Game of Thrones Season 3, Episode 8: Second Sons

In a society that adheres to strict succession of property and titles through the male line, being a lord’s second son is not a good position to be in.  Your older brother will inherit your family lands and titles and will receive more appealing betrothal offers simply because he had the good fortune of being born first.  Fate gives second sons a bum hand, so men in that position must shape their own destinies.

And yet, of the many second sons we see in this episode, only two are actively shaping their own destiny, and of those two, one has only started doing so recently.  That one is Sandor Clegane, who used to act as Joffrey’s guard dog.  Until the Battle of the Blackwater, he did what he was told, killing whomever the crown told him to kill without question.  He never made his own choices, never had his own ambitions.  But now he is free to do what he wants and be the man he wants to be.  He is still not a good man, openly stating that he will do the right thing for the wrong reasons.  But he is a better man than many in Westeros (which is a sad fact indeed).

The other second son who forges his own path is Daario Naharis, a captain (or possibly just a leftenant) in the sellsword army known as the Second Sons.  As explained in the books, the Second Sons were started by a group of second sons hoping to make their fortune.  Knowing that they would never inherit the family fortune, they set out to earn what fate had denied them, and built a reputable company of warriors (or as reputable as a group of mercenaries can be).  Daario is a particularly interesting case; whereas most people on this show feel bound by duty, even people who are second sons, Daario does what he wants when he wants to.  Tyrion is going through with a marriage he has no interest in and Stannis is fighting for a throne he doesn’t want because “they have no choice.”  But Daario is never without a choice.  When told that he must kill Dany or die, he takes a third option, killing his comrades.  Duty, honor, and loyalty mean nothing to Daario.  All that matters is what he wants.

Let’s look at the other two second sons this episode focused on: Tyrion Lannister and Stannis Baratheon.  First up, how great was Peter Dinklage tonight?  From his tongue-tied attempt to put Sansa at ease to his drunken barbs to his father, to his threat to the psychopathic king, every minute of Dinklage’s performance was stunning.  Unfortunately, I can’t say the same of Stephen Dillane.  Stannis Baratheon in the books starts out as an unlikeable character who thinks things should go his way because he believes that they should.  This viewpoint doesn’t change, but Martin slowly alters our perspective of him by revealing that although Stannis is a slave to duty, that doesn’t mean he likesit.  Stannis believes in the rule of law to a fault, and if the law says something is so, then it is so, whether he likes it or not.  Stannis in the book does not want to be king, but he knows that the laws of Westeros, as well as destiny, have made it so.  With Robert leaving no issue, he is next in line, and although he does not want to be king, he has no choice.  Dillane says as much, and Davos tells him (for the purpose of telling the audience) about these qualities, but Dillane does not play Stannis as a man burdened by destiny and duty.  He plays Stannis with a smirk that suggests that he is pleased by the turn of events that made him next in line for the Iron Throne.  Either way, Stannis is a second son who is content to let destiny dictate his life, something he admits to this episode (basically stating that it is not our place to question destiny).  But the book portrayal makes him much more sympathetic.

Tyrion, meanwhile, tries to rebel against destiny, tries to avoid his duty.  Or at least he says he does.  As I pointed out in a previous review, Tyrion does have a choice.  He and Shae could run away to Essos and live the lives they want to.  But Tyrion chooses to stay, citing the fact that his place is in Westeros.  So he does everything he can to mitigate the awful fate that is given to him; he tries to put Sansa at ease about the marriage that neither of them wants, he (drunkenly) reminds Tywin that he is not so easily manipulated, and he stands up to Joffrey.  But at the end of the day, he still allows others to dictate the course of his life.  His intelligence could earn him a great life in Essos, but instead, he chooses not to forge his own path, but to remain bound by a duty to a family he despises.  Daario’s devotion to only himself makes him dangerous and unpredictable, but when compared to how Stannis and Tyrion live their lives, it does not look like the wrong choice.

Random Thoughts

·         Thank you, Cersei, for obviating the need for me to explain the song “The Rains of Castamere” to non-readers.  I was all set to open the next review (episode title: “The Rains of Castamere”) with the story of House Reyne’s demise.

·         Braavos is once again tied to death.  When Daario and the other Second Sons captains try to decide who should assassinate Daenerys, they draw coins, each one from a different city.  Whoever draws the Braavosi coin will kill Dany.  When Daario draws it, he says “valar morghulis,” all men must die.  Unfortunately for the other two captains, Dany is not a man.

·         Is it just me, or are the sex scenes getting more intense?  This week’s Melisandre/Gendry scene and last week’s Theon three-way would not have looked out of place in a porn film, but  for the lack of on-screen penis.

·         I also have to give props to Sophie Turner, who does so much to make Sansa into a great character.  Unlike many, I like Sansa in the books (starting in book 2; she was a bit grating on my first read of book 1 before I realized what Martin was really going for), but Turner adds a level of pathos not present on the page.

