dgw

VIP

10

This was an episode comprised of three stories from three of the show's most significant characters. One was great; one was good; one was godawful, all for different reasons. Let's take them in turn.

Saul's storyline was tremendous, and much of it has to do with the direction and cinematography of the episode. Mandy Patinkin certainly held up his end of the bargain, but the way his scenes were structured really elucidated Saul's paranoia without having to be more explicit about it. The way the camera seemed to be spying on him (a technique the show would employ in its first season) sold Saul's feeling cornered and needing to do something risky and/or desperate. I also appreciated how he gave Carrie the kiss off at the beginning of the episode, but that what he was experiencing gave him reason to believe her. Straining the relationship between your two most significant characters and then bringing them back together is an old trick, but they're doing the legwork to make it plausible and compelling. At the same time, it was nice to see Saul using those spy skills again, from downloading the documents after creating a diversion, to slipping During the drive without his CIA tail being able to catch on. Great stuff.

Carrie's storyline was only OK, but it was heightened tremendously, as always, by Claire Daines's acting. Whatever they are paying Daines, it isn't enough, because in scenes where her character is lonely or isolated or desperate or blindsided, the written dialogue does her no favors -- full of cliches and weak lines -- but she sells in her reading of those lines, in the pained or blindsided or wistful expressions that show she's at the end of her rope, and in the way she carries herself that lets the audience buy into her situation. She's succeeding in a herculean task on that front, and it elevates the material.

The Quinn storyline, however, was ridiculous, in a bad way. I realize that any show, especially one involving spycraft, is going to require a certain amount of willing suspension of disbelief, and a tolerance for things working out just as they need to for the plot to move along. But my god, a nearly-mortally wounded Quinn being rescued by a random good samaritan who just so happens to be flatmates with a terrorist who was released because of the very documents that Carrie is so worked up over and revealed Saul's plan with the Germans? That just strains plausibility too far. It's far too convenient as a plot development, and Quinn overhearing a terrorist plot, and then becoming the Pirate King by killing the terrorist guy in a final showdown rumble at the end of the episode was just too cartoonish for me to bear. Really hacky stuff. I don't know where they're going with all of this, but it had better be good to justify this level of B.S.

[7.4/10] Ugh, I want to give this episode a higher score. I really do. But the Roland story is so bad. He’s never been my favorite character, but when the show relegates him to the background, he’s not so bad. But now I fear that putting him as a regular presence at the hotel is going to mean more and more of his unfunny shtick.

Case-in-point, Roland once again acts like no human being would. Bringing a mini-fridge to work, watching Erin Brockovich in the middle of the workday, and playing video games on the T.V. you were told to leave at home is just over-the-top, cartoony behavior that has zero basis in reality and, worse yet, isn’t remotely funny. There’s a decent kicker with Jocelyn explaining that she needs him out of the house and Johnny relenting, but it’s pretty meager all things considered and drags the whole episode down.

The David/Stevie/Patrick story about David being unwilling to compromise is much better on a scene-for-scene basis. It’s hard to put my finger on why, but I get such a kick out of Stevie and Patrick scheming to bust David’s eminently bust-worthy chops. In this case, tweaking his inability to compromise with the prospect of plungers and other toilet accoutrement at the front of the store. David’s facial reactions and body language when trying not to betray his utter disgust and disdain are fantastic. The fact that his ensuing rant leads to the first time he refers to Patrick as his boyfriend is a cute button to put on the whole thing, and Stevie’s in rare form.

But the most interesting story in the episode is the one with Moira, Alexis, and Twyla. Moira’s realization that she hasn’t been involved in her own daughter’s life and her fumbling attempts to rectify that nicely walk the line between endearing and comedic. The cold open, with Moira obliviously talking about Ted’s “striking” new girlfriend, is a laugh riot, and Moira’s awkward efforts to learn about her daughter and give her advice for picking up a man, are all quite funny.

They’re also very touching. For one thing, Moira’s earlier clumsy attempts to help her daughter give way to a really sweet statement that Alexis is in her prime and deserves every happiness. It speaks to how mother and daughter are on the same page with how Alexis is once again using Twyla to channel feelings she can’t express herself, and Moira uses Twyla to communicate her feelings back. I’d feel bad for poor Twyla, but she’s touched by Moira’s vicarious compliment and goes home with someone who shares her second favorite color, so surely she’s on a winning streak here anyway.

Still, the best moment is the closing one, where Moira reassures her daughter, not in so many words, that even if you have to wait a year for the right person, when you know there’s something there, it’ll still work out, because it worked out with her and Johnny, so it can work out with her and Ted. It’s the exact reassurance Alexis needs to hear right then, and it’s the perfect counterpoint to her cluelessness in the episode’s cold open.

That story does so well in the end, and the shenanigans involving the Rose Apothecary crew are amusing, but the Roland storyline is so bad that it brings the whole thing down.

Back to the Howards living each other's life in the other's side of things. Finally we got each Howard confronting the other, one on one, about the faults from each other in each other's lives! That's something I've eagerly been waiting for and that dialogue did not disappoint, it was some of the best stuff Counterpart has given us, so far. Though he was right in some points, Howard Prime kept his same aggressive, self-righteous, douchebag attitude, while Howard Alpha finally showed some balls and set Howard Prime straight! Our Howard has been growing since he's crossed to the other side, and I love that.

Now that they've uncovered the school for the sleeping agents on the other side, I feel that they've forced the hand of the "resistance" (or whatever we're supposed to call them) and we should be expecting a strong backlash from them in our side, so maybe they'll be preparing a violent strike, soon...

But I really wasn't expecting Quayle to frame Howard (Alpha?) for being the mole... I sympathised with Quayle in the last episode, after him finding out he'd been played for years by his own wife, but his cowardness now was just low.

Things won't be looking good for either Howard, from now on... Which means they'll be looking great for us, the viewers!

So there it is, the worst thing HIMYM had ever done, or would ever do. "The Robin" was once my breaking point on this show, the point where I stopped harboring any illusions that it might one day return to being the show and I had known and loved and accepted that, instead, it had metamorphasized into a pale imitation of its former self. HIMYM had previously had bad episode, bad characters, and bad storylines, but none of them was so fundamental to the mythos of the series, so bafflingly wrong-headed, and so essential to the show's past and its future, as "The Final Page."

But before we explore the horror, let's take just a minute to chat about the things that are okay, even good about the episode. The comedy subplot about Marshall and Lily having their first day off since Marvin was born gets pretty broad, between their minute-by-minute list of activities, to their cartoonish lullaby, to their immediate separation anxiety, but it's pretty standard HIMYM Season 8 comedy, with a few cute moments, and that's enough to give it a pass.

What's more, Ted's speech to Robin about the virtues of making an ass of yourself is a lovely little scene, that manages to delve into Ted's fairly unrealistic view of what loves means, and yet draws it back to something sweet -- that even his wildest misfires have helped him to find a great friend. I've never really bought into the show's thesis, first presented in Season 7, that what was holding Ted back from finding The One was that he needed to get over Robin. But accepting that premise, his words are heartfelt and the gesture of taking Robin to the WWN building is meaningful.

With that out of the way, let's talk about the event that manages to wreck one of the show's foundational relationships, botch its romantic-arc storytelling over at least the last season and a half, practically ruin two of the show's main characters, and infect nearly everything that came after it: The Robin.

The result is simple -- essentially everything from Barney's profession of love to Robin in "Splitsville" has been part of a play, a scheme on Barney's part prime Robin for his proposal. The drunken kiss, the dating Patrice, the whole kit and kaboodle, were one grand effort at manipulating Robin into loving him.

Let's address the first problem with this whole plan -- it's tremendously implausible. The problem with a lot of works, be they dramatic or comedic, aping the Tyler Durden-esque twist that reshapes everything you've seen previously, is that too often they require all too much convenience in order for these sorts of byzantine plots to work. Too much of "The Robin" requires people to react in just the right way, at just the right time, on just the right schedule, or the whole thing falls apart.

Now HIMYM has always been a show that runs more on emotional logic than on real logic. To some degree, you accept the level of willing suspension of disbelief necessary to enjoy this show, or you pretty much have to give up on the whole thing from the beginning (or chalk it up to Future Ted as an unreliable narrator). I'm generally okay with that idea, and the other contrivances that are necessary for the grand gestures that are the stock and trade of HIMYM to work. But this one stretches the reality of the show too far. Maybe it's just that there's too many moving parts; maybe it's that the plan stacks implausibility on top of implausibility until the whole bit is too unwieldy to pass even the most generous of B.S. detectors, or maybe it's that I don't like what this routine is in service of and that colors my willingness to accept it or not. Whatever the reason, "The Robin" feels like a bridge too far in terms of the coincidences necessary for Barney's ploy to work, and while that's far from this episode's greatest problem, it does sincerely damage the effectiveness of the twist.

So let's get into the greatest problem, which is really two fold: that Barney would do something like this and that Robin would accept it.

The first part is arguably, devastatingly in-character for Barney. There have been several episodes to rehabilitate Barney as not just some sort of Lothario on the prowl, but as an actual human being with real feelings and a desire to love and to be loved. The results have been mixed, and all too often the show falls back into the idea that Barney is basically a sex-minded wizard, conjuring spells on unsuspecting dames at the bar with little moral compunction.

So then it's not crazy that Barney would offer this bizarro version of something Ted might do. Barney too goes in for the big gesture, for making an ass of himself, but he does it in the most deranged, cruel manner imaginable, that plays into the worst qualities of the character. Manipulating someone that you claim to love, knowingly putting them through the pain and humiliation and instability that Robin has been suffering from over the past few episodes, doesn't amount to a grand profession of love; it amounts to the revelation that Barney doesn't really understand what love is.

