Tag: metacrone

Manifest Season 1 Episode 8: Point of No Return Recap

~ Metacrone

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The Point of No Return, this week’s episode title, refers to the point that’s THE point where there’s no turning back, where the decisions you make and the actions you take are irreversible. For the most part, this episode leaves the point of no return in each storyline mysterious, though it’s clear that life altering decisions are being made and confrontations are coming. For Harvey, the passenger of the week with a death wish, the point seems obvious, but is it? Was he doomed when he started telling stories in O’Ryan’s Tavern, or did he doom himself by overthinking the pattern?

We’re given very little information about Harvey, so we don’t know if he was getting callings that put the ideas of angels or death into his head. We don’t know what he ignored and what he followed. All we know for sure is that he gave up, in a way that he couldn’t turn back from.

This episode, each character commits to a course of action that could lead to a disaster or could help. Cal returns to school, where his friends are 5 years ahead of him and everyone else thinks of him as the 828 kid. He’s grateful to get some normalcy back in his life, but remains aware that it could all disappear in a moment when the experiments start again.

Grace and Ben return to their pre-828 routine of Friday night date nights, while Jared and Lourdes decide to stick to their plans to start a family. But both marriages are weakened by lies and deceptions. Jared and Ben each have a connection with someone other than their wives, and they both have ongoing involvements in the 828 case that they haven’t mentioned to them.

Michaela receives a verbal calling that’s as vague as the previous callings, but this one doesn’t clarify itself by the end of the episode. It comes with another angel reference and several deaths, leading her to question everything she thought she knew about the callings. They’ve been her lifeline since she returned home, and now she’s seeing their dark side. But she can’t ignore them and she doesn’t know who her latest calling is referring to. (I think it’s Cal.)

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The Man in the High Castle Season 3 Episode 8: Kasumi (Through the Mists) Recap

~ Metacrone

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As the Reich draws closer to the full implementation of Jahr Null, episode 8 explores reinventing oneself and changing directions. Some, like Himmler, stay on the course we’ve seen them follow all season. Others, like Ed, Frank, Nicole and Helen, attempt to explore new paths.

After they’ve seen Juliana’s film, the Jewish characters of Sabra refuse to see that there could be another way, and stick to their traditional fight. Ed and Frank are inspired to use art to inspire others. Juliana has the science behind the knowledge in her acquired memories confirmed, and moves forward with her fight.

In the American Reich, Helen experiments with a little independent thinking about Reich orthodoxy, which causes Dr Ryan to call John again. John puts an end to Helen’s analysis and tries to end her independent thinking, but I suspect that’s impossible.

John tries to make Himmler see reason when Himmler courts another war with Japan, this time on American soil. But Himmler sees the Western Hemisphere as his plaything, to be toyed with or broken as he sees fit. He has no sympathy for the people who’d be affected by an American war.

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The Man in the High Castle Season 3 Episode 7: Excess Animus Recap

~ Metacrone

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In episode 7, Excess Animus, characters’ arcs continue to come full circle, just as Juliana and Joe’s did in episode 5. Kido delivers his brand of justice to the traitor Nakamura with extra zealousness, since he’d given the “hapa dog” a chance, despite his better judgement. But Kido also discovers that Tagomi hasn’t found him worthy of sharing important secrets, because of his ruthlessness and inability to see nuance.

Sabra faces more challenges to its seclusion, from bounty hunters looking for their friend who Layla killed and from Juliana, who hopes to recruit a few members to join her cause. Mark goes to Denver to take care of the bounty hunters, since he feels responsible for bringing that trouble to Sabra’s door.

Juliana has an unexpected reunion with her two oldest and dearest friends, Frank and Ed. It feels like they’ve each had a lifetime’s worth of experiences since the last time they saw each other. But everything has brought them back around to being on the same page again when they meet at Sabra, which is as tragic as it is wonderful. This reunion can’t last, and Juliana and Frank are both wanted fugitives. The odds of the three of them surviving until the end of whatever rebellion is coming are small.

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Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD Renewed for Season 7, with One Agent Missing

~ Metacrone

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Is This a Sign of the Effect That Avengers 3&4 Will Have on Agents of Shield?

This is good news! Disney/Marvel/ABC announced today that Agents of SHIELD has been renewed for season 7, even though season 6 won’t air until Summer 2019. Many had assumed that the shortened, 13 episode season would be the series last, so early confirmation that the network is still supporting its original foray into Marvel TV programming is very welcome.

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Midnight, Texas Season 2 Episode 4: Sneak Peek (Video)

~ Metacrone

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The Midnighters Find a Baby Weretiger

Minor book and show spoilers.

Calling all Midnight, Texas book readers! Midnight, Texas is doing the baby weretiger plotline from the books, with their own twist. For one thing, the baby is a girl instead of a boy, a welcome change in a show with too few female characters. For another, the Rev isn’t around to help raise the baby. Even if he returns, he’s no longer a weretiger, so he’ll be of little help in controlling the child.

My next question is, will the other character who came to Midnight as part of this plotline join the cast soon? This character was also part of the Sookie Stackhouse books, but was notably left out of True Blood. If they follow the books, this addition would bring a romantic shake up to the town that it could use right about now.

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Manifest Season 1 Episode 7: S.N.A.F.U. Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 1 Comment

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Episode 7 of Manifest continues the exploration of faith vs skepticism that we examined in episode 6. After Michaela’s calling leads her to stop the recipient of Evie’s donated heart from ruining his life, she becomes more certain than ever that the messages are good and she should continue following them.

