Thursday, December 25, 2014

Bethany Young is a Red Herring

Everyone is thinking that if the show does do the Twin thing then Bethany is Ali's Twin.  However she clearly seems to have been older then Ali.

I know a lot of people are convinced Ali won't have a Twin, just accepting everything we're told in interviews about them not going there.  Even though they effectively said the same things about Mona.

Like with Mona it won't be the same way, I don't think we'll learn that the Ali the girls were friends with was never the one originally named Ali but the crazy person who should have been institutionalized.  At least I certainly don't think she tried to kill her.

It's popular to say the whole Soul Swapping with CeCe thing was done in place of having a Twin.  I think on a psychological level that further proves Ali is a twin.  I think she's probably not consciously aware she has a Twin but is definitely subconsciously aware, and so she latched onto CeCe to play the role of her Twin.

In the Christmas special Ali asks if the other dress was for Bethany and Mona says it won't be that easy.  That is effectively proof to me the dress wasn't for Bethany.

Let's start with the mystery of Toby's Mom's death.  Everyone was thinking that story-line was useless filler, but I knew from the start that that was how we'd eventually get to Ali's twin.   And learning Jessica was on Radley's board only made me 100% certain.

Then when Bethany was tied to that mystery, the first intended assumption was that Bethany pushed her.  But as stated on the show it makes no sense that she'd be mad at Jessica over that.

In the recording of Bethany from 5:12 she says Jessica had lied to her.  Here's what I'm thinking.

NO!  Jessica was not Bethany's mother, she just lead her to believe that for some reason.  But Jessica's real investment in Radley was always Ali's Twin.  Bethany is, it seems, younger then Jason, it's pretty silly really think Jessica hid that pregnancy form Kenneth.

Bethany said "Both of them" and Spencer just assumed the other of the them was Ali, but I think it's the Twin.

Bethany knew that the Twin had pushed Toby's Mom and Jessica had covered it up, and that lead her to realize she'd been deceived.

I don't know whether Bethany and the Twin escaped at the same time or separately, if separately I'm thinking the Twin may have gotten out sooner and then forged that letter from Ali to lure Bethany.

I think it was Ali's twin who tried to kill Ali.  I'm not sure what exactly I think about who killed Bethany, it might have always been the Twin's plan to kill both Ali and Bethany.

And I think the twin Killed Jessica too.  A lot of people were speculating on that murder as if it's another filler mystery, and that it's probably either Kenneth or Veronica.  But if it was another filler mystery it'd have been solved by the mid-season point like Maya and Wilden's were.

Why would Jessica be keeping this a secret?  Why act like it's a threat to her marriage?  I'm thinking maybe Kenneth isn't the father of the Twins.  A little known fact about genetics is that people who are twins are genetically more likely to have twins.  I'm thinking Jessica cheated on Kenneth with someone who is a twin and was afraid the fact that she had twins would give that away.

If this theoretical twin father of Ali is supposed to be important, I'm thinking perhaps he's the Twin brother of Toby's mom.

One more random thought if they wanted to really shake things up.  Ali's Twin is Lucas' mysterious girlfriend form the 100th Episode.

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Get your facts straight, CNN


 
 



I can't find this video on Youtube, it was hilarious.

Update!!!
Finally found the video online
http://thecolbertreport.cc.com/videos/krcfjp/balrog

I'll see if I can Embed it here
<div style="background-color:#000000;width:520px;"><div style="padding:4px;"><iframe src="http://media.mtvnservices.com/embed/mgid:arc:video:colbertnation.com:015014d8-ed01-11e0-aca6-0026b9414f30" width="512" height="288" frameborder="0"></iframe><p style="text-align:left;background-color:#FFFFFF;padding:4px;margin-top:4px;margin-bottom:0px;font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px;"><b><a href="http://thecolbertreport.cc.com/">The Colbert Report</a></b><br/>Get More: <a href="http://thecolbertreport.cc.com/full-episodes">Colbert Report Full Episodes</a>,<a href="https://www.facebook.com/thecolbertreport">The Colbert Report on Facebook</a>,<a href="http://thecolbertreport.cc.com/videos">Video Archive</a></p></div></div>

Friday, December 12, 2014

Spencer Hastings has the same initials as Sherlock Holmes.

It is in fact meaningful when a fictional characters has the same initials of an older more well established fictional and/or historical and/or mythological character.  There is a reason countless fictional spies have the initials J.B.  And John Conner has the initials J.C.

It shouldn’t have taken me this long to notice this.  I’d been comparing Spencer to Sherlock Holmes for awhile, especially after she deduced a phone number from a parrots chirping (I also thought of Batman of course).  And last season's stimulant addiction storyline just further codified it.  She’s the real modern Sherlock Holmes, not Elementary, not that BBC show, not Robert Downy Jr. not even Gregory House.  Spencer Hastings is truly the greatest Great Detective.