Because what's striking about "The Robin," and what is supposed to ease the audience into accepting all of these horrible things, is that Barney has no malice in any of this. Barney isn't trying to hurt Robin; he's not trying to trick her into loving him; he's not trying to be an amoral monster about something as sacrosanct as two people pledging the rest of their lives to one another. He just doesn't understand. "The Robin" unintentionally reveals that the Barney's arc from, at a minimum, the end of Season 2, where he slowly develops from a sexual predator into a mature human being, is a failure. It leads to a person who believes he loves another person, and maybe, in his own way, he does, but through his twisted methods, shows he has no concept of what love really is.

Love is not torturing someone so as to catch them off guard with your proposal. (I'm also looking at you, Friends.) Love is not intentionally driving someone "nuts." Love is not toying with people's emotions. Love is not spying on your friends. Love is not pretending to date the object of your heart's desire's worst enemy just to get to them. Love is not an elaborate game where if you lie and cheat and steal enough along the way, you get a human trophy at the end.

These are not the acts of someone who truly cares for another human being. These are the acts of a sociopath. This is the best Barney can do. This is him playacting as a romantic. This is him trying to replicate the rhythms of the Mosbies of the world while having no facility, maybe even no idea, about what truly loving another person means.

And this is the point where Barney crosses the moral event horizon. It is telling that the show's creators patterned Barney's "long con" after a similarly elaborate plot from Breaking Bad's Walter White (occasional HIMYM guest star Bryan Cranston). That moment in Breaking Bad is arguably the point where Walter White goes from being a man with good intentions and bad impulses to being the monster he would become. "The Robin" presents a turning point for Barney as well. This is where he goes from being a character who does some pretty terrible things that you can write off as an exaggerated, nigh-satirical take on "pickup artist," buoyed by the character's accumulated vulnerabilities and affections, to becoming someone who would enact this horrifying, violating scheme and view it as a sincere expression of love.

Maybe it is. Maybe this is the closest Barney can come to expressing the emotions that he believes amount to love. But if so, that's terrible, and speaks volumes about the fissures in the foundation of a relationship HIMYM doesn't just wants us to be on board with, but which has been, and will be, at the core of the series' final three seasons.

But perhaps even more insulting is the idea that Robin accepts it. Robin herself has deteriorated a bit as a character since the beginning, becoming more and more exaggerated herself as the late season dearth of places to take the show's characters became more pronounced. And yet there is little in her history that suggests the cynical, pragmatic, independent woman we have seen over seven-plus years, would not only excuse Barney's deplorable behavior, but accept it as a sign that the two of them should be together.

Robin herself offers the most convincing and powerful rebuke of Barney's inherently messed-up gesture. "Seriously, Barney?" she asks. "Even you, even someone as certifiably insane as you must realize that this is too far. You lied to me, manipulated me for weeks. Do you really think I could ever kiss you after that? Do you really think I could ever trust you after that? This this is proof of why we don't work, why we'll never work. So thank you. You've set me free because how could I be with a man who thinks that this trick, this enormous lie could ever make me want to date him again?"

That should really have been it. Robin should have walked away, resolved never to talk to or let Barney into her life ever again, and recognize him as someone who could not trusted to be honest, to be open, to be a mature human being in an adult relationship. Instead, she realizes that this is all, in fact, leading to a proposal, and convinces her to have a complete change of heart about the whole thing.

And it makes absolutely no sense.

How that sense of betrayal becomes instant acceptance of the offer to marry this cretin is beyond me. The most charitable interpretation is that Robin appreciates this as Barney being all-in as only he can be. But that doesn't erase the horrible things he did to her to get there, or offer any indication that he couldn't or wouldn't twist noble ends into terrible acts once more. The less charitable interpretation is that Robin has been left so off-balance and messed up by Barney's machinations that she's in a bad enough place mentally to be willing to accept this sort of thing. The even less charitable interpretation is that no reasonable human being would ever look at what Barney did as a genuine sign of love, or at least as a sign that someone can be trusted to be a committed, loving partner in life, and the show just fiats Robin's emotional acceptance to get us to an end point it not only hasn't earned, but which is the antithetical result to all that we've seen thus far.

Or maybe there's another explanation.

The version of Robin Scherbatsky we've seen over the last handful of episodes has not been good or decent or likable. She is pointlessly horrible to Patrice. She selfishly tries to sabotage what she thinks is Barney's relationship with Patrice. And she only returns to wanting Barney after his declaration that she cannot have him. This too, is not the foundation of a real, committed relationship, or the kind of person with the maturity to be in one. Robin has always been much more of an adult than Barney, and even within the heightened reality of the show, felt like more of a real person. But the version of her we've seen in the lead up to "The Final Page," presents a discomforting possibility.

Maybe these two people deserve each other. Maybe they both have such a fucked up view of what it is to want and care for and love someone that they are made to visit these types of violations of trust and of conscience upon one another again and again, in a spate of co-dependence rather than legitimate connection. Though Barney's missteps are much greater in magnitude here, both he and Robin act terribly in the lead to this mid-season finale. They mislead, don't consider the genuine happiness or well-being of the other (not to mention innocent bystanders), and above all act with wanton disregard for anyone's interests but their own. Perhaps that level of myopia leaves them unexpectedly well-matched, even if not portends a thoroughly unhealthy relationship to follow.

But that's not what How I Met Your Mother seems to want its audience to take from "The Final Page." It wants us to take this all as the act of genuine devotion rather than of hopeless narcissism, as a moment filled with true love than a reveal of psychopathology, as two people who belong together beautifully and finally joining as one than as an implausible acceptance premised on falsehood and manipulations.

This, more than any prior missteps, more than any previous faults in the characters or the plot, more than even the justifiably polarizing finale, is the moment that broke the show, that proved it had truly and fully lost whatever tenuous grasp it had on its understanding of its characters, their stories, or how love and romance work. It's the point at which we were asked to accept the product of a depraved act of betrayal and manipulation as an enviable celebration of true feeling.

There was no turning back from "The Robin." No retcons could save it, and no amount of attempted rehabilitation could rescue the show in its wake. It is the point at which How I Met Your Mother ceased to be a series that had always had a certain rom-com view of romance but which grounded it in genuine human emotion and moments of real feeling, and instead became one simply playing out the string to its unsatisfying endgame, increasingly fixated on relationships that hadn't and didn't work, and which were founded on so much betrayal -- of character, of love, of common sense -- that it could no longer have even the force that came from the years of good will and myth the series had crafted for so long. "The Final Page" is, without question, the worst thing the show ever did, and true to HIMYM's non-linear bent, its ripples are felt in both the past and the future of the show.

I remember watching this episode in the '90s and being stunned that they actually referenced minor events from previous episodes. At this point I was just used to the Star Trek style of storytelling which was generally very self-contained. But Stargate embraced continuity, and this episode brings back completely unimportant characters from not one but two previous adventures! Just for single, throwaway scenes! Crazy! The fact that the show rewarded you for watching like this was one of the things which made me fall in love with it.

• Tobin Bell will always be "the guy from that Stargate episode" to me, not the guy from Saw.
• Narim plays things a little on the creepy side with Sam when viewed with more modern eyes. But his character is easy to like.
• The Tollan are a cool race to introduce at this point, but left as a bit of a mystery. I like that they had both a pleasant and unpleasant side with Narim and Omoc. Future appearances will always be fun.
• Hello, Maybourne. Welcome aboard.
• Loved the weird camera shot that starts right inside a jug of water in the conference room.
• The scene with Daniel and Omoc on the mountaintop is great. I love how Tobin Bell played it, like indulging a curious child.
• The Nox were so underused in this franchise.

[7.3/10] Man, this moved at a crazy pace. I’ve liked the time we’ve spent doing The Experiment, and the twists and turns along the way have largely been strong ones. But even for a show known for blowing through plot, “Help Is Other People” just races through some of the biggest bombs this season could drop at the midway point.

The experiment is ending (and we’ve apparently jumped six months). Simone has figured out that something is amiss and has concocted elaborate theories. John spills the beans about Jason not being Jianyu to the group. We’re trying desperate maneuvers to get the four humans to rack up good deeds, like putting Brent in peril and telling them that they’re in The Bad Place.

That is, well, a lot. Most of it’s good! I like almost all of those developments, if not every slice of the execution. But man, that’s packing in a lot without giving any of it time to breathe. The rapidfire pace of this show is usually a feature, not a bug, but I walked away from this one excited for what’s to come next but also wishing we could have stretched some of this out and developed more connective tissue with what came before.

Still, there’s quality material here. We haven’t really had time to get to know Chidi and Simone as a couple (despite the amusing muffin/ducky appellations), but I appreciate the cause of their break-up here. It’s a little too conceptual rather than emotional, but I like the idea that it stems from a raw philosophical difference between the two. Simone is a scientist and evidentialist -- that means she keeps secrets from Chidi because she doesn't want to taint her analysis and walks away from Brent because he’s shown them no evidence that he’s a good person worth saving. Chidi is a Kantian and deontologist, which means he keeps secrets from Simone because he can’t bear to break his oath of secrecy and he goes to save Brent because he believes he has a moral duty to do so. The pair respect one another’s positions, but realize that it makes them incompatible when push comes to shove despite some on the ground chemistry.

I truly like that notion! It’s just a lot to get through in a single episode, and it’s harder to invest in that when we’ve barely seen them be a couple in the afterlife. There’s a level of chaos that’s introduced from Simone having identified that something fishy’s going on and snooping around to figure out what it is, but the destination is more impactful than the abbreviated journey.

