Of Swords and Parasols

I watched Arrow up until about halfway through the episode where Laurel's mother showed up and Helena returned, and somewhere in between Roy calling Thea a "rich bitch" and Diggle referring to Helena as "your psycho ex-girlfriend," I realized not only was no woman between the ages of 20 and 30 was ever going to appear of the show without being thrown at Oliver, and, remembering spoilers I've read about Shado, the only way the comic book ladies were going to appear on the show and still be allowed to fight is if they were evil killers (and I'm still rather enraged from earlier in the season when Helena and Dinah/Laurel were made rivals who apparently can't stand each other over Oliver.)

The Lady Vanishes: A BBC TV movie that, like the Alfred Hitchcock movie, is based on Ethel Lina White's novel The Wheel spins, in which a young woman travels by train from Croatia to England in the 30s. On the train, a woman from her compartment disappears, and the other passengers in the car claim she never existed, leading the rest of the train to believe the young woman is delusional because of sunstroke. I can't compare it to the book or the Hitchcock movie, but I enjoyed it a lot, though I question Our Heroine's love interest falling for her while believing she's insane and would benefit from temporary instutionalization, and Our Heroine has some very cringeworthy xenophobia in the first half (it doesn't go away in the second, but she seems to have realiazed that xenophobia is not cool and only causes problems after a while) but her xenophobia is actually an important plotpoint, as opposed to the narrative agreeing with her when she's going on about how people in other countries should learn English for the convenience of British tourists and it's silly to speak any other language.

Person of Interest 2.19:

( spoilers )As both Arrow and Once Upon A Time appear to have abruptly been cleared off my slate (maybe I'll netflix them when I'm over my current annoyance- and I'm still very behind on Bomb Girls, Nikita and Beauty and the Beast, but I intend to catch up with them, and I think The Borgias is back too), I'll take a moment to list new/somewhat new-ish shows that I've been thinking about checking out (not including some Asian shows I need to watch and a few other British series that have finished airing):

The Americans
DaVinci's Demons (though not until I've heard feedback that isn't about "ZOMG SEX")
Deception
Defiance
On Top of the Lake
Orphan Black
The Vikings

Please feel free to PM me trigger warnings for any of the above(misogyny, rape, racism, homophobia, ableism, the woobifying of white men who like to engage in the above, and excessive gore) or leave non-spoilery general warnings in the comments. Graphic sex for the sake of graphic sex/shock value/"being edgy" also isn't exactly a favorite thing of mine and is a bit of a turn off. (I actually have seen a list of trigger warnings for TotL and am pondering, as I can handle most in a narrative that handles them properly, but I'm not sure about all of them at once.)

In non-new-TV news, I finished revisiting canon for RareWomen (more accurately: I skimmed it a while back, planned and plotted, and rewatched all the scenes with the character who will be the subject of my fic) and am sad that there will be mo more of it ever. I also watched the first season of Sarah Shahi's shortlived Fairly Legal and simultaneously enjoyed it a lot (though I didnt enjoy the fact that her character is apparently white, and so want her to be secretly adopted) and wasn't really surprised that it didn't last long, as it doesn't fit easily within any strict "categories," and USA likes its categories. Very disappointed the second season apparently wasn't released on DVD, and probably won't be.

(PS-I've read your comments re: Adam Horowitz and rape-apologia and nod with each of you.)

Arrow 1.10-1.13: This show's devotion to getting at least one actor from every geeky show ever to guest star at least once continues to amaze me. I'm currently rooting for them to dunk either Kathleen Munroe or Gloria Votsis's hair in some red hair dye so I can finally have some Barbara Gordon on my screen. (Preferably as Laurel's BFF, and not making one of her comic book BFFs be a romantic rival like they did with Helena.)

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Bomb Girls 2.1-2.6: It makes me happy to think that we're only halfway through the season, but have already had as many episodes as we had for the whole first season.

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Elementary 2.11-2.15: At this point, part of me thinks Watson is still with Holmes because she's training him to be her personal valet.

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Haven 3.11-3.13: Well, that was a much better cliffhanger ending than last season, but I suppose that isn't really that hard to accomplish. But oh, does this show make it hard to keep liking it at times.