But Ben continues to watch Cal struggle with his deepening involvement with and knowledge of the other passengers and the investigation. Cal’s life is in danger because of his callings, and Ben is unable to help him. It’s much more difficult for Ben to take the same leap of faith that Michaela now finds easy. Even worse, Michaela doesn’t seem to quite understand Ben’s difficulty.

The callings appear to be changing and manifesting in new ways. Are we going to be focussing more intensely on an alternate definition of the show’s title soon, as more than just the flight’s manifest (secure list of passengers, cargo and crew)? Are we waiting for Cal to manifest something in particular, for the passengers as a group to manifest a new ability, or for something entirely new and unexpected to manifest as a result of Flight 828? The calings and Cal’s abilities have been there all along, but Dr Clarke and Marko bring in new elements with larger implications.

Just don’t tell me that aliens laid eggs inside them, and the fetuses are creating the callings. And especially don’t tell me that it was all USD’s idea.

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Travelers: Netflix Announces Release Date for Season 3

~ Metacrone ~ 1 Comment

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After what feels like a very long wait, but actually wasn’t, Netflix has FINALLY announced the release date for season 3 of their science fiction time travel series Travelers. Prior seasons of the show, which stars Eric McCormack, were shown weekly on the Canadian network Showcase before being released all at once to the rest of the world on Netflix. After Showcase decided to back out of its part in producing Travelers season 3, Netflix took over production completely, so everyone will get the show at the same time this year.

And when will that be? I’ll let the Travelers Twitter do the honors:

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Midnight, Texas Season 2 Episode 3: To Witch Hell and Back Recap

~ Metacrone

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As we move toward the darkest time of the year, it’s a dark time in Midnight, Texas, too. Multiple hearts get broken on episode 3, To Witch Hell and Back. Some are demon hearts, so we shouldn’t be too sad, because no one likes a demon, right? But some belong to our favorite Midnighters, who’ve survived many obstacles already to be together.

Fiji and Bobo continue to investigate the supernatural cause of Bobo’s accidents, now with Manfred’s help. Manfred has given up on his dream of reuniting with Creek, and placed all of his hope in keeping his friends happy and together. How much struggle and heartbreak will the three of them have to endure?

With a Hunter’s Moon on the horizon, Chuy spends the night on the couch pacifying his inner demon. Joe, still looking for fulfillment in his life, meets up with that hussy Walker, the demon hunter, to go kill some demons without telling Chuy. Call me crazy, but I just don’t see a relationship that starts with a lying angel ending well. Walker isn’t good for Joe.

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Midnight Texas Season 2 Episode 2: The Monster of the Week Is Patriarchy Recap

~ Metacrone

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In this episode of Midnight, Texas, the #Me Too movement takes a distinctly supernatural turn, as ghosts, vampires, and vampire wives all stand up to the oppression of the patriarchy, with varying results. The moral of the story is, we are stronger when we fight together, but violence isn’t the answer. Or it almost never is. Maybe the moral is to use your powers wisely so the patriarchy daddy/husband vampire won’t find an excuse to try to take them away from you again. Or, put more simply, don’t get caught red-fanged. Channel Olivia or Fiji, not Dawnette.

The discussion as to why it’s fine for all of the men who hurt and exploited Dawnette to run around unpunished, and for Lem and the Rev to run around unpunished, while Dawnette has to quickly be made contrite and powerless again, will have to wait. Suffice it to say, broadcast audiences don’t want to see an angry, scary, powerful woman go unpunished, no matter how righteous her anger or deserving her victims. And a combination of misogyny, racism and classism dictates that a woman like Dawnette couldn’t be trusted to learn to control her power or anger, even though Lem did. They might as well have made her stripper name “Rebel China Doll”.

Episode 2 opens with Healer Kai curing a man’s elbow pain at the Crystal Desert Hotel, using the same basic procedure that he used to cure Manfred of his demon cancer in episode 1. He ends with sucking the negative energy out through the man’s mouth and into himself, but we never see him release it, just like the last episode. Kai’s two, ahem, loyal assistants, Lyric and Sequoia, are there to help.

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Manifest Season 1 Episode 6: Off Radar Recap

~ Metacrone ~ 1 Comment

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In Off Radar, we watch as the connections between the main characters on Manifest are either deepened or further strained. Everything is connected, but not all connections are going to remain strong forever. If the callings are tests, then they are, in part, a test of which connections the passengers are willing to risk losing, and which they’ll fight to keep.

In real life, radar uses reflected radio waves, broadcast over the air, to determine the speed and position of a targeted object. In Off Radar, Cal is the receiver, as he has been before in other ways. He’s receiving emotional, physical and mental information from one of the other passengers, a Bulgarian man named Marko. At the same time, Cal becomes gravely ill. It’s up to Ben, Michaela and Saanvi to interpret Cal’s symptoms and newfound ability to speak Bulgarian, determine if this is a calling, and what the calling wants.

It turns out Marko and ten other passengers have gone missing since the passengers were released by the Feds. Ben uses his data analyst skills to determine where they might be, then Michaela and Jared follow-up on the ground. This brings Michaela and Jared to a turning point in their relationship, when Jared demands that Michaela finally tell him the truth about the callings.

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