Outcast, Season 1, Episode 9: Close to Home

This isn’t an especially Kyle heavy episode as he hangs more around the edges. But there are a lot of poignant moments as he gets Amber back in school and tries to reassure her fears. Having found her pictures he knows she remembers Allison being possessed and wants to desperately reassure her and protect her even as Amber is a lot more cynical than most children her age. It’s hard and quite sad to see that painful knowledge

Kyle does find Allison- she’s checked herself in a Mental Institution (with standard mentally ill people as wallpaper) – and no matter how he appeals to her, she won’t leave. She says it’s up to him to raise Amber. This is painful but I can see this – how would you deal with knowing you hurt your own child, knowing you did it but not knowing why, what triggered you, what set you off… or if it would happen again. What can you do?

Ogden and Kat leave town – but not out of the influence of Sidney who gives them a new, ominous mission. Ominous keeps happening as we come close to the season finale

Alas we have to check in on Anderson. He seems to have landed on his fee with Patricia who doesn’t deserve such an arsehole in his life. Equally he has Giles who continues to support and protect him even as Anderson shows he has absolutely no control at all. Seriously this man needs to lose his fawning supporters as of yesterday.

This lack of control Includes attacking Sidney in full view of the council looking to replace him (this didn’t help his case). And attacking Patricia’s son (yes the kid’s an arsehole – but Anderson defaults to attacking verbally or physically anyone who refuses to fit his world view) which goes down especially poorly with Patricia since her ex was abusive.

He accuses Patricia of letting Sidney and her son (who is hanging out with Sidney) play her. Which, again, shows his arrogance and inability to see what’s in front of him. They’re not playing her – they’re playing him, his arrogance, his temper. In the last 2-3 episodes we have seen Anderson blow up, what, 3, 4 times? His temper is predictable. Sidney doesn’t have to isolate Anderson from the town – he only has to gently poke him and watch Anderson go rabid. He’s predictable and he’s easy and unless he steps away from the mindset of making everything about him, he will continue to be used and fail.

Is There Rhyme Or Reason To Game Of Thrones Deaths?

For a very long time, Game Of Thrones had a reputation as the most brutally uncompromising show on television. In particular, it was known as a show that wouldn’t hesitate to kill off a protagonist or favourite character. This was grounded not just in the writing, but in the philosophy of series author George R.R. Martin. Martin has argued that his tendency to kill characters off is not simply a result of a pessimistic outlook or a play for shock value, but rather a reflection of the fact of life that death can strike down anybody at any time. It’s not a cheerful thought, but it’s the truth, and Martin, even while writing a book populated by dragons and ice demons, prides himself on keeping things real.



For five seasons, HBO reflected Martin’s feelings and writings with death after shocking death that rattled and even upset fans. Ned Stark’s fate all the way back in season one has been counted among the most shocking television deaths in recent history, and fans quickly discovered that it wasn’t to be an outlier. In this show, popular characters die all the time, and when it looks like someone is about to be killed, he or she usually is. That, for a long while, defined death on Game Of Thrones. It was the idea that this is not some fairy tale in which underdog stories are common, or last-minute miracles save the heroes. Martin writes, and HBO always followed, based on the odds. In short, if a sword was falling toward a neck, there was never a blade that was going to get in the way at the last moment.



It’s because of five seasons like this that as we headed into season six, most of the discussion wasn’t about who might win the Iron Throne (basically the gold medal of this whole “game”) or whether the remaining Stark children might find happiness. Rather, it was about two things: whether or not Jon Snow would come back from the dead, and who else would be dying soon. Indeed, character deaths have become such a major part of this series that there were even betting odds on who would die first in season six (which favoured the likes of Olly, the High Sparrow, and Lancel Lannister). That’s a pretty remarkable concept. The show had become so well known for killing off major people that people were actually wagering on who might be next.



In terms of the volume of deaths, season six lived up to expectations and then some. In fact, to a more casual observer of the show, it may even have seemed as if nothing changed, and Game Of Thrones simply went on doing what Game Of Thrones does best — and perhaps even got a little better at it. But a closer examination showed that despite the high body count of season six, Game Of Thrones actually changed drastically this year as it moved beyond Martin’s writing for the first time. Simply put, this time it was the bad guys and the seemingly powerful who died at the hands of protagonists and underdogs.



