If you follow me on twitter, you may have noticed I got a little dramatic with my righteous rage over last night’s episode of The 100. My bad, whatever, blame the alcohol, I was pretty drunk by the end of the ep. Now I’m sober, I’m calmer, I’ve rewatched, and I stand by all of my anger but am in a better position to explain it so let’s recap this shit (and, sadly, I do mean shit).
SPOILERS AHOY!
I am curious about the choice to jump a week before the beginning of this episode. On the one hand, I get it, Clarke is calmed down enough to think things through. On the other, it seems like a waste of some perfectly good rage built up at the end of last week’s ep. I was super looking forward to Clarke and Lexa flat out brawling and this felt a little bit like a let down (and before you rush to think that’s my shipper bias showing, I’m also hardcore rooting for Clarke and Bellamy to fight, I’m a huge believer in scream your feelings out and clear the air, it shows passion and makes for more interesting character interactions this, imo, squandered that opportunity). It comes back to show, not tell. By telling us Clarke has had a week to calm down and not showing her working through her rage, it feels flat. It makes it seem like she did an emotional 180 much faster than she actually did. As a friend said to me after the ep, this show has always been fast paced but this was too fast paced and I think that applies to the whole episode and made it a weaker storytelling beat overall.
I am glad that we got a let’s hash out what happened at Mt Weather convo at the very least. (Although, lbr, if we hadn’t had at least a token nod to that there’s no way this ship could believably sail). While I understand Lexa’s position and why she’s asking Clarke/the skaikru to join the coalition and why it’s a good idea for them to do it, Lexa telling Clarke it’s the only way she can protect Clarke’s people is a really good example of why this ship fails to hit my ship buttons. I get that Lexa cares deeply about Clarke, I would never deny that and I get that the only way she can show that and still maintain a strong face of leadership in front of her people is to line up all her political ducks, but the fact that she has to go to those lengths illustrates that as much as she wants to be and as much as she’s trying to be, she’s not in a position to put Clarke (as herself and not a figurehead/leader) first and that’s where it all falls apart for me. I generally ship ships that are on the same team and because of their positions within this world, Clarke and Lexa can never truly be a united front, they are always going to have their individual people between them. For Lexa to continue to be a good commander (and while I hate some of the decisions she’s made, I would argue that from a grounder perspective she is very, very good at her job), she will ALWAYS have to put her decisions as a leader before her decisions as a lover. We saw this in season 2 and this is just reinforcing that on a larger scale.
I gotta say, I am so glad that Clarke recognizes that for all Lexa cares about her, there’s a political component to Lexa having the Wanheda on her side that can’t be ignored. I get why she’s making the decisions she’s making and I’m glad she makes them with (at least partially) open eyes.
I did very much love the grounder politics and first look at the actual city of Polis in this episode (Indra grinning at Kane, excited to show off her city made me legit squeal with glee). The writers have been touting the expanded worldbuilding as one of the highlights of this season and I’m here for it. I do think there was a lot of wasted screen time with people trying to convince Lexa and Clarke to kill each other (though I’m less annoyed at the Clarke/Roan scene because I have already established I am pro-Clarke and Roan scenes). We already know the political advantage in the grounder world of killing the Wanheda so that didn’t need to be established. We also know there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell Lexa is actually going to decide to kill Clarke so why bother? To establish who the characters’ enemies are? We already knew the Ice Nation was no good, we could’ve reasonably assumed that Roan has a vendetta, so that just leaves Titus and honestly when has a bald advisor with religious head tattoos not been tasked with whispering nasty ideas in a leader’s ear? In addition to (and tied into) the aforementioned tell not show weak storytelling, I think this episode showed an underlying WE DON’T TRUST OUR AUDIENCE TO KEEP UP SO WE WILL EXPLICITLY LAY IT OUT attitude on the writers’ part and that is not my favorite.
