All posts by Rubbra

<p>This has been a great show, and I've really loved the dialog. The fans here have been wonderful. But it's time for me to move on, and just say thank you to you all for everything you had to say. We didn't heed everything you said -- obviously we were on a different time line than viewers were -- but this has been very nice. My personal recommendation is that you not just grab on to any show which comes along; you don't need a rebound show. Think carefully about what you liked; it's possible that what you really want in the meantime isn't another show, but perhaps something in another medium. Or in the real world. Look a homeless person in the eye, and try to understand just by looking what this person might have gone through before dismissing him as a scammer. We are not here to condemn. </p><p>Thank you. </p><p>Good night and good luck. </p><p>Be seeing you. </p>

<p>I love how life sometimes intersects with art. Our company finished out its 10 year lease in Chelsea (coincidentally the same building where Michael Emerson's agency is... saw him on a sidewalk, but never in the elevator... I did encounter an actor who played a corrupt cop in Season 1 in the elevator, and he said Emerson's agency was there), and a dozen or so of us were exiting late AM, laden with banker boxes, heading to the new place with personal effects and crucial files we didn't think we could trust the movers with (we expected to need immediate access etc.) THERE IS A POINT, TRUST ME. It looked as if the elevator wouldn't hold us all, and I did this movie cliché where I played the wounded buddy on the battlefield, who would only slow all the rest down if they didn't sacrifice me and hightail it, and in those cliché scenes the mortally wounded soldier, knowing he's done, tells them to GO GO GO, they won't be able to save me etc. </p><p>There was a bit of this cliché in the finale, with Finch and Reese competing for martyrdom (and heroism too, we learned). The trick for any writer is in refining the clichés and finding new ways to use them and twist them. Some make it obvious with a wink (I remember Pynchon doing it with the hair of the dog in Gravity's Rainbow). Cliches are friends, and they are crutches. Great storytellers recognize the value in mining the past (cf The Prisoner), and find a way to make the cliché less obvious. Although the finale was, truly, in the martyrdom cliché, they made it their own so well it wasn't overly obvious. </p><p>IMHO. </p>

<p>Something which occurred to me on my second viewing, tonight, was the Machine's line about not having a choice to lose this time. As if it was letting Samaritan show it everything it had in all those millions of simulations, and it was learning from the showy display. While the machine understood the importance of defeating Samaritan, and was not cocky about battle in the satellite, it didn't seem as if it was in fear. </p>

<p>"It's A Wonderful Life" was more relevant to penultimate episode IMO. Oh, and when a phone rings an angel gets his wings. :-) </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>Lazy8 wrote: Harold and Grace... </p><p>Boy, does he have some 'splaining to do! </p><p>And I got the feeling that never again will a pay phone ring in his presence. </p> </i></div>
<p>Did he really get back to Grace? The tone of the colors was so different, and color tone was used in the last two episodes to suggest a simulation or a fantasy. In the finale, we saw it when Harold was on the roof, and the scene where he imagines himself with Grace. In the penultimate episode they used it in the simulations imagining a world without the machine. </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>Helloclaire wrote: </p> Reese’s exit felt odd. I don’t really like what he did. </i></div>
<p>Well, it wasn't telegraphed at the beginning, but I took it that the child at the funeral was Reese, and that his Dad had made a life-saving sacrifice that stuck with him. If so (and I think I'm correct about this) it adds a different light to John's bender in order to drink out Carter's death. I don't say it CHANGES his grief, it's just a different sidelight. And the more that I think about it, the additional light isn't really additional light. I don't think any different of the bender in response. </p>

<p>"Everybody dies alone..." OK so they didn't go total nerd on that and complete it with the TMBG follower "and that is beautiful." I will say that the conclusion -- it all goes on -- was set up by establishing the 2nd team (with implications that there could be 3rds and 4ths out there). Nicely done, show. Thank you for five splendid years. </p>

<p>I liked this for a lot of reasons, and one of them is that by bringing in older characters it says that everything will not need to be tidied up by episode 13. Mystery has been reintroduced, and we (the audience) are free (have the burden?) to speculate about the post episode 13 world. </p><p>What I also like about this is that the development of another "cell" of assets is consistent with all sorts of revolutionary/terrorist organizations. Developing cells is important to maintaining the operation, and limiting the awareness is too. However, the comraderie and openness at the reflecting pool kind of violates that. That's either a kiss to the viewers or a signal that the Machine has something else in mind. </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>Helloclaire wrote: </p> <div class="quote"> <p>Rubbra wrote: Too bad it wasn't the same. That would have been a wonderful mindferk. </p> </i></div>
<p>But why? For the FBI man and Finch's father to be the same person? lol, please no! </p> </div> <p>Well, they wouldn't BE the same person, different ages and appearances. But it would have suggested Finch under complete stress, unable to distinguish between past and present, tempted to see his father in the agent. </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>LeverageGuru wrote: The FBI agent was Geoff Pierson, who's a well-established character actor. He gets around a good bit. Finch's father was a different actor, Tuck Milligan. See Lethe and Aletheia. </p> </i></div>
<p>Too bad it wasn't the same. That would have been a wonderful mindferk. </p>