And then there is her older sibling and also possibly the only person on Earth smarter then her, Melissa Hastings also has the same initials as Mycroft Holmes.

I suppose that makes her Watson the other 3 Liars, and Tobey her Irene Adler.

If you want to really chase this analogy down the rabbit hole, it shouldn’t be to difficult to guess who would be moriArty.

Thursday, December 11, 2014

PLL Christmas Special reaction

The episode was fantastic, I loved it.

I'm certain Holbrook was not the one kissing Ali, that's a mislead, they're not gonna rehash the whole crooked Cop angle a third time.  I stand by the theory I posted not to long ago.

Heather's recap was cool as usual.

The whole thing about telling Ali she’s going to Hell really bothered me. Reminds me of what lats year I hated how AHS Coven ended and how TVD ended Katherine’s story-lines.

The Gothic horror of the 18th and 19th centuries was usually written by Universalists. I"m not a Universalist, but I simply prefer the horror in a horror story to end when the character dies, leave the after life out of it please.

I'm bugs me that Paige is being put on a Bus again.

The show was awesome over all because everything I love about PLL, everything Fevalian about it, was up to 11.

Friday, December 5, 2014

Tales of The Shadowmen Volume 11 is now ready to order

http://blackcoatpress.com/talesshadowmen11.htm

I'm still Alphabetically last.  My story in this volume is much shorter then the last one.

I have a theory about Holbrook and Roma Mafia

So the assumption has been that they're suspicious of the Liars.  But I have a different idea.

I think they know full well that they're trying to solve this mystery on their own, and just letting them.  Because they, doing it unofficially, don't have the Red Tape that the cops have.  And an official consulting detective is supposed to have the same restrictions.  But this way they can have plausible deniability of all the illegal things done, yet still hope to benefit from their work.

Thursday, December 4, 2014

A quote from Paul Feval

In a letter written in 1861 to the Baron de Chapuys-Montlaville, Paul Feval defended popular fiction by saying.
"That insignificant literature sometimes has higher aspiration, but it never declares them, and that is the secret of its power."
The above quote was made available for English speaking readers in Alain Landier's introduction to Black Coat Press's Shadowmen 2: Heroes and Villians of French Comics, edited by Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier.  Which I read early last year (2013).

I've often thought of that quote of Paul Feval recently when reading Heather Hogan's Pretty Little Liars recaps, or listening to the BrosWatchPLLToo podcast.

It's a show that some people find easy to write off.  But is none the less very awesome.

Since I discovered Paul Feval, and other 19th century Feuilletonists like Ponson and Sue and Dumas, but mostly Feval in 2012, I've seen his fingerprints, his/their indirect influence on all modern Popular Fiction, from the Pulps to Comics, to CW television shows, and of course numerous Hollywood and made for TV movies, and in Anime and Manga too.

But I feel nothing today is more Fevalian then Pretty Little Liars.  That show is pure Rocambolesque.  It takes itself incredibly seriously and not seriously at all at the same time, it's wonderful.  A perfect Melodrama.

Alison is like a teenage Marguerite Sadalous, and Mona is like a female John Devil.

I may or may not be the only Tales of The Shadowmen contributor who's familiar with the show.

I also feel like commenting on how Brian Stableford said in his afterward for The Blackcoats: Heart of Steel that the book is "Unintentionally proto-feminist".  It's a very good and informative afterward and I recommend it.  The only thing I might partly disagree with is the "unintentionally" part, though not entirely.

Feval was a devout Catholic and Royalist, which made him a Conservative in the context of 19th century French politics.  And as such clearly saw traditional gender roles as important.  But at the same time this wasn't the only novel where he (and other 19th century french catholic royalists like Ponson) had surprisingly strong and active female characters.

Feval and Ponson supported the Nobility on traditionalist grounds.  But they also seemed to feel that the Nobles brought their downfall on themselves.  They would not be like a modern Fox News pundits going "How dare you accuse the rich of being greedy and selfish".

And as I read about Echalot and Similor in the Blackcoats saga, I feel compelled to conclude that Feval would be surprisingly supportive of LGBT people.  I don't think he'd object to the internet Slash-Shipping his characters.

Monday, November 24, 2014

Gotham mid season finale reaction

Only two Tweets today

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Gotham, Harvey Dent reaction

I didn't tweet again, sorry.

Harvey Dent did not actually seem to be in the episode enough to justify being the title character.

Oswald continues to be creepy.

Having Barbara jump into bed with Montoya that quickly doesn't make sense to me.  I'm afraid they really don't know what they're doing with this storyline.  I want to root for the Lesbian storyline, but they continue not to inspire much faith in me.

Probably the biggest new is seeing Arkham truly being born.  Gordon is hilarious, he told the Mayor what the problem was.

