a day late and extremely short episode reations: Merlin 3.05; HI 5-0 1.04; SPN 6.03.
Okay, the Merlin and H50 reactions got a little long this week--and the SPN one (I finally watched the ep tonight) is a little truncated. I think I need to go ponder everyone else's reviews to glean their wisdom.
Merlin 3.05
I transcribe my family’s reaction to the opening of the episode:
Me: Why are Merlin and Arthur running?
The five-year-old: Ninjas!
The nine-year-old (older, and more sociologically precise): Temperate Rainforest Ninjas!
Exit Merlin and Arthur, pursued by the TRNs, who manage to wound Arthur with their mad archery skillz.
But then I got confused again. Last week, there was a guy with a leg wound. So they decided the best medical procedure was to get his shirt off pretty damn quick. This week, Arthur got shot in the back with an arrow. Like, you know, in upper half of his body. And rather than getting his mail shirt, etc., off him, so that he could, maybe, I dunno, try to clean the wound or something, Merlin just lets him lie there, on his back, in the dirt and leaves, while he ineffectually tries to magic him better, and then cries.
I’m willing to accept the medical ineptitude of everyone on the show (the Dark Ages were pretty dark, after all), but it’s hard to believe that the show let a perfectly good opportunity to get someone’s kit off slip by. (Not that I keep track or anything, but the last time Arthur was had an upper body injury and ended up unconscious at the mouth of a cave while Merlin did magic stuff-in 2.14-he spent at least half of the episode shirtless, bloody and bandaged. That was a good episode. Maybe Merlin was crying because he’d tried to conjure away the shirt and failed).
Still, on the bright side, it was another chance for Arthur to spend some quality time unconscious while Merlin did magic stuff. Bradley James must look forward to it every week; they probably get in a body double, and he catches up on his texting or something.
That’s about all I have to say about the episode. I usually enjoy the episodes that bring up the whole “do not meddle in the equations of life and death” thing, and I liked this one fine, even though it was pretty much a retread of things they’d done before (with Mordred, for one).
H50 1.04
It’s been a pleasure watching larger and larger swathes of my flist succumb to the sunny, bickery badassery of H50 this week *waves to y’all*
I think I might be a little bit seduced by the high production values, myself. It’s been a long time since I watched a big-budget network cop show, and part of me is just going-Helicopters! Locations! Music! Shiny! Though it would all be for naught without the equally shiny chemistry of the cast.
Does anyone know how long Scott Caan’s ACL surgery/recovery affected the scripts/filming? Poor guy-it can’t have been fun to have to keep working through that (though, didn’t he tear it doing some ridiculous extreme sport?). Of course, it has its pros and cons.
On the one hand, the scenes of Steve and Danny sitting around literally bickering informants into submission were pure gold this week-who needs fists when you have snark? And you really can’t complain about the Steve-Chin partnering-- That has to be the prettiest rescue party ever to have rescued anybody.
On the other hand, I missed action!Danny. And all the great bickering that could have gone on during the rescue mission:
S: Aw, gross, man! Why didn’t you tell me you got airsick?
D (not at all apologetic): I dunno-it was never an issue back in Jersey, where the cops stayed on the ground like they are supposed to--none of this boats, trains and freakin’ helicopters bullshit.
Or:
D: Okay, Steve, when I made that Apocalypse Now allusion back in the restaurant, it was joke. Get it? A joke. I did not mean “let’s take a trip to the freakin’ jungle and go all Martin Sheen on these sons of bitches.
S (ignoring him and pointing): Watch out: snake.
D (muttering): Never get out of the boat, never get out of the boat.
S: What’re you talking about, Danno? We came in a helicopter, not a boat. Remember? With the puking?
Of course, if H50 had a fully functioning kink meme, I would now be expecting lots of porntastic “How Danny really hurt his knee” stories, along with some lovely, unrealistic h/c in which the knee makes it really hard for Danny to shower properly, and Steve has to help him.
In other news, the show seemed to be trying hard to humanize Steve this week, what with the flaky sister and her news of angsty family relationships, and his weird kindness to Dana, who married the armed robber. I guess I can see why they’d do it, though I, personally was fine with crazy-military-guy!Steve.
But still, who cares, when a show can make a “how long you two been married” joke work fifteen minutes into the fourth episode?
SPN 6.03
Okay, I finally watched this, and was pleased to see the epidemic of shirtlessness I noted on Merlin last week spreading to America’s heartland.
And, while the whole Staff of Moses thing was a little Raiders of the Lost Ark for me (also, Show: naming the kid with the staff Aaron? A little much, imo), I did enjoy having Cas (and his deep bond with Dean) back quite a bit, especially with his wonderfully re-charged disapparating powers (“I need myrrh”).
