Walking Dead and the Law of CBM (spoilers for 2/8/15)

And by CBM, I mean "Conservation of Black Men."

Now before I begin, let me make something clear:  I'm not calling the writers of The Walking Dead racist. I'm NOT. They've killed young and old, black and white, male and female. It's just that I've noticed this pattern and I wonder if anyone else has, as well?

Morgan

T-Dog

First there was Morgan Jones, in the very first episode ("Days Gone By"). He's a neat character who I wish we'd seen more of (and hopefully we will if he catches up with the group this season), but he stays behind when Rick goes to Atlanta. This gives us a Black Male Value of 1.

However, the BMV of the show doesn't change, because even though we've lost Morgan we meet  T-Dog in the next episode ("Guts"). Sadly, T-Dog doesn't do a hell of a lot for his entire run and his character is never fully explored, despite being on the show for two seasons.

Andrew

Big Tiny

In the second episode of season 3 ("Sick), our intrepid group of survivors goes to the Prison and finds several inmates inside. This is where we see the Law of Conservation of Black Men in action, as three of the characters -- Andrew, Big Tiny, and Oscar -- are black and, at this moment, any of them could join the group. But within that same episode, Big Tiny is killed and Andrew becomes a villain, fleeing from the group. This sets our BMV to 2.

The next time we see them ("Killer Within"), T-Dog is killed by walkers and Oscar takes his place within the group. The BMV is reset to 1, and the LCBM is observed to be constant.

Oscar

Tyreese

In episode 8 ("Made to Suffer"), Oscar is killed when the group assaults Woodbury to rescue a captured Glenn and Maggie. Later that episode, we first meet Tyreese, but he is not accepted into the group due to Rick flipping out, and so Tyreese goes to Woodbury. The BMV stays at 1 for the duration of season 3.





By season 4 I'm already aware of the LCBM, so when we're introduced to Bob Stookey I'm convinced he's going to die horribly that episode ("30 Days Without An Accident"). I think perhaps the writers are

Bob

aware of this as well, and so they spend a good chunk of the season messing with us, making us think Bob is going to die at any moment -- trapped under a shelf of booze to be eaten by walkers, getting alcohol when he should be getting supplies, generally annoying the group, etc.

Father Gabriel

Miraculously, Bob survives the entire season, which means that the BMV has permanently been set to 2. I think this is mainly due to the fact that Bob and Sasha make an adorable couple, and this gives Tyreese a family he can look after -- which means the stakes are upped as now even more heartache can be inflicted upon these people as the things they love are ripped away.

This brings us to season 5, and in the second episode ("Strangers") we are introduced to Father Gabriel Stokes, who is both a priest (Episcopalian) and a black man. Much like Bob, in his first few

episodes we wonder how he's survived this long and when he's going to die... but there's always the possibility that he can pull a Bob and increment the Black Male Value by one.  Does he?

Nope. Bob is captures in that same episode, and he's dead by the next. Both BMV and LCBM remain constant.

Noah

In episode 4 ("Slabtown"), we are introduced to Noah. He's a bit of a statistical anomaly in that  he isn't part of the group, but is rather a prisoner held by the same people who captured Beth. Later he escapes, and even later he meets up with Darryl and Carol. He doesn't join the group until episode 8 ("Coda"). BMV temporarily rises to three...


... and then, in episode 9 ("What Happened and What's Going On"), the LCBM reasserts itself and Tyreese dies in what is probably the best and most touching farewell episode ever given to a character.

Again, I'm not asserting racism. I am asserting either lazy writing or a deliberate attempt by the writers to screw with us.



Look, basically what I'm really saying is this:

1. The moment Morgan catches up with the rest of the group, someone's gonna die (right now it's even money between competent-yet-injured Noah and  Father Gabriel the moveable feast)
2. If the survivors ever run into another Asian male, I'm going to be very, very frightened for Glenn's safety. 