I’m also a little apprehensive of where the show is going with Lexa’s arc this season. It sure as hell looks like they’re setting up a scenario where her feelings for Clarke completely undermine her authority and will therefore reinforce the ‘love is weakness’ bullshit from season 2. I don’t know about you but I vehemently hate that theme. I am all about love giving you strength and at this point that doesn’t look like the direction they’re going with this and that gives me a major sad.
I was a little confused by the sort of fight between Kane and Abby at the beginning of the ep, not what the fight was about but why the circumstances for the fight exist in the first place. I totally understand where Kane is coming from, opening up Mt Weather and moving people into it was an honest to god stupid political move and I’m genuinely not sure where Abby was supposed to have been coming from. I get using their medical facilities, she was a doctor a hell of alot longer than she was a chancellor and that was absolutely a doctor’s decision. The rest of it, what? Season 2 showed us that while she’s prone to making emotional decisions, she’s also very capable of making mediated political decisions and as Claire Legrand pointed out in conversation, she’s clearly a good chancellor off camera or Arkadia wouldn’t have flourished as much as it did over hiatus so where the fuck did this idiocy come from? Someone give me a reason because it sure as hell feels like clunky, inorganic writerly maneuvering of characters into position to make plot events happen down the road. It’s sloppy in a way I like to think the show is generally better than. Also, skipping forward to their scene in Polis when Abby tries to pass the chancellorship like it’s a hot potato (which, ???????????? seriously wtf are the writers doing with her), ‘let’s hold an election when we get back to Arkadia’ GOSH I WONDER WHO ELSE WILL RUN AND IF THAT WILL BACKFIRE HORRIBLY. On the bright side, how fucking excited is team Kabby right now? I only low key ship them and I’m excited, so I can’t imagine how over the moon y’all are.
Speaking of opening up Mt Weather, the partial adventure squad walking into a Farm Station party in the Mt Weather dining room we last saw covered in the bodies of children was chilling (ditto the moment a little later where Bellamy stood in the field of yellow flowers outside the MW door aka the field where Keenan’s (name?) burnt up and blistered body collapsed while Cage and Tsing watched and god I hated the mountain fuckers). I am 100% team Octavia on this one, gross, nope, I’m out. I’m entirely unsurprised by this development, Pike made it pretty clear last week that any empathy for people who weren’t on his team was long gone. I am mildly side-eyeing Bellamy’s apparent chill over it though. Of all people, he knows exactly what that room was the scene of and while I get that he can be pragmatic when he needs to, that seemed a little overboard.
For as much as it broke my heart, I very very much loved the scene between Octavia and Bellamy. I love how much their relationship has grown over the course of the show, I love that Bellamy has shed his overbearing obnoxiously protective brother role and can accept that Octavia is not happy and needs to leave. I love that he trusts her to be able to take care of herself and I love that he immediately reassures her that even if she has to leave Arkadia, she will always have a place with him (AND THEY HELD HAAAAAAAAAAAAANDS). It’s especially heartbreaking considering we know from the season trailer that something is coming that will destroy their relationship and I’m going to hold these precious moments close and cry over them while I brace for the explosion. (Also, lots and lots of crying over people leaving Bellamy Blake. One of the episode subthemes was ‘everyone leaves Bellamy’ which is obviously meant to show he is emotionally vulnerable and blatantly teeing up his susceptibility to Pike’s influence. I get why it’s being done but, as with basically everything else in this episode, I wish it had been done better. This episode is about as subtle as being hit in the face with a sledgehammer.)
Speaking of things I am sad about, how about Echo? I was so excited that Echo was coming back and then I had the misfortune to see an unconfirmed spoiler that ended up being true. I wish they’d gone another route and not had Echo betray Bellamy and co (seriously, dude can NOT catch a break this ep) but I get why it happened (see above about blatantly positioning Bellamy to join team Pike).