·         Olenna Tyrell points out how incestuous the powerful families of Westeros become due to limited marriage pools.  Siblings Loras and Margeary Tyrell are planning on marrying an mother and son, respectively, turning Loras into Margeary’s stepfather.

One Woman’s Trash, Or: More Thoughts About Girls And Lena Dunham

I’ve been thinking a lot about this week’s episode of Girls.  The episode itself was very good; Hannah being out of her element in the “dream home” of a(n initially) kind and adoring stranger allowed for a great contained character arc as she started out unsure of herself, gained confidence in who she was and what she was doing there, then finally dropped her armor.  But, as seems to be required for any episode of Girls, the reaction to “One Man’s Trash” has been just as intriguing.

Yesterday, I posted a Jezebel article examining how numerous online articles reviewing the episode got hung up on the idea that Lena Dunham, a woman who is not “conventionally attractive,” could hook up with the conventionally attractive Patrick Wilson.  I have said in the past that there are legitimate criticisms that one could make toward Girls, but I really don’t see how this is one of them.  Tracie Egan Morrissey, writer of the Jezebel article, did a great job of calling out the other writers’ sexism and objectification.  In particular, she pointed out that many of the same people who complained that the first season of the show lacked people of color are assigning value to women based on how they look.

After posting the article, I felt that I had said my piece on the subject by bringing attention to someone else’s well-written thoughts.  And then I realized I had to say more.  A friend of mine, currently my best and closest friend, replied to my Facebook post of the article.  She had this to say:

I started thinking about all the media in which we are just supposed to accept that overweight, slobby man children can not only get attractive women to have sex with them, they get them to marry them and raise kids with them.  And it’s not like this is an uncommented upon cliche.  There is a TV Tropes page dedicated to it, labeled “Ugly Guy, Hot Wife.”  The one-sheet poster for the film Knocked Up (which was directed by Girls executive producer Judd Apatow) directly addressed this idea, asking women how they would feel if the not-conventionally-attractive Seth Rogen became the father of their child:

Hell, even the Slate article (written in a conversation format by two guys) mentioned in the Jezebel piece addresses this.  After the first author states that he could not buy the Hannah/Joshua pairing because they were so “clearly mismatched - in style, in looks, in manners, in age, in everything,” the other author claimed that he “wanted to suspend [his] disbelief,” the way he has done for multiple unlikely pairings in the past.  (Emphasis in original.)  He gave the following examples of mismatched couples: Al and Peggy Bundy; Homer and Marge Simpson; Jim Belushi and the actress who played his wife on According to Jim.  Notice how all these pairings are of the ugly guy, hot wife variety?  What allows him to suspend his disbelief for them, but not attractive Joshua and not-conventionally-beautiful Hannah?  (By the way, as I wrote yesterday, I still don’t understand all the attacks on Dunham’s looks; she is by no means a model, but I personally find her very easy on the eyes.)

The Slate authors try to answer that question, but the answer falls flat.  One author states that the reason he can’t buy Hannah and Joshua together is because Hannah was “especially and assertively ugly” in the episode, and lists examples of her being ungraceful (playing naked ping pong), rude (asking about why Joshua’s wife left him), and selfish (asking Joshua to make her orgasm first).  Leaving aside the excellent points made by Morrissey in the Jezebel piece, they make these complaints the very sentence after conceding that “[n]arcissistic, childish men sleep with beautiful women all the time in movies and on TV.”  How are narcissism and childishness any less “especially and aggressively ugly” than the qualities they mentioned in Hannah?

Even beyond the realm of film and television, how often do we accept pairs that are “clearly mismatched - in style, in looks, in manners, in age, in everything”?  We have a term called “trophy wife” to refer to young, attractive women who marry older men.  Just look at pictures of a certain real estate tycoon/reality show host/clown who shall remain nameless and the women he marries.  Could there be a greater divide between style, looks, manners, and age than between him, who John Mulaney once described as a hobo’s vision of what a billionaire should look like, and the models he marries?

The other two articles each posited that the majority of the episode was just a dream.  This brings me back to something I said near the beginning; in the traditional ugly guy, hot wife examples, not only have the unattractive men convinced the beautiful women to sleep with them, they also convinced the women to marry them.  Let’s think about the Girls episode for a second.  Were we ever supposed to believe that Joshua saw Hannah as a long-term love interest?  He was kind and welcoming to Hannah, but did he really go above and beyond what basic respect dictates?  He thought Hannah was cute enough and interesting enough to have a fling with, and once she dropped her armor and let some of her raw self show, he lost all interest.  At that point, he even did act below the standard level of respect by leaving her behind without a word and acting put off and afraid of her complete self.  Is that really what Hannah would fantasize?  Meanwhile, we unquestioningly accept that Cheryl David remains committed to Larry David through much of Curb Your Enthusiasm, despite him looking kind of like a frog and being among the most socially maladjusted man ever.  Or what about Al and Peggy Bundy?  Peggy stays with Al even though he can barely provide for her and chairs a group committed to misogyny.  And then there are Homer and Marge Simpson.  Homer treats Marge as both wife and mother.  When pressed to come up with what he can offer her that no one else can, he proudly responds “complete and utter dependence.”