As one recap wrote, some critics went so far as to suggest that this was antithetical to the spirit of George R.R. Martin. More than a few referred to season six as a crowd-pleasing effort, or suggested that it was an unrecognizable shift in tone for the show. That’s a little bit of a stretch, perhaps, but it’s still easy to see how someone could come to that conclusion. Martin’s own assertion that death can come to anyone at anytime actually held up extraordinarily well in season six. What changed is that a few people against whom the odds seemed to be stacked finally scrambled away from death to triumph. There had hardly been an unlikely win in five seasons, and in season six there were several of them.



The question now is how much of this was intended. It could be that HBO has simply decided to go in its own direction as Martin struggles to push the sixth book through his notoriously slow writing process. But it could also be that he always intended to have a few comeback stories and satisfying heroic victories, and that five books’ worth of relentless adherence to the odds was meant as a setup. Until The Winds Of Winter (book six) comes out, we really won’t know. But for now, we’re left somewhat in the dark about where this show is going, and what the nature of the countless deaths sure to come will be.

Killjoys, Season 2, Episode 6: I Love Lucy

After the traditional opening where we see the Killjoys be their usual silly, fun selves. I do like these little preludes that remind us that normal life (such as it is) goes on.

But the gang needs answers and the best way to get this is with the green goo they have in Johnny’s pet Mossapede. Taking inspiration from Pawter’s mother they decide to experiment by injecting said goo into someone and seeing what happens –namely D’avin since he has all kinds of gooey woo-woo in his system

It turns out that injecting random animal secretions into yourself is a bad idea. The goo forms a mental bond between D’avin and the Mossapede which is most unpleasant. Life in a bug’s head is not good. From this they conclude they need some pure goo

Thankfully Pree has a contact from his Stylish Dictator Days that may provide just that.

San has a ship on an asteroid and is a collector – you know the trope I don’t need to spell out the oceans of shiny things he has. And he wants to trade for more

He’s all jaded and not impressed and ends up double crossing them (to the shock of no-one) and doesn’t instantly get mauled by Dutch because he has 3 illegal sexy, deadly female androids.

Yes, sexualised jokes are included but I have seen so much worse. Much more fun is Lucy hacking one of those Androids and clearly having a huge crush on Johnny to the point of being willing to sacrifice her new shiny Android body for him. It’s actually fun and kind of touching and I think I’ll miss Android Lucy.

The main story is Dutch and San – he wants her Sitarra, her musical instrument and the story behind it and uses woo-woo tech to see what she sees to see their past

We hear her tragic story of her past. Or some of it: of her being placed in a Harem, of her having Khlyen as a tutor who taught her how to play music and her promise of leaving the harem when she marries. It’s all very very sweet right up until Dutch shares the rest of her story – at the Harem she was taught to find a good husband. But to kill him. The musical instrument has poisoned strings that are then used to garrotte… and all of Khlyen’s promises about her not having to kill once she got married were a lie – because her mission was to kill her husband and with it all her dreams of being free.

It’s tragic, heartfelt, incredibly powerful and brutal. Her singing before the whole garrotting is beautiful and hits all his emotions as well and longings as well. It’s an awesome scene.

But he’s not dead – and we get his story. Aliens invaded his planet 4 centuries ago, he was tortured and he betrayed his people (he and Dutch strike a commonality with the idea that they both traded other people’s lives for their freedom and now hate themselves for it). He sought medical help – and ended up being filled with illegal nanites that, effectively make him immortal by healing all damage.

He has found common cause with Dutch, she understands, she invokes emotion so perfectly – he wants someone to stay with him. He wants someone to make him a better man. He wants Dutch to make him a better man.

“I’m not your Manic Pixie Assassin”.

Zoo, Season 2, Episode 7: Jamie's Got a Gun

It’s time for another episode of Zoo, so what ridiculousness do we get this week?

The gang heads over to a country. This is apparently England. Apparently. Despite having a church that looks very un-English, wooden houses that are pretty rare in England, a whole load of animals that don’t live in England, hordes of Cicadas which is pretty good for a species that is nearly extinct in England and some accents that most certainly do not come from England. Ye gods.

So why is the gang there?

Well using various amounts of brain twisting desperate explanation and trying desperately to get the writers to lay off the LSD for 5 minutes – just 5 minutes – we have the following incoherent explanation for the animals running amok:

“So you’re saying that some traveling carnie grifter from the 1890s inadvertently invented the triple helix?”