It was a little disconcerting that Balthazar turned out to be the guy from Fringe. I kept expecting him to tell Cas about this nifty way of moving between alternate universes he knows about.
Merlin 3.05
I transcribe my family’s reaction to the opening of the episode:
Me: Why are Merlin and Arthur running?
The five-year-old: Ninjas!
The nine-year-old (older, and more sociologically precise): Temperate Rainforest Ninjas!
Exit Merlin and Arthur, pursued by the TRNs, who manage to wound Arthur with their mad archery skillz.
But then I got confused again. Last week, there was a guy with a leg wound. So they decided the best medical procedure was to get his shirt off pretty damn quick. This week, Arthur got shot in the back with an arrow. Like, you know, in upper half of his body. And rather than getting his mail shirt, etc., off him, so that he could, maybe, I dunno, try to clean the wound or something, Merlin just lets him lie there, on his back, in the dirt and leaves, while he ineffectually tries to magic him better, and then cries.
I’m willing to accept the medical ineptitude of everyone on the show (the Dark Ages were pretty dark, after all), but it’s hard to believe that the show let a perfectly good opportunity to get someone’s kit off slip by. (Not that I keep track or anything, but the last time Arthur was had an upper body injury and ended up unconscious at the mouth of a cave while Merlin did magic stuff-in 2.14-he spent at least half of the episode shirtless, bloody and bandaged. That was a good episode. Maybe Merlin was crying because he’d tried to conjure away the shirt and failed).
Still, on the bright side, it was another chance for Arthur to spend some quality time unconscious while Merlin did magic stuff. Bradley James must look forward to it every week; they probably get in a body double, and he catches up on his texting or something.
That’s about all I have to say about the episode. I usually enjoy the episodes that bring up the whole “do not meddle in the equations of life and death” thing, and I liked this one fine, even though it was pretty much a retread of things they’d done before (with Mordred, for one).
H50 1.04
It’s been a pleasure watching larger and larger swathes of my flist succumb to the sunny, bickery badassery of H50 this week *waves to y’all*
I think I might be a little bit seduced by the high production values, myself. It’s been a long time since I watched a big-budget network cop show, and part of me is just going-Helicopters! Locations! Music! Shiny! Though it would all be for naught without the equally shiny chemistry of the cast.
Does anyone know how long Scott Caan’s ACL surgery/recovery affected the scripts/filming? Poor guy-it can’t have been fun to have to keep working through that (though, didn’t he tear it doing some ridiculous extreme sport?). Of course, it has its pros and cons.
On the one hand, the scenes of Steve and Danny sitting around literally bickering informants into submission were pure gold this week-who needs fists when you have snark? And you really can’t complain about the Steve-Chin partnering-- That has to be the prettiest rescue party ever to have rescued anybody.
On the other hand, I missed action!Danny. And all the great bickering that could have gone on during the rescue mission:
S: Aw, gross, man! Why didn’t you tell me you got airsick?
D (not at all apologetic): I dunno-it was never an issue back in Jersey, where the cops stayed on the ground like they are supposed to--none of this boats, trains and freakin’ helicopters bullshit.
Or:
D: Okay, Steve, when I made that Apocalypse Now allusion back in the restaurant, it was joke. Get it? A joke. I did not mean “let’s take a trip to the freakin’ jungle and go all Martin Sheen on these sons of bitches.
S (ignoring him and pointing): Watch out: snake.
D (muttering): Never get out of the boat, never get out of the boat.
S: What’re you talking about, Danno? We came in a helicopter, not a boat. Remember? With the puking?
Of course, if H50 had a fully functioning kink meme, I would now be expecting lots of porntastic “How Danny really hurt his knee” stories, along with some lovely, unrealistic h/c in which the knee makes it really hard for Danny to shower properly, and Steve has to help him.
In other news, the show seemed to be trying hard to humanize Steve this week, what with the flaky sister and her news of angsty family relationships, and his weird kindness to Dana, who married the armed robber. I guess I can see why they’d do it, though I, personally was fine with crazy-military-guy!Steve.
But still, who cares, when a show can make a “how long you two been married” joke work fifteen minutes into the fourth episode?
SPN 6.03
Okay, I finally watched this, and was pleased to see the epidemic of shirtlessness I noted on Merlin last week spreading to America’s heartland.
And, while the whole Staff of Moses thing was a little Raiders of the Lost Ark for me (also, Show: naming the kid with the staff Aaron? A little much, imo), I did enjoy having Cas (and his deep bond with Dean) back quite a bit, especially with his wonderfully re-charged disapparating powers (“I need myrrh”).
It was a little disconcerting that Balthazar turned out to be the guy from Fringe. I kept expecting him to tell Cas about this nifty way of moving between alternate universes he knows about.