Looking back now at all these works, I must say that the Hannah/Joshua pairing is much more realistic than anything mentioned above.

The Legend of Korra Book 1, Episode 9: Out of the Past

“The question becomes now, who is the bigger threat?”  That’s how I ended last week’s review, wondering whether Tarrlok or Amon would ultimately become the main villain of the season.  One week later, we have our answer.  For all of Tarrlok’s scheming and danger, Amon is the biggest threat to Republic City.  Which, when looking at what we know about the two of them, is saying a lot.

Korra spends most of this episode out of commission, locked in a metal box in an out of the way cabin.  The opening scene of Tenzin bloodbending Korra into the box is straight out of a horror movie.  The low angle of the shot of the stairs, the shadow slowly moving down, and the exaggerated creaking sounds create a foreboding atmosphere, and the image of the levitating Korra, clearly in pain, drives home the terror.  Even in Aang’s time, bloodbending has been a crime for decades, and it’s not hard to figure out why.  Bloodbending is one of the most terrifying things imaginable.  Being unable to control your own actions and being forced to do the will of someone else is powerlessness in its purest form.  Both Tarrlok and Yakone used the skill to impose their will on others and achieve their own goals.  But whereas Yakone knew that he was a criminal and tried to “rule” Republic City as a crime boss, Tarrlok chose to go the “legitimate” route and rise through the ranks of the city’s government positions.  He wanted to achieve power by helping* the city, and whereas Yakone’s use of bloodbending was just part of his criminal activities, it would appear that Tarrlok used it as a last resort whenever people got in the way of his plans.  But his plans still involve taking over the city.

And that’s why it’s so interesting that Amon is the greater threat to the city than Tarrlok.  Amon’s goal is itself pretty noble – ending oppression of non-benders in Republic City – but he goes about it in a horrifying manner.  Meanwhile, neither Tarrlok’s goal nor his methods are noble.  He wants power, and he’ll achieve it by hoodwinking and bloodbending the citizens of Republic City.  Tarrlok needs to be stopped.  Amon himself needs to be stopped, but his followers need to be reasoned with.  So when Amon confronts Tarrlok and is able to resist bloodbending, it’s clear that he is so much more than he appears to be.  Who is this man who can energybend and resist bloodbending, who can outmaneuver master benders?

This episode also drives forward Korra’s story of becoming a full-fledged Avatar.  With nothing else to do in her prison, she finally taps into her past lives and sees Aang, Toph, and Sokka (who is a council member!) deal with Yakone.  She also is learning the value of strategies aside from “attack head-on.”  She formulates a plan to avoid being electrocuted by the Lieutenant, and she wisely avoids a fight with Amon, knowing that she couldn’t win while outnumbered and not at full strength.  Her allies also get a chance to show their potential when Lin breaks Mako, Bolin, and Asami out of prison.  Along with Tenzin, they break into an Equalist base looking for Korra and ably hold their own against the entire movement.  Tenzin and Lin have shown their fighting skills before, but it’s always great to see just how powerful airbending can be.

As the season draws to a close, things look pretty dire for Team Avatar, though.  The Equalists are a substantial threat, and each week only shows that they will be more difficult to beat than our heroes had previously thought.  And Team Avatar looks like it could suffer some in-fighting, as Asami is none too pleased to see Mako react to the news that Korra is missing or that the two of them kissed once (after Mako and Asami began dating).

*I hate to do this, because complaining about what didn’t happen is fairly pointless, especially when there is so much to praise about what did happen.  But my reaction to Tarrlok’s arc was strong enough that I feel I need to address it.  I know that this show isn’t The Wire and that it is written with the intent that children can watch it.  But so far, it has been a very smart and dense show with layered characters.  It still is, but I feel that Tarrlok ended up as too much of a complete monster and not enough of a well-intentioned extremist.  He would always have shades of complete monster, due to his use of bloodbending, but the desire to save Republic City by any means necessary would push him toward well-intentioned extremist.  A legitimate desire to save the population from the dangerous Amon is noble, and is shared by Korra, Tenzin, and the rest of Team Avatar, but the use of bloodbending would take him too far.  Instead, he only wanted to save Republic City so that he could rule it and follow in his father Yakone’s footsteps.  Had he repudiated his father’s desire to rule through fear while still using the same tactic his father used would have made for a more interesting political villain.  But I digress.

