S.H.I.E.L.D., S6 - July 30

Let us start… no, let us skip the obligatory disclaimer, and go to the more intense things. Or not, let us wait and see how it goes.

To begin – ‘Insatiable’ continues… either to have problems, or to generate problems for itself, via Netflix: by now, there are rumors of a ‘review embargo’; i.e. apparently, no critical reviews can be published until the film itself is released. Look: it may appear to be a sound strategy, but in reality, this shows that ‘Insatiable’ does have problems that are more serious than just a badly made trailer is. If the film was sound, then a little criticism wouldn’t hurt; there are plenty of movies that went on regardless of what the critics thought…including the TV ones, but ‘Insatiable’ is trying to do something different, apparently, so good luck to it – so far it just further amplifies the feeling that ‘Insatiable’ is a badly made movie, so it might end up going the new ‘Ghostbusters’ route, where the movie had a bad reputation and was just bad. In fact, having any reputation helped the new ‘Ghostbusters’ some, as it actually made people want to come and look at it, just to see how bad it really was. Not unlike the Marvel ‘InHumans’ TV series, it was just…insipid, and while Marvel ‘InHumans’ just got cancelled after their S1, the new ‘Ghostbusters’ movie franchise…has also ended; there are some new ‘Ghostbusters’ comics, but otherwise? That is it for now; just like ‘InHumans’, ‘Ghostbusters’ have failed.

Meanwhile… the shark week has ended, the global tiger day was yesterday, and there are new news about AoS. Firstly, Clark Gregg, (aka Phil Coulson) will be back…to direct the first episode of S6. There are no news of Wen, (May), so she probably will not be back in AoS in any capacity, period. There are some Coulson fans that will be excited by the news, no doubt, but for the rest of us? This will not be the same; as always, AoS wants to have it both ways and consequently, does not succeed in either – go them. Not.

EW has published a mini-interview with Gregg online and showed that yes; he is directing the upcoming 6x01 episode – ‘Missing Pieces’, (or something like that). Good for him, Gregg has directed the ‘Fun and Games’ episode of AoS already back in S5, (does anyone feels that this made ‘Fun and Games’ somehow different from the rest of AoS, eh?), so he has plenty of practice under his belt – and everyone is very excited, especially Chloe Bennett, (who plays Skye/Daisy/Quake). The more I see of her as a person, the less I like her, regardless of what I feel for her character on one hand, and how much I respect her acting skills on the other.

Speaking of Skye/Daisy/Quake? Jeff Ward is also staying on AoS, as Deke Shaw, the FitzSimmons’ grandson from the future, and probably Daisy’s love interest. Why?

Listen, AoS began as a show about three couples – the FitzSimmons, Skye & Grant, and Phil & Mel. The FitzSimmons are technically a couple still, even though the show constantly divides them in ever creative and new ways, to a point where it gotten ridiculous: the two of them still have to sire and give birth to Deke’s mom, for otherwise, Deke will just fade away and Daisy will be left single again.

No, seriously, what gives? Daisy’s/Chloe’s love interests come and go every season, again to the point of ridiculousness – Britt and Dalton, Mitchell and Luna, and anyone else who’s forgotten, they all came and went for various reasons – is working on AoS with Chloe so bad? Seriously, by now this sort of a relationship leapfrog game with Daisy is also ridiculous…and there are still some fans who are feeling let down by the fact that SkyeWard relationship did not happen.

Of course, there is now Deke. Deke and Daisy, there is the letter D alliteration, how clever. If the S5 had treated their relationship as a, well, fledgling relationship, things would have been better for them and for the viewers. Instead, Deke’s role on S5 was all over the place, and never concretely with Daisy, (or as S.H.I.E.L.D.’s new rookie either, for that matter), so right now he has less of a presence than Kasius and Sinara do – that alien power couple have some fans, even though they are evil and are kind of dead. Ish. If Deke and Daisy will appear as a couple of whatever sorts on AoS’ S6, then there will be some backlash just because – and now it is unknown if AoS can take it. (Mind you, if after their sixth season they will decide just to call it quits…that might not be a problem – six seasons are a respectable run, after all, and the Marvel scene is changing too…)

Anything else? No, not really. There’s also the upcoming ‘To All the Boys that I have Loved’ movie, also on Netflix, and-

And it is shaping to be a very different piece than the original novel was. The original novel – the first in a trilogy, and perhaps – the strongest, is a love drama novel. Yes, there’s some humor – moreso in the other two novels than in this one – but mainly to undercut the drama of the plot and to ensure that the novels don’t get too high-handed, or high-strung, or whatever. The movie – even in its’ trailer – has a lot more humor in it, including physical humor, than the novel does.

