This week’s reviews of Off the Map and V. Enjoy!
Spoilers.
Off the Map – “There’s Nothing to Fix” (B+)
Oh Mina, how I adore you so. I’m sorry I keep rehashing this point week after week, I really am. I’d love to talk about something else in these reviews but quite frankly each week she just ups her game. I’m probably biased but there just aren’t enough characters on TV portraying emotional shut-ins like myself. We finally have a voice. An awkward, monotone voice.
And being that I’m also a fan of Ryan – who just happens to be the exact opposite of Mina – I had a good time watching them pair up this week to deal with a jerk patient. There was so much I loved about this pairing I made a list, and, since you’re already reading, I guess I’ll share it with you.
- The part where Ryan tells Mina that the pizza joint the patient owns is just a place where Americans go because they’re too afraid to try the local cuisine, and Mina responds “the pizza’s actually not that bad.”
- When the angry patient tells Mina her chicken is the only thing that depends on her and she responds “that’s not true, I have a god daughter.” Great call back to last episode.
- The sweet ending scene between Mina and Ryan abruptly ended with an “okay bye” from Mina.
- The entirety of the funeral scene – “Come on! I basically yelled the guy to death.”
Tommy’s story on the other hand was all over the map this week, or should I say off the map (huh, see what I did there). I couldn’t really peg it. At times it was great, like when he gave his own blood to save the patient, and at times it wasn’t so great, like his freak out upon first discovering the patient. Overall I’m glad they showed his remorse over cheating on Alma, I was just a little iffier on the execution.
I still don’t like Cole and Zee as a couple. I enjoyed the way they got back together last week, but together there’s just something grating about the two of them. I think Valerie Cruz does a great job with her character, and Cole seems to be alright when he’s on his own, it’s just the writing for them when they’re together doesn’t do either of them justice. Take this week’s story for example – it is way too early in that relationship for them to be talking about babies. I know they probably had a history before the show began, but they just got back together. Give it a week.
The subject of having kids was clearly brought up more so they could relate to the patient story, but what it ended up doing was making Cole seem irritating. It may have set up a nice future storyline for Zee’s character, but there were a number of ways they could have introduced the fact that Zee can’t have children, and the way they ended up doing it weakened the episode.
And of course last but not least there was Brenner, who this week was pretty much all on her lonesome. Caroline Dhavernas is such a wonderful actor (actually there’s a lot of strong acting on this show), and she did a pretty decent job of playing how devastated Brenner was over the loss of her patient (and I suspect a little over the loss of her relationship). Her breakdown at the end of the episode was a little out of nowhere, but Dhavernas sold it. It could have been a lot worse.
It should be interesting to see the clinic without Keeton next week. I can’t wait.
V – “Devil in a Blue Dress” (C+)
Is it just me or has this show devolved into a formula?
It seems like every week our team comes up with some sort of plan to attack the visitors, almost always explained through some horribly clunky dialogue, attempt to execute that plan, fail, and then start getting ready for the next week when they’re really going to bring it to the Visitors. It’s actually becoming so bad that it’s come right back around to being funny again.
This week was more of the same. First we got an incredibly forced scene where Sid, our local scientist, describes Concordia, the visitor’s brand new power plant. The writers of course set up the mission, what would be the obstacles, what would be the reward, all in expository dialogue so unnatural you couldn’t possibly misunderstand them.
My favourite part of the episode was when Sid, simply by touching two small blue energy balls together concluded that blue energy was a “particle anti-particle construct.” Are you kidding me? You got all that from a light show?
And then there was Erica’s freak out after the mission failed. First off, you’re the one who ordered to abort the mission, so you really shouldn’t be taking it out on your entire team. And second, can you explain to me why the rest of the Fifth Column leadership, who doubted your ability to lead not two episodes ago, continue to follow you despite failure after failure?
I assume the ending scene with Diana was supposed to be exciting – all the Fifth Column in the same room – but it didn’t really feel that way. Next week is the season and most likely series finale. Just judging by what I’ve seen up to this point, my guess is this show will go out on with whimper rather than a bang. Oh well, I still love you Elizabeth Mitchell. We’ll always have Lost.
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