Random Thoughts

·         Shouldn’t the season of the year be autumn?  This is the Air book, and the element of air corresponds with the season of autumn in the Avatar universe.  In Avatar: The Last Airbender, each book’s element corresponded to its season (water = winter, earth = spring, fire = summer).

·         Who was the Air Nomad on the council during Yakone’s trial?

·         There must be a better way to describe the act of removing one’s bending ability than “took your bending,” right?

·         Lin doesn’t seem to have done much “outside the law” work; she’s still sore and doesn’t mention doing anything.  As I said before, imagine what this show could do with a longer season.

·         We still don’t know how Yakone and Tarrlok can bloodbend without the full moon.  But this was Yakone’s defense at trial, so we’ll probably learn something about the family.

·         Speaking of bloodbending, upon learning that Tarrlok can bloodbend without the full moon, WHY DIDN’T TENZIN, LIN, AND THE POLICE IMMEDIATELY TRY TO SUBDUE HIM??

·         The Equalists’ tunnel system is pretty spacious and advanced, complete with trams and hidden doors.

·         Judge Sokka spin-off, please!

·         I’m still looking for suggestions for a season 1 retrospective.

Game of Thrones Season 2, Episode 7: A Man Without Honor

This episode of Game of Thrones is titled “A Man Without Honor.”  Toward the end of the episode, Catelyn Stark uses that phrase to describe Jaime Lannister, the Kingslayer.  But really, it could apply to nearly every character that appears on-screen tonight, and even some that don’t.  Certainly Theon Greyjoy, Xaro Xoan Daxos, Pyat Pree, the Clegane brothers, and Tywin Lannister all fit the bill.  But to paraphrase Sandor Clegane, many people will thank these honorless men for the horrific things they do.  In wars, someone has to do the dirty work, and as much as noble people like Robb Stark or Brienne of Tarth don’t want to believe it, that is how wars are won.

If Game of Thrones in general and this episode in particular have taught us anything, it’s that “honor” is subjective and not necessarily a valuable trait (at least not in a crapsack world like Westeros).  It’s no coincidence that Jaime Lannister brings up Ned Stark, the man who defined himself by his unbreakable sense of honor, in his verbal sparring match with Catelyn.  The two are brought together after Jaime nearly escapes his cell at Robb Stark’s basecamp.  Throughout the season, Robb has used Alton Lannister, one of Jaime’s cousins as an envoy to King’s Landing in an effort to broker peace. Now that Alton has returned, Robb sends him back to a cell, where he and Jaime bond a little bit.  Alton tells of his great respect for Jaime, and he is likely one of the few people in Westeros who is able to separate Jaime from the “Kingslayer” persona that everyone else gives him.  Jaime responds by telling of his time squiring for Ser Barristan Selmy, another highly respected warrior (who Cersei and Joffrey foolishly dismissed from the Kingsguard last year).  The sweet moment of bonding is brought to a disturbing end when Jaime savagely kills his cousin in order to create an opportunity for escape.  Jaime’s only concern is for his own life, and anyone else’s can be forfeited in order to ensure that his continues.  Not at all an honorable viewpoint, but in many ways a pragmatic one.  Furthermore, Jaime recognizes that “honor” is a bit of a fallacy.  When Cat angrily calls him “Kingslayer” and accuses him of breaking every vow he ever took, Jaime hisses back that Aerys was absolutely mad and repeatedly took the lives of innocent citizens, and further stated that sometimes vows will conflict, and there may be a higher moral calling than blindly following every oath you made.

Other Lannisters and Lannister bannermen have similar views on honor as Jaime.  The brothers Clegane are no stranger to dirty work, and Sandor proves that there’s nothing so heroic that he can’t undermine by providing a dishonorable means for doing so.  His response to Sansa’s thanks for saving her last week are met with a gruff response that he only did it because he likes killing.  He sees his place in the world as nothing but a lackey who does the dirty work for those in power, and he accepts it because he enjoys the rush of combat.  He does what needs to be done so that kings needn’t get their hands dirty, and he doesn’t begrudge them for it.  He responds to Sansa’s disgust by telling her that someday she’ll thank him for his dark services, when she is queen and needs a rebellion quashed or a protestor silenced.  Meanwhile in Harrenhal, his brother Gregor is told by Lord Tywin to burn the villages of commoners loyal to the Starks and the Tullys.  Gregor reveals that a group of outlaws known as the Brotherhood Without Banners have been causing trouble for the Lannister forces and that many of the commoners have come to see them as noble figures.  Tywin knows that such thoughts undermine the government’s power and that the group needs to be stopped, lest the Lannisters lose the war.  Killing civilians who support the other side or romanticize outlaws without themselves breaking any laws would most likely be classified as a war crime if such a thing existed in Westeros.  But Tywin would rather be feared than loved and knows that honor won’t win wars.  In war, people die, and eliminating those that defy him before they take up arms is the best course of action.