Secondly, the attitude. The author – Jenny Han – has made her heroine, Lara Jean, (let us just call her LJ in the future) – old-fashioned to a point, where she is still a virgin. Gasp, and with most of her friends, (including her big sister), not being so to the point. Somehow or other, Jenny Han’s LJ novels are romantic, without any sex involved, especially not directly. And in the movie trailer? LJ’s dad hands her apparently a set of condoms, for fun.

Now, here’s the thing – it isn’t certain if LJ is her author’s mouthpiece in her trilogy, but she is a representative of a certain set of values; actually, Jenny Han isn’t subtle about showing her values at least in this trilogy; she is politically correct and progressive, (of course), as there are racial minorities in the novels, and at least one homosexual character; but-

But when it comes to characters in the LJ trilogy in general, Jenny Han seems to have issues with them as an author. There’re LJ and her family, (including Trina, her eventual stepmother), there’s Paul Kavinski, (LJ’s significant other), and his family…but they are already nowhere near as well fleshed-out as LJ and her family are, there’s Josh and John- wait.

Josh deserves a special mention because he was LJ’s first love…but he became the boyfriend of Margot, LJ’s sister, and then they broke-up, Josh and Margot, leaving Josh free, but LJ didn’t want to get with him, because of reasons. She hooked-up with Pete instead…and the rest of the trilogy, (two and a half books, basically), are all about LJ and Pete…being together. They are being shoehorned together, sure, but-

But the same goes for the rest of romance novels, period. Teen or adult, it doesn’t matter – when it comes to characters, it all goes down very simple: character A meets character B, they fall in love and spend the rest of the novel getting there, whether you’re talking about Jenny Han or Nora Roberts; the devil’s in details, true, but the basic framework? It is the same. For those who love romance, Jenny Han’s novels, (both LJ trilogy and the others), should work; for those who want something more substantial, they will not. At least the LJ novels are driven only by plot, and the characters – especially the non-main characters – are secondary at best, little more than placeholders at worst. Josh was a main character in the first novel, (and he is probably going to be so in the movie too), but in the rest of the trilogy? He is barely even mentioned. Yes, he got himself a new girlfriend who was not related to the Song-Covey family, but his abrupt dismissal from the LJ world still kind of stings. Kitty – the youngest SC girl – actually addresses a point that Josh is not around anymore, and it goes down…about as well as the Apu controversy in the Simpsons-verse – it does not. As soon as characters stop being important to the LJ in love with Pete plot, they practically vanish and become ghosts for all that it matters. Ah well, how does the saying go? Don’t like it, don’t read? Sounds about right – Jenny Han’s novels – or at least the LJ trilogy – is sitting out there on bookshelves, as people do not read it. Maybe they will after the movie airs, but considering that the movie is already revealing itself to be very different from the books, it is not certain that it will be a good idea. For example, LJ novels are not very approving of sex in general and of casual sex in particular – the trailer has Mr. Song-Covey hand the movie LJ a set of rubbers – yes, that sort of rubbers. Ouch! This is a direct opposite of the novels’ atmosphere, of LJ’s character and of her father’s – but the movie does not care. This just might be a new ‘GG’ reboot in the making, or even – the PJ movies, which were denounced by Riordan personally, and that was the end of them – but that is another story.

In other movie-related news, SW9 will feature Carrie Fisher, or rather – the footage of Carrie Fisher as princess Leia. Her real-life family are apparently very happy/proud/positive etc., which is good, because if they weren’t, then the Disney-Lucasfilm merger behind the SW movies would’ve had a bigger problem from what they already had – but it was discussed earlier. There is still going to be controversy, as there was when they had done something similar in the SW ‘Rogue 1’ film, so why not? The mess that Disney-Lucasfilm merger found themselves in these days was discussed earlier too…

So, this is it for now – see you all soon!

