Do you think that maybe this is just your life?
Tuesday night TV:
The Flash: Running to Stand Still
WALLY WEST! ♥♥♥♥♥ Please don't screw him up show! Please! I had a really hard time with Nice Guy Wally on YJ because I want JL/JLU Wally, i.e., THE BEST FLASH, in everything. Hopefully this kid will be more like him than YJ!Wally or sad sack Earth 2-Jay has been so far. Though he doesn't seem to be young enough to accept being Kid Flash, so I wonder what they'll do when he gets hooked into the Speed Force.
So we had Barry Allen, Jay Garrick, Wally West, and (briefly) Jesse Quick in this episode. Plus Zoom. SO MANY SPEEDSTERS. SUCH SPEED FORCE. WOW. Is it wrong to wonder when Bart's going to show up?
Captain Cold! Oh my gosh, Wentworth Miller just gets campier and campier and I LOVE IT. He's more of a secret Santa. I'll bet he is. Plus, Mark Hamill going full on Joker with Trickster. And even with his maniacal scenery chewing, he still didn't get the best line of the night, which easily went to Grinch Harry Wells: "Your toys. Give them to me." Bwah!
"Magnets, bitch!" I don't even watch Breaking Bad but I was amused. I love that Cisco's pop culture references feel true and earned rather than shoehorned in and awkward.
I don't understand why Barry hasn't told Patty - and why he didn't tell her when he had the chance - he didn't have to even take off the cowl, he could have just stopped disguising his voice and she would have realized (honestly, as soon as he took her in his arms to fly out of there she should have realized, if she hasn't already figured it out, because he's going to smell like Barry! I am just saying. That was also a sweet and nasty Flash-stopper she pulled out. I hope they get a chance to use it on Zoom!
Joe West! ♥
Between this and Supergirl, it's been a really fun week!
iZombie: Cape Town
I didn't love this episode because I found vigilante brain!Liv annoying rather than amusing, and it didn't have the same emotional stakes as stalker-brain!Liv, which made me upset on her behalf as well as at her. I mean, Major's not wrong, and I'm glad he stood up for himself in that fight (even though he is totally wrong for not telling her about his work for Max Rager). The only thing I liked was Ravi's glee about Liv being a superhero and her superhero name (though Cisco would have come up with better names for her. I vote for Doctor Zombie, though Doctor Dead wasn't bad. Not very reassuring, though.)
Even though I didn't like the self-serious vigilante schtick, I did like that it set Liv at odds with Clive, though now I really want her to tell him! Come on, Liv! Though given that she doctored that FBI report two weeks ago, she kind of can't tell him now without revealing that, too. Oops.
Mr. Boss is the best kind of villain. Unassuming and chilling. *shudders*
Major got the best storyline - that was surprisingly touching, with the zombie call girl (ugh, Blaine just gets worse and worse) - and then any hope for a quick and easy cure (er, no pun intended) dissipates when Hope reverts back to being a zombie rat. Otoh, it would allow Liv and Major to be together if he were also a zombie. *hands*
I really like how everything is coming together.
And now, Wednesday books:
What I've just finished
Symphony for the City of the Dead by M.T. Anderson, which is a really strong biography of composer Dmitri Shostakovich/history of the siege of Leningrad and the Leningrad Symphony he wrote during WWII. Definitely recommended.
We Are Robin 6, Robin War 1, and the Grayson and Gotham Academy tie-ins, so I'll just talk about them all as one.
FUCKING COURT OF OWLS. Are they going to be behind every large scale event in Gotham now? On the one hand, my issues with the multiple connections to Dick's family's past remain (see my complaint about Court of Owls), but on the other, I do like that they want him back, that he's acknowledged as the leader of Robins, that he's amazing. Though I'm not sure how I feel about him pulling such a Bruce-like maneuver on all the other Robins.
I did love Jason's defense of Robin, and how each Robin got his own little batch of proto-Robins to train (and oh, Damian, you clearly need more hugs), though I still completely side-eye everything the reboot has done with the timeline, especially in terms of Tim.
I also loved Riko at Gotham Academy and Maps's 180 on her once she learned Riko was a Robin, and Damian showing up at the end promising Maps support when needed. Ugh, BEST TEAM.
I guess I'll say this outside the cut, since it isn't really a spoiler, but I honest to god can't understand why they thought it was a good idea to do whatever it is they've done to the timeline, because now Batman had four Robins - three of whom died! (Well, Dick "died" when he was Nightwing, but still) - and Tim was never technically Robin, he was always Red Robin. Like, wtf? If I recall correctly, Tim was Robin for like FIVE YEARS WITHIN THE TEXT - he's about 12 when Jason dies, right, and he's 17 when Dick takes Robin away and gives it to Damian? At least, I think so. So this is some serious bullshit. Also he's got the wonkiest characterization of the Boy Wonders: Jason's fratbro nonsense is also wrong and irritating, but it's intermittent; Dick and Damian seem to have fared pretty well in the switchover; but Tim is inexplicable.
What I'm reading now
Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen, which is exactly a Sarah Dessen novel, so I'm enjoying it.
What I'm reading next
Well, aside from yuletide source review and research (...I have a title to go with my idea?), I still have the latest issue of Batman and Robin Eternal, the Star Wars annual, and the first issue of Devil Dinosaur and Moon Girl to read. Then whatever book strikes my fancy, or whatever comes next from the library.
***
Board meeting this afternoon, and then I can relax for a week and a half before being off work for the holidays. Sigh.