No, really. Some 1890s travelling show man with Ye Olde Mutant X-Ray machine took X-rays of creatures around the world, creating the triple helix. These creatures’ descendants then became the raging triple-helixed mutant animals

This means:

A)     Apparently a majority of all the animals in the world are descended from creatures this guy X-rayed. In the 1890s. I mean how did he even travel that far?! And he must have X-rayed literally thousands of creatures of the same species for this level of dominance. You’d think he’d have got bored after the first 100

B)      He X-Rayed a gazillion jellyfish. Even leaving aside the logistic of X-raying one of these, not hurting it and putting it back, why would you even bother? It’s a jellyfish. It’s transparent. I can’t think of a more pointless activity

C)      X-Rays. The Triple Helix was caused by X-Rays

That sound you heard was a million scientists crying out in pain.

Or it could be the sound everyone made when Allison started flirting with her step-son Mitch.

So they’re going to this guy’s old home in the hope he’s kept a convenient list of the thousands of animals he’s pointlessly X-rayed so they can Pokemon the lot of them and find a cure. Yay

Except Reiden got there first and has totally stolen everything except the shit this long dead Carny decided to bury in hi non-existant brother’s fake grave because where else are you going to store shit? See, before Ikea when you ran out of shelf-space you really had no option but to invent a sibling, pretend they died and then dig out a burial plot. Obviously.

Reiden has stole this because reasons, I’m sure. Can someone remind me again WHY Reiden is so against saving the world? And no “evil” is not a motivation.

Anyway, while they’re all doing that Jackson loses touch with reality, starts digging a grave himself (ah, must have something to store!) and babbling gobbldegook. Seeing his companion having a psychotic break and unable to communicate rationally Mitch blames this on Jackson overhearing his step-mother flirting with him

Mitch decides to treat this by inducing some hallucinations with experimental mind altering drugs!

Remind me again why everyone last episode thought he was such a brilliant doctor

This leads to a merry trip down memory lane where we learn that Jackson’s dad was an arsehole, he liked using Mnemonics to teach things and that Jackson burned down his dad’s lab and life’s work. In response his dad decided to inject him with the triple-helix which is why Jackson’s all mutated today.

I like to think that Jackson also smashed his dad’s “world’s best dad” mug – or that’s pending since Abraham just learned that Professor Oz, senior, is still alive. He thinks it’s a good idea not to tell Jackson. So do I.

Dariela gets some rapidly stuck on character development about not wanting to be a soldier and all about death so decides to leave the gang to stay behind and protect civilians with terrible accents against animal attacks. Kind of like a soldier. I hope this isn’t writing her out.

Logan turns out to be an evil spy working for Logan and this may be the one plot line I actually like – because the gang totally deserves this. I mean, we were introduced to Logan as a thief and liar willing to screw people over for money, Jamie decides he’s hot (which, granted, he is) and he chopped her toe off due to frostbite (I’m told this is a common mating ritual in Canada) and suddenly he’s trustworthy? Really Really Really? Yes I’m GLAD this bullshit is coming back to bite them in the arse

Oh and Jamie has taken to being mopier than a Livejournal Poet

 

Pictured: Jamie

 She also doesn't have a gun.

Consent in Romance - Love at First Woo-woo

Romance will always be one of the central elements of Urban Fantasy - and is certainly the foundation for Paranormal Romance. Naturally, there are many many tropes that are dubious or troublesome when it comes to romance (and more than a few that are mockable), but in our society where rape culture is so entrenched, there are few things more damaging and more disturbing than the many issues around consent.

We have already spoken about magical romances that bind the couples together, removing their consent to leave - but now we look at the foundation of so many of those romances.

We have referred to this in the Lexicon as Love at First Woo-woo, but often it is far more pervasive and destructive. Whether it’s magical bonds, the whims of some deity, magically induced lust or some other convoluted reason, all too often we see the woo-woo swoop in and the characters squished together into a romance.

Whether they want it or not.

Whether they chose it or not.

Whether they would ever choose it. Even when it goes against everything they want or dream or stand for. The woo-woo has spoken. Choice, autonomy, sex is irrelevant.

Magical sexual attraction seems to be the mildest form of this - and we have no end of incubi/succubae/witches et al who simply must have sex or are overwhelmed by the woo-woo lust for each other. Anya Bast’s Witch Series, is a classic example, elemental witches are drawn to each other by the woo-woo. The sad thing is it’s completely unnecessary - there’s no reason why these characters couldn’t have just found each other attractive - but no, there had to be coercion. There has to be that external pressure that forces that sexual step

There has to be an excuse.

