddie apparently has a special blood line. Proved by him throwing a stick and impaling Carlos before stabbing both his hands to the chair – Carlos laughs.

Santanico continues to try and seduce Richie and convince him she’s a nice vampire and he stabs her. She doesn’t give up and we get a flashback when she was a mortal among the Inca. She ran rather than let people be sacrificed in her name; since she refused to spill blood, she was cursed (as we saw in the pilot) to have an insatiable need for blood. The hunger drew her to the temple where she would be enslaved (presumably to the Lords of the Night). He’s still not overly sold on her plea to free her.

Meanwhile, Professor Sex Machine expositions the fact the vampires have visions (Seth objects – he’s with them on Temple of Doom but draws the line at Crystal Skull. Seth, all right thinking people draw the line at Crystal Skull). Also underworld may be mentioned. Meanwhile Katie takes comfort in the belief that if she dies she will go to Heaven with her mother. To which Jacob basically prepares to spill some big terrible secret about the dead mother and, presumably, why she isn’t in heaven. This causes something to growl. I’m with you unseen monster, bad mouthing the girl’s mother when she’s desperately using the memory to be brave is totally not cool Jacob. Never mind losing his faith, this man is a monumentally shitty pastor. Can you imagine going to see him for comfort? “I take comfort knowing my mother’s in heaven!” “What? Your mother? Hah. Well you can take comfort that she ain’t cold at least!”

Anyway, I digress, they run from the angry vampires, Katie and Jacob falling behind because Jacob has a bad leg. But Seth can’t leave them behind and helps them behind the door they found just before the vampires get them. Professor Sex Machine was willing to leave them behind and Katie gives him a very appropriate kick.

Their little sanctuary is full of all the various cargo the vampires have stolen over the years. And they find a very agitated man with a shotgun who has been hiding down there for a rather long time – though he’s not sure how long. However he’s, perhaps, a little affected by his experiences and demands they spin the “wheel of misfortune”, a little cardboard game of life or death he’s set up. Which Seth wins, earning a shopping spree! And the revelation that the man has been to the very centre of the temple and seen bad bad things.

Scott isn’t dead, he’s in some uber scary catacombs full of scary noises and glowing green eyes. So, not in a good place either – he comes out in Santanico’s lair, watching her trying to convince Richie to trust her

Freddie wants Carlos to tell him why Santanico needs Richie and Carlos responds with a flashback – he was one of the Conquistadors. Hearing of the killing and abuse of the Incans – and the forcible conversion of them; Carlos isn’t so interested in the latter, wanting gold more than anything. So his commander decides the best way to do both is find their gods – which are probably gold statues. The Incans took him to a temple, a step pyramid with the Eye Serpent symbol with lots of gold – and a chained Santanico. She starts to bite him – and he cuts off her chains

Becoming her servant (and creation) which he has been ever since; keeping the deathlords happy and both of them alive. He lured his fellow conquistadors to the temple and killed them.

See, kill your villains, don’t wait for them to exposition!

Santanico tells roughly the same thing to Richie only says Carlos doesn’t love her – he worships her. He’s also greedy, always has been – and makes a profit from working for the lords which means she doesn’t think he can pass the “trials” needed to free her.

Carlos continues his exposition with the news that Richie has only killed one person at their behest, the bank teller (we’re ignoring the police he shot, apparently) the other serial killer victims were not his. He also dismisses the people who regularly die in the Titty Twister because he doesn’t consider them “innocents”. He adds more talk about who Freddie is, a white hat, the price he’ll pay and how he’ll never see his family again – before a vampire sneaks up behind Freddie and knocks him aside.

The vampire is Scott, bitten by Carlos. Carlos is freed but Freddie escapes down the trap door. Carlos again assumes Freddie is dead. And Scott, who was spying on Santanico, tells Carlos she chose Richie over him.

Supernatural, Season 9, Episode 21: King of the Damned

We are starting out of their usual stomping grounds – Leith, Scotland, 1723. Crowley’s old home – when he was human. Abaddon drops in on a man planning to run away to the colonies (he may be Crowley, we can’t tell because the Crowley we see now is, of course, just the body he’s possessing – which also means Abaddon is time travelling since that’s not her true form either) and casts some kind of spell.

Intro established, it’s to the present, 3 people enjoying a drink at a bar and a fourth being That Guy who absolutely no-one wants there, insists on talking about work and bragging and not taking the hint that no-one wants him there. Let’s hope something eats him. Until he mentions being close to the Metatron. They’re all angels and he’s giving them the spiel about why Metatron is worth following. Loose lips sink ships – or in this case get you kidnapped by Castiel’s team.