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Once Upon A Time 1.10-1.12: I liked 2.10 a lot. Yes, a lot of it was setup, but it was about the stuff I cared about and the flashbacks were something I've been wanting more of. I expected to like 2.11 a lot and mostly did, but it let me down due to headbangy fail in the flashbacks. I liked bits of 2.12 but I dislike both Rumples and Whale and find Whale thoroughly boring, and so multitasked through much of it.

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White Collar 3.11-3.13:
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Still catching up on:

Beauty and the Beast
Lost Girl
Nikita
Person of Interest
Scandal

Arrow 1.7: So Oliver can almost run fast enough to chase down a motorcycle? Uhm...no. Actually, that alone makes everything else look realistic. Also, this show is determined to get an actor from every genre show ever to show up.

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Beauty and the Beast 1.7: Kind of bored by Vincent's angst (and sad at the return of the implication that Catherine has some responsibility for his behavior) but deeply amused by the fact that his shower apparently has random chains hanging in it. Vincent, why do you have chains in your shower? Or are they JT's? Still loving all things buddycops, and I enjoy this week's Dude In Distress bit.

Elementary 1.8: This week's mystery was prtty good, but I mostly enjoyed Holmes's excursions into Denial Land and Watson's exasperated expressions over it. Also, I have no idea if Alfredo is meant to be recurring, but I hope he is.

Haven 3.10: Don't know how I feel about this one. (Mostly on the Jordan front.)
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Nikita 3.5:

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Once Upon A Time 2.8:

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Person of Interest 2.8: This episode was fabulous for Carter's expressions. And I can't help but think it was originally scripted to be a Valentine's episode.

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Revolution 1.10: QAnd now we have a 4 month hiatus.

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The Paradise Series 1: Based on a book by Emile Zola and altered to be British, The Paradise is set in a Victorian department store (though the series sometimes has more of an Edwardian feel) of the same name, focusing on a shopgirl, Denise, and her employer, Moray. For a large chunk of the series, the focus is divided between Denise and the other women who work in Lady's Wear and Denise learning about business (in the first episode, she tells one of her roommates, Pauline, that contrary to Pauline's beliefs, she doesn't have a crush on Moray, but rather, that dhe wants to become her own version of him. True at the time, and I wish they'd stuck with that as the driving force of her arc so that I could have daydreams of her leaving and starting her own successful business and poaching the other women in Lady's Wear when she did.) and Moray's plan for expansion and ambitions, as well as his courtship of Katherine (probably the most complex and interesting character in the series), an aristocrat with an influential (and rich) father whose support Moray is after. I'm not a big fan of Moray and the latter episodes are (IMO) bogged down by a romance that doesn't feel necessary, but it was pretty good and should satisfy most peoples fashion and ,female interaction/relationships needs, and the setting is certainly different from other UK period dramas. A second series has been commissioned and I'm looking forward to it, though I imagine it will be very different in a number of ways.

Arrow 1.5: My main thoughts are (1) Show, why can't you give Byron Mann a shave? There's a very nice looking man under that beard, but you can't really tell, (2) Moira, you would be my favorite forever after this episode, except that Laurel is Black Canary (even if they're just going to tease us about it forever and probably not follow up on it for ages) and that's kind of stacked way too high against you, (3) well, at least someone pointed out the biggest logic facepalm in the show and tried to fi it (ok, a big logic face palm, maybe not actually the biggest) and (4) can we just have Laurel and Oliver learning to be friends for a while and getting to know each other again and maybe a lot of grovelling and working for it from Oliver instead of pushing how they are Meant To Be? Please.

Covert Affairs 3.13-3.14:

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Haven 3.7-3.8: The Claudia Black episodes!

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Nikita 3.4:

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Once Upon A Time 2.6: I enjoyed the present parts of this as much as I expected to, but didn't like the flashbacks as much.
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Person of Interest 2.6: Did I mention this season is like awesomely crackstastic fanfic in the cases? Because it really is.
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Revolution 1.7: Well, someone on the writing staff certainly likes Peter Pan.