Cloak & Dagger, 'Back Breaker' - July 27

And so, with 1x09 ep done and gone, “C&D’ are at their S1 finale. In their penultimate S1 episode – ‘Back Breaker’ – aka this one, things are looking ambiguous for our duo: Ty is feeling down and empty as Hell… and so’s Dy, only she has figured out that she can do an energy vampire sort of thing and get high on the hopes of others. This is not very heroic…which is why Ty straightens her out during this episode – sort of.

Let us try again, with less rambling. Firstly, 1x09 gave father Delgado something to do – he talked about heroes in literature at length, about their narratives and what will you. This is very impressive, very expositional, but we already went through this sort of thing with Hank Pym in the first ‘Ant-Man’ movie, where Hank became an expositional machine to be justified to be staying in the movie at all, period. It is sad, and father Delgado’s situation is just as sad. His role is to be a spiritual guide to Ty (and maybe to Dy, if he ever meets her), but this is probably the second episode that he has been in so far. Regardless, good luck to him – he needs it.

Secondly, aunt Voodoo and her niece are back. Aunt Voodoo appeared mainly in the episode’s prologue, where she apparently had laid a hex on Roxxon’s pipe network and it worked, as two new Roxxon minions, (male, of course), got contaminated by something that came through the pipework and now they are after Mina – that girl just cannot get a break: first Dy has apparently eaten her happiness, and now this.

Yes, Dy can now eat the hopes (and happiness?) of other people; Ty, maybe, can eat their fear (and despair?) – something like that. This is bad, of course, but the voodoo niece now knows that Dy is the other half of the Divine Pairing or something like that – bring on the fan-shipping. The fact that the two lead actors got amazing chemistry with each other does not hurt this show development at all either. More importantly, the two heroes of ‘C&D’ are down in different ways for different reasons and need to get back up, because more corrupt cops are coming after Ty, while Roxxon’s CEO sent an assassin against Dy’s mom…because he’s a heartless, brainless, greedy sod, who just cannot let it go…and the assassin isn’t much better off – here’s to her getting skewered by Dy’s daggers in the S1 finale next week. Of course, to make things worse for Dy her Roxxon hush money is missing, as is her semi-boyfriend, Liam, who both stole the money and got out of New Orleans ASAP, or the assassin has already captured/killed him and secured the money – ‘Back Breaker’ is not clear on this point. It does not matter to Dy, nor to Ty, who needs to make his great escape. Since he is the night, he’s cloak, he will make it.

…So, ‘C&D’ are playing a tight ship – much more like AC than AoS, for comparison – and are not afraid of a little fourth wall breaking. The catch is that that tightness makes the wall breaking unnecessary – unlike AoS, there are no unexpected twists in the narrative, and everything is quite predictable and enjoyable. So was AC, for that matter, so kudos for ‘C&D’ for imitating it in this way.

Meanwhile, detective Mayhem is having her problems – her boyfriend is dead, and the Corrupt Cop is out and has already beaten her badly, with no one else stopping him. Of course, since she is a ‘hero’, she will still do the right thing, (in the next episode/S1 finale) and become Mayhem proper, as it was implied in the Comic-Con promo. Odds are, she will go full vigilante as well, since her stint in the police did not work out – not in New Orleans, and not in NYC, (from which she had transferred down to New Orleans). In addition, there may be claws. The original Mayhem didn’t really have claws, but the TV version is different, so why not claws?

Anything else? Well, apparently, there is yet another teen Netflix movie going down, ‘To All the Boys that I Loved’ or something like that. Considering that Disney is airing its’ own teen movie – yet another version of ‘Freaky Friday’ later this summer, I am guessing that there may be some sort of a competition going on, but who knows? And more importantly – does anyone care?

Well, this is it for now – see you all soon!

Reverie, 'Despedida' - July 26

We are continuing to go our merry way with ‘Reverie’, as it reaches its’ 8^th episode, ‘Despedida’. This time, the AoS’ rip-off is Melinda May and her complex relationship with children; in the ‘Reverie’-verse she became Pilar, a woman who had sort of failed to save a group of girls back in her past, during Chile’s revolution (in 1973), and who has utilized the titular device to try and fix it – and fix it she does, with Mara’s help. What next?