In Winterfell, Theon continues his attempt to be taken seriously, and continues to fail at every turn.  Each succeeding failure only serves to make him more desperate and more willing to be cruel and violent.  He knows (thinks?) that he needs to have the respect of the Iron Men in order to hold Winterfell, never once considering that an angry populace will create its own problems.  The only way he will get the respect of the Iron Men is to be cruel to those who defy him, even if it means going against all logic and sense.  The lives of Bran and Rickon Stark are extremely valuable to him if he hopes to hold Winterfell, but he says that he’ll kill them if doing so is the only way to keep the loyalty of his countrymen.  For Theon, the idea of honor never enters his mind.  All he can think about his proving that he is not weak.  What he doesn’t realize is that there are many kinds of weakness, and the power to take the lives of those who defy him doesn’t make him strong.  Acting out of desperation, even if that means doing horrific things, underscores just how weak he truly is.

Does honor have any virtues at all?  Robb and Jon certainly think so, and it aids them to different degrees.  Robb continues to treat his prisoners well and ensures that everyone gets medical attention.  So far this season, his men have respected him much more than the commoners of Kings Landing respect Joffrey or the Iron Islanders respect Theon.  But things may quickly change.  During Jaime’s escape attempt, the son of Lord Karstark, a Stark bannerman, is killed, leading the Lord to demand the right to kill Jaime.  Cat won’t let him, knowing that doing so would be dishonorable (Jaime is an unarmed prionser) and that Jaime is very valuable alive.  This doesn’t sit well with many of Robb’s men, and could spark an uprising.  North of the Wall, Jon tries to explain the iron code of honor followed by the Night’s Watch to Ygritte, who scoffs at every sentence.  To her, the rules Jon finds himself bound by are foolish and do nothing but keep him prisoner.  She extolls the virtues of freedom, of being able to choose to be with whoever you want and to choose your own leader.  Honor isn’t abiding by silly codes because a king or a lord says so.  And honor isn’t fighting your own kind simply because they live on the wrong side of some large Wall.  But Jon won’t hear any of it.  He has lived his entire life believing that honor is one thing, and won’t entertain any thought that says otherwise.

Finally, honor, or the lack thereof, nearly drowns Daenarys this week when she sees just how far some people will go to attain power for themselves, even if it means using her as a pawn.  Her presence in Qarth provided an opportunity to Xaro Xoan Daxos and Pyat Pree, who set in motion a sequence of events to put themselves at the top of the Qarth government.  Her whole life, she has been little more than a pawn; Viserys sold her to Drogo to get an army, Jorah used her as a bargaining chip to return to Westeros (although she doesn’t know this and he did not act upon it once he got it), and now her dragons allowed the man she thought was looking out for her in Qarth to enact a bloody coup.  What is all of this teaching her about leadership, and how will the rest of the world fare when this woman scorned is lord and master of a trio of dangerous dragons?

Random Thoughts:

·         Tywin’s scenes with Arya continue to be incredible.  The two of them need to have some kind of meetup with Roger Sterling and Sally Draper.  And in said meetup, Sally may or may not be an airbender.

·         Speaking of Tywin, his lecture about the history of Harrenhal and how the Targaryens “changed the rules” was fantastic, and another example of why “honor” is incompatible with warfare.  Attacking a fortress with dragons probably wasn’t the honorable move, but damn was it effective.

·         Thirdly, Arya makes a point of reminding Tywin that Aegon I Targaryen didn’t act alone; he had his two sisters with him.  In Westeros, behind every great man are very shrewd women.

·         Because the show doesn’t give characters inner monologue, Theon can’t reveal the truth about Bran and Rickon.  I theorized in the podcast that the final scene of the season will be a surprise reveal, unlike in the books.

·         You’d think that a group of men who regularly scout a snowy wasteland would realize that wearing black isn’t the best of ideas.

·         Jaime and Brienne meet for the first time, foreshadowing one of the books’ best relationships.

·         “What was the name of that bastard he fathered?”  “Brienne.”  “No, that wasn’t it.

Cowboy Bebop Session 7: Heavy Metal Queen

The world of Cowboy Bebop isn’t just criminals and bounty hunters.  Most of what we have seen so far has shown us just enough of the rest of the solar system so that we know it exists.  People eat in restaurants, gamble in casinos, and attend the opera.  But most of these settings exist to provide a cool, noirish or western background for our heroes to chase their prey.  With very few exceptions, all POV is from the Bebop crew or the criminals they are chasing.  One thing “Heavy Metal Queens” does very well is to give POV scenes to an interplanetary trucker, known only as VT.  Through her, we see a completely different industry: shipping.