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I'm current on Beauty and the Beast, Elementary, and Scandal and am enjoying all but have nothing new to say about any. Though, as much as I enjoy watching Scandal for every important character but Fitz, I have no idea what the writers are thinking with the main plot.

Arrow 1.2: So, Oliver appears to have spent a good chunk of the last 5 years practicing his delivery of "YOU HAVE FAILED THIS CITY." No, really, he seems very proud of it.

I'm going to watch every week hoping that the new episode will be the one where Laurel starts to become Black Canary, even though I know it will be futile for quite some time.

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Beauty and the Beast 1.2: This episode was about 10% angsty manpain, 10% sisterly bonding and 80% WOC buddycops. I approve of this ratio, though could do less with the angsty manpain if Vincent is going to be setting off my "creepy no" meter like a lot of his scenes this episode did. Vincent, I liked you better in the pilot, where you were bland but nice, and not setting off my stalker alert in a way that I might have to take seriously, as opposed to "oh, CW...". (Right now I feel like their relationship is Vincent going "I pine for your purity but we cannot be but I will stalk you for your protection and tell you to avoid me!" and Catherine going "You will lead me to my mother's killer! You will be very useful and I will not let you escape helping me! Oh, and you got I really bad deal so I feel pretty bad for you.") Also, I'm glad this show is giving Kristen Kreuk lots of action scenes.

Covert Affairs 3.11: That was certainly a short midseason hiatus. What was that, 3 weeks? 4?

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Nikita 3.1: This episode had a lot of really high points, but opened on a sour note by having Ryan do the intro narration? WTF? THAT'S NIKITA'S JOB. Never got over the WTF there, and both the beginning and ending of the episode made me feel like the writers are more interested in Ryan's troubles and struggle than the rest of Team Nikita, including Nikita herself, and I don't like that feeling. (If I want a show focusing on the struggled of an intelligent educated white dude adjusting to a stressful new job and responsibilities, I have a few dozen other options.) But what it does right it still does right, I just hope the current direction doesn't overtake everything that was good in the first two seasons.

Once Upon A Time 2.3:

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Person of Interest 2.3:

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Revenge 2.3:

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Revolution 1.5:

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Elementary, Haven and World Without End were all pretty good, but I don't have much to say about them. Most of Scandal was good, but the "romantic" plotline reached new heights of icky and creepy.

Arrow1.1: Better than I expected, but still rather eyerolly. Particularly Oliver's "I am Batman with a touch of Edmond Dantes" voiceovers, and I mostly cringe at Oliver's somewhat annoying BFF and how they appear to be treating his bodyguard. I started it not expecting to like Oliver and don't particularly, but don't dislike him the way some things I'd heard made me expect I would. No idea what I think of the plot yet, but I was entertained. Dinah lance is now a lawyer and goes by Laurel. I refuse to ship her with the guy who cheated on her with her sister (especially since her sister died in the middle of the cheating. Err, because of a shipwreck, not his killing her) but they are pretty and maybe he'll work really really hard at it.* But I hope she gets to join in on the crimefighting in the literal sense before long too. Roy Harper also appears to have been genderbent into Oliver's younger sister (And, uhm, he held on to a rock for 5 years because it had an engraving that reminded him of her and it was his "beacon of hope" type thing or whatever? CW shows and siblings...) which I think I approve of. Especially if sh ever joins in on the literal crimefighting.

*There's also a scene that goes pretty much like this:

LAUREL: Well, I guess I'm glad you're alive.
OLIVER: OMG YOU STILL LOVE ME. WE ARE OTP. FOREVER.
LAUREL: I mean, my sister still died while you were cheating on me with her, so there's not going to be anything happening there, but if you ever need to talk...
OLIVER: OMG YOU TOTALLY WANT TO GET BACK TOETHER EEEEEEEE. Wait, this doesn't work well with my angst.
LAUREL: I'm not sure we're having the same conversation.
OLIVER: I LOVE YOU FOREVER AND EVER BUT WE CANNOT BE FOR I AM A DARK AND ANGSTY AVENGER. I MUST PUSH YOU AWAY FOR YOUR OWN GOOD.
LAUREL: What is going on here?
OLIVER: FOR. YOUR. OWN. GOOD. Cocky playboy time!
LAUREL: Well, you're still a jerk.