<p>We are receiving a houseguest in a couple days from the Netherlands, and I remember her once telling us how she and her friends used to laugh about how on TV all the American phone numbers begin with "555". True to form here, if you pause on the business cards. </p><p>I'm going to have to do some heavy searching on IMDB, but wow the actor playing Harold's interrogator looked like the actor who played his father. If the same, how brilliant. </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>TJlive800 wrote: </p> <div class="quote">Rubbra wrote:
"Be seeing you." Classic exit line from The Prisoner. Do NOT tell me the writers are too young to know about The Prisoner. Age does not prevent you from learning from the past.</i></div>
<p>Nobody ever suggested that the writers were too young to know about or reference old works but whatever </p> </div> <p>Someone did, in another episode discussion. I could dig it up, but I'm not that obsessive. I think it's to the writers' credit that they give that wink. And as you say, whatever. </p>

"Be seeing you." Classic exit line from The Prisoner. Do NOT tell me the writers are too young to know about The Prisoner. Age does not prevent you from learning from the past.

<p>Now that I think about it, Leverage Guru... How about a page on the required suspension of disbelief? I'm not talking about the amazing convergence of events at Madison Square Park, but things like the elevator. And in the international airliner episode, whether or not that huge luggage bay is anything close to reality. </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>AnotherName wrote: Well I removed my post before I saw your reply. Turns out I was wrong on both statements... maybe 2 wrongs do make a right???? Don't get me stated about elevators and Big Guns and SUV's....LOL </p> </i></div>
<p>In retrospect, I don't know why I didn't push back on the AM frequencies; growing up in South FL there was a Miami AM station at 560. On FM they avoid the even numbers on the decimals (they will do 102.3, but not 102.2). </p><p>I WANT you to get started on Big Guns, SUVs, and even, if you want, whether or not you could do a big arrest at the Port Authority Grain Terminal. Because it's TEE VEE!! </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>AnotherName wrote: and btw AM radio stations use odd number frequencies like AM 1190 or AM 570; no such thing as AM 520. Standard practice I suppose. </p> </i></div>
<p>I still love (another episode...) the elevator with the bullet holes, where the outer door which stays on the floor and the inner door which goes with the carriage descended together, so from inside the carriage we could still see people shooting. BECAUSE!! REASONS!! </p>

<p>A score of things to love about this episode, but I thought the idea that a rescued person would rebel against the recommendation to go off the grid was fascinating. We've seen many episodes where knowledgeable people were handed new identities and encouraged to go away. Although it was martyrdom, it was good to see someone choose to be different. </p>

<p>I wonder how familiar the writers are with The Prisoner. When Shaw saw the boat in the water, waiting for her, I had this recollection of the various teases which the Village authorities used on Number Six, to convince him that he'd escaped, and then to snatch that from him. There are two episodes of this ilk (and there are only 16 in the whole series!), "The Chimes of Big Ben" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chimes_of_Big_Ben) and "Many Happy Returns" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many_Happy_Returns_(The_Prisoner)). I wonder if there was a bit of a homage going on here? </p>

<p>oooh baby, the Sunset Park warehouses out by Costco. Been in that neighborhood a jillion times, and that "courtyard" was used in a video by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. Loved it! http://www.samueljohnson.com/blog/parchives/060429.html </p>

<div class="quote"><i> <p>LeverageGuru wrote: We don't know that was we saw was THE end, just an end. I didn't interpret it as a hint that only Root survives. </p> </i></div>
<p>Not even that. The people who create time capsules sometimes don't know what's important. My interpretation is that when Root recorded that message that was what she thought. It might have turned out otherwise. </p><p>I have to say here what I said to my other as we were watching: the references to pieces from before do make it feel as if it's less improvisatory than Twin Peaks. And thus less chaotic. As if thoroughly planned all those years ago. And if so, bravo. </p><p>However... there is a counterargument in regarding past references in the New Testament, regarding where the NT evangelists follow up a gospel event by citing something in the OT, which makes it feel as if it was all part of a plan. Without getting into a discussion of whether or not it was all part of a plan, there are many events in the OT which do not tie in to NT events and do not foretell a plan. I expect one could take a microscope to earlier episodes and find contradictions or unsolved threads. A bit of kryptonite in a fridge in a Greenpoint apartment where someone from HR lived, perhaps. </p><p>Don't care. It's only rock n roll but I like it. </p>