Of course other institutions still exist in 2071.  But we’ve never seen any up close before.  That’s probably because, aside from the trucks now being interplanetary spaceships, not much has changed in the shipping industry.  Truckers communicate via CB radio using call signs (VT’s being “Heavy Metal Queen”) and eat at greasy spoon diners.  And while stereotypes about groups of people exist, everyone still has their own personality, which is shown through images of different truckers’ cabs.  Each one decorates it differently, with one covering all the walls with porn, and another with stuffed animals.  Decker, this week’s bounty head, is a trucker who painted his rig with an image of Saraswati.

Speaking of stereotypes of groups, VT believes in some negative ones about bounty hunters, many of which are confirmed at a scene in a truck stop.  She walks past a group of bounty hunters in sombreros and ponchos, talking about some famous bounty hunter.  This group follow her in and begin harassing a waitress.  As evidence of just how much of a crapsack world the Bebop characters inhabit is, the bounty hunters actually commit battery against the poor waitress, pulling her into their laps, and the only person who does anything about it is VT.  As far as we know, no one, not even the waitress’ coworkers, call the police.  If the bounty hunters are doing the jobs of the police, tracking down criminals, what happens when they get out of hand?

VT holds her own in the fight, but one against three is a hard ratio against which to maintain the upper hand.  Fortunately, she gets help from a hungover Spike after one of the rambunctious bounty hunters causes him to drop an egg yolk in his lap.  (He was going to make a mixed drink out of the yolk to cure his hangover.)

Spike was in the diner hunting for Decker, but was not doing well.  In addition to his hangover, the information the Bebop crew received turned out to be paltry.  All they knew was that he was in the area and he has a dragon tattoo.  Faye scopes out a nearby kiddie ice cream parlor, and has finally become part of the team.  There are still some kinks the team needs to work out (she says at one point that she has first dibs on Decker, and Jet still complains about her whining, but Spike refers to Faye as his friend and when Faye calls in to Jet with information about Decker, he is not unhappy to hear from her).  Faye also uses her femininity to lure in the man she believes to be Decker; I guess the guys finally realized that Faye can bring things to the hunt that they can’t.  As it turns out though, the big muscly guy she suspects to be her target is just a red herring; the real Decker is a scrawny, nervous, Woody Allen lookalike who overhears Faye’s plans to capture Decker.  Faye realizes her mistakes and ID’s Decker, but not before he can escape and toss a powerful explosive at the Redtail, preventing Faye from pursuing.

Spike and VT get along well, bonding over fighting off the bounty hunters and “prairie oysters,” the egg yolk counter-hangover drink.  VT says that she only ever knew one other person who drank them, her late husband.  Unfortunately, their bonding is cut short when Faye calls in to say she found Decker.  Unfortunately, the other bounty hunters vandalized Swordfish, disabling it, forcing both Spike and Faye to hitch a ride with VT.  When they get back to the Bebop, Jet grumbles that Spike and Faye wrecked both ships on the same day and expect him to repair them.  Earlier, he tried to assuage Ein’s whining about only getting bean sprouts for dinner, first telling him that bean sprouts are healthy before conceding that they are all the crew can afford.  This week marks the seventh consecutive week without turning in a bounty head, so it’s a wonder how they can still afford food and parts with which to repair the Bebop and the three smaller ships.  I think we are meant to assume that the adventures we don’t see are more successful, but even so, the crew is not doing too well.

Fortunately, they get a second chance at Decker when a trucker puts out a bulletin on a space truck with the image of Saraswati on it; Decker was in such a hurry that he cut off another trucker, nearly causing an accident.  VT overhears this and realizes it is Decker, after overhearing Faye telling Spike about him.  VT tracks down Decker and calls the Bebop, offering them the opportunity to capture him.

This sets up a great climax that shows us just how brave/crazy Spike can be.  Decker flees into a mining asteroid and tries to get rid of his pursuers by releasing explosives to close off the shaft.  He succeeds, but also kills himself in the process.  Spike, Faye, and VT decide to use another explosive to reopen the shaft, but they have no way of positioning it without sacrificing one of themselves.  Spike decides to program part of Swordfish to fly toward the end of the shaft with an explosive in it, but in order to get out alive, he has to jump from his ship to VT’s without a suit.  At this point, the rule of cool takes over; it’s certainly awesome to see him risk his life in open space unprotected and use his pistol to propel himself in the right direction.  It’s just a tad unbelievable, but the visuals more than make up for it.

We don’t learn much about the character’s pasts here, but the episode does a good job fleshing out the world and updating us on the team dynamic.  It also shows us that Spike, Jet, and Faye are different from many other bounty hunters in the world.  They may see other humans as price tags, in the words of VT, but they have an honor about them that not all bounty hunters possess, and VT accepts that Spike is in fact a good person.