On the other side, I like our heroes scrambling to get the humans in the best position possible before the experiment ends, and everything going predictably awry. Some of that is just standard sitcom storytelling, but there’s an enjoyable chaos that follows from Eleanor and company putting together their supposed perfect dash across the finish line, the humans completely thwarting that possibility, and then the good guys running around trying to react.

I appreciate their plan here, to try to earn them one more set of major good deed points by rescuing Brent when, for a guy that douchey, the only reason to save him could be pure altruism and respect for human life overall. The fact that it splits this quarter apart, when these sorts of events bonded the original group together, is an interesting shift away from our usual expectations and understanding, and I appreciate the desperation of it.

There’s also something interesting about the final ploy, to tell Brent and Chidi that they’re in the bad place (or rather, give Chidi enough to guess it), so that Brent has to confront the idea that he’s a bad person. Brent denying it, having his view of himself punctured, is a really intriguing idea that I imagine we won’t get to explore in any depth until later, if at all, and the notion of him apologizing to Chidi as a moral buzzer beater is compelling as a final monkey wrench in the experiment.

There’s also some good laughs here. Michael doing “earth magic” is amusingly lame. Janet trying to get into the obelisk and talking about how she’ll need to “violently eat” her Janet-babies were both laughs. Jason’s reaction to Tahani’s London references and Tahani’s shock at Jason’s two-for-two bits of coherency are both funny bits. And Eleanor going for the margarita pitcher rather than the glass at the end is a cheap laugh, but a solid one.

I just wish we got more of this. Maybe that’s me worrying that we have a Game of Thrones situation here, where there’s a good story to be told, but smushing it into a small episode order creates pacing and development plausibility problems. Still, I trust this show to make it work, and I hope that what comes next justifies that faith.

Okay, I really wanted to like this episode, mainly because Jacqueline's character development is such a feminist statement. Unfortunately, the entire subplot with Titus as a Geisha is......argh. The way they dealt with this subplot is very one-sided and unfair. This episode comes off as pandering to the anti-SJW/anti-PC crowd. They could have at least give the PC crowd a much fairer portrayal. Like pointing out more realistic reasons why they're offended by Titus' portrayal of a Geisha in the first place like how doing a yellowface can actually be harmful to the way how people perceive Asians. Not because they're offended cause they're offended, like how they were portrayed in the show. With this, it gives a much fairer discussion on the still talked about political correctness vs. comedy debate. But nope, it's very clear what kind of bias Tina Fey has in regards to this topic.

In regards to this debate. Full-on political correctness is bad. I believe jokes on very taboo subjects has to at least be clever and does not come off as making fun of the oppressed. Like in regards to making a rape joke that makes a rapist the butt of the joke rather than the rape victims. Of course, that subplot is in response to the whitewashing of Jacqueline since the actress who is playing her is white. Honestly, I am okay with Jacqueline's character being an Native American despite being played by an actress who is white because it's ironic, gives a plot twist that Jacqueline is not actually white and also delivers a sad massage about how many PoC had to make themselves white to be feel worthy. Honestly, with this kind of story, I wouldn't buy an accurate Native American actor playing Jacqueline. Let me be clear that whitewashing in general is awful. This is just an exemption because this particular part is executed well in my opinion.

[9.3/10] At first blush, Baby Driver writer-director Edgar Wright and fellow director Wes Anderson don’t seem like a natural pairing. Wright’s films, like Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead tend to be overtly comedic, include a good quotient of action, and bring an adventure-focused quality to the proceedings. Anderson’s, by contrast, tend to be quieter, more droll pictures, that are certainly funny and have their share of exciting moments, but which find their form in the more reserved, music box sensibilities of Anderson’s oeuvre.

And yet, Wright and Anderson’s films have something very much in common. They both create films where it seems like the world was built to fit their characters, rather than more typical films where the main personalities find themselves struggling in a world that’s indifferent to them or even more commonly, which doesn’t fit them at all. Whether it’s Anderson’s elegant dioramas or Wright’s “everything’s foreshadowing” rube goldberg machines, the environments of these films bend to our heroes, not the other way around, resulting in some wonderfully well-choreographed cinema.

Baby Driver is the apotheosis of this tack, brought to bear in the form of car chases, gunfights, and the best jukebox soundtrack this side of the galaxy (and any attendant guardians). Indeed, Marvel Studios’ Guardians is a nice reference point, as both films not only feature countless rockin’ tunes, but also center on roguish but decent young men, holding onto to the last holy artifacts of their mother, finding solace in music and falling in with a rough crowd before deciding to stand for something more. It’s kismet that star Ansel Elgort, who plays the lead (appropriately named “Baby’), is signed on to be the past and future Han Solo in the latest standalone Star Wars flick, a character who’s very much in the DNA of Guardians’ Peter “Star-Lord” Quill.

Independent of any comic book counterparts, however, Baby Driver doesn’t offer much in terms of an original premise. Baby is a badass driver and a decent kid, mixed up with some bad folks, tentative about the prospect of blood and his hands, wanting to start a new life with his lady love. There are a lot of tropes in the film: the quiet but effective young naif, the loose cannon gangster, the slimy mastermind, the ingenue who represents a beacon of hope, the inevitable moral dilemma.

But what the film lacks in originality in its setup, it more than makes up for in performance, texture, and execution. Baby Driver has a murderer’s row of performers who chew up and spit out Wright’s script and make what could otherwise be stock character come alive and compensate for any dearth of depth with the sheer vividness of their presence.

Kevin Spacey looks alive for the first time in ages, bringing a blasé menace as the organizer of each heist. Jamie Foxx is at his extroverted best, rolling through pointed monologues and bringing a lived-in flavor of crazy. Lily James has enough homespun, wanderlust charm to balance out her underwritten part. Elgort is necessarily more reserved, but equally endearing and a fine fulcrum for the movie. And Jon Hamm brings his Mad Men practiced-gentility in a fashion that makes him seem like that much monstrous when the scales fall.
But while the performances carry the film in its quieter moments, what sets Baby Driver apart is sequence after superlative sequence of breathtaking kinetic cinema. Not content to simply toss in explosive but empty action to keep the heart-pumping, Wright, cinematographer Bill Pope, and editor Paul Machliss create these elegantly constructed set pieces of gorgeous synchronous stunts, twists, and turns, the hum right along with the music, just like the protagonist.

That works whether Baby is blowing the doors off the film’s opening with a series of death-defying terms perfectly sequenced to his backing track. It works when the young man finds himself embroiled in a firefight where surprise shots and returned fire blast back and forth in time with the beat. It works in chases on foot as the rhythmic thump of the tune of the moment matches the energy of pursuers and pursued alike. Even when Baby goes to get coffee, the world moves with him; from the graffiti on the walls to the buskers on the street everything goes where he goes.

In the same way, the film doesn’t so much present action scenes as it does ballets of chrome and octane. Baby Driver oozes with style and tempo, knowing how to hold the audience’s attention through great escapes that and close scrapes that keep topping one another, and quieter scenes where the tension comes from sweet interactions juxtaposed with combustive elements, leading the viewer to wonder which will win the day.

It’s also a near perfectly-paced movie. Like a perfect mixtape, Wright knows when to kick things into gear and when to slow things down to let the audience catch its breath before putting his foot on the gas once more. While the film starts to feel a bit overextended at the very end, with the villain creeping into unkillable slasher territory, for the vast majority of its runtime it holds your attention from moment to moment and scene to scene expertly. In that, Wright matches the talents of his protagonist, directing and maneuvering this complex machine like it were a rough-and-tumble ballerina, full of slick thrills and inimitable grace.

He achieves this with a movie, a setting, and a lead character, that each move like clockwork in sync with one another. While Baby Driver is neither as quiet or twee as Wes Anderson’s work, it brings with it the film’s own sense of longing and melancholy beneath an intricately constructed world. Every scene is a dance, every moment a confluence of sound and imagery and movement, whether in the pulse-pounding races against cops or robbers, or gauzy imaginings of another life that might be. In Baby Driver, Wright has built his most elegant, intricate toy, and it’s a treat and a pleasure to see him play on the screen once again.

The finale to season 1 may be low key, but it's a very strong episode. The religious aspects that the show will come to be known for are fully introduced here, and they're handled maturely. I've always found the Bajoran faith to be fascinating and one of my favourite parts of this show, even though I consider myself agnostic and have a low opinion of organised religion. DS9 manages to successfully intertwine the beliefs of science and faith, and figure out how its characters can learn to keep those two points of view while still respecting each other. It's not an easy journey, as this episode demonstrates.

It's worth noting that this is the first time since the pilot that Sisko's role as the Emissary has been referred to in any significant way. The episode introduces a couple of major recurring characters in Vedek Bareil and Vedek Winn - the latter being played wonderfully by Louise Fletcher and managing to inspire an incredible amount of hate in the viewer! If you despise her, as most do, that only means that she did her job extremely well. And it's going to get much, much more intense from here on!

I like the O'Brien subplot, it's just a shame that Neela hadn't had more of a presence throughout the season up to this point. That would have made her reveal much more powerful. It's also great to see Odo being the excellent investigator that he is. Dax is still relegated to not much more than a background science person at this point, I hadn't realised just how little the first season had used her.

An overall great episode and powerful end to the first season, really showing that Sisko and Kira have worked through things to find common ground and respect for each other. The only real weak point for me was the slow motion "noooooooo!" at the end which was a bit cheesy. It is redeemed somewhat by - for once - a gorgeous accompanying musical score.