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Our huge thanks go out to Erin Palette from Lurking Rhythmically for this guest post! Be sure to go and check out her site for other great pieces.

Doctor Who: The Caretaker

Clara's two worlds combine as The Doctor does a bit of moonlighting at the Coal Hill School in The Caretaker.

This episode begins with a montage showing Clara struggling to live two lives at once, her "normal" life as a teacher with Danny Pink, and her life adventuring in time and space as The Doctor's Companion. This whole montage draws the parallel of a woman cheating on her partner, and in that it succeeds reasonably well. We get the distinct impression that something's going to give pretty soon.

After The Doctor leaves Clara behind to go "Undercover" She appears to have time to focus on Danny, but naturally The Doctor is going undercover at Coal Hill School as John Smith, the temporary replacement Caretaker. Hilarity ensues.

The Threat of the Skovox Blitzer is fairly minor, which is fine, because The Doctor straight up tells us he can handle it easily. There is no discovery of the threat, as The Doctor already knows about it. There is no investigation, as The Doctor already has a plan, and even when that goes wrong he seems to figure out a fall-back plan with minimal fuss. Sadly, if the majority of screen time doesn't even involve the monster of the week in any way, the focus of this episode becomes Danny's discovery of Clara's life with The Doctor.

This all puts the episode squarely in the category of that I like to call "The Companion Show Featuring The Doctor". In retrospect this has been a bit of a trend throughout the season, particularly in Listen, but so far it's not taken up the majority of an episode. I thought (or hoped) we'd gotten past this issue once Clara stopped being The Most Important Person In The Universe™. Once the mystery of her origin was solved, she could become just another travelling companion for The Doctor. Hopefully the resolution of the Danny situation will reduce the focus on Clara and allow The Doctor more time in the limelight.

The scene with The Doctor mistaking Adrian for Clara's boyfriend was strange and has left me feeling a bit annoyed. There's two ways to take this. One, general arrogance from The Doctor that Clara would want someone who looked like he did, because that means she still wants him; or two, a fairly obscure kind of paternal feeling where The Doctor would only approve of someone who was somehow like him. I'd like to think it was meant to be option two, but something tells me that's not really what they were going for here.

The Doctor's irrational hatred of soldiers outlined in Into The Dalek was clearly designed to work with this episode, but despite this not fitting with established canon (The Doctor has been friends with several soldiers), Danny's response to The Doctor was actually pretty awesome.

Yet again we are treated to a scene in the Nethersphere, but this time Missy seems to have her cranky pants on and is reportedly "too busy" to deal with the poor dead policeman. For the first time since the Promised Land arc began, I am actually intrigued. I still don't really care who Missy is, but my interest is piqued as to why she would be annoyed.


Overall, this is a pretty nothing episode. It does well enough considering it's entire point is to get The Doctor and Danny introduced to each other, it's just I like my light science fiction show about aliens and time travel to focus a bit less on a single character's love life and more on, you know, the aliens and time travel.

Score: 6/10

Doctor Who: Time Heist

Season 8 of Doctor Who continues to showcase the potential for story diversity, as The Doctor and Clara pull a bank job in Time Heist.

This episode was just spot on for me. It really highlights the way Doctor Who can remain solidly rooted in science fiction, whilst at the same time playing off other genres and tropes. This episode uses the classic heist movie formula in the tradition of Ocean's 11, Sneakers or the Australian classic Malcolm.

Things start off quickly, with The Doctor and Clara (and us of course) thrown in the deep end along with a pair of specialists. The memory wipe is a great way of bypassing the discovery phase and getting straight into the action. Sadly I think it went some way to telegraphing the identity of The Architect for me. Not that it really mattered all that much.

