indy42
Big-Time Director
MR's Resident Indiana Jones
Posts: 257
|
Post by indy42 on Dec 7, 2009 17:17:22 GMT -5
|
|
|
|
Post by Dale on Dec 11, 2009 17:03:29 GMT -5
i want to apologise to you indy, because i'm so far behind on point season 2 i haven't been leaving replies.
but you deserve better than getting completely blanked like this.
|
|
|
|
Post by Dale on Feb 16, 2010 16:09:40 GMT -5
2x08– “Escalation”
The opening of “Escalation” deals with Tanner’s death. Wells tries to talk Alex but quickly gets of course, showing more emotion towards the loss of the house and the files they have gathered on Johnson and company than the loss of Tanner. This draws the ire of Alex who snaps and gives a nice little speech, telling Wells Tanner meant more than the files etc. etc. It was a nice way to start. At this point I’m just pretending Alex’s brother didn’t die and none of that ever happened, because this would have made for a much more satisfying conclusion to that particular story. So I’m just going to pretend like this is the conclusion Indy gave us all along and move forward from there.
The scene with Derek looking at the remains of the House and everything he had built there was nice. I can’t help but feel like it would mean more if we had spent more time there and there had actually been some kind of investment in The House and the people who lived there (i.e – Sophie, Clare). I feel like a broken record for saying it, but these are characters that have had every little development. I felt like I got to know Robin, Mike and Earl, characters featured in Flashbacks for one episode, better than I know these guys are supposed to be our heroes main back up. There aren’t that many characters in “Point”, it shouldn’t be to tricky to fit in a scene or two between some of these secondary characters to flesh them out a little.
I really enjoyed C.O’s conversation over the phone with the mysterious Fin. C.O has been the standout character all year in my opinion and I really liked this exchange, from complimenting the coffee as he threw it away, to making glib remarks to the explosion. It was all well done.
Shan heading to meet Corner is interesting. We saw Conner earlier in the year as Alex paid him a visit, if I remember correctly Alex was looking for information on Tanner so she could track down the snitch inside Johnson’s Company. So I hope we see a return to that particular plot thread now. We also find out Conner has a connection with Derek like he seemed to with Alex which is intriguing and I wish we could have seen more of Conner this season, acting as the go-to man for information.
C.O’s interaction with Johnson just makes the whole Luke incident as pointless as I thought. Johnson’s mission was to kill Alex. He failed; he’s back in the club anywhere because of the bombing. So why even do the Luke story to begin with? Why not just have Johnson responsible for the bombing, succeeding in his task ... for once and getting back in that way. It seems like slap dash storytelling to me and it’s rather disappointing if I’m being honest.
Derek revealing a list of shareholders and the location of the shareholders meeting was intriguing. The plan to blow it up gives the season a direction whilst ignoring everything else we’ve found out this season. Both a good and a bad thing; good because it gives the show some direction which it’s seemed to lack over recent episodes. Bad because these characters are being so bloody stupid in not going after the inside man who was the be all and end all in the third episode of the season. Instead of just finding this information in the back of a car, how much more exciting and rewarding would it have been had they tracked down the inside man and found it from them? There’s a good story here, it’s just being lost in some strange decision making.
The later portion of the episode; whilst exciting could have quite easily been spread over a full episode of its own in my opinion. It would have provided us with a chance to get to know some of the background characters a little better, as they interact with the main characters. But alas, it wasn’t to be. We did however get a nice conversation with Harding and Alex in which Alex discusses more of her background and the change she went through after being shot. The kiss, not necessary in the least, didn’t really call for it in the moment and actually kind of undid the really endearing moment where Alex wipes tears away. It’s one of the few times Alex has shown that level of emotion throughout the series and you really kind of set yourself up for an emotional relationship between Harding and Alex down the line. And you just kind of went from zero to sixty in record time.
Overall, I really wanted to like this episode. But it’s starting to frustrate me that all these things are being looked over in favour of something else. There’s an inside man Tanner used in the Johnson Company. She (still assuming it was Robin who Tanner coerced in her flashback episode) was important earlier in the Season but has since been almost entirely forgotten. And Scott’s return was anti-climatic given the fact nobody has even mentioned his name since he was taken. I bet he’s pissed nobody came for him like he did for Tanner. Also, Jared Johnson may be the dumbest man on the planet. His bank heist was foiled in a very simplistic fashion, he failed to kill Alex and then got lead, presumably to his death by a man he knows full well can’t be trusted at his word. This episode has some really good stuff in but also comes with its fair share of baggage that have been weighing the show down over the past few episodes (primarily Johnson and the mishandling of his character, and the plot line involving Alex’s brother) and a lack of follow up on early story arcs is beginning to nag at me as well as the characters lack of acknowledgment towards them.
Score: 7/10
|
|