Up next: Music box music plays as Jet explains that sometimes he does the preview alone.  He introduces himself and gives his age – 36 – and says that not everyone thinks he looks 36.  But not everything is as it seems.  The next episode will embody that idea, and will be a different kind of story, but one worth telling…

Cowboy Bebop Session 2: Stray Dog Strut

Coming off a pretty strong pilot episode, Cowboy Bebop gives us a weaker second episode.  It isn’t bad, but it suffers from a story that doesn’t feel complete and one of my least favorite storytelling techniques: the “as-you-know” exposition info-dump.  Still, we learn a little more about Spike and Jet, a new character joins the crew, Big Shot: For Bounty Hunters is introduced, and the music remains great.

Let’s start with a good use of exposition: Big Shot, the delightfully low-budget bounty hunter TV show.  Last week, Spike and Jet got their information from an internet database (I currently do not recall the word for “internet” in the Bebop universe).  This week, bounty head Abdul Hakim (worth 8 million wulongs) appeared both on the database and on a cheesy TV show named Big Shot: For Bounty Hunters.  Big Shot is kind of like America’s Most Wanted, in that it gives viewers information about fugitives.  Unlike AMW, which advocates calling the authorities with tips about featured fugitives, Big Shot gives out the information for the purpose of helping viewers capture the criminals and collect the bounty.  It is hosted by Punch and Judy, two over-the-top stereotypes masquerading as people.  Punch uses a hilariously exaggerated Texas/Mexican accent and plays the smart partner to Judy’s ditzy blond, who always wears an open jacket without a shirt or bra.  Cowboy Bebop uses Big Shot to set up the bad-guy-of-the-week, informing the crew, and the viewer by extension, of what kind of criminal they will be hunting.  The sole purpose of the show is to reveal details that probably would remain unknown without some kind of third party, such as the database or an informant.  Spike and Jet would never know that Hakim was a “serial pet thief” unless someone was to tell them, because Hakim himself isn’t too likely to do so.  Some episodes, like “Asteroid Blues,” simply give us Spike and Jet reading this information.  “Stray Dog Strut” uses an informant and Big Shot, which are much more entertaining methods of storytelling.

Speaking of informants, this episode reveals that Spike and Jet have some network of friends and contacts who advise them on whereabouts and physical descriptions of bounty heads… usually for a price.  Here, the Bebop crew has the fortune of being on good terms with a doctor who performed plastic surgery on Hakim to help him evade the law and the bounty hunters.  After a call from him, Spike and Jet are on the trail of serial pet thief Hakim.

Like the villain of the last episode, the bounty head of “Stray Dog Strut” is introduced as an unstoppable force.  Physically modeled after Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Hakim is a sinewy giant, barely able to fit in the world around him.  When we first see him, he takes out three men with guns aimed at him, despite being unarmed himself.  And unlike Asimov, who relied on a drug to help achieve his superhuman feats, Hakim gives out drug-free beatings.  What a seemingly unstoppable force is doing as a serial pet thief is beyond me.  Surely the people in charge of all the gangsters we saw running around last week would want someone like him fighting for them.  It’s true that the pet he stole in this episode, which led to the 8 million wulong bounty, is very valuable, but I just don’t see how a man of his talents never got into a more lucrative field of criminal enterprises.

Another thing about this episode that doesn’t quite work is why the dog Hakim stole, later named Ein, is so valuable.  We know that he is something called a “data dog” that cost a lab millions of wulongs to develop.  We know this because of some very clunky dialogue from the scientists tracking Ein and from a rushed explanation on Big Shot that doesn’t tell us anything new.  What we don’t know is what makes a data dog so valuable.  Ein does show some heightened intelligence throughout the series, but it’s never anything more than how dogs are often portrayed on television.  (See: Frasier, Spaced.)  Supposedly, we get a little more information about what makes Ein special in the manga based on the series, but I have not read the manga and thus cannot comment.  (Web personality Mr. Plinkett has commented on the idea of essential information only being available in tie-ins, a concept he and I both dislike.  Check it out here.  The specific line is around the 15:45 mark in Part 1, but the whole thing is worth watching.)

Strangely, in an episode in which not enough is explained, the biggest problem is the awful use of exposition by the scientists.  In their first two scenes, we see them driving around a large van looking for Ein, as one scientist tells things to his partner for no one’s benefit but the audience’s.  It’s clear that the other scientist knows how much money went into developing Ein because he was there.  Also, it’s likely that he knows just how much trouble they’ll get in if the police catch Ein, because we later learn that the scientists were operating out of an illegal research facility.  This is an example of “as you know” exposition, when a character tells another character something he or she already knows, often preceded by the phrase “as you know.”  Because the listener already knows the information, there is no reason for the speaker to be saying it aside from filling in the audience.  Obviously, this is not good writing.