On that note, I understand they were setting up The Doctor figuring out who The Architect is, but it just seemed out of place to hear him come out with "I hate him,' with no real motivation behind it. The Architect hadn't done anything specific to harm The Doctor or anyone else. They all heard themselves willingly submit to the memory wipe. It was just out of place.
The entire caper was very enjoyable, and played out with perfect pacing. The only element to the plan that seemed a bit strange was the "exit strategy". I'm unclear how Psi and Saibra managed to return to the planet and insinuate themselves into the guard staff when the place was in lockdown. The thing is, the quality of the rest of the episode allowed me to suspend disbelief at that point.

The Teller was a nicely creepy monster, very alien and clearly threatening. The whole "soup" thing was really cool, and looked creepy enough. I'm not sure detecting random guilt is particularly fool-proof when the punishment is encephalous liquification. There's no real room for appeal after that. The flaw in that method was already highlighted nicely in the Red Dwarf episode Justice. That said, it's their bank, and they can police it as harshly as they want, I suppose.

The budding Clara / Danny relationship took up very little of the episode, but disappointingly, despite all his apparent confusion at Clara's primping at the start, The Doctor ends the episode with the very jealous sounding line of "Beat that for a date." We are confusing the situation again here. If the sentiment is "Why would you go on a date when you can do this?" then I get it, but this phrasing makes it sound like, "I'm better than him, so you should love me."


All up, this was my favorite episode of the season. Solid, entertaining, and oh so cool-looking. I think we have our first perfect score for the new Doctor.

Score: 10/10

Doctor Who: Listen

The Doctor deals with some of his own personal monsters and we learn a bit more about Danny Pink in Listen

We begin with The Doctor proposing a theory that just as nature has produced perfect hunters there may also exist a creature which has evolved to be the perfect hider. He suggests these creatures are the cause of a dream shared by all people where a hand grabs you from under the bed.

Using a telepathic link with Clara to direct the TARDIS, The Doctor hopes to find a point in her life when she had the dream, and therefore discover the creature. Unfortunately, Clara gets distracted by the embarrassing aftermath of her fairly disastrous first date with Danny Pink, and things don't go according to plan.

This was an interesting concept for a story and I think overall it was executed quite well. Initially I felt a bit short-changed after there was no confirmed monster, but it is actually quite a refreshing change. There were several hints that indicate there was no creature at all, with each bit of evidence for it being paired with a rational explanation, but at the same time we just can't be sure.

I think it's a testament to the concept and the writing that there is already heated debated raging online about whether there was or wasn't a creature. I've said it before and I'll likely say it again, Steven Moffat can write. Where he falls down is his insistence on pushing these grand, overarching stories and tying everything together. Which leads into my one real issue with this episode. The connection to Day of the Doctor. It just seemed a bit gratuitous to me.

On a similar note, is Gallifrey not time locked any more? How was the TARDIS able to get to that point in The Doctor's timeline? Perhaps it was just a special quirk of Clara's because she has been spliced throughout The Doctor's timeline, but it feels like they are forgetting some important canon there.

In the end, this whole episode felt like a bit of a nothingness. We got some interesting insights into both The Doctor and Danny Pink, and it was yet again Clara's knack with kids that won the day, but overall it was a much slower pace than we've seen recently with not a great deal of excitement. Not that that's inherently a bad thing, but we maybe need a bit more to hook the audience. And with no definite resolution, we are left without so much a story as a collection of things that happened and some unanswered questions. As I said, not everything needs to be answered, but this kind of felt unfinished.

Score: 6/10

Doctor Who: Robot of Sherwood

Our new Doctor really begins to hit his straps as he takes Clara to meet a legend in Robot of Sherwood.

This episode gets us back to basics, with The Doctor and Clara resolving to simply do a bit of adventuring in time and space. Clara chooses to go and meet Robin Hood, and despite The Doctor's claims that he is nothing but a myth, meet him they do. After a brief duel and a mild innuendo (seriously, I don't think they can help themselves), Robin takes The Doctor and Clara to meet his Merry Men.