…One of ‘Reverie’s’ flaws is not that it is influenced, cough, by AoS – it is not the first one to do so. ‘Blindspot’ did it, so’s ‘Quantico’ and DC’s LoT, but all of these shows are team-focused, literally speaking. There is no main character, unlike ‘Arrow’ or ‘Supergirl’ shows, for example, which do focus primarily on the titular main characters, at least to a point; everyone actually gets their ten minutes of fame, depending on an episode, whereas in ‘Reverie’, it was always about Mara, with the rest of the main characters always being in support roles. Some episodes – such as last week’s episode 1x07 – did try to change the dynamic, but not really; with just 10 episodes in the first season, the show’s cast and crew did not have too much room to maneuver, probably. This is not exactly a problem, more of an inconsistency; yes, from the common-sense-P.O.V., naming a show ‘Mara’ made it somehow less attractive than naming it ‘Reverie’; yet somehow this is still mostly a show about Mara, than about anything reverie-related.

Is it a problem? Not really; ‘Reverie’ is still in its’ first season; it might get better, or just change, in the following seasons, or it might get cancelled altogether, as ‘The Change’ did, (though ‘The Change’ ended after 2 seasons, rather than just one). Unlike ‘C&D’, there are no news of it being renewed for a S2, and somehow, this is not surprising – for all of its’ positive features, it just is not very good.

Anything else? ‘Quantico’ is ending after three seasons or so, sad. Rousey had her shark week special, which was really a personal promo piece for her badassery – she should probably see a shrink about how to make herself feel happy rather than harass sharks. She clearly has issues, and whatever she does, sharks or no sharks, it is not helping. Maybe it is time to see professional help instead? Who knows…

Facebook took a huge dive in stock, but, apparently, they had expected it, so they are not down for the count by a long shot. There are first photos of the actress who will be playing the titular character in Disney’s live action Kim Possible film, and people are already fighting over it. What a surprise. Life goes on as it usually does, i.e.

Well, this is it for now; see you all soon.

Insatiable - July 24

So, ‘Insatiable’. Why take two cents on it?

Because it is reminiscent of the SW and its’ post-merger-with-Disney problems, that is why.

What did we see?

A trailer, which starred the main character of the upcoming show – Debbie Ryan. At first she is in a fat suit and everyone hates her; then her character loses weight over the summer, (got into a fight over food, acquired a broken jaw and had to fast all those weeks), and became ‘hot’. As in ‘sexy’. So?

Firstly, this story sounds already tropish and clichéd. The concept of an overweight, or a fat, woman, losing her bulk and becoming sexy, has been in use for a long while now, especially in various soap operas and the like. None of them use this concept as a fat-positive thing…because it is not. It is fat-negative, pure and simple, so for the ‘Insatiable’ crew to declare that their TV series will be so is either a lie, a straightforward one, which is bad, or their (first) trailer was just poorly designed and has currently shot the entire upcoming series in the foot, which isn’t very good either. In the trailer, to elaborate, we see Debbie’s character Patty decide that rather becoming a brand-new person, she would have revenge on everyone else, and we see footage of her punching another girl in the face at one moment and in another pouring…something (it can booze, or pee, or gasoline), over a sleeping boy, (after the two of them had sex). How exactly is this positive anything? It would make more sense to assume that Patty was always an unpleasant person, only now that she’s thin nobody notices it – not at first – and so she’s free to do whatever she wants, which is to say – be an unpleasant and a bad person. How is this positive?

…Meanwhile, Netflix airing another TV series, about another heavy young woman named Sierra, and this series is very different; it is another variant of the Cyrano story. In the original version, Cyrano was a very eloquent, but ugly man – he had a big nose, rather like HP’s professor Snape, but unlike the latter, he was very meticulous about his looks, (inasmuch as it could be helped), and a master duelist as well, so fewer people wanted to fight him than they did Snape…before Snape became a Potions’ Master, an Animagus, a Death Eater, and so on. He certainly had no problem in whipping Lockhart back in HP&CS either, but then again, we are talking about Lockhart here, so yeah. Where were we?

…One of the main plotlines of the Cyrano story was when he was helping another nobleman – a handsome man, who was as dumb as a rock…basically, a stereotypical rock – woo a maiden by being Cyrano’s mouthpiece – and the same we see in the Sierra’s trailer, where she uses one of her classmates – a pretty girl who is failing her classes – to act as Sierra’s mouthpiece to win over another one of their classmates…a handsome jock. How exactly this is more radical and fat-positive than ‘Insatiable’, exactly?

Actually, it is not. ‘Insatiable’ is the more radical one, ironically, but it just is not fat-positive. The word itself, ‘positive’, has a bunch of associations tied to it by now, and people know how to use them in a story, especially in a visual one – in a cinema, on TV or on a YouTube channel, to name a few sources. You try to subvert them…and you might succeed, or your followers might, where you have failed.