***
This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/799590.html.
people have commented there.
The Flash: Running to Stand Still
WALLY WEST! ♥♥♥♥♥ Please don't screw him up show! Please! I had a really hard time with Nice Guy Wally on YJ because I want JL/JLU Wally, i.e., THE BEST FLASH, in everything. Hopefully this kid will be more like him than YJ!Wally or sad sack Earth 2-Jay has been so far. Though he doesn't seem to be young enough to accept being Kid Flash, so I wonder what they'll do when he gets hooked into the Speed Force.
So we had Barry Allen, Jay Garrick, Wally West, and (briefly) Jesse Quick in this episode. Plus Zoom. SO MANY SPEEDSTERS. SUCH SPEED FORCE. WOW. Is it wrong to wonder when Bart's going to show up?
Captain Cold! Oh my gosh, Wentworth Miller just gets campier and campier and I LOVE IT. He's more of a secret Santa. I'll bet he is. Plus, Mark Hamill going full on Joker with Trickster. And even with his maniacal scenery chewing, he still didn't get the best line of the night, which easily went to Grinch Harry Wells: "Your toys. Give them to me." Bwah!
"Magnets, bitch!" I don't even watch Breaking Bad but I was amused. I love that Cisco's pop culture references feel true and earned rather than shoehorned in and awkward.
I don't understand why Barry hasn't told Patty - and why he didn't tell her when he had the chance - he didn't have to even take off the cowl, he could have just stopped disguising his voice and she would have realized (honestly, as soon as he took her in his arms to fly out of there she should have realized, if she hasn't already figured it out, because he's going to smell like Barry! I am just saying. That was also a sweet and nasty Flash-stopper she pulled out. I hope they get a chance to use it on Zoom!
Joe West! ♥
Between this and Supergirl, it's been a really fun week!
iZombie: Cape Town
I didn't love this episode because I found vigilante brain!Liv annoying rather than amusing, and it didn't have the same emotional stakes as stalker-brain!Liv, which made me upset on her behalf as well as at her. I mean, Major's not wrong, and I'm glad he stood up for himself in that fight (even though he is totally wrong for not telling her about his work for Max Rager). The only thing I liked was Ravi's glee about Liv being a superhero and her superhero name (though Cisco would have come up with better names for her. I vote for Doctor Zombie, though Doctor Dead wasn't bad. Not very reassuring, though.)
Even though I didn't like the self-serious vigilante schtick, I did like that it set Liv at odds with Clive, though now I really want her to tell him! Come on, Liv! Though given that she doctored that FBI report two weeks ago, she kind of can't tell him now without revealing that, too. Oops.
Mr. Boss is the best kind of villain. Unassuming and chilling. *shudders*
Major got the best storyline - that was surprisingly touching, with the zombie call girl (ugh, Blaine just gets worse and worse) - and then any hope for a quick and easy cure (er, no pun intended) dissipates when Hope reverts back to being a zombie rat. Otoh, it would allow Liv and Major to be together if he were also a zombie. *hands*
I really like how everything is coming together.
And now, Wednesday books:
What I've just finished
Symphony for the City of the Dead by M.T. Anderson, which is a really strong biography of composer Dmitri Shostakovich/history of the siege of Leningrad and the Leningrad Symphony he wrote during WWII. Definitely recommended.
We Are Robin 6, Robin War 1, and the Grayson and Gotham Academy tie-ins, so I'll just talk about them all as one.
FUCKING COURT OF OWLS. Are they going to be behind every large scale event in Gotham now? On the one hand, my issues with the multiple connections to Dick's family's past remain (see my complaint about Court of Owls), but on the other, I do like that they want him back, that he's acknowledged as the leader of Robins, that he's amazing. Though I'm not sure how I feel about him pulling such a Bruce-like maneuver on all the other Robins.
I did love Jason's defense of Robin, and how each Robin got his own little batch of proto-Robins to train (and oh, Damian, you clearly need more hugs), though I still completely side-eye everything the reboot has done with the timeline, especially in terms of Tim.
I also loved Riko at Gotham Academy and Maps's 180 on her once she learned Riko was a Robin, and Damian showing up at the end promising Maps support when needed. Ugh, BEST TEAM.
I guess I'll say this outside the cut, since it isn't really a spoiler, but I honest to god can't understand why they thought it was a good idea to do whatever it is they've done to the timeline, because now Batman had four Robins - three of whom died! (Well, Dick "died" when he was Nightwing, but still) - and Tim was never technically Robin, he was always Red Robin. Like, wtf? If I recall correctly, Tim was Robin for like FIVE YEARS WITHIN THE TEXT - he's about 12 when Jason dies, right, and he's 17 when Dick takes Robin away and gives it to Damian? At least, I think so. So this is some serious bullshit. Also he's got the wonkiest characterization of the Boy Wonders: Jason's fratbro nonsense is also wrong and irritating, but it's intermittent; Dick and Damian seem to have fared pretty well in the switchover; but Tim is inexplicable.
What I'm reading now
Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen, which is exactly a Sarah Dessen novel, so I'm enjoying it.
What I'm reading next
Well, aside from yuletide source review and research (...I have a title to go with my idea?), I still have the latest issue of Batman and Robin Eternal, the Star Wars annual, and the first issue of Devil Dinosaur and Moon Girl to read. Then whatever book strikes my fancy, or whatever comes next from the library.
***
Board meeting this afternoon, and then I can relax for a week and a half before being off work for the holidays. Sigh.
***
This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/799590.html.
people have commented there.