What follows is a very condensed retelling of the Robin Hood story as we are introduced to the main villain, the Sheriff of Nottingham, who is swiftly shown to be a nasty piece of work. Then we bounce straight to the archery contest for the golden arrow where things take a sharp turn away from the norm, and The Doctor and Robin take time to get really stuck into a phenomenal comedic double act. It really was very entertaining.

Interestingly it is Clara who gets to take the lead in coaxing out the Villain Monologue and securing a bit of back-story from the Sheriff. It's always good to see the Companion adding practical value rather than just being a warm body to explain things to or as an emotional foil for The Doctor.

The season arc tease was a little less offensive this episode in that Missy herself was blissfully absent, however it still seemed clumsily shoved in. We don't need the arc referenced in every episode. Let's just enjoy a standalone episode for once.

The Doctor works out the Sheriff's plan and why it won't work, revealing a flaw that will prove fatal to half the country. And here's where it falls apart a bit for me. Ignoring the practicalities of The Doctor's solution, I liked that the three of them had to work together to pull it off, and the overall resolution of the episode was nice, especially Robin's words to The Doctor.

Overall, the episode ran a little short, making the whole thing seem a bit rushed. I can forgive The Doctor and Clara happening to materialize right next to Robin, thereby getting things moving quickly, but the Robin Hood legend is so rich that it's always going to be tough to get it into such a short space of time. We move straight from introducing characters to a major point in the legend. Add to this that (amusing as it was) a lot of time was chewed up on the banter between Robin and The Doctor and things just seem a little hurried.

I have to say that I still found this episode to be great fun, and would totally re-watch. I have to give it extra points because my wife actually enjoyed this one, and she's not really a fan at all.

Score: 8/10

Doctor Who: Into the Dalek

Capaldi settles into his version of The Doctor and Clara sets her sights elsewhere as an old enemy returns in Into the Dalek.

Things start with a bang, as we see yet another large scale cold open which shows off the special effects budget. This one worked considerably better than the dinosaur at the start of Deep Breath though, in that it was better integrated into the overall story. We pick up where we left off (sort of) as The Doctor has picked up the coffee Clara demanded at the end of Deep Breath.

From there things are set up solidly as we are introduced to a magic shrink ray and The Doctor gives a nod to the obvious inspiration for this episode, Fantastic Voyage (or was it Inner Space?). Of course I'm seeing a few things in this episode that I've seen before. The Doctor's initial encounter with the titular creature is very reminiscent of Nine's meeting in the Season 1 episode Dalek. Once we get inside the Dalek, we see robotic antibodies again, much like in Season 7's Let's Kill Hitler. The sets were nice though. They seemed somehow realistic and delightfully cheap at the same time.

Things play out as you would expect with miniature people running around inside a cybernetic alien killing machine, culminating in a fairly predictable result once their goal is achieved. The Doctor's little mind-meld took a wonderful turn, playing nicely into the "am I a good man?" theme they seem to be setting up for this season, and was hammered home with one line from Rusty.

One thing I didn't really appreciate was being taken out of the story so abruptly just to wave the whole Missy season arc in my face again. It seems they are going to handle it in a similar way to the Madame Kovarian tease from Season 6. I don't recall the Kovarian tease being quite so jarring though. Generally she peered through the hatch during slower parts of the story. Throwing from a tense climax to the "heaven" just felt wrong. Perhaps that was the point. Either way, I think I like my season arc hints a bit more subtle than this.

We see more of a shift in dynamic between The Doctor and Clara this episode too, which is summed up neatly when she refers to herself as his "carer". That was actually pretty funny, but very telling at the same time. Is she bitter about his apparent aging? And now that The Doctor is off the table, they are setting up some kind of clumsy relationship with Clara's co-worker Danny Pink. And what was with all the sexual innuendo around Danny? It made no sense to me.