This is where that SW make an appearance. After their merger, Disney did not make a complete reboot of the series, rather they are continuing in the general direction of GL, but due to a series of surprising decisions (from Disney) that were discussed at another time, they were able to split their fanbase into a number of fractions, and it isn’t the case of a vocal minority – a single one; rather, this is a case of several fractions, all of whom are vocal and also warring with each other: the best case for scaring away new fans as well as for losing old ones. Both Disney and SW are media juggernauts, but their latest movie – ‘Solo’ – brought only tens of millions of income rather than hundreds, as expected, especially by Disney, so now Disney & SW are keeping a low profile as they are possibly figuring out what to do without appearing to be submitting to the fans’ desires of – whatever they want, for that would be a bad weakness, you know? Of course, this is also how democracy works – the people want something and they force it out of their politicians – but these days in real life USA has issues with democracy too, so let’s leave Disney & SW be… for now.

Back to Netflix? With ‘Insatiable’ and maybe similar TV series/movies/etc., they are trying to do what Disney did with SW, only go further and subvert the tropes in new ways. This actually will not be new, as the semi-reboot of ‘Heathers’, (appearing on various TV outlets earlier in July 2018), has already done – and it is already meeting with disapproval…which hadn’t stopped it from being aired, not entirely. Donald and his presidential achievements come to mind – they too are met with disapproval, and it had not stopped them, not entirely. How is that for a discussion topic on the U.S. society?

Back to Netflix again? As we discussed at the beginning, ‘Insatiable’ doesn’t come across very fat-positive; neither does Sierra’s series, but there Netflix isn’t subverting the tropes, but rather playing them in an old-fashioned way, and as a result that series is already being compared to ‘Insatiable’ in a favorable manner. Good for them…perhaps this is all a plot by Netflix to boost Sierra’s ratings for this and the future installments, while dropping ‘Insatiable’ off post-S1, (or sometime around that). In that case, where does it leave Debbie Ryan and the rest of her droogs? Probably pissed-off at Netflix and looking for some revenge.

More likely, however, is that Netflix is venturing into an unknown territory without a map and already getting some things wrong. That is not a problem, all they still need to do is to figure out when to cut their losses and retreat, or at least – re-think their strategy, just as Disney & SW might be doing right now. Otherwise, Netflix will arrive where Disney &SW currently are – in a position where they seem to be losing money rather than anything else.

Again, this is not exactly new territory for Netflix, as their misadventure with the ‘Gilmore Girls’ indicates – sometimes they actually do not succeed and need to do something. When the ‘Gilmore Girls’ reboot didn’t succeed, they quietly shelved any potential follow-ups, while ASP is currently running a different TV series entirely – and a successful one, just as the reboot was not. Sometimes all you need is to end something and start an entirely new thing instead. Good luck to her.

And equally good luck to Netflix with ‘Insatiable’, too. I don’t know what is going on with the series – maybe ‘Insatiable’ is going to be a great series and what we have here is just a badly made trailer – but until it comes forth, (August 10, 2018), we’ll just have wait to see how it develops.

This is it for this time; see you all soon.

Shark Week begins - July 22

Obligatory disclaimer: I hate my life. A new caveat: I hate my family even more; I did not expect to hate anything more than my life, yet surprisingly, I do. We, in our family, do not get along with each other, and with everyone/anyone else,…this is something else, and it is personal, so I am not going to dwell very much on it… this time. In addition, speaking of lives… ‘Shark Week’ of the Discovery channel is beginning today…on the Discovery channel…and it is bringing celebrities – human celebrities, and this brings us back to life: do any of those people have it?

No, seriously, this year’s ‘Shark Week’ of Discovery is bringing us Bear Grylls, and Shaq, and Ronda Rousey – all people who are supposed to be really famous and monumental in the lives of the peons, and they are all appearing on Discovery channel, and- wait. Isn’t Discovery channel supposed to educate, rather than entertain…as opposed to TMZ or whatever?

Rewind? Last year, a famous athlete of a swimmer – whether Michael Phelps or someone else, I neither remember nor care, admittedly – appeared on ‘Shark Week’, where he raced…CGI’d sharks. Basically, this was a free promo for the bloke, but since I do not remember him appearing ever in anything in the last year, (we are talking about summer of 2017 here), I guess that it did not work out for him. Why do Bear Grylls, and Shaq, and Ronda Rousey think that it will work for them?