This was the sort of episode where it felt like a lot of pieces were finally snapping into place. I liked the fact that Allison is having trouble coping with her role as a double agent. She's not just a cold and indifferent spy. She's caught up in something that's put her under a lot of strain and stress and while she seems cool and self-assured in the thick of it, she's having a lot of trouble in private moments. It's solid, character-based take on the hoary mole story that takes advantage of the actress's abilities.

To the same end, I also appreciated Jonas, of all characters, in this episode. He's something the show's desperately lacked for more than a few seasons now -- a regular individual who can look at the world of spooks and spies and remark as to how batshit insane that entire sphere is. It helps ground the show a little, and to put Carrie's transition into civilian life into perspective. He's not my favorite character on the show or anything, but he's a voice of reason to some extent here, in opposition to the take-it-for-granted personalities of everyone in the muck of intelligence gathering on the show, which makes the role he plays in the episode interesting.

I do appreciate that they're shining some light and connecting a number of dots here. Carrie puts together the general nature (if not the specifics or motive) for the people who put a hit on her. We understand the goal of the Russians and it's set up nicely with what we've seen from Saul and his colleagues so far. There's even some legitimate connection between Carrie, Laura, and Numan via the documents, to where it seems like they're legitimately positioning them to come together (as is inevitable) in a way that feel's natural rather than contrived. The disparate threads of the plot are all being tied together nicely so far, and it helps.

The weaker parts of the episode, however, were the hacktivist story and Quinn's wounded duck routine. The hacktivist protest, with Numan's mask and the lowgrade "I am Spartacus" routine just reeked of watered-down attempts at topicality, though having witnessed a couple of Occupy protests, it wasn't necessarily off the mark. It still just feels like this storyline was stapled into Homeland from a different show. The tone is a little off, and while Homeland is not always subtle, there's a bluntness and an all-too-tidy nature to how this plot is depicted that renders the storyline less than pleasing.

In the same vein, Quinn's weak-willed suicide attempt to protect Carrie felt like too much. He loves Carrie; we know that, but I thought this was a bridge too far and not necessarily depicted artfully either. Plus, I have no idea where they're going with the religious guy following him around. I suppose I should withold judgment.

Those griefs aside, I appreciated how this episode put an interesting spin on some spy cliches, like the troubled mole or the concerned civilian, and how it's started assembling the plot and bringing disparate elements together in a way that both makes sense and is intriguing.

When I started this show, the night of the multiple Emmy wins, I was confused. It seemed like an Arrested Development rip-off with a load of more conventional sitcom tropes thrown in, but without the laughter track.

After the first two seasons, I found myself asking people who'd watched it all about when it gets good. And now, having watched every episode, I find myself asking the same question. There were some great scenes and some good episodes, but never a consistent run of great episodes. At no point was it funny enough to justify the tedious and saccharine sentimentality (if I'd wanted to watch The Waltons, I would've done), nor emotionally striking enough to justify the comedy deficit. The only 'emotional' moment really that worked was the final scene with Alexis and Ted.

In its favour, it had great leads performing the thin material very well, and it was an easy, unchallenging watch. One of the key features of a good comedy is whether I'd want to watch it again, and in this case it is very unlikely.

So I'm still left wondering what merited all those Emmys, not least because every main character (other than maybe Alexis) had become a broad caricature of themselves by the weak final season. That said, the Emmy's picked a serviceable but unremarkable Rick & Morty episode over one of the greatest TV episodes ever (the penultimate episode of Bojack), so what the hell do they know?

[6.5/10] Every story in this one was some mix of good and bad, or in one case, outright bad.

Let’s start with that one. Alexis is the worst here. So not only does she lie to Ted about keeping things from their former relationship, but then she plays a convoluted game of take-backsies with Twyla over a locket that Ted had given her, after insulting her appearance, no less. Sure, I guess Ted calls her on the lie eventually and Twyla ends up with a bunch of expensive jewelry because of it, but it’s a bad case of Alexis being shitty and there’s hardly a laugh to be had in it.

The biggest mixed bag is Moira’s story. Her going crazy after taking a host of Bosnian pep pills is the sort of broadest of broad humor that makes me roll my eyes. That said, Catherine O’Hara is a champ and manages to sell at least some of it. But the whole “Johnny’s secret love letters” bit hitting the gossip train is just a dumb storyline. That said, I like where they end up with it, with Johnny explaining that Moira wrote them herself while injured and on painkillers, and Johnny had taken them out because he missed her while she was filming in Bosnia. It’s still a dumb subplot, but it at least ends in a sweet place.

The really weird storyline is the one where David and Stevie get robbed. For what it’s worth, I thought the scene where the actually get robbed is hilarious. The two of them being caught like deer in the headlights and not knowing what to do, scrambling around to try to placate their would-be attacker, is a nice bit of comedy, especially with the performers’ reaction to the whole thing.

What’s strange, though, is how “Love Letters” follows that up. Apparently they “did it wrong” somehow? Apparently attempting to mollify a potential robber with luxury goods when you don’t have cash to hand over is bad for some reason? And they should have challenged him on not having a weapon despite the fact that they had no idea what was or wasn’t under his jacket? When someone in a mask threatens you and tells you they’re robbing you, you don’t have to risk bodily harm, especially if you’re someone like David who, let’s face it, probably isn’t much good in a fight. It’s really bizarre to me how both Patrick and the cop give him and Stevie shit over it. The two are very funny in their scenes, so I’m inclined to give it a pass on laughs alone, but it’s a really weird setup.

Overall, this one has a few funny and/or nice moments but a lot of problems on top of them.

7.4/10. The Abed story is what makes this one. The premise of the gang trying to Can’t Buy Me Love/Love Don’t Cost a Thing him after discovering a girl who seemingly has a crush on him is, as Jeff points out, a bit trite and inevitably going to lead to a “just be yourself” message. But, as Community always does when it’s at its best, the episode finds interesting wrinkles to that archetypal story.

The reveal that Abed not only doesn’t need to be someone else to get the girl, but that he doesn’t need to be encouraged at all, is a nice reversal. The sentiment that when you know who you are and what you’re like about yourself, changing for others isn’t a big deal, is a pretty powerful one in the confines of a semi-goofy story. And Abed showing the gang that as well-meaning as they were, it was them who were missing the boat, not him, is another great turnaround. It’s one of those bits that it’s hard to imagine another show being able to pull off as well.

Jeff’s story on the other hand is…not that great. I appreciate that it dovetails well with Abed’s lesson, but the whole notion of Jeff refusing to play pool because he doesn’t want to look dumb is not a strong enough motivation or story engine. On top of that, the big third act resolution, with Jeff and the pool teacher stripping down to their skivvies to play their big game, is broad without being clever in a way that doesn’t suit the show. There’s a sports movie parody baked in there somewhere that works at times, but for the most part, it pales in comparison to the other storyline.

Plus there’s all the great little asides that make Community great. The recurring bit about Britta pronouncing “baggles” is minor but hilarious. The gags about Abed being on the spectrum are funny because they’re about the rest of the gang’s reaction rather than Abed himself. And the whole ep is quite the showcase for Dani Pudi, who excels whether he’s imitating a vampire, Don Draper, Jeff, or pulling double duty as Joey. The Jeff B-story brings it down a little bit, but overall it’s a quality episode.

When Voyager tackles big story lines, it can take me by surprise. This is a gorgeously twisty episode that doesn't worry about how much it tries to fit in, starting in one place and taking us on a winding path to get somewhere new. I have to congratulate the writers on handling it all so well.

I'm really glad to see that the Maquis are still not entirely comfortable on board the ship, because they do tend to blend into the background in most episodes. It's just a shame that any time we meet one it has to be a new character and actor. The show would have been so much better if there were all people that we had been seeing since the start.

The death and funeral scene at the start really didn't work for me at all for exactly the reason that we don't know or care about the character who died. All of our main cast were talking about how well they knew him, how he had saved their lives and it falls flat. Chakotay especially fails here as he gives one of the most underwhelming and unemotional funeral eulogies - I don't really think that guy truly cares about anyone, or else Robert Beltran was just bored out of his mind.

Always happy to see Seska back, and her interactions with Maje Cullah were a bit more nuanced here, less evil villain. The Trabe kind of suckered me in, I was hoping they would actually be good guys. Nice nod to The Godfather Part III with the big mass execution.

The ending is a bit of a letdown with Janeway realising that the Starfleet way is the only way (it really shouldn't be), and giving a cheesy motivational speech.

Voyager can land! That's pretty cool, and something I only vaguely had in the back of my memory. I thought that the sequence was done pretty effectively here.

While this riffs on similar ideas done in the TNG episode 'The Neutral Zone', it makes it more about the Voyager's crew than the people they find, which was a good decision. It does feel like quite a big moment when Janeway and Chakotay walk into the cargo bay to see how many people want to leave. Honestly, I was a bit surprised that everyone wanted to stay because the show hasn't really managed to sell the idea that everyone there is working towards the same goal at all.

It's also nice for them to encounter something that isn't a spacial anomaly. I quite like that the people they find include Amelia Earhart (dodgy wig aside) and how Janeway bonds with her. The rest of the 37's are a bit flat, though - at least, the ones who are actually allowed to talk. It's particularly annoying the way Fred goes all-American and immediately becomes hostile. Nice to see Tackleberry from Police Academy, though!