At the core a lot of these tropes stem from the enduring, sexist, trope that a sexual woman is evil. A woman who pursues sex is a slutwhorejezebel and terribad awful, to be shamed and condemned. Nice Girls don’t sully themselves with the dreadful, awful sex and reach shakily for the smelling salts and the fainting couch, pearls clutched in a death grip, at the very idea. The only way your pure shining womanhood can possibly use her sinful ladyparts is if it isn’t her choice - or, more accurately - her FAULT. It’s very closely linked to the trope where a woman says “no” and has to be “worn down” by a male love interest until her defences are finally breached.

This is epitomised by the Anita Blake Series where we see Anita having one of the most expansive sex lives of any protagonist ever - but had to be dragged kicking and screaming to every sexual encounter.

It’s a tragic trope and the prevalence of it - that women need to be able to blame magic for them actually having sex - is why I still repeatedly praise series like Yasmine Galenorn’s Otherworld series that show pro-active, sexual women who enjoy their sex lives without any magical nudge to justify them getting down. This shouldn’t be praiseworthy, this shouldn’t stand out - but sadly it does

Of course this trope goes beyond reinforcing the idea a “good” woman needs to have an excuse to have sex - we can’t stress enough how often this violates consent.

Twilight is an especially infamous example of this trope - where magical “imprinting” results in werewolves (nearly all male) bonding with their love interests after just looking at them - making the relationship pre-ordained. And consent? Well one of these “women” who is “imprinted” on is actually a small child. The other a baby in the womb - but we’re assured they’ll have an attentive, loving caring future-boyfriend to dote on them until they come of age.

That’s called grooming. It’s a crime. And even if they don’t touch that girl until she’s 18, honest, that’s still a lifetime of brainwashing to impose on her. No reasonable person can call this consent.

While Twilight is extreme because of it’s involvement of children - it’s not alone. Nalini Singh’s Psy/Changeling series has changelings begin the “mating dance” with their chosen mates - even when those mates are completely uninterested not just in love, but in emotion at all! But the woo-woo has spoken! Personal consent, lives, beliefs or inherent nature are irrelevant! Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Werehunters form magical bonds - again before any real acquaintance has even been established. Eileen Wilks World of the Lupi series has mating bonds so strong they can’t even move too far away from the other! They’re literally joined at the hip!

It’s not just shapeshifters (though they do seem to dominate for some reason) - the Black Dagger Brotherhood (which has never seen a terrible romance trope without claiming it) has vampires getting in on the bonding-at-first sight nonsense as well.

This is another element that has to be emphasised of this trope - nearly all of these bound-for-life-at-first-sight people are virtual strangers. It emphasises not just a lack of consent but also strikes us as lazy writing. You could build a relationship, you could write the things about the other that attracted and endeared your protagonist. You could write them falling in love as they come closer and see all the wonderful qualities. Or, woo-woo could strike within seconds of seeing each other and they could be happily skipping down the aisle before they even know each other’s surname.

Chaos Rises (Chaos Rises #1) by Pippa DaCosta

Gem and her brother Del are half-demons – which is a difficult in the world after the demon invasion. Humans want to destroy or imprison them. Full demons want to enslave them. Gem and Del have made terrible decisions to keep the safe.

And now Del has disappeared – and Gem is faced with another set of terrible choices and thin hopes to save her brother – but her demonic master is the only one who seems to know what is happening even though she knows she cannot trust him and he has his own sinister agenda

This is a semi-dystopian world where the population is recovering from the aftermath of a (possibly brief) demonic invasion. It doesn’t seem to be too different from out world – but there are demonic zones and creatures lurking around

This leaves the demons still on Earth both as creatures to be feared and also creatures that are targeted by humanity from what I can see. While the demons themselves have complex powers, their own culture and their own history

This is one of the few occasions where I actually say I need more world building info! It’s common for initial books in a series to dump too much information in. But this world is big, it has history, we have the demons before the veil, the veil collapsing, this apparently leaving demonic places on earth. We have the elements, we have courts and demon kings and queens and princes, we have lesser demons. We have the half-demons, we have the Institute. A lot of this has history and world building implications which isn’t just good for my nosy, world-building loving self, but it would also really help understand what is going on, understand these characters, understand them and how they relate to the world. I neeeeeed more

Colony: Season 1, Episode 1: Pilot

The pilot of this dystopian does exactly what it needs to do – introduces everyone, what their issues are and what the stakes are as well as setting up the world setting

Which is interesting because of how subtly it was done. It didn’t scream “dystopian hellhole” from the opening scenes – no, people seem to have relatively normal lives. I appreciate how it started with such a very mundane opening scene of breakfast and then introduced just a hint of the underlying problems: Shortages of basic supplies we take for granted

Our main characters – Will, Katie and their children – go through a relatively normal day with these constant little hints: radios talking about travel bans, ominous flying machines, fear of the police – all of it escalates as we see Katie bargaining for insulin (in a world where the occupiers don’t feel the need to treat diabetes).