Well, when it comes Ronda Rousey we might be off to something here. Ever since her defeat in MMA (or whatever it is called), her life was never the same, in a sad way. These days she might be on WWF, but it is not the same, and as for her TV debut…

No, seriously, Ronda Rousey was on ‘Blindspot’, (yes, the same TV series that we are discussing on occasion here), at the end of S2…for about one or two episodes, and that was it. Considering that ‘Blindspot’ had worked her up in its promo videos, this was weird…in an AoS way. Unlike the other Marvel TV series, (even ‘InHumans’), AoS had to deal with actors that went more than came, and as a result the main actors and their characters got reshuffled to different roles very often, especially in the later seasons. Ronda Rousey’s aborted presence on ‘Blindspot’ brought the same feeling to ‘Blindspot’, especially S3, which might be one of the reasons why it was somewhat different from the previous seasons, and not exactly in a good way. Something went wrong for Ronda Rousey with ‘Blindspot’, so now she is trying her luck on ‘Shark Week’, alongside Shaq and Bear. Here’re kudos for them; Ronda, in particular, will be dealing with mako sharks, which is good, for they hunt fish rather than marine mammals, but also bull sharks, which is work – these sharks are generalists and are game for anything, at least once, so if Ronda isn’t careful or dealing with CGI, she will be risking her life for real – and is it worth the (potential) fame?

The flip side, of course, is that unlike TMZ, WWF and the like, the Discovery channel was supposed to educate, rather than entertain, so why there are celebrities? What next, the World Wrestling Federation doing a number of shows with real life sharks also? The line between education and entertainment is blurring on the Discovery channel, and that isn’t good: for a while, Impossible Pictures™, also did educational shows, but then they got into entertainment, and it was the beginning of their end, until BBC pulled the, out of their misery for good. Will the Discovery channel go down the same route? We will just have to wait and see.

This is it for this time; see you all soon!

Cloak & Dagger, Comic-Con - July 21

So, about the Comic-Con of July 2017… It has a lot of information, but what interests us now are, well, ‘Cloak & Dagger’. Make no mistake, Comic-Con provided a wealth of information period – about the ‘Arrowverse’ series, (including ‘Black Lightning’), about the upcoming DCEU movies (such as ‘Shazam’ and ‘Aquaman’), about other movies, (such as ‘Godzilla: King of Monsters’, which is going to also feature Mothra, Rodan and King Ghidorah – no sign of Kong for now), but ‘Cloak & Dagger’ are of a particular interest to me, because, well, I tend to review them, as you’ve seen, if you follow my blog.

What has Comic-Con ‘C&D’ clips showed us? A few things. One is that detective Mayhem and the Corrupt Cop aren’t done with each other yet, and detective Mayhem will certainly become that – Mayhem – in ‘C&D’ S2, because yes, ‘C&D’ themselves got renewed for S2. Good for them, but so far aside from ‘InHumans’ and AC, MCU does not tend to cancel its’ shows – AoS is returning for a S6 next year, the Netflix crowd is going strong, and even ‘Runaways’ were renewed for a S2 back in January (2018). Go team Marvel!

Back to ‘C&D’ proper? The teaser video showed us Ty and Dy growing into a dynamic duo that is dependent on each other, for better or for worse. So far, team Roxxon still appears to be the ultimate bad guy for this season, but it is worth noting that their leader has mentioned both Stark (as in the Iron Man) and Rand (as in the Iron Fist) in the promo video, which is good, because so far all of the entire MCU is a mess; people in particular have pointed out in the past how CA: CW film had ignored the fledgling ‘Defenders’ series, all of them. (No mention of Daredevil or Hell’s Kitchen for example). ‘C&D’ is clearly amending this, which is good.

On the other hand, we see Ty and Dy fighting a crowd of crazed zombies, which is bad. That said, ‘C&D’ has clearly resolved the issue of villains by making them into almost faceless others – like the zombies of TWD and related fandoms, for example, or the wights from GoT. They are inhumane; they have no personality, no rationality or reason, no motivation; just good old-fashioned destruction. The ‘C&D’ version, however, are capable of using tools, such as chains or shovels, which most zombies usually can’t, but this doesn’t really matter in the long run – they can overrun Ty and Dy and their friends through sheer numbers, if nothing else succeeds.