Thursday, November 13, 2014

I have seen all 9 episodes of Sherlock

I enjoyed it, my favorite episode was probably a Scandal in Belgravia.  All the actors do a very good job.

I really like Molly, who I don't think is based on anyone from the original books.

It's interesting how Artistic inspiration goes in circles, House M.D. was clearly based on Holmes a great deal, and it's also clearly influenced the Holmes Adaptations that have been made since.

On the question of how Sherlock survived the fall.  We're kind of supposed to see the third answer shown at the real one, but it's still a little ambiguous.  I found the the 3rd scene shown the most absurd frankly, there is no way that couldn't have had witnesses who weren't in on it.

All 3 theories start with the same wrong assumption I think, that Sherlock surviving means he didn't hit the pavement.  It could be a simply matter of him doing something when he landed to minimize the damage.

Now the big mystery is If and and if so How did Moriarty survived.  Which I find interesting because he killed himself the same way Henri Belcamp did in John Devil.  And while Feval never made a sequel to that I think he was going to if the novel had been more successful at the time.

People accidentally survive shooting themselves through the Mouth like that quite often.  Anything you can do by accident someone as smart as Moriarty could probably do on purpose.

I found the show's take on Charles Augustus Miverlton (Magnussen) interesting.  He's a total control freak and literally marks his territory.

The reveal of how his "Files" actually work reminded my of The Colonel's Treasure a little bit.  It's Psychological rather then Supernatural, but the premise is the same, it kind of doesn't actually exist.  He is the Treasure.

Monday, November 10, 2014

Gotham episode 8 reaction

Both a young Tommy Elliot and Sionis, this is great. 

There are reasons why introducing The Black Mask and Hush together is quite interesting.

Now for Tweets
Jared Welch retweeted
A mask hides the face but frees the soul. A mask speaks the truth. - Mr. Sionis
0 replies 2 retweets 4 favorites

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Carmine The Roman Falcone

Carmine Falcone is an interesting character in the history of Batman villains.  The story he was first created for, Year One, he's theoretically the Big Bad but really a back ground character mostly, Leob and Flass are the more direct antagonists so Gordon is the real protagonist.

The Long Halloween fleshes him out some, drawing on Godfather imagery, but he's still not much of a Supervillian there, the story is ultimately about his demise.

In Batman Begins Nolan based him on very modern depictions of crime bosses, his name being Italian didn't influence how he was written much at all.

Gotham marks the first time I know of in which we really see the character at a time that isn't just as his empire is about to fall to the advent of the freaks.  Yet the dialogue of the show constantly acted like he was about to fall anyway, everyone thinks he's become old and soft and weak.

At the end of Viper I like many others I'm sure thought of The Godfather seeing him in that hat feeding pigeons.  It was an interesting contrast as Maroni has a more Goodfellas/Casino vibe.

As of the end of Penguin's Umbrella we realize that indeed this Falcone is not an old push over yet.  He and the Oswald are going to be quite formidable.

And of course I now find myself thinking of Paul Feval's Colonel Bozzo-Corona from The Blackcoats.

I find it very unlikely that's intentional, that the writers of this show are familiar with the Novels published by BlackCoatPress.

Part of it because of The Godfather imagery, The Colonel is compared to Vito Corleone often, but I've always found that a very superficial comparison, The Colonel is much more Evil then either Vito or Michael.  And his level of respectability in society is well beyond what Vito has in Part I, more like what Michael's trying o achieve with the Imobolari deal in Part III.

Gotham's status as a Prequel where we know Gordon will fail which we've talked about before.  Now I'm realizing how that's similar to everything Stableford said about Feval's decision to make Prequel novels with Salem Street and The Invisible Woman, where continuity demanded none of the Habit Noirs we know from the prior Novels will be brought down.

And now I'm really loving that, this Falcone will be like The Colonel.  People will keep trying to bring him down but they never will.  And Oswald I'm thinking could be his Lecoq.

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Gotham Penguin's Umbrella reaction

I didn't live Tweet at all yesterday.  I don't have a Mobile so I can't really do it like most people do, I generally just do it during commercials.  I can only do it at all if it's a show I watch with the rest of my family.

This episode was awesome Seventh episode twist.

Now that Gordon and Montoya are on the same side that triangle should become much more bearable.

Zass being a hitman for Falcone is something they borrowed form Begins.

Oswald is proving to be a magnificent little bastard.  This should be fun.

Friday, October 31, 2014

Well, Today is my Birthday

I don't have anything special planned, probably watch some monster movies latter.

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Thoughts on Pretty Little Liars and Ezria

I'm not an Ezria Shipper, I watch PLL for the Slash ships.

But I have been someone who was, (before the Ezra as -A mislead) never offended by the relationship.

