Mid-Season TV Report: Gotham, Huh? & Sleepy Hollow, 90% Yay!

[retsuko]

So, the cold open for last night's Gotham featured a character we'd never met before, high on a Plot Device drug, running screaming at the camera. This image pretty much encapsulates the show for me: it's loud, it's not subtle, and if I'm willing suspend a lot of disbelief, it's fun in a "did they really go there?" sort of way. The best scenes

Comments

[ladybird97]

HATED the backstory of the Weeping Lady. HATED IT. Hated the way it played on old tropes of female jealousy and female untrustworthiness. Hated the way that it made loving Ichabod into the only possible motivation for anyone's actions.

I admit that I find Katrina the least interesting character right now, and I often wonder whether the writers feel that way too - they intended the Ichabod/Katrina relationship as the central Eternal True Love of the series, but quickly realized that the other plots and relationships were more interesting and then weren't sure what to do with Katrina after that. But with all that being said, I do not like that they fell back on sexist tropes to introduce the possibility that she might be evil.

ahem. off soapbox now.

On another note - the actress who played Caroline also played Jane in Lizzie Bennet Diaries! This made me very happy to see her, and even sadder when Caroline died. But I loved the scenes between her and Ichabod - that friendship felt very real, and Ichabod's reaction to her death was very well-acted.

And outside of last night's episode, I've really been liking this season! Hawley's presence seems a little forced, but mostly it's great. Love the continuing Ichabod Vs. Modernity struggles, love the strength of the Ichabod-Abbie friendship, love every bit of scenery that John Noble has chewed off :) This is still an excellent show.

Re:

[retsuko]

Heh, sopaboxing is more than fine here! I do more than enough on a regular basis! ;)

You're right, I should clarify: I loved the LOOK of the ghost lady, but I didn't like the backstory, either. It could have been summarized as, "Chicks, man." I love urban legends as hooks (and the cold open with the teenagers making out, even though it was a little hackneyed, wasn't overdone), but it was too bad that all Mary amounted to was JEALOUS BITCH BE TRIPPIN. I keep wondering if Abbie will address this trope* head on, the way she did with Crane "allowing" Katrina to do her own thing. That's what I do if I were the writers, and I would do it straight up next week. >:p

And, in thinking about this more, that's where I get the Ring vibe: she's nothing more than an emotional stain on the place where she died. And that's a pretty sad fate for any female character who isn't Sadako and doesn't have a well to crawl out of. I guess Crazy Water Lady crosses cultures pretty easily as tropes go.

Oh, sweet, it's good to know that the actress has done other cool stuff! She's on Twitter, too, and seems very nice and chill (while casually teasing the writers about resurrecting her character.)

* I initially mistyped that as 'tripe'. :D

[lady_of_mists]

I think she's also Raj's new girlfriend on Big Bang... (the red-haired friend of Ichabod)? If so, I guess she decided which show she wanted to go with... ;)

I was a little perturbed by Mary being obsessed with Ichabod, but it was also interesting that Katrina was the immediate reason for her death as well. The letter sent to Ichabod from "Mary" was interesting too... just kind of wrapped up all of those colonial loose ends for him, didn't it? ;)

So Katrina is a shard now? And was John Noble crying at the end? I had a crying baby I was tending to (because S has managed to find a staph infection), so I didn't really see everything.

I liked Katrina a little better in this episode. And, to be honest, I was almost rooting for her to get with Death. They had some chemistry last night in the parts I saw! :headdesk:

[retsuko]

I wish I knew what Katrina's handwriting charm was! That's a nifty little bit of convenient magic.

Ichabod has a lot of colonial loose ends, but I do agree that this one was wrapped up so neatly that it didn't make an appearance until this very moment! A wild, jealous, old flame ghost appears! ;)

I still get the Phantom of the Opera vibe from Headless, but...

Poor S, staph is awful. Are you all OK? Hope he recovers ASAP!

[lady_of_mists]

I need a handwriting charm. It would be great in the office.

And it did seem typical of a man to just breathe a sigh of relief that the obstacle (old girlfriend) had magically seen reason and gone home... lol

You have to remember that I'm not seeing all of the headless parts. The locked in a house thing's a little ridiculous to me. Lots of trust issues are going on there. ;) But I will say there was a moment that something he said was almost sweet, if you overlook the fact that he's keeping her prisoner in this house.

We are doing okay. S hasn't touched E since early Monday morning. He misses E, but I can't have the baby getting staph. He was looking better today and I think he went to work. I need to call him and work something out about E and the pickup time. I don't know if we need to risk it and let Daddy take care of E for a couple of hours (the infection's on his nose, not his hands; plus he's been on antibiotics for 72 hours by the time he'd be near E) or if I need to cancel my evening appointment and go get him myself.

Anyway, just more to think about.

[retsuko]

I know, right? I'd be using that handwriting charm all the damn time for little, every day nefarious plans. ;)

Yeah, Abraham would be sweet and kind... were he not keeping her prisoner in an effort to convince her to enter into a ceremony where her head is chopped off of her own free will. D: SO CRAZY.

Augh, poor S! I hope it resolved soon! :(

[ladybird97]

haha, tripe :)

And, I should moderate too: I liked the way they staged the attacks, and while I didn't like the JEALOUS BITCH BE TRIPPIN trope, I did like the way they played with horror-movie tropes. I've never seen Ringu, but I'll take your word for it that they did that well. It was definitely spooky and well-done.

[retsuko]

Yeah, don't watch Ringu on your own, on your own TV, on a video. ;p The horror in it stems from two things: the idea that emotion (in particular, the emotion of a wronged girl) is powerful enough to cheat death, and that it's also powerful enough to affect random passers-by who have nothing to do with the death of the wronged party in any way. In this case, I liked the revelation that the deaths weren't random, but I don't like the idea that Mary existed solely to be jealous, and jealous from beyond the grave! (Spooooky noise effects go there.) She looked great--the lace, the ink, the water, and the evil plants at the bottom of the river--all of those were spooky and effective. Dang it, episode, so inconsistent!