Beauty and the Beast 1.1: Very entertaining, bad dialogue, multiple POC, and soundly fails to pass the reserse Bechdel Test due to the fact that the 1 scene with 2 men and no women is the men talking about Catherine. They don't even try to make Vincent look beastly (he just has a strategically placed scar) most of the time and the beast part is that he kinda...werewolfs out? They seem to be doing a Jekyll/Hyde thing which has the unfortunate potential to head south fast but we'll see. I'm going to be watching in fear that we'll start having Catherine having to learn how to behave around him, though I don't actually get that vibe from the pilot. But, well, it's CW, and they have a certain history there when it comes to controlling/abusive men as love interests. (I also remember that in the original series, he lived in an underground city filled with "society's rejects" or however they put it-my mother loved that show so I saw a lot of it, but not since my early teens-and i think I much prefer that to being holed up in his buddy's apartment.) I feel like multiple episodes worth of Catherine and Vincent's relationship was condensed into one episode (I suppose they wanted to jump straight to the "Angsty forbidden romance" part?) and wish they'd taken their time. It's called "Beauty and the Beast," we know you're going to have lots of angsty romance, you don't have to shove as much of it into the first episode as you can to make sure we know that, ok? It's not going to win any "Best Anything" awards (well, maybe for Kristen Kreuk's hair) but I mostly enjoyed it, though I suspect that of the new shows I'm watching, it's the one most likely to get cancelled.

(Err, Both Arrow and Beauty and the Beast pretty much end with the dude watching the heroine from above without her knowing? What's with that, CW?)

Haven 3.4: I enjoyed this episode's Troubled plot, but so much of it made me think of the things I don't want to have happen (love triangles, Audrey and Duke not trusting each other, Audrey and Nathan not being buddycops anymore with Boston Cop on the scene, Boston Cop ending up evil, etc.) threatening to happen. I mostly enjoyed Claire's scenes (I'm starting to suspect she's Troubled herself.) and hope she doesn't go the way of other non-Audrey female characters on this show. I'd much rather have more of Audrey's past selves than the stuff Nathan and Duke are up to.

Once Upon A Time 2.2: Well, that was a pretty good episode despite the almost total lack of Emma and Snow.

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Revenge 2.2:

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Revolution 1.4: 

( spoilers )Scandal 2.1-2.2: I adore this show despite not caring about roughly 2/3 of the plot. (Though I think I'll much prefer the "What happened to Quinn?" plot more than the Amanda Tanner plot simply because Fitz isn't involved in it.) But then, I adore Olivia and Mellie and like and am interested in every other important character except Fitz. 2.2 makes me just want to...not talk about anything but how much I hate Fitz. He's verbally abusive to Mellie, might as well be an ornament but likes to rant about how the people who keep him afloat are the unimportant ones, andhe has no respect for Olivia's interests or boundaries in the name of their "true love" (which she seems to suffer more than reciprocate, more often than not. I mean, those phone calls are downright creepy. Try replacing "call" with "touch." Especially the one at the beginning of 2.2, when it pretty much becomes "I stayed up late and made 23 people work late so that I could impose on you in the middle of the night and touch you. Do you want me to stop touching you? Tell me, the most powerful man in the country, to stop touching you in private. No? Ok, I'll abuse my power and misuse my staff again so I can touch you again tomorrow night." WHY SHOW WHY DO YOU FIND THIS RELATIONSHIP ROMANTIC? Yet, I will endure it for the sake of watching Olivia and Mellie verbally smack people around and rule the world. (Why can't Mellie be olivia's Forbidden True Love? At least that'd be different and interesting.)

World Without End 5-6: I thought these episodes were a lot better than the first 4. Things felt more unified in general, and it pretty much did away with the violence against women that was so pervasive in the first half. I briefly considered liking the king again, but then I remembered the "you can be my mother or you can be a whore" bit, and, nope. Sorry Blake Ritson. Hopefully the last two episodes stay on the same track as these two. Sadly, Godfrey (Godwin? I tend to be busy wishing him ill when he's on my screen and so don't pay much attention to his name.) and Alfred didn't die of the plague.