Alright, so, sibling scene aside, I’ve been kind of a downer, let’s talk about something I loved about this ep: Raven Reyes. Maybe it’s my super fan showing, maybe it’s how fucking awesome Lindsey Morgan is, but I fucking love this character and everything she does. Raven is in full Raven this ep, she’s cocky, she’s snarky, she’s generally the fucking best. In case I haven’t made that absolutely clear, I am so overjoyed that Raven is getting actual screentime this season and plot stuff that doesn’t tie into her being a love interest. Also that scene with Sinclair when he confronts her about limitations? More tears. Lindsey Morgan is amazing and that scene gave me more feelings than the rest of the episode combined. I’ve mentioned before that I’m super here for other characters looking out for Raven and I feel like this is the first time we’ve seen an in depth look at her and Sinclair and I love it. Everyone should look out for Raven, not because she needs it, Raven will handle her shit if it kills her, but because she deserves all the nice things.
Further happy stuff, Abby and Clarke gave me a lot of feelings. I wish they could’ve had more of a moment to comfort each other but I didn’t honestly expect it. This show moves fast and this episode moved faster than most.
(Oh and as long as I’m focusing on the good stuff HOW AWESOME WAS IT THAT JAHA WASN’T IN THIS EPISODE AT ALL? SO AWESOME.)
I don’t have too much to say about the summit scene. The costumes and atmosphere were gorgeous, the grounder anthem was awesome. I get that ceremony was an established procedure but I’m not going to lie, seeing Clarke Griffin on her knees hurt my heart a little (a lot). Other things that hurt a lot: Bellamy’s face when he realized Echo had set him up. Also his face when Clarke told him she was staying. I get why the plot needed these things to happen but they hurt me. Somebody give that boy a hug because he needs one.
Okay, now let’s talk about the MAJOR FUCKING SHITFEST THAT WENT DOWN THIS EPISODE. Specifically the fridging of Bellamy’s girlfriend Gina. I am so fucking mad you guys. Like legitimately disgusted and I didn’t even like Gina (I mean seriously, how could you? she had all of the characterization of paste. Pleasant paste, but still paste). From the moment Gina appeared all inoffensively bland and sans actual personality, I was afraid that this was her fate and assured myself that the show was better than that. I have never been more upset about being wrong. For a show that loves to proclaim how feminist it is, this was an incredibly shitty move that I’m honestly flabbergasted they went with. Allow me to direct you to this post which flawlessly breaks down all of the issues with how her role played out. If you don’t feel like clicking through, let me summarize, all of the impact of her death was basically already in place and if the writers had trusted their audience to know the characters and understand their motivations, they didn’t need to FUCKING FRIDGE THE POOR GIRLFRIEND. This was some amature hour misogynistic bullshit writing and I’m so fucking mad I can barely see straight. Not only that but it telegraphed Bellamy’s arc to the point where if character arcs were physical objects, you could see his from fucking space (also, sidebar, what the fuck was up with ‘yeah I did’ re: killing the grounder guards? I can see where he’ll be open to following Pike’s lead after this episode but that seemed a bit premature). It was some lazy garbage writing and I can’t wrap my head around what it’s doing in this show.
And so the stage is set for an anti-grounder coupe in Arkadia which seems a little, I don’t know, repetitious of already covered themes? Like, season one was all about the delinquents learning that not all grounders are bad and now it seems like we’re going to watch a faction of the adults learn it all over again. Up until this episode, I kept assuring myself that I could trust the writers to do something cool and unexpected with it but honestly, after this episode’s bullshit my trust level is lower than ever. I do like how they tied in Emerson and the Ice Queen reveal but honestly, by the time the show got to that bit I was so disgusted and disengaged, it didn’t really have an impact.