Overall, this is a fun episode. A few things bugged me: finding the car floating in space and it works - wouldn't all liquids inside be extremely frozen? Also, having Paris be a geek for 1930s automobiles certainly detracts (again) from his bad boy image, but in this case it does serve the character better because he needs to move away from that. On the flip side, I thought that the way the rest of the crew talk about the car was quite realistic, and kind of charming. Once we meet the humans living on the planet, it feels like a massive cop out that we don't see these incredible cities they are talking about; yeah, I get that it would have been a huge and expensive undertaking to put them on screen, but the dialogue around them feels so awkward and could have been handled so much better: "I'd love to see your amazing cities!" "Oh wow, weren't those cities amazing!" just doesn't cut it.

It's funny, before I'd even seen the title of this episode, I said to my wife, "I know it's going to be controversial to portray Carrie's mental illness as a super power." But however good or bad that depiction is, it's one the show has held to since its first season, and I think it worked surprisingly effectively here. As pleasant as it is for someone who's been watching Carrie develop as a character for four seasons, to see her in a place of stability, there is something undeniably compelling about Crazy Carrie, at least in small doses.

And to the point, the show doesn't use Carrie going off her medication as a means for her to solve the major mystery presented at the end of the last episode. Sure, it allows her to figure out that someone used the kidnapping of her boyfriend's son to figure out her location, but it's also shown as a way to remove the protective shielding Carrie's erected around herself to keep her from feeling all the deaths she's been responsible for. It's a little corny, but the image of Carrie sitting within a star made up of the faces of the people she's killed (including, as the episode's direction draws our attention to, a number of women and mothers) is a powerful one.

I must admit, I am something of a sucker for gut punch of a character on television hallucinating the presence of someone close to them who's passed on. House did it to great effect; it's been a reliable arrow in the quiver of The Walking Dead, and shows as varied as Buffy and The Sopranos used figurative (and sometimes literal) ghosts to bring the sins of the past to the fore. Having an innocent like Aayan be the manifestation of Carrie's misdeeds and the lives lost in the process was affecting, and I appreciated the surprise and the way it was used here.

I also liked that they developed Jonas a bit. Thus far he's been a pretty generic studly boyfriend, but it was nice to see him disgusted by Carrie's actions, but also strong enough to go toe-to-toe with her when she was going off the deep end. To the same end, I appreciate that the show did not hold back on showing how ugly and manipulative Carrie could be when she was off of her meds. They didn't sell the bipolar disorder as a magic cure-all, but rather as something with a pretty severe cost, which worked in the context of what we know about Carrie's prior condition.

As for the other storylines in the episode, Saul is pretty scary this year. Mandy Patinkin absolutely sells that Saul is a changed man from when we last saw him before the time jump. Sure, he could certainly be steely, but there was always a warmth behind the strength that came through. Now, despite the reveal that he's sleeping with his subordinate (and was that a baby bump?) he seems so cold, so angry, so harsh with everyone from During to the expelled embassador, that I completely buy him as both the kind of calculating guy who would be orchestrating a coup with Dar Adal and as a much different presence in the series than he's been historically. Patinkin's face tells the story in almost every scene, and it's great stuff.

Hacktivist/Reporter Lady story is still a little eh. As I've said before, it has promise, and I'm especially liking the way the Newman character is being developed, but I'm a little less confident in how the story itself is being developed.

In the same vein as Saul, robotic, chessmaster Quinn is frightening in his own right. The establishing of Jonas's ex wife and son was well done before I realized what was happening (a nice little twist), and he seems so single-minded and coldly effective in everything he does, from kidnapping Jonas's son to connecting with his old flame for equipment. The episode's final scene with his and Carrie's cat and mouse game was incredibly well shot and directed, with a great sense of building tension. The last little bit was a very Dexter-esque end-of-episode tease, but overall, I was incredibly impressed by not only how well each individual story was told and acted in this episode, but how all three were balanced together. One of the best episodes the show has put together since the end of the original Brody storyline.

You know what REALLY makes this ending just so so so so so fucked up? The fact that Tracy was literally treated as just an incubator for Ted. She literally had no other purpose than to make some children for Ted, and once she was done with that she was killed off so that Ted and Robin could be together like the writers always wanted to.
What was even the point of going through all THAT when it was just going to be Ted and Robin? Why get us invested into this character who is presented as so nice and sweet and the PERFECT girl for Ted, only to then write her off in a half assed 2 minute flashback? And not to mention how BAD it is that they knew since the BEGINNING that it was going to end like this, so everything about Robin not wanting kids and not being able to have them is the absolute worst cherry on top of an already disappointing finale.
Again, Tracy is treated like she's just some girl that can make children for Ted, and Robin is actually his "the one" since the beginning, but wait she can't have children so let's just use this random girl as his incubator.
There's so many fucked up things about how the show ended and the last two episodes, but this. THIS really takes the cake. I would give this -50 out of 10 if i could.

[6.0/10] “Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?” That amusing phrase more or less sums up how I feel about “Code of Honor.” It is an episode rife with racism and sexism that, if you could somehow strip away, would leave you with a solid (albeit not overwhelming) dose of the usual Star Trek moral and diplomatic dilemmas.

The story finds our heroes traveling to Ligon II, a less technologically advanced planet that nevertheless possesses a vaccine capable of curing a disease that’s plaguing the Federation. The catch is that the (indistinguishably humanoid) aliens have the titular retrograde “Code of Honor” which forces Captain Picard to balance his dignity, Starfleet protocol, and the safety of his crewman versus the need to obtain a vaccine that could save scores of lives.

That’s not a bad premise! It’s classic meat and potatoes Star Trek to have the crew tiptoeing around local customs they don’t agree with and bristling against Starfleet regulations when there’s some greater moral good involved. If that’s all this episode amounted to, this wouldn’t be the world’s best installment of TNG, but it’d be fine.

The problem is that “Code of Honor” is suffused racist and sexist approaches to exploring this material. What I’d remembered from childhood was the treatment of the Ligon people, which would have been enough to sink this episode on its own. Suffice it to say, taking the most African-coded characters in all of Star Trek and depicting them as duplicitous and backward in their practices and society, and less advanced than their mostly caucasian counterparts for good measure, is a strike that this episode never recovers from.

But what I didn’t remember is how wide-ranging those uncomfortable elements here beyond the depiction of the Ligon. A stray line from Picard seems to suggest that the civilization of the Enterprise’s less-sophisticated guests resembles that of the Chinese. An otherwise amusing character moment where Picard attempts to defend the honor of the French language devolves into condescension (and, I’m betting, misinformation) about the practices of indigineous people.

That’s all before the sexism at play here. Once again in the early going, the show’s treatment of Tasha Yar as a sexual being isn’t great. You can see TNG trying to pat itself on the back, with the Ligon’s surprise that a woman is the chief security officer and the other crew members explaining that this is no big deal in the Federation. But at the same time, we’re back to Khan Noonien Singh-style “Women can’t help but be attracted to these raw, manly dudes, even when they’re terrible, because they’re just such Great Masculine Men” infantilization with Tasha, which is a whole separate shade of problematic.

Beyond that, a lot of the business here is just silly. I try not to slate older shows/episodes for that too harshly. But it’s hard to deny the abject goofiness of Tasha and Yareena theoretically fighting to the death amid their stage-combat theatrics on some glowy rhythmic gymnastics set. There’s some rough line reads and bad dialogue here (Picard and Crusher’s conversation about the costs of the disease they’re trying to cure is rough.) And that doesn’t even count some of the costuming choices here, like Wesley’s giant sweater or Yareena’s metallic garbage bag jumpsuit.
The shame of all of this distasteful/tepid nonsense is that there’s some decent ideas at play here. Stripped of its racial context, there’s some decent interrogation here over how societal “honor” can often be a grift used by those in control to maintain existing power structures and hold down and/or take advantage of those outside of that circle. Framing it as something particular to an African-coded community smacks of baseless cultural condescension, but a greater acknowledgement of it as a self-critique could have paid dividends.

More to the point, the episode sets up some of the usual levers and pulleys that Star Trek captains have to consider when dealing with different civilizations that have something the Federation wants. I particularly enjoy the setup where Picard has to basically play Lutan’s game, sacrificing some of his dignity in the process, in the name of diplomacy so that he can get his crewman back and receive the vaccine that’s so sorely needed. His obvious annoyance at having to play along in the game of the greater good makes for interesting character work.

Speaking of which, the best moments in “Code of Honor” have nothing to do with the plot. They’re just the little moments where the characters relate to one another or reveal a little of who they are. Geordi endures Data’s latest stab at comedy. Picard melts a little and allows Wesley to observe on the bridge. Troi, Data, and the captain himself have to convince Riker to be on board with Picard leading the away mission (addressing this feels almost unprecedented!). Picard pokes fun at himself for speechifying to Data about things everyone already knows. Riker follows the captain’s lead and lets Wesley help out at ops.

These moments are, at most, marginally related to the broader conflict with the Ligon, but they go a long way toward making these characters exist beyond the needs of the plot of the week. They have wants and interactions and personalities that aren’t dependent on which alien culture they’re crossing swords with or strange space anomaly that’s entered the view screen. Especially for a show in its first season, that sort of detail is vital, and it’s not a coincidence that the best stuff here could basically be excised as an out of context clip and not lose much impact.

It doesn’t help that Picard’s solution to the problem seems arbitrary and, at best, lucky. There’s a lot of pontificating about the prime directive here, and how it combined with the Ligon people’s leverage from the vaccine puts Picard in a bind vis-a-vis rescuing Tasha. You can feel the show trying to play the “take a third option” game here, with Picard trying to work within Ligon rules to win the day by allowing Tasha to emerge victorious in the battle to the death, while still ultimately saving Yareena’s life after an emergency beam-up.

