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Jul. 17th, 2021 09:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impyAh, lets chat some more about fictional failures and maybe not failures, shall we?
First up: Loki!
Of the three Disney+ shows, Loki was the only one I said I'd pay for and was also l did wind up having to pay for. I'm not sure if this meant I held it to a higher standard or not, but I doubt it. I think it was just... complicated?
The show was entertaining for 5 out of 6 episodes and that final one dropped nearly every single ball, especially when the showrunner (director?) announced they wouldn't be back for S2 and also S2 hadn't even been a known thing til recently. Which is kind of a damn lie, depending on how you define recently. But we'll assume she meant when they were making/filming and that might be true, but it makes the finale so much worse if they were fine ending their show with:
"our" Loki sent to the wrong timeline after being the one betrayed and bringing that part of his arc full circle. Except maybe not since a lot of Loki's issues stem from feeling like he'd been betrayed by Odin so... but yeah, we'll go with they were playing this as an arc beat for him. This is a TERRIBLE place to leave your main character for a series finale, btw. But it works just fine for a season finale.
A billion timelines branching off and creating true chaos. Obviously the kick-off for the next round of movies but since we got here because the final episode had a bad guy they never fucking properly named (something the MCU only saves for characters who don't really speak or aren't really seen before being more than a glorified easter egg) giving us nearly an episode's worth of info-dumping... I'm not thrilled. :/
The TVA was never going to get resolution in this but it still felt like a cheat to not even really try and to basically ignore Renslayer going off to... do something.
And to fucking waste the post credits scene with "Loki will be back in S2" when that was announced before the first episode ever aired?! What the fuck!
Sigh. Look. WandaVision also set up the whole multiverse thing with Wanda hearing her kids calling across the timelines. But it first made sure to wrap up at least a couple of plotlines while it set up other movies/things: Monica's gonna get to suit up in spaaaaaaaaace! Wanda finally had time to deal with her grief and there's hope to run into Vision again, somehow. We learned what sparked the Hex and Agnes admitted to being the absolute hammiest worst/best annnnnnnd a whole slew of other things. There was closure of a sort, even though it absolutely felt like you could go another six seasons and a dozen movies if you wanted to.
Falcon and Winter Soldier had probably the most self-contained story/arc as it was basically to build Falcon into the new Captain America and help break Bucky from the mental shackles of the Winter Soldier. Hell, the series ends with the title card changing from Falcon to Captain America. Bucky gets to actually be happy, which isn't a thing we saw after he went off to the initial war back in his first appearance. Yes, it does Sharon so dirty and yes, it clearly sets up Sam to have his own Cap movie, but it doesn't do so at the expense of a good, satisfying ending. And again, I would happily watch another six seasons of Bucky and Sam just being buds and doing stuff, even if it meant I had to suffer through John Walker some more. (Btw, I really loved how they made him just the absolute fucking worst but I still felt for him for a good, long while.)
Loki gets NONE OF THAT.
The. Fuck.
Oh, and I feel like I've taken crazy pills because people freaked out about Miss Minutes apparently scaring the bejesus out of people when she appeared in a scene and um... you guys never seen a proper jump scare before? Because The Haunting of Hill House has a doozy that even KNOWING it's coming will still scare you, but sure. Act like an animated clock voiced by Tara Strong scared you into wetting yourself. 0_O
Lesse. Mums rented/bought/whatever Black Widow for my birthday and I don't have a lot to say about it beyond it being a case of too little, too late from Marvel at this point and that Yelena stole the whole damn show. I hated the post credits scene because I'm like one of three people who likes MCU Hawkeye (I'm contractually obligated to like archers. It comes with the name.) and I can't even shriek about that because fuck having Yelena working for the bad guys...again. Uuuuuuuuuuuuggggghhhhhhhhh. Also um, didn't Natasha reference Budapest like it was a great time but then it turns out that she spent the last however many years thinking she'd bought her freedom by murdering a child then? How, exactly, does that tie into one of her most memorable lines from the first Avengers movie? Wtf? You and I really do remember Budapest very differently, Nat.
Oh! Fear Street 1978 was much better than the first one. Possibly because the story was anchored by better actors, or maybe it was simply knowing the fate of MOST of the named characters so you didn't get your hopes up on the wrong person. Also, I preferred the sister storyline to the young love crap they kept pulling from the first movie (you've yet to give me a reason to care about Sam, movie, and this is your through-line for all three movies? Oof.) so knowing that was going to end with one dead kind of helped. So less ranty about that one. Not sure how I feel about round 3 yet, but I'll let you know once I get around to watching it.
Now, unrelated to all that: I stopped at the Walmart by work for the first time since... maybe early 2020? Maybe even back so far as 2019. Anyway, I was hoping they had the Rainbow High line on fun clearance like a lot of people have been showing online, but my store was one of the ones where their clearance price was higher than the regular prices elsewhere. I did pick up the last Fail Fix doll I needed so I'd have one of each character even if I don't have each version. Why, oh why, are there no price checkers in the store anymore? Whyyyyyyyyyyyy?
Oh, and to the person who commented in one of the doll groups (probably RH again) that he'd never been helped by an employee, ever, it took all my self control to not say, "all that says is that you're either really, really young or a dick to retail staff. Maybe both."