Before I wrap up, I want to talk a little about the episode structure. I’ve mentioned that it felt more rushed than usual which is honestly weird because looking back, the first half of the episode was kind of slow. There was a lot of set up (some, I would argue, that was recapping things already established but whatever) and then the last 15 minutes were kind of ALL THE PLOT HAPPENS AT ONCE. I feel like this episode’s story would’ve been much smoother split into two eps. My sister called me to rage after the episode and pointed out that for all Jason Rothenberg likes to compare The 100 to Game of Thrones, this episode clearly illustrated a massive failure to understand part of what makes GoT so good (my note: at story structure, I have massive problems with a lot of things about GoT). While people like to complain that episodes of GoT can seem boring since they have to visit about 40 different characters for about 5 minutes, each of those 5 minute glimpses advances the 40 stories that much further. That means when the plot kicks in and knocks all of the characters over, you care, it has an impact on all of the characters. You’re not like oh yeah that dude, totally forgot about that dude, we haven’t seen him in weeks. Last week opened up a bunch of new stories (Murphy and Emori off to have adventures, Monty reuniting with his mom which btw if she was in MW I will light shit on fire, Lincoln existing) and this episode left most of them lying in the dirt. I get that the show has a lot to accomplish in a limited amount of episodes and some sacrifices have to be made, but I also feel like good writing means that sort of stuff shouldn’t be obvious and this episode felt pretty obvious (see above comparison to sledgehammer and repeat for emphasis).
So, yeah, tl;dr, this episode was not my favorite. It felt like it dangled Clexa in a dramatic and tantalizing fashion and expected the audience to be so overwhelmed by the glory of a lead f/f ship on network television that they would ignore the weakness of the rest of the episode. As much as I am absolutely pro f/f visibility, I think using it as a shield to cover shitty storytelling is cheap and honestly, pretty gross. I know this show stumbles a lot with some of its “progressive” messaging but I honestly thought it was better than a lot of the hot garbage tossed into this episode and I’m deeply disappointed. Representation shouldn’t come at the expense of quality, no one wins in that scenario and it just hands ammunition to the assfaced shitfucks who like to say you can’t have diverse representation and quality storytelling at the same time (which is obviously not true). Here’s hoping it gets back on its feet next week.
I don’t even have a gifset to leave you with, I’m too mad and I want to forget this episode even happened.
Lea @ YA Book Queen
There NEED to be more Clarke/Roan scenes….And loved the sibling bonding with Octavia and Bellamy 🙂
(And oh my gosh, I completely forgot about Jaha until you mentioned him. It’s like I started blocking him out of my memory)
I didn’t care for Gina (mostly because we never got a chance to know her), but her character arc was messed up and incredibly lazy. There are other ways to work on Bellamy’s arc, and I’m not sure how effective the choice to kill Gina will be as the season plays out. It would have been better to either develop her character or not have her at all.
I’m hoping the rest of the episodes will be stronger, because this one was a bit of a mess. :/
Meg Morley
10000% cosign all of this. I think a huge part of the reason I’m so mad about Gina is that the show has gone out of it’s way to promote itself as pro-ladies beyond belief and then….this. It’s the exact opposite of everything they claim to stand for and not only should all entertainment be better than that, this show especially should be better than that.
Rebeca
Not gonna lie, they handled Gina so poorly, I heard the spoiler of her death and was like,
“Wait, who?”
It’s not quite as infuriating as when they offed Anya for no fucking reason other than ~*~*~*drama~*~*~*~ but it’s in that ballpark.
Meg Morley
DICHEN LACHMAN DESERVED BETTER. DICHEN LACHMAN ALWAYS DESERVES BETTER.
Gillian
“On the other, it seems like a waste of some perfectly good rage built up at the end of last week’s ep….I’m also hardcore rooting for Clarke and Bellamy to fight, I’m a huge believer in scream your feelings out and clear the air, it shows passion and makes for more interesting character interactions this, imo, squandered that opportunity”
Y A S
“It makes it seem like she did an emotional 180 much faster than she actually did.”