But why does The Doctor have a hatred of soldiers now? The Brigadier was a soldier, and The Doctor was all set to call on him in A Good Man Goes to War. I sincerely hope they are not setting up some reason why The Doctor can dislike Danny just so he can appear jealous of Clara. If it plays out more paternally, it would be okay, but even paternal feelings for Clara would feel a bit out of place in the face of the detached alien coldness we've had the past two episodes.

Overall it was a thoroughly entertaining episode, and I think it tops most of what we've had for the past few seasons. I wouldn't call it exactly perfect, but certainly close.

Score: 9/10

Doctor Who S8E1

Now *this* is The Doctor I've been waiting for.

**some spoilers ahead**

I'll admit right up front that Peter Capaldi's take on The Doctor is much more to my liking than...let's say the direction the series seemed to have been drifting. More 'ancient alien', less 'fangirl boyfriend material' please.

No slight to Christopher Eccleston, David Tennant, and Matt Smith, who all did fine jobs in their turns, but The Doctor is *centuries old*, and he's an *alien*. Apologies to all the fangirls, but he's not something that is terribly likely to get all weak in the knees over a 20-something girl from Earth.

It's always good to see our Victorian friends in the form of the Paternoster Gang: Madame Vastra, Jenny Flint, and Strax, and there are also once again a few nods to the current popularity of Steampunk. My only small regret is that they didn't leave much new material here for revisiting, which is a shame.

A new minor villain takes up most of the episode and gives The Doctor plenty of room to explore how different this arc is going to be. Combine that with a new major villain with very little screen time, but just enough menace to ensure we keep an eye on events to come, and I think things are definitely on the upswing.

Overall, I enjoyed The Doctor's post-regeneration disconnection this time, as it provides a fine opportunity to deal with the rather large shift that must be happening internally as he adjusts to a completely new cycle of regeneration. The call from Eleven at the end signals that this shift may be (hopefully 'is') something that will span at least a few episodes, if not the whole arc.

Overall, a worthy start to a new arc, and one I'm looking forward to following.

Doctor Who: Deep Breath

The Doctor suffers the usual regeneration confusion in the first episode of Peter Capaldi's run, Deep Breath.

Much like previous regeneration episodes of the New Who, we spend most of the time seeing the doctor getting his head around who he is now. He spends much of the first half of the episode being confused and forgetful. At the same time Clara spends the first half of the episode not knowing how to handle The Doctor's change to an older form.

We touch again on the theme of Companion abandonment, both physical and emotional, as Clara comes to terms with The Doctor's wholesale change and later when he runs off, gets a taste of that "what now" feeling we've seen companions deal with before.

It's made clear fairly early on that there will be no hanky-panky with this Doctor, leading to the final scene in which he makes it emphatically clear that he is not Clara's boyfriend. Early on, Vastra lays it down wonderfully, putting Clara, and by proxy certain segments of the audience, in their place.

For all her protestations, much of Clara's issue with The Doctor's regeneration does seem to relate to physical looks, so that whole scene is quite gratifying in many ways. On the other hand, Clara's implication that she's into older blokes could be a worrying indication that we've not seen the end of the Companion puppy love.

Bringing the Clockwork People back was an odd choice and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I always thought more could have been done with them, but this felt a bit ham-fisted. Why did they need to be from a sister ship? In The Girl In The Fireplace it was established that it was the destruction of the mission computer that caused the maintenance droids to start cannibalising the crew. Are we to believe this happened twice? I'd have rather seen this as the same group of droids that had all come through a time window and become trapped.

The dinosaur was a bit of a nothingness though. It served almost no purpose in furthering the story, apart from a very public immolation. I suppose it did bring the Paternoster Gang there, but I suspect a blue box crashing into the middle of Victorian London would probably have done the same thing.

This episode went to great lengths to show the parallels between The Doctor with his multiple regenerations and the Clockwork Man with the constant replacing of its own parts. The broom analogy was a good one, which coincidentally I had seen used only recently as I read Terry Pratchett's I Shall Wear Midnight. I'm not sure if the silver tray scene was taking this too far or not. I think I liked it though. I do worry that this "who am I" business will become a sub-plot that takes up too much of this season.