First of all it annoys me to no end when the word "Pedophile" gets misused.  Pedophile refers to attraction to prepubescent children. It's not a synonym for Statutory Rape.

Statutory Rape laws are needed, but they are perhaps too simplistically written, situations need to be considered on a case by case basis.  For most of human history a relationship between a woman in her late teens and an older man was perfectly normal.  That so many people think it should be condemned now without exception is just ridiculous to me.

I keep hearing "A teacher is a position of authority" and that just reminds me how I hate the modern Pubic School system, because for most of history it was not.  A Teacher used to be an employee, and if the student demonstrated a failure to learn by getting a bad grade, he failed at his job.  There was no authority in the job at all.

Aria did always have the agency in the relationship, and at times she did seem more mature then Ezra.

While they were misleading us to Ezra being -A, the show was kind of at it's best, because Ian Harding made a very entertaining villain.  And the tension with Spencer and Aria was great.  And the Noir Episode was awesomeness.

But I also knew full well that they were gonna back out of it, and when they did they would be stuck in an inescapable corner.  Because I also knew they would certainly try to redeem Ezra.

So many people hate the show trying to Redeem him now.  "Getting shot doesn't take away what he did".  Well to people who invested in that romance for 3.5 years this retcon (that is incompatible with many facts from early on) doesn't take away all of that.

And what Ezra is guilty of is exaggerated, if they'd paid attention they'd know he was not aware of -A the whole time.  The full on surveillance was only going on during season 4.

The book reveal makes no sense with the extremeness of how we saw Ezra behaving, but that's fine, the show is contrived melodrama and that's what I love about it.

I just wish they'd done one thing differently.  Keep Ezra having the past relationship with Ali, and knowing about the other liars from her, and coming to Rosewood for the intent for investigating and writing the Book.  But still have him not know that was Aria at the Bar, still allow that one moment to be just a coincidence.  It would still make him very shady from what happens latter on, but allow enough of the sort of innocence of how their romance started to remain.

Thing I like about the reveal in the season 4 finale of how he and Ali met, which I don't think many others noticed.  Is it parallels the original scene of Ezra and Aria meeting.  Ali does kind of the exact same thing Aria did.

People overlook that Aria didn't know that would be her teacher but certainly did know that was an older guy, and deliberately withheld information that might have discouraged an older man from making out with her in the bathroom.

What I've always liked about Aria is how she is in a strange way the most exactly like Alison of the Liars.  Hanna has her looks, Emily has her Heart (which she usually hides) Spencer has her Brain, but Aria has the same Soul.   Aria is Vivian Darkbloom.

Monday, October 27, 2014

Gotham Goat Reactions

Tweets first

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Gotham episode 5 reaction

I didn't tweet much during this episode because I was sleepy

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Rocambole in London

For now I decided to skip Volume 2 of Basil Balian's abridged Rocambole translations and go right to volume 3 with his London adventures.

The first story in the Volume was really the epilogue to Rocambole's India adventure.  It was amusing.

The summery of the Rocambole saga on CoolFrenchComics is sometimes misleading. Part of it may be how abridged this Translation is.  But I take notice that Jeon-Marc seems to want to encourage people to compare these characters to Iconic Modern characters, in ways that may or may not be accurate.  In the case of this first story, they describe The Beautiful Gardiner (Romia) in a way makes her sound kind of like Poison Ivy.

I did my post that talked about the Strong Female characters of Ponson and Feval.  Now that I've read this there are more I could add.  Vanda, Romia, but most of all Ellen Palmure.  At least in the first book of the London trilogy she is a really intriguing character.  The way her character completely changes at the end is kind of hard to swallow.  A problem that faces many female villains when they make a Heel-Face turn.

One of the main things I was looking forward to reading about was Reverend Peters Town.  Who's called Bishop Towne in this translation.  He's been called a sort of Protestant counterpart to Eugene Sue's Father Rodin.  Thing is, he's not actually clever enough to fit that analogy I feel.  It's always a different Villain who actually seems to be a match for Rocambole's ingenuity.  Towne is maybe more comparable to Father D'Aigrigny, Rodin's superior.

Rocambole was a character who started out a villain.  What's interesting here is that while operating as part of this Irish Resistance in London he kind of seems effectively like he's a Supervillain again in terms of his tactics.  Comparable to Anime characters like Lelouch Vi Britannia.

Feval and Ponson both wanted to play on French reader's tendency to sympathize with the Irish under British occupation, but Ponson was willing to go much further.  Because Feval still had Fergus O'Breanne and Henri Belcamp as villains rather then heroes.

There are flaws, but overall I recommend it.

Monday, October 13, 2014

Arkham, Gotham TV Reaction

No Montoya or Catgirl tonight, but a Hott Selene Gomez look alike.

First my Tweets.