Only Better Call Saul can make me glued to the screen for five minutes of monotonous activity involving passing characters without any dialogue, and gasp at an object shot.
I was never expecting a happy ending or even the characters surviving, but the execution felt silly. But then, I couldn't take this season seriously ever since they inexplicably reset where they left off the central relationship at the end of S3 and kept them separate and rehashing the same old conflicts for the majority of the season while introducing new characters and inconsequential plot... for reasons? Relying on the actors'/characters' chemistry does not a well crafted story make.
As others have said, it's just sad, given the potential we all got hooked on in S1.
I need to point something out. The Asch conformity experiments mentioned intrigued me so I googled it to learn more, and the results are misinterpreted in this episode. You can look all the details up, but it's important to note that in majority of the cases the subjects did not conform; 75% of the participants did conform at least once (out of many trials!), but that doesn't indicate two thirds were total conformists as the expert on the show implied, a myth that research shows is popularly perpetuated. Again, you can read thorough summaries with more context elsewhere.
That's not to say there isn't real psychology behind cult indoctrination, of course! I'm interested in that, that's why I'm here watching. I just dislike misinformation so it's quite disappointing that this bit wasn't properly fact-checked before making it into a documentary.
Whaaat is happening with the newcomers like Francesca or the dude's C cup talk? It felt so weirdly inorganic. (I realize the irony of saying this of a reality show episode, haha.)
Don't get me wrong, though, I am entertained. The mess is especially hilarious/ridiculous after the more down-to-earth studio talk reunion.
I'm enjoying Gemma Whelan SO MUCH. She plays Marian with such a great mixture of humor and sincerity.
Ugh, I don't care for these duos entering to compete as a single persona, the extra person never brings anything interesting to the table, imo.
I mind it slightly less whenever they create a duo from eliminated players who are then forced to work together, but it's still not my favorite plot twist.
Great finale, LOVED the players meeting, but I will say I found the whole final rating plot twist unnecessary. A part of the fun of final ratings is that you don't know how sincere or strategic everyone else is gonna be (almost everyone voted pretty sincerely here, but it's never guaranteed), so to me it provided nothing but temporary shock value.
Overall, though: FUN.
I said on the US version that I really don't care for two people playing as one, but I gotta say I am enjoying the twins! I think it's largely that they're in sync and it flows well between them, whereas often the dynamic feels a bit imbalanced (or just boring). Also I'm impressed with how they play Luma, she comes across as having an actual personality, which many catfishes seem to struggle with.
I don't like that there were suddenly conditions for who she was allowed to visit! There's so much drama in the possibilities, I thought it was likely she would've visited Courtney even without the imposed rule, and they could've made her answer the question of who deserves to win for this Inner Circle business anyway.