There are a few choice innuendos between Vastra and Jenny, but nothing excessively crude. I even chuckled at a few points. Sadly, by involving Clara in these, Vastra and Jenny's relationship is somehow marginalised. The cool thing about Vastra and Jenny's relationship was not that is was a cross-species same-sex one, but that it was seemingly strongly monogamous. By showing that Vastra is into other girls too, really ruins what was a lovely duo.

And finally The Doctor thinks to ask the question he should have done in The Bells of Saint John. Who gave Clara his number? This really is all the tease for the season arc that we need. Unfortunately that's not spoon-feeding us enough, so they elected to have an entire epilogue scene introducing Missy, the Gatekeeper of the Nethersphere. In a far more tragic turn of events, she refers to The Doctor as her boyfriend. Goddamnit!

And I just need to take a second to comment on the new opening credits. Do. Not. Like. There's a hint of something interesting there, but all the cogs and clocks is just a bit too clichéd for me. There's nothing wrong with the good old time vortex with flying names. It's a classic for a reason.

As nice as it was to see Capaldi take on the mantle of The Doctor (and I think he did it well), this episode was just too riddled with issues to score particularly highly from me.

Score: 6/10

Almost Human : Unbound

In the interests of full disclosure, yes a friend of a friend acted in the recent episode “Unbound”. I wish I could say it was the stunning Gina Carano as the XRN, but alas no, I cannot get you an introduction.

 I like this episode for several reasons. First we're seeing the introduction of characters that will take the series beyond the confines of the routine of police cases. Partly because the episodes are apparently being aired out of order (no surprise there, it's on Fox) there doesn't seem to be much going on with regards to the attack that started the series off.

 This episode changes that by introducing two sides to a greater conflict that could engulf our heroes. John Larroquette is on one side as the creator of the DRN and XRN androids, and Leon Hanson on the other as a former political opponent whose actions led to the DRNs being removed from service...but despite their character's initial introductions, I'm reserving judgement as to who is on which side. I think the writers are leaving just enough up in the air that it could go either way. Is Dr. Vaughn plotting bad things with his androids, or is he just misunderstood? Is Councilman Hart an innocent victim doing the right thing, or is there more going on that we'll find out later? These are the stories that can take the series forward.

 The other reason I enjoyed this episode more than some of the others was the introduction of a suitable foil for Dorian's capabilities. Heroes are only as good as the challenges they face, so it's nice to see other advanced androids that go beyond the sterile MX drones. I get that they serve their purpose, but the bad guys need to be formidable and believable for our heroes to have something to overcome, otherwise we stop caring about them. The XRN serves that role nicely, so I'm hoping that they find a way to bring the character back. After all, the episode starts off with her coming back from the 'dead'. More ass-kickery please.

 The possibility that our heroes will end up caught between three major factions, some of whom aren't clearly 'good' or 'bad' yet leaves plenty of story opportunities for the foreseeable future. So I'm impressed with the buildup and I'm still watching and waiting for more action and story development. I keep looking for news that Almost Human has been extended for more episodes, and with that, I'm off to catch up on the latest episode, Beholder.

Zenescope’s Grimm Fairy Tales: The Animated Series

If I were to tell you that a powerful and massively famous independent comic book series was partnering with one of the directors from Metalocalypse and The Venture Bros. to make a similarly styled animated series, you probably would be pretty stoked for it. If I then told you that the series would pull no punches when it came to  adult content—read: violence, nudity, and sex—and push the boundaries of even a TV-M rating, my guess is this would only serve to bolster your enthusiasm. And finally, I would tell you that the series would star Lena Headey, of Game of Thrones and 300 fame, as the main character’s voice, well I hardly believe you would be able to resist the urge to kiss me or call me a liar.