The scientists also suffer from poor line readings.  The voice work is relatively weak in the first few episodes, but shows a marked improvement around “Ballad of Fallen Angels.”  Unfortunately, this can briefly take one out of the episode.  The worst example in this episode is a scene in a weapons shop.  Spike is trying to get information on Hakim from the owner, who responds by attempting to extort Spike.  Instead of paying the guy off, Spike picks up a pair of nunchaku and comments on the design.  The owner then gives up the information, and his line reading makes it seem like he was so impressed by Spike’s knowledge of weapons history that he decided to give away the information he’d previously withheld in hopes of receiving some money.  I had to stop and wonder whether the line was supposed to be said with a more scared tone, because I couldn’t understand why the owner would be impressed into giving out free information.

But enough about what didn’t work.  Let’s look at what did.  Spike and Jet’s scenes add to our knowledge of them and the Bebop.  Early on, we see Spike complaining that everything on the ship is broken, after kicking the TV to make it work and seeing Jet walk by with some tools, who states that some unnamed part is “history.”  Later, Spike seems positively giddy when he confronts Hakim. Last week, Spike reversed his blasé attitude about the “small fry” bounty head when he learned how dangerous Asimov was, and this week, he was at his happiest when about to take down Hakim.  Part of his happiness was no doubt related to the 8 million wulong reward, but for him to be so happy before securing the reward shows that he was likely looking forward to the fight.

Conversely, Spike gets extremely annoyed with Ein, stating that he can’t stand animals or children.  It’s not that Ein is a bad dog; Jet gets along with him fine.  Rather, Spike is not as easygoing as he thinks himself to be.  When Spike chases down Hakim a second time, after losing him but gaining Ein, Jet asks him to stick to their plan and not to get hot-headed, to which Spike angrily responds that Jet hasn’t seen him hot-headed yet.  Once again, Jet shows that he wants to keep things simple and direct, maintaining the set plan, and is worried about Spike’s improvisations.  And what does Spike’s line mean?  Does he not realize how upset he was?  Or does he know that he has the potential to get even more angry and irrational?  But perhaps most importantly, we see that Spike truly is a good person, despite his rigidity.  [SPOILERS] When he has to make a choice between saving Ein, an innocent dog, and capturing Hakim, he chooses the former, thus losing out on the bounty.  (This makes two weeks in a row in which our heroes don’t get their man.)

We also learn a little more about the world(s) of Cowboy Bebop.  Most of this episode takes place on Mars, the supposed paradise planet.  What we see of it isn’t too special.  The establishing shot shows that for the most part, Mars remains an uninhabitable red desert.  A large crater has been terraformed to allow for human life, and the borders are lined with atmosphere machines to keep the air breathable.  Obviously, we don’t see the entire planet, or even the entire crater, but what we do see doesn’t seem like a very good place to live.  Most of the episode is spent in a rough neighborhood, with people picking fights, teens stealing briefcases directly from their owners, and apparently a strong pet black market.  Mars, like Tijuana, seems to be past its zenith, and is beginning to decay.  Also, one thing I noticed was that, at the end of the episode, a pet shop owner seen earlier was watching Big Shot.  Seeing as how it’s aimed at bounty hunters, is she a bounty hunter on the side?  Does she need to keep informed of criminal activity to prevent her shop from being victimized?  Or is Big Shot so entertaining that everyone watches it?  I’m guessing the last option is most likely, because it is pretty damn entertaining.

Although this isn’t one of Bebop’s best, “Stray Dog Strut” has more good than bad.  Exciting chase sequences, good music, nice visuals, a pet store owner who wears a turtle on her head, and the Spike and Jet interplay makes up for the weak story and storytelling.

Up next: Faye Valentine introduces both the next episode and herself, making statements such as “money makes the world go ‘round,” “show no mercy,” “that’s how the game [life] is played,” and indirectly referring to herself as great.  Girl’s got an ego, that’s for sure.

Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken

While I’m doing all this posting about the house sigils of A Song of Ice and Fire, I guess I should explain why I like the Martells so much, seeing as how my posting of them just said they were my favorite.  I’m drawn to celestial imagery, so when I first read the appendix to A Game of Thrones, the Martell sigil drew me in.  (Part of why I put House Arryn so high was because of the use of the crescent moon it that sigil.)

While we weren’t introduced to any Martells until A Storm of Swords or saw Dorne until A Feast For Crows, what we were told intrigued me.  The Dornish resisted dragon-mounted conquerors, lived in a region with more “exotic” foods, and ruled from a castle called Sunspear.  How could they not be awesome?  And then, when we met Oberyn, my interest in them was sealed.  In a medieval world, Oberyn had some pretty progressive views, including believing in gender equality (something all of Dorne does to a degree, as the first-born child is heir, rather than first-born male).  He trains his bastard daughters to be independent, and they respond by becoming educated and formidable warriors.  His brother Doran then reveals himself to be a pretty magnificent bastard/chessmaster.  It’s clear that the Martells value intelligence just as much as strength, which earns them a lot of points in my book.