But it’s not clear why that would solve the problem of ensuring that the Ligon people turn over the vaccine. There’s also nothing to set up that death dissolve the marriage bonds so Yareena can marry Luton’s second in command and empower him instead. It’s all just solution by fiat, where you can see the framework of what the show’s trying to accomplish, but the details don’t add up.

If that were “Code of Honor”’s only sin, it would merely be one of scores of Star Trek episodes with a solid idea and flawed execution. The solid bones of this installment are still apparent despite its other problems. But since the episode is so wrapped in racist and sexist tropes, it stands out as misguided for so many reasons, not the least of which is how it betrays the inclusive, humanizing spirit that the franchise stands for.

[8.4/10] This is a great spoof of traditional horror tropes, while also showing how well Dan Harmon and company know their characters. The premise of somebody in the group being a psychopath is a nice spine for this one, and the coining of “Britta” as a verb is a Community classic.

My favorite of the stories here are Abed’s and Annie’s. Abed’s story of a hyper-prepared and overexplained couple at a cabin in the woods is both a nice take on his sort of hyperliteralism and nitpicky story sense, but also a nice broader spoof of the boring movies that cinemasins-style critiquers would create. At the same time, Annie’s “teach a vampire how to read” tale is an amusing parody of Twilight and a hundred other monster romance books, which also speaks to Annie’s need to help fix people (“You should be so proud of how I changed you!”), and has an amusingly disturbing twist with the werewolf dismemberment material that leaves her classmates in shock.

The next two runner-ups in the story department are Shirley’s and Britta’s. Shirley’s is a great visual take on a sort of Chick tract come to life. The misguided drug slang and low key disdain for her friends’ lifestyles, mixed with the self-righteous “I forgive yoooouuu!” and a great turn from Dean Pelton as the Him-esque devil is outstanding. And while Britta’s story is pretty standard stuff, the way her perfunctory storytelling is reflected in the skit and the dialogue is hilarious.

Jeff’s story is true to form as a way to get the group on the same page. Pierce’s turn as “Magnum” is pretty unpleasant, even if that’s supposed to be a reflection of Pierce’s prejudices and self-inflated ego. And Troy’s low grade take on a Human Centipede-type story isn’t full of as many laughs as you might expect, but at least reflects Troy’s teenage boy sense of “awesomeness!”

The group’s mutual paranoia and eventual realization that they’re all psychopaths is an amusing place to take the frame story (not to mention Britta imagining herself reading “Warren Peace”), and goes out on a fractured but sweet note which characterizes this show.

Overall, this is a great Halloween outing, with very funny takes on classic horror movie beats and knowing takes on each of the characters.

[7.5/10] “The Harvest” takes a number of pages out of the George Romero zombie playbook, and it’s an appropriate tack for the second installment of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead and its progeny were nominally amount the creeping monsters who used to be your friends and loved ones and the boilerplate horror of them attacking, but they were also stand-ins for any number of real life issues. Racism, consumerism, militarism, and much more were addressed through those reanimated corpses. It fits, then, that BtVS embraces its cinematic forebear in doing the same with its own set of undead villains.

To the point, the Real Life Problem™ this week is Buffy having to sneak out of school and then her house because of parents and school adminstrators alike worrying about her falling back into trouble. In lieu of genuine bad behavior, the actions that get Buffy crosswise with her assorted authority figures, whether it’s the principal or her mom, are her slaying duties. But it still has the tone of the rebellious teen surreptitiously getting out of the house to go down the local hangout.

That “supernatural as a stand-in for the real issue” setup works with the more literal call outs to Night of the Living Dead as well. The sequence in the sewers pays direct homage, with Buffy and Xander trying to hold the door up against grasping hands, and a mob of lurching creatures emerging around every corner to flush them out. It allows Whedon & company to create an appropriately tense atmosphere and action set piece in the show’s early going, with the vampire creating the same creeping sense of dread while they advance on our heroes that their zombie counterparts do.

But “The Harvest” also addresses one of the oldest and yet most salient tropes in the zombie genre – the notion of something you have to kill that still resembles someone you care about. Xander’s struggles when facing Jesse, and Giles’s warning that the scoobies are not fighting their friend, but rather “the thing that killed him” play in the emotional difficulty of having to take out a creature that, however much you rationally tell yourself is evil, still looks and sounds like your old buddy. The episode wrings a bit of power out of that, and it sets up something important for Xander.

As the painfully written and acted scene where the newly-dubbed Angel gives Buffy some tips portends, BtVS will play around with the idea of “good vampires,” or at least less-bad vampires running around. But Xander is always the slowest to adjust, the most likely to resist accepting them or helping them. While there’s rational reasons for that – even the best vampires in the show’s universe have killed and can be unpredictable – in retrospect it feels like an emotional response to this first killing. Xander is pained and upset that these creatures took his friend; he’s angry that they not only turned someone he cared about into another monster but that they made it so that he was a snack to his old buddy and had to kill him himself. Xander harbors a resentment for that which rarely, if ever, seems to leave him.

Jesse’s turn in the episode also plays in that “real issues brought to life with monsters” space. His transition is a dark-edged version of the Teen Wolf movie (which, in hindsight, seemed to represent the tone the director of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie was going for, over Whedon’s objections). Jesse suddenly has the confidence to go after Cordelia in earnest after being consistently rebuffed by her, and despite some pushback, she actually seems receptive to the new him. There’s some semi-uncomfortable commentary there, draped in nice guy vs. alpha male rhetoric, but maybe it’s just a critique of Cordelia who’s not exactly put up as a laudable person to woo here.

His turn also plays on one of the things “The Harvest” and BtVS does best, which would quickly set the show apart from its brethren – subversion and surprise. It’s easy to forget it when you know how the episode goes, but the twist that Buffy and Xander think they’ve rescued Jesse, only to discover that he’s been turned and leading them to a trap, is a nice little reversal that catches the audience off guard.

By the same token, Buffy’s confrontation with Luke at the bronze uses some generic genre action beats. The villain takes over, monologues for a little bit, only to be upended by a quip from the good guy, and a scuffle ensues. But it’s the shape that scuffle takes that makes it novel and interesting. Buffy faking out Luke by exposing him to “sunlight,” only to distract him enough with the ruse to take him out the old fashioned way, is a clever way to end the fight, and shows the inventive bent Whedon & Co. take to classics and clichés.

The nuts and bolts of the episode are a microcosm of the things the show had figured out and the things it was still nailing down. It’s impressive how well-formed the dynamic among Buffy, Willow, Xander, and Giles is already. Their banter in the library is, perhaps, off a half-step or so, but very recognizable and amusing. The world-building and description of the hellmouth are a little rote, but offer a solid enough setup for The Master and the events to come, which fit into a “here’s the ancient problem, now let’s find a solution” blueprint the show would return to repeatedly.

On the other hand, the show can’t always escape the orbit of its clichés and sillier bits. The scene with Cordelia and Willow in the computer lab is pure 80s teen comedy material. The same goes for most scenes featuring Cordelia and Angel, the former sounding a little too stereotypical in her takedowns of Buffy (to Harmony!) and the latter still generally unable to act his way out of a paper bag. And The Master is a mixed bag himself. Sometimes his friendly malevolence suggests the show laying the groundwork for a certain big bad yet to come, but sometimes he hams it up with bad puns that recall a maligned scene from the recent Rogue One film.

Still, in just its second outing, BtVS is much more assured and confident than in the pilot. Borrowing from the greats like Romero, whether its in direct references, familiar tropes, or the general spirit of genre-as-subtext, helps boost the episode and give it more focus and potency. There’s still growing pains, but “The Harvest” is a good introduction to what the show could do well, if not the best realization of its potential.

[6.1/10] I have to admit, the show is starting to feel formulaic even as it’s moving the ball forward, and I’m getting a bit tired of the repetition. The show is overly didactic when it comes to the theme of Eleanor not being a joiner or willing to be a part of a group vs. here when she realizes that Chidi & co. like her and want to be on her team. It’s a sweet enough idea, but the show is just too blunt about it to land.

The B-story, with Tahani trying to teach Michael to grow a backbone and stand-up to the reps from The Bad Place similarly ends on a strong note, but fills the coffers with some pretty feeble comedy and tepid storytelling when getting there. The badness of the bad guys is a little too over the top to be funny.

That is, of course, except for Adam Scott, who is just perfect at playing this sleazeball. It’s a complete 180 from his character on Parks and Rec or Party Down. Plus, new Eleanor is Sabine from Star Wars Rebels, which I appreciate, and her instant nerd chemistry with Chidi is certainly cute.

Overall, this one just didn’t click with me. I’m beginning to catch on to the show’s rhythms, and the humor wasn’t strong enough to cover for that in this one.

6.3/10. I thought that Quinn was dead. In some ways, I was hoping he was, not because I dislike the character, who quickly became one of the show’s best, but because I thought it fit with the themes of Season 5. This type of life is difficult, both to live through and to escape. It forces people like Carrie, Quinn, and Saul to make hard choices, to perhaps even have to kill people they love. Saul had to kill Allison, a woman he cared about but was deceived and betrayed by, for the greater good. And it seemed like Carrie had to make a parallel choice, to kill Quinn, a man whom she, in her own fractured Carrie ways, loves, because she believes it’s a mercy when the alternatives are a difficult life he faces caused by her own choices.

The major theme of Season 5 was the quest for a normal life and whether it’s possible after all these people have seen. Including a major casualty in these events, let alone one caused by the show’s protagonists, seemed to drive home the costs of being in this world.
But Quinn, as you know if you’ve watched this episode or any Season 6 promotional material, is alive. And as I rewatched the end of the Season 5 finale, the intentions of that last scene were more ambiguous than I’d recalled. Carrie still seems poised to end Quinn’s life rather than face the difficult and uncertain road to recovery, but then there is that flash of light – the titular “Glimmer,” that seems to symbolize the possibility of a life apart from all of this misery and mayhem – and she pauses.