Zenescope Entertainment, an independent comic book company that started in 2005 out of Philadelphia, successfully funded a Kickstarter crowdfunder to pilot the creation of an animated series based on their popular, long-running Grimm Fairy Tales series. The project reached its goal in May of 2012. The pilot episode is currently being screened at certain venues around the country. One such venue was Amazing Arizona Comicon in January 2014. I was able to take in the screening there.

Like you, I was excited about the idea of Grimm Fairy Tales: The Animated Series for all of the reasons listed above. And I was sorely disappointed.

In short, the pilot episode was just not very good. The comic did not translate well over to an animated format. As advertised, the animated series was just as crude as the comic. The breasts are comically humungous, the sexual exploitation of “innocent” teenagers is a constant undertone throughout, and the violence is right up there with an episode of Metalocalypse. However, unlike with the saga of Dethklok which has a mysterious mythos underneath the violence and sex, the plot of Grimm Fairy Tales is hollow. The story feels more like a necessary evil in order to show the graphic violence and make sexual innuendo.

It could be that I’m wrong and that there is an audience out there for such a show. But I believe that the world has moved beyond flimsy storytelling for the sake of animated nipples poking through impossibly low-cut tops. Sex and violence is more than fine in an Adult Swim show (obviously!), but there has to be more substance with it. It is my hope that Zenescope and director Jon Schnepp make a few adjustments to the pilot and build a better show. After all, the dessert tastes best after a hearty, substantial main course. 

Top 20 Shows of 2013: #10-1

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Top 20 Shows of 2013: #20-11

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The Blacklist

So let’s get this out of the way first: The Blacklist is a good show based off an entirely uncreative premise. We’ve got a super smart criminal that purposefully gets himself caught and then starts assisting the FBI in catching a bunch of other “most wanted”s. He also enjoys the finer things in life such as fine dining and five star hotels and talking down to everyone else. The premise is so uncreative that I may purposefully neglect to use James Spader’s character’s actual name (Reddington) and instead just call him Fauxnibal.

Now that we’ve done a good job at pooing on top of The Blacklist’s head, the truth is that the show is actually fantastic once it gets going. And it’s fantastic mostly because of the way Spader portrays Reddington/Fauxnibal. James Spader was the first thing that got me interested in the show. I always knew that he was a celebrated actor, but I could not have told you one memorable role he had played in prior to his brilliant stint on The Office. But he did such a great job as Robert California that he totally stole the show, even from Rainn Wilson. TV career, thereby, cemented.

The way that Spader plays his character in The Blacklist is not terribly different from Anthony Hopkins’s Hannibal Lector, Kevin Spacey’s John Doe in Seven, and even Michael Emerson’s Ben Linus in LOST. In fact, it is something of an amalgamation of them all. But rather than coming off as empty or cliché, Spader is super creepy, charming, and believable. There are few outside of Spader that could have made this show as enjoyable as it is.

But he is not the one and only great thing about The Blacklist. I am fan of mystery when it is done correctly (See: The first three seasons of LOST); (See also: the exact opposite of the last three seasons of LOST). And The Blacklist does mystery very well. Fauxnibal’s motives are not at all clear. Who the real villains are is up in the air. Is there some sort of parentage between Fauxnibal and the lead female character, Elizabeth Keen? What’s up with Elizabeth’s husband? The audience knows that there is definitely more than meets the eye with these characters, but we know little else than that.

The Blacklist is about half way through its inaugural season and is currently taking a winter break. The series returns with new episodes on NBC on January 13^th. Sadly, it’s not yet on Netflix, but I would imagine season one will get there once/if season two begins. In the meantime, I advise you scour your OnDemand, Hulu, and Amazon Prime resources to get caught up if you missed The Blacklist so far. It’s definitely worth your time and it is not a show you can comfortably jump into the middle of. I, personally, will be watching the rest of season one with rapt interest to see how good the payoff on these mysteries will be.