First up: Loki!
Of the three Disney+ shows, Loki was the only one I said I'd pay for and was also l did wind up having to pay for. I'm not sure if this meant I held it to a higher standard or not, but I doubt it. I think it was just... complicated?
The show was entertaining for 5 out of 6 episodes and that final one dropped nearly every single ball, especially when the showrunner (director?) announced they wouldn't be back for S2 and also S2 hadn't even been a known thing til recently. Which is kind of a damn lie, depending on how you define recently. But we'll assume she meant when they were making/filming and that might be true, but it makes the finale so much worse if they were fine ending their show with:
"our" Loki sent to the wrong timeline after being the one betrayed and bringing that part of his arc full circle. Except maybe not since a lot of Loki's issues stem from feeling like he'd been betrayed by Odin so... but yeah, we'll go with they were playing this as an arc beat for him. This is a TERRIBLE place to leave your main character for a series finale, btw. But it works just fine for a season finale.
A billion timelines branching off and creating true chaos. Obviously the kick-off for the next round of movies but since we got here because the final episode had a bad guy they never fucking properly named (something the MCU only saves for characters who don't really speak or aren't really seen before being more than a glorified easter egg) giving us nearly an episode's worth of info-dumping... I'm not thrilled. :/
The TVA was never going to get resolution in this but it still felt like a cheat to not even really try and to basically ignore Renslayer going off to... do something.
And to fucking waste the post credits scene with "Loki will be back in S2" when that was announced before the first episode ever aired?! What the fuck!
Sigh. Look. WandaVision also set up the whole multiverse thing with Wanda hearing her kids calling across the timelines. But it first made sure to wrap up at least a couple of plotlines while it set up other movies/things: Monica's gonna get to suit up in spaaaaaaaaace! Wanda finally had time to deal with her grief and there's hope to run into Vision again, somehow. We learned what sparked the Hex and Agnes admitted to being the absolute hammiest worst/best annnnnnnd a whole slew of other things. There was closure of a sort, even though it absolutely felt like you could go another six seasons and a dozen movies if you wanted to.
Falcon and Winter Soldier had probably the most self-contained story/arc as it was basically to build Falcon into the new Captain America and help break Bucky from the mental shackles of the Winter Soldier. Hell, the series ends with the title card changing from Falcon to Captain America. Bucky gets to actually be happy, which isn't a thing we saw after he went off to the initial war back in his first appearance. Yes, it does Sharon so dirty and yes, it clearly sets up Sam to have his own Cap movie, but it doesn't do so at the expense of a good, satisfying ending. And again, I would happily watch another six seasons of Bucky and Sam just being buds and doing stuff, even if it meant I had to suffer through John Walker some more. (Btw, I really loved how they made him just the absolute fucking worst but I still felt for him for a good, long while.)
Loki gets NONE OF THAT.
The. Fuck.
Oh, and I feel like I've taken crazy pills because people freaked out about Miss Minutes apparently scaring the bejesus out of people when she appeared in a scene and um... you guys never seen a proper jump scare before? Because The Haunting of Hill House has a doozy that even KNOWING it's coming will still scare you, but sure. Act like an animated clock voiced by Tara Strong scared you into wetting yourself. 0_O
Lesse. Mums rented/bought/whatever Black Widow for my birthday and I don't have a lot to say about it beyond it being a case of too little, too late from Marvel at this point and that Yelena stole the whole damn show. I hated the post credits scene because I'm like one of three people who likes MCU Hawkeye (I'm contractually obligated to like archers. It comes with the name.) and I can't even shriek about that because fuck having Yelena working for the bad guys...again. Uuuuuuuuuuuuggggghhhhhhhhh. Also um, didn't Natasha reference Budapest like it was a great time but then it turns out that she spent the last however many years thinking she'd bought her freedom by murdering a child then? How, exactly, does that tie into one of her most memorable lines from the first Avengers movie? Wtf? You and I really do remember Budapest very differently, Nat.
Oh! Fear Street 1978 was much better than the first one. Possibly because the story was anchored by better actors, or maybe it was simply knowing the fate of MOST of the named characters so you didn't get your hopes up on the wrong person. Also, I preferred the sister storyline to the young love crap they kept pulling from the first movie (you've yet to give me a reason to care about Sam, movie, and this is your through-line for all three movies? Oof.) so knowing that was going to end with one dead kind of helped. So less ranty about that one. Not sure how I feel about round 3 yet, but I'll let you know once I get around to watching it.
Now, unrelated to all that: I stopped at the Walmart by work for the first time since... maybe early 2020? Maybe even back so far as 2019. Anyway, I was hoping they had the Rainbow High line on fun clearance like a lot of people have been showing online, but my store was one of the ones where their clearance price was higher than the regular prices elsewhere. I did pick up the last Fail Fix doll I needed so I'd have one of each character even if I don't have each version. Why, oh why, are there no price checkers in the store anymore? Whyyyyyyyyyyyy?
Oh, and to the person who commented in one of the doll groups (probably RH again) that he'd never been helped by an employee, ever, it took all my self control to not say, "all that says is that you're either really, really young or a dick to retail staff. Maybe both."