There is that same glimmer present in “Fair Game,” when Quinn is sitting in some drug den, looking squirrely, disheveled, and thoroughly not himself. He writes it off a glimpse of another life, a sign that he views himself as a lost cause. And after some reflection, I think the move works as a narrative choice, that it turns the final scene from an (admittedly compelling) symbol of the darkness that comes with this career choice, to a symbol of hope, that no matter how deep in you are, it’s worth the strain and struggle to get your head clear and your feet on the ground again.

The problem then becomes how Homeland depicts that path back to normalcy for Quinn and for Carrie. The idea of a guilt-ridden Carrie checking in on a resistant Quinn every day in the hospital gives us a cliché “let me go” story thread. Claire Danes and Rupert Friend are superior actors who can elevate the material, but it doesn’t make the setup any less tired. What’s frustrating is that there’s potential there. In my write up for the Season 5 finale, I compared Carrie to Tony Soprano, with the idea that both shows depict their protagonists as tainting the things they touch to some degree. The idea that what Quinn needs to recover is to be away from Carrie, and that Carrie’s guilt over being a cause, if not the cause, of his current condition prevents her from being able to do that, to Quinn’s detriment, is an interesting one.

But the depiction of Quinn’s downward spiral is hokey as all get out, with this damaged individual going full Riley Finn/Trainspotting to signify the depths of his despair and his hopelessness. Again, Friend is a great actor and makes these scenes work better than they have any right to, but it’s all just well-worn shorthand for rock bottom that doesn’t feel as real or pathos-ridden as it ought to. By the same token, Carrie and Quinn going full Odd Couple (with a side of Bubs from The Wire) has some mild potential given the themes in play, but comes off as more of a conceit to keep them around one another than a natural story development.

But that’s part of what a season premiere, especially for a show like Homeland, has to do – establish the plots and the premise of the upcoming season, even if it has to contort itself a bit to set everything up. We can see that in Saul and Dar Adal’s storyline, where the President Elect seems skeptical of the CIA’s “lethal programs” and proposes pulling out, or at least severely scaling back America’s military efforts in the Middle East and elsewhere. Dar Adal ascribes it to the President Elect having lost her son in Iraq, something she apparently would not discuss publicly and, if the closing scene where she lingered on a locket is any indication, it’s a good guess.

Saul is bullish on the President-To-Be though, wagering that she’s right where it counts and persuadable on the margins, while Dar is a “paranoid fuck” who’s chatting with others in the intelligence committee—without Saul—and presumably deciding how to continue on the same path regardless of the President. We only get the first wisps of this storyline in “Fair Game,” but the promise of a conflict between the President and the intelligence community (something that could only happen in fiction, clearly) with Dar on one side and Saul on the other portends intriguing things.

But it’s the other major storyline introduced in “Fair Game” that holds the most promise, or at least potential. Sekou Bah is a young American Muslim who is painted as a terrorist by the generic special agent who takes him in, but is, through the scenes where we’re introduced to him prior to his arrest, presented as a young man who clearly sympathizes with terrorist actions and is devout, but who is also principled, who believes in a seemingly justified different perspective, and who knows and appreciates his rights in this country.

It’s bold territory to not only present but to humanize a young Islamic kid who praises the actions of terrorists. While Qassim, the terrorist with the heart of gold from Season 5 felt like something out of a generic action movie, Sekou feels far more real, far more three-dimensional already, and, true to the spirit of Homeland, far more relevant to the current issues the country is facing at the intersection of radicalization and xenophobia. Again, this is Homeland, so there’s plenty of ways for this to go off the rails (and please, for the love of god, don’t have Carrie sleep with him), but it’s a promising start.

But “Fair Game” spends so much time on the poorly executed Carrie/Quinn business – Quinn’s unfortunate jaunt, Carrie acting as a civil rights lawyer(?) for people targeted by the CIA/FBI, and other “Hey! We’re in New York now!” moments that it drags the whole thing down. There’s a lot of dull setup that even the consistently good acting on the show can’t overcome.

If the theme of Season 5 was the cost of trying to get a normal life back, the theme for Season 6 appears to be the cost of trying to go it alone. Otto tells Carrie that she cannot make it as a loner (which feels like groundwork for she and Quinn getting together); Saul and maybe the President Elect are being isolated by the rest of the intelligence apparatus, and Sekou finds himself separated from his family, his home, and his life. “Fair Game” isn’t a great start, but like most of Homeland’s premiere, at least offers the possibility of interesting things to come, even if it presents them in a fairly uninteresting way. Let’s hope it can make good on that promise.

[7.7/10] Liked this one quite a bit. Two strong storylines that had great beats for a variety of characters.

I honestly don’t know which one I liked better. The one where Johnny struggles over whether he can pay for both the new second motel and his son’s wedding catering seemed like it was about to crater. The whole “business vs. family money trouble” bit is a cliché, and it started to lean into some more unpleasant bridezilla tropes for David. Plus the humor of Johnny trying to not-so-subtly find ways to go less expensive at the caterer’s was pretty tepid.

But from there things took a really nice turn. For one thing, David coming and telling his dad that the extra plates aren’t his dad’s financial responsibility and that if Johnny can’t afford the catering at all, David would totally understand helps mitigate his wedding-related nutso-ness. Likewise, Johnny’s predicament takes on a more emotional tone when he recalls that he and Moira had set aside their own nest egg for David’s wedding, involving flying people to Bali and other extravagance, and now he’s struggling to just pay for beef tenderloin. It’s not just about the financial situation it’s about being able to provide for your kid on a major day in their lives and the sense of not measuring up to your own expectations that reminds Johnny how far he’s fallen. Eugene Levy does some of his best work in the series in that moment.

The solution, though, is even better. Stevie using Johnny’s own techniques from his book to come up with a strategy to franchise the Rosebud and solve their financial woes is a nice beat for her. I’ll admit, it seems like a stretch, but it works within the willing suspension of disbelief of the show, rouses Johnny, and proves Stevie’s business mettle.

I also greatly enjoyed the Moira/Alexis story. For one thing, the soap opera humor is worth plenty of chunkles, and it’s a venerable strain of comedy. More than that though, I like the trajectory of Moira being ready to sign on for a reboot, being steered toward the truth by her daughter, and then getting a measure of revenge and perspective. Alexis having the shrewdness to research what happened and understand who has leverage continues her development, and Moira slapping the co-star who squeezed her out and “going after what she’s worth” at her daughter’s encouragement is a great corresponding note for her to play.

Overall, this one is a breath of fresh air in what’s otherwise been a weaker season, with quality things for almost all the major characters to do.

[7.5/10] It speaks to the quality of the Alexis/Ted storyline here that I would rate this episode as pretty darn good overall, despite the fact that the other two storylines in this installment are crap. Once again, we’re in the bizarro world equivalent of the show’s early seasons, where Alexis’s arc is the backbone of the series rather than the albatross around its neck.

I have to admit, when Ted showed up on Alexis’s doorstep and seemed pensive, I worried he had just flown across the country to break up with her. Instead, it’s just a job offer to stay in the Galapagos for three more years and an admission that he’s not sure what to do.

Alexis isn’t either. As I’ve said before, some of my favorite stories in the series are the ones where Alexis shows genuine growth and maturity and this may very well be the peak of that. Her deciding that she couldn't bear to have the man she loves give up his dream job for her, nor could she live in the Galapagos, and so they both have to move on, amicably as friends, is one of the hardest but strongest decisions we’ve ever seen her make.

Ted, of course, affirms it, knowing that he wouldn’t want her to give the career she’s built anymore than she’d want him to give up his. So what follows is sad but sweet. Alexis expresses that they built each other up to this point, giving one another the support and comfort to realize their dreams. I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t hoping for some “Five Years Later” tag in the finale where they reunite down the line. But in some ways it’s better if they don’t, because this moment, of toasting what you have when the mature thing to do is let go of it for now, may be the most grown-up, empathetic, and human Alexis has ever seemed. It’s been a hell of a journey for her, and this may be the high point of it.

That’s a good thing too, since the other two storylines bring almost nothing to the table. I called Patrick coming back from the spa with an orange glow tan from minute one. David as a bridezilla is getting really tiresome, and the gags here are predictable and weak. There’s something mildly cute about the two taking candids on Stevie’s cellphone afterward, but I really hope we’re building to something with David’s behavior with this stuff, otherwise it’s just unfunny shtick.

Likewise, Johnny waving off Roland, Jocelyn, and his wife from the “Presidential Suite” at the new motel is totally reasonable. Moira making a big production over how they should move there is more unpleasant behavior from her, and the Schitts sneaking into the suite after the Roses have already decided to break Johnny’s rule and stay there was, again, predictable. This whole portion of the show has been a graveyard of laughs in recent episodes, and that continues here.

Overall, the Alexis storyline works like gangbusters and is one of the character’s crowning moments. The other two stories are, at best, the fertilizer her narrative grows out of.

[8.2/10] This one went in a few directions that I wasn’t expecting, and I liked all of them heartily, so it gets a “great” from me!

The storyline I was least into was Alexis fretting over a tarot card reading from Twyla that predicts bad things happening on their Galapagos trip. Maybe it’s just that I’m not a superstitious person, but it seems like a silly source of conflict. That said, it’s totally legitimate if it’s just reinforcing Alexis’s preexisting concerns, and I like the notion that she’s grappling with the prospect of missing her family for the first time. It’s more emotional growth for her, to the point that even experiencing that sort of longing is a foreign feeling to her. Ted reassuring her that if it feels wrong, they can go back home is a nice tonic to it, as is Twyla reassuring her that she sees a “golden ring” around the Rose family.