…And Roxxon and its’ quest for power may be behind them; as far as villains go, Roxxon is not so much soulless as brainless and heartless, which is sad. When will master Jip make his move? Maybe he is the promised power for Roxxon, (or had promised power for Roxxon and they were stupid enough to believe him)? If so, it will be interesting to see how that will turn out; master Jip used to work for the Ancient One, (re: the ‘Dr. Strange’ film – remember it back in 2016?), so it will be interesting to see how his partnership with Roxxon will work out, (if there is a partnership, that is).

Anything else? Comic-Con has also showed first footage of the upcoming ‘Titans’ live action reboot, (we’re talking about ‘Teen Titans Go’ series, 2003-2006, I believe). So far this is already a very different show from its’ previous animated incarnations. This already is drawing some criticism, but so what? We ought to first wait and see as to how it will go on the TV screens first before criticising.

Well, this is it for now; see you all soon instead!

Cloak & Dagger, 'Ghost Stories' - July 20

…With only episodes left in S1, ‘Cloak & Dagger’ are stepping up their game and most of their cast is back – only father Delgado is absent. And the Voodoo priestess. And her niece, but – with master Jip lurking in the wings, it probably is only a matter of time until they reappear, because ‘Cloak & Dagger’ might be going into the more supernatural side of Marvel, due to the fact that in this universe the titular characters’ powers’ origin is more mystical – in the original comics they became, well, Cloak and Dagger by being experimented upon by a mad scientist type – kind of how it went down with Luke Cage, for example too – and here, on TV, we have a bunch of underwater scenes, and some black-and-white oily powers, and who knows what else – very different. Go, Ty & Dy!

Speaking of Luke Cage, or rather – ‘Luke Cage’ S2, Danny Rand, or rather – Iron Fist, will be airing his S2 soonish as well. So far, we know that this time the villain is someone called the Steel Serpent, but-

But there are at least two canon characters who are named that, so…it’s going to be rather how ‘Luke Cage’ S2 went, with one its’ main villains being the Bushmaster, (are ‘Luke Cage’ crew and co. will be putting the titular hero against snake-themed villains from now on?), the only thing is that it was the ‘other’ Bushmaster, in comics this name is usually used for one Quincy McIvor, while John McIvor is more of a runner-up. With ‘Iron Fist’, though, the situation is reversed – the Steel Serpent who is going to appear is the regular, a bloke named Davos, while the runner-up – the master of the death touch – will appear at a different time, if ever. We will have to wait and see just how MCU’s version of Davos is different from the comics’ version…

Back to ‘Cloak & Dagger’? This episode – ‘Ghost Stories’ – marked a milestone for the characters. On one hand, they have succeeded: Ty the Cloak got the Corrupt Cop put away, while Dy the Dagger confronted the chief of Roxxon over her dad’s death. On the other, they failed: Dy discovered that her late father wasn’t as good as she assumed in her idealism; in particular, he’d seen nothing wrong in some good old fashioned domestic abuse with her mom on the receiving end of it…so she’s going to take Roxxon’s hush money, and-

And nothing. So far Dy is back to hiding her cash in remote places, saving it for later. Mind you, saving money for later is a good thing, but in that case, Dy should have figured out a scheme to legitimize this cash in put in the bank under percentage or bonds or whatever, because just hiding the money does not work, the last time her mom discovered it and spent it all on a drug binge. Wonder what will happen to this cache of Dy’s cash?

Onto Ty? His main big scene will happen next week, and this week’s episode ended when Detective Mayhem comes home and discovers that her obligatory love interest – another cop, who appeared about once per scene every few episodes or so – is dead and stuffed in the fridge, with everything else in it pulled out beforehand to make space for him. This is ‘Godfather’ done in an obsessive-compulsive way; maybe it is master Jip finally making his own move?

Otherwise…no, this is it. ‘Ghost Stories’ was another good episode, masterfully done and with plenty of action and drama that was so lacking in the first few S1 episodes. Sadly, the numbers for the show still remain low, and with AoS’ remaining Disney/MCU’s obligatory supplement canon TV show, while the Netflix crowd is still more successful than ‘C&D’ are, the future of ‘C&D’ is still up in the air.

…Well, this is it for ‘Ghost Stories’; see you all next time!