Sam and Dean arrive to find Cas has a fully working base, staff, the whole set up. Anyway, Castiel wants peace between angels, no more violence… for which he’s preparing for a war. Also he has an angel to question and he’s called the Winchesters to do it. Castiel isn’t doing this no-violence thing very well.

Of course Dean is up for some torture and he’s been trained by one of the best. Throw in the Mark of Cain and the main worry is him killing Ezra accidentally. Sam has a different plan, telling Dean just how low level and pathetic Ezra is so there’s no need to torture him, Metatron probably doesn’t even know Ezra exists – Ezra, a guy who felt the need to brag how important he is, of course opens his big mouth without Dean having to get creative. They learn Metatron has a portal to heaven that is undetected because it moves. Metatron is putting together an elite squad to do something – but Ezra really doesn’t know what

Sam and Dean leave the angel but when one of Castiel’s minions check on him, he’s been killed. Dean suspects there may be a mole in Castiel’s organisation. Castiel also takes the chance to ask Sam about Gadreel possession – with an apparent slant towards “are we sure Gadreel is evil”. Sam thinks, regardless of what he felt from Gadreel, he killed Kevin. So the answer points strongly to “yes, evil!”

Still, Castiel meets with Gadreel and tries to reason with him. Though during their argument they’re ambushed and have to kill a few angels. Gadreel insists he didn’t plan it and he believes in honour (killing Kevin was honourable) but Castiel makes the point that this just proves Metatron is not the good guy. He wants Gadreel to be his mole.

Crowley’s holding his own board meeting with black-suited demons – who are not on his side it turns out. Crowley has well and truly dropped the ball and his minions have betrayed him to Abaddon (he does threaten them with a whole lot of torture though). Abaddon is rather worried about the Mark of Cain and the First Blade since it can actually kill her – but she does point out if they do actually kill her, they’re not going to stop and the Winchesters will kill Crowley next. She wants them to work together to take down the Winchesters.

Night Terrors (Shadow Watch #1) by Tim Waggoner

When Audra was a little girl she spent many a night terrified of a clown.  As phobias go, coulrophobia isn't rare, let alone odd.  What is odd is that one day, the clown who had been haunting Audra's dream for years, suddenly comes to life.  You see in Audra's version of Chicago, some people have the ability to create living beings out of their nightmares.  Audra as it turned out is not a troubled child but an Ideator.  As an adult, Audra works with an agency tasked with policing earth and Nod - the land of the nightmares with Jinx, her nightmare come to life.

Audra and Jinx work well as a team but when Jinx gets kidnapped and a high profile incubus (read: living nightmare) manages to escape custody, Audra knows that despite being pulled off the case, the balance between Nod and Earth is out of balance.  Can Audra find Jinx in time to stop a full incursion of the earth?

I was immediately put off by Night Terrors because it began with a big battle before we were given any idea about the world, or the characters involved.  It's hard to root for the protagonist when you don't know anything about the players involved.  It's always good to hit the ground running; however, since this is the first book in the Shadow Watch series, it felt completely disorienting. From the beginning of the novel the nightmares brought to life were referred to as incubi.  Waggoner put a spin on the incubi mythos but he took quite a bit of time before he explained this leaving me feeling for quite some time that his story didn't make any sense.

Once the world of Night Terrors was explained, I did find it interesting.  The very idea that one's dreams could come to life is actually quite fascinating.  Equally so is the idea that the incubi would have one personality during the day and another at night when they became the living embodiment of the nightmare.  I found Jinx to be a fascinating personality and he was certainly an interesting twist on the terrifying clown.

As fascinating as the concept of Night Terrors is, I found that I couldn't invest in the story let alone get lost in it.  For me, at least part of the problem were the fight scenes.  They seemed to drag on and on. Neither Audra or Jinx seemed to really investigate anything and sort of just lucked into clues and made assumptions that lead to a conclusion.  There is also the issue of the Perry Mason like confession at the end of the novel. The story telling very much let down the concept.

In Audra, we once again have an isolated ass kicking protagonist.  She is filed with spunky agency and never takes time to formulate a plan of action.  Audra charges forward, even when it is detrimental to herself because that is what hard asses do.  She is far more of a walking trope than she is a character.  There are other female characters in this novel and so Night Terrors does pass the Bechdel test; however, while women do interact, I would be hard pressed to say that there are any real relationships.