While people don’t lead happy lives, the fact they don’t lead utterly hellish lives of pain and privation is, I think, an important touch. Especially since the (presumably) alien overlords (they talk of “the arrival” and “the invasion” and we see a lot of super technology) are largely absent and it is collaborators who are actually the face of oppression. They are the ones who round up dissidents, enforce the curfew etc etc. There’s a resistance and some of the people even call them terrorists. The fact the dystopian isn’t constant hellish torture is perhaps the key to selling this – because people probably can keep their head down, keep quiet, play along and not face any consequences. We also see very clearly that the Collaborators enjoy a much higher quality of life with much better food, drink and general luxuries.

I am interested in how the Resistance is portrayed – they’re planting bombs, some call them terrorist and those bombs are even called IEDs. No direct comparisons are made with real world insurgencies, but I have to say I’m surprised in the present political climate to have an Insurgency presented as, at least potentially, good guys.

Our main characters deviate from their “normal” lives when Will tries to leave the walled city of Los Angeles to find their missing third son – and gets caught up in a Resistance strike which ends up with him being caught. And exposed as an army ranger: which is rare skill set these days as all police and soldiers were rounded up and disappeared shortly after the occupation (another of Will’s friends, Broussard, talks about this).

Glitch, Season One, Episode One

Sergeant James Hayes gets a call that there's some trouble happening at a grave site and when he arrives to investigate, he finds a woman covered in mud with a deep cut on her leg. James tries to question her as to what happened and who she is, but the woman is in far too much shock to answer.  Deciding that the woman needs medical treatment, he calls for help and Doctor Elishia McKellar arrives. Am I the only wondering if this make believe area of Australia is too poor to afford an ambulance?  As they work on the woman, two men appear, similarly covered in mud naked and in shock.  Hayes is quick to give them a blanket to cover themselves and they also have no answers for him as to what exactly is going on.  Elishia and Hayes decide to take the people back to the surgery but before they head off, another woman appears.  Elishia decides to take the women, leaving Hayes to transport the men.  Before Elishia can drive off, yet one more woman appears.

What neither Elishia or Hayes realises is that they missed someone.  Paddy Fitzgerald is equally covered in mud, so he wraps himself in one of the blankets Elishia and Hayes left behind and leaves the cemetery.  Beau, a young Aboriginal kid, having watched people crawl out of the grave decides to follow Paddy and record him.

By the time Hayes arrives back at the surgery, Elishia has started to get the women cleaned up so, he tends to the men, handing out clothing. Charlie remembers that he lives on a farm but that's all he knows.  Carlos has flashbacks to running away from law enforcement, so he takes off, forcing Hayes to chase him.  While Hayes is outside with Carlos, one of the women learns her name from looking at an inscription on the ring she is wearing.  The woman learns that her name is Kate and what more, she's convinced that she's been at this particular surgery before.  Before Elishia can look her up, Hayes comes back inside with Carlos and is astonished to see Kate.  Yes, as it turns out, Kate is Haye's dead wife.  Hayes doesn't want to admit it at first but the resemblance is uncanny and Kate even has the coffee coloured birthmark that his dead wife had.

When Beau turns a corner to follow Paddy, Paddy jumps on him demanding to know why he is being followed. Beau explains that he is filming this and Paddy lets it go though he seems confused.  Paddy decides that after the night he has had, he wants to get a drink and asks about a bar he knows. Conveniently, the bar is around the corner but when they arrive it's closed. When Beau points out that he cannot enter, Paddy assumes it's because Beau is an Aboriginal.  Thankfully, Beau immediately calls Paddy, a "racist fuck" and says that the bar is closed and that if they go in, it's breaking and entering.  Paddy however will not be dissuaded, so the two break in. Once inside, Paddy finds his knife prominently displayed at the bar.

A shocked Hayes drags his reanimated wife back to her grave.  Kate's overcome and remembers digging herself out.  This enough for Hayes to apologise for bringing Kate there in the first place.  They had to a playground - a place where they used to go when she was alive and talk for the first time.