That certainly bears out for Johnny. What everyone worries is a heart attack turns out to just be a bit of severe heartburn. There’s not a lot of actual jeopardy, since it seems unlikely that the show would kill off Johnny at this point. Still, what’s heartening is seeing the reaction from the rest of the cast.

Let’s get this out of the way. Roland continues to be terrible and why they haven’t written him off the show by this point is beyond me. That said, I love Moira’s reaction to the prospect of Johnny being in mortal peril. Her freaking out at the hotel, telling Johnny that he’s the most important thing in the world to her, and all-around caring about her husband’s well-being is a really nice note to play from a character who can often be pretty self-centered. Even when the show was shaggier than it is now, the caring relationship between Johnny and Moira was always a highlight.

Likewise, I really like how clearly affected the less-than-emotive Stevie is over the prospect of Johnny being in trouble. Her sense of panic and relief that this surrogate father figure is okay has an understated but very potent sweetness to it that I really liked.

Speaking of sweetness, I was absolutely not expecting Patrick’s proposal. He and David bickering over the prospect of a hike felt like one of the standard, broad sitcom-esque setups that the show does now and then. Instead, it’s a great tribute to the way that Patrick and David can be on different pages but look out for one another when it really matters. David is obviously not the hiking type, but when Patrick is in trouble, he pushes out of his comfort zone and takes care of the man he loves.

The actual proposal is exceedingly sweet, full of another heartfelt performance from Noah Reid, and a great emotional reaction from Daniel Levy. There’s enough humor throughout all the serious stuff here to keep it funny and light, but the emotions feel honest, which makes the whole thing work.

Overall, this one went to some more significant places than I was expecting, but in a good way!

[7.1/10] I don’t really know how I feel about this episode. It has two stories that I am, at best, pretty meh on, and one that I like but have issues with.

Once again, the easiest storyline to be meh on is the Roland one. It’s really more of a running gag than a storyline, but the prospect of Johnny being overwhelmed by a charcoal grill, of all things, got no chuckles out of me (beyond, I suppose, Roland’s grill apron puns). It get that it’s a comic relief story, but it has to get some actual laughs for that to work.

The other one I’m meh on, for different reasons, is the Alexis text message story. I actually like her making friends with Rachel who, as far as she knows, is just a random guest at the motel, who helps her diagnose what is clearly an accidental text from Ted. There’s a quick friendship there that’s endearing.

And yet, it’s in service of an increasingly unpleasant instance of Alexis flirting and otherwise being low-key inappropriate with Ted when she knows he has a girlfriend. Again, I don’t need this show to focus on Alexis’s romantic trials and travails, and however much good work the show did last season in actually making me root for Ted and Alexis is undone by her acting this way, and the show reveling in the cringeyness of it.

I’m also of two minds about the David/Patrick story and reveal here. I like the bones of it. There’s something relatable about David having had bad luck in relationships, thinking he’s damaged goods, and it being hard for him to trust even in what’s plainly a good thing because of that bad history. There’s some cute David/Patrick moments and some sweet David/Moira moments in the different pairings recognizing this and encouraging David to push past it. It’s a very human side of David to show, and I like it.

I’m less enamored by the low-grade Jane Eyre-style reveal that Patrick was previously engaged to a woman who’s been contacting him. I said before that Patrick felt too good to be true, so I like the show trying to add some issues that give him more dimension than just perfect boyfriend. But this feels like a weird wedge to put between him and David. I get that it could be a lot of David to take in, but this changes nothing about their relationship, and he knew that this was Patrick’s first step out of the closet. It seems like making a mountain out of a molehill, or at least a moderately sized hill, rather than something important or revealing enough to give them real issues. Maybe the kick is that David has trust issues to begin with, as the episode tells us, so even a medium-sized bump in the road feels like armageddon, but I hope the show doesn’t linger on this as a distance between them and that they both react to it like adults.

Overall, this is a strange, mixed bag of an episode, but with enough good stuff to put it into positive territory.

Despite my rating, I have some mixed feelings about this episode. So let's take the good and the bad.

Good: CBS hyped the heck out of a then-notably crazy Britney Spears appearing on the show. The episode, accordingly, got record ratings, and from that point on How I Met Your Mother turned the corner as a successful show that was no longer in perpetual danger of cancellation and could build toward the future.

Bad: Britney Spears cannot act worth a damn. It's not like her role was so well-written or anything, but she had an awkward delivery and added nothing to the episode itself. It's strange because she acquitted herself well enough on Saturday Night Live back in the day, but maybe she just didn't fit with a sitcom setting.

Good: Sarah Chalke is delightful. As Scrubs fans know, Chalke is a consumate pro, who knows how to be charming and likable and also carry some more emotional material in a comedy environment. There's a brightness and sense of fun to her as Stella, and it boosts the episode tremendously. The way she sells both her reasons for not dating Ted and how much her daughter and her career mean to her is great.

Bad: There's something mildly troubling about the entire "turning a no into a yes" motif. It feels generally fine here because we know that Stella does like Ted, there's just something holding her back. Still, there's the fact that whatever her reasons, she turned Ted down pretty unequivocally (as Robin amusingly points out), and the fact that he keeps pressuring her and trying to woo her despite that is a little uncomfortable, at least in principle, even if it works alright in the heightened reality of a sitcom. Plus he's pretty awful to Abby in the process.

Good: There's so many tremendous jokes with a delayed payoff here and gags that play with the nonlinear storytelling of the show. From Barney being the one who made Abby cry, to Marshall being the one who left the self-help book that prompted Ted to devote himself to it, to Lily rubbing Marshall's injured neck. There's some tightly-constructed humor and it really works.

Great: The 2-minute date. Again, there's something a bit uneasy about the whole idea, but damn if the 2-minute date is not an incredibly romantic gesture and one of the top moments of the show. It's Ted at his sweetest and most creative, and the little joking asides through the whole thing are remarkably endearing. If there's one thing that helps wash the sour taste of the "no becomes a yes" idea of my mouth, it's a payoff this inventive and with a great energy and real emotion to boot. A good finish goes a long way.

9.2/10. One of the things that elevates this show above the average sitcom is how it plays with the timeline and form. Telling three stories at the in three different points in time, having them nest and relate to one another pretty perfectly, and centering it around a frame story in the present day that ties into the rest of the season is sharp storytelling.

Plus, despite the fact that each of the stories is working its way through Barney's progression, each manages to have its own distinct flavor on the "not where you eat" principle. Robin's is the traditional story (as often seems to be the case on HIMYM), Marshall and Lily have two twists when it's another couple and a neighbor instead of a coworker, and Barney and Wendy the Waitress has the added stakes of McLaren's plus Barney's general awfulness. It creates interesting parallels that never feel dull or repetitive, and the crackerjack editing keeps everything moving and interesting.

And then at the end, Ted is in the least insufferable and most sympathetic shade of his personality (despite his labor-intensive disheveling of his own hair). He acknowledges that there's a good chance things with Stella won't work out, but that he's putting himself out there and taking risks despite that, and even if it doesn't go perfectly, the risk of failure is worth trying to find love, regardless of what the rules are. If anything, that's the message of the series in a nutshell, and it's one of the more down-to-earth yet optimistic versions of Ted we've seen in the series so far. Big thumbs up.

Probably the best episode of season 1. This has a lot of fun with the concept of an alternate universe and feels like it's on a bigger scale than anything that's come before. It's all genuinely exciting. I particularly like that it's all from Daniel's perspective as I don't think it would have worked quite as well with any of the other core characters. Plus, he gets to express a level of frustration and disbelief that helps the episode along.

• Every actor modifies their performance just enough to be both recognisable and different from the version we know. Really well done.
• I love that Catherine returns. It works as both a callback to another episode/the original film for the audience, and as a way for Daniel to try and connect with her by telling her things he knows from her past.
• Doctor Carter's final scene is great. You think she's taking the coward's way out but then flips it around to show that she's still a bad ass.
• This episode establishes the 38 minute window for maintaining an open wormhole on the Stargate. It will come up fairly often.
• Aww, England is totally wiped out.
• Good thing that Daniel didn't need the alien remote control to get back home after all.
• Teal'c's hair. I love it.

A classic stranded-and-hoping-for-rescue episode, with a nice mystery twist. I love the way this plays out, especially the stuff back at the SGC. The Jack/Sam stuff is fine - and I'm sure it triggered a huge amount of shipping among fans - but can begin to drag in parts. The dialogue is so quiet and slow which gets in the way of some good character stuff. It's the search that's that really interesting part, especially Daniel's efforts.

• General Hammond is becoming warmer by this point, and Don S. Davis was just the best in this role. I love the way he gets caught up in Daniel's enthusiasm once they begin to figure things out.
• In fact, Daniel is the most important part of this by far. He figures out everything by himself. I loved it when they really let him use his brain.
• And on the other end, Carter gets to show her smarts too. She and Daniel are really in sync even when apart.
• First appearance of Siler! Although he doesn't get injured in this one, something that will become a running joke. He also flips around the classic Star Trek routine of an engineer being able to effect repairs far quicker than their estimates by saying no, can't be done.
• The comedy is improving! It's maybe not laugh-out-loud at this point, but definitely elicits some good chuckles.
• The reveal of where Jack and Sam are, and the second Stargate, is fantastic. It opens up a lot of new potential storytelling.