*snaps*
“she will ALWAYS have to put her decisions as a leader before her decisions as a lover. We saw this in season 2 and this is just reinforcing that on a larger scale.”
THISSSSSSSSSS and then ofc the show is so going to do the thing where the moment lexa DOES put clarke first, she’ll die. so.
“(Indra grinning at Kane, excited to show off her city made me legit squeal with glee)”
SQUEEEEEEEE
“To establish who the characters’ enemies are? We already knew the Ice Nation was no good” HONESTLY AND IT SEEMED LIKE THE ONLY POINT OF THIS EP WAS TO FURTHER REINFORCE THIS WHICH…WE KNEW (i mean also to create a reason for the anti-grounder movement among the arkers but as we have agreed on, lazy fucking way to do it)
“WE DON’T TRUST OUR AUDIENCE TO KEEP UP SO WE WILL EXPLICITLY LAY IT OUT” ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh
“clunky, inorganic writerly maneuvering of characters into position to make plot events happen down the road. ” nailed it. this is the crux of the problem. this is the whole episode in a sentence.
” Abby tries to pass the chancellorship like it’s a hot potato (which, ???????????? seriously wtf are the writers doing with her), ‘let’s hold an election when we get back to Arkadia’ GOSH I WONDER WHO ELSE WILL RUN AND IF THAT WILL BACKFIRE HORRIBLY. ”
UGHHHHHHHHHSDFILUHKSDGSIDF:HSLDFS
“I am 100% team Octavia on this one, gross, nope, I’m out.” YES it was super chilling and like you I don’t 100% buy Bellamy’s chillness either. like, he helped CAUSE that massacre. he would not be remotely that okay. ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh LAZYSHOWLAZY
BLAKE FAMILY FEELS you’re right, this along with the Clarke/Bellamy eye fight was the only affecting, organic, beautiful scene in the whole rotten episode
“This episode is about as subtle as being hit in the face with a sledgehammer” yeeeeeeep
TEAM RAVEN GOD DAMN REYESSSSS
agree, summit scene was beautifully executed from an aethetic and worldbuilding pov, but fuck. that kneeling.
“This was some amature hour misogynistic bullshit writing and I’m so fucking mad I can barely see straight.” this whole fucking paragraph my rage is a fucking seismic event
“I do like how they tied in Emerson and the Ice Queen reveal but honestly, by the time the show got to that bit I was so disgusted and disengaged, it didn’t really have an impact.”
I WAS SO DISENGAGED I LITERALLY DIDNT EVEN NOTICE HIM UNTIL TUMBLR TOLD ME
“I feel like this episode’s story would’ve been much smoother split into two eps.” SO. MUCH. THIS. and then maybe then tehre’d be time for Clarke to change her mind ORGANICALLY and not jsut because the plot requires it
UGHHHHHHHH
“and this episode left most of them lying in the dirt” BUT ACTUALLY
“It felt like it dangled Clexa in a dramatic and tantalizing fashion and expected the audience to be so overwhelmed by the glory of a lead f/f ship on network television that they would ignore the weakness of the rest of the episode”
nailed it.
Meg Morley
“and then ofc the show is so going to do the thing where the moment lexa DOES put clarke first, she’ll die. so.”
I AM SO VERY AFRAID THAT THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT WILL HAPPEN AND AM DEEPLY NOT HERE FOR IT. I hate hate HATE when characters are punished for loving and trying to have balanced relationships.
“TEAM RAVEN GOD DAMN REYESSSSS”
ALWAYS
It’s been 4 days and the salt level is still maxed out
Carina Olsen
For some reason, I did not get an email about this blog post. How weird. Do you have any idea why? 🙂 It did show up in my Feedly, though. <3 Just not an email, like I always get. Hmph. Anyway.
Such a stunning review Meg. <3 Thank you for sharing your thoughts about this episode. Sigh. I don't know what to say. I shall try to comment 🙂 I also wanted to see Clarke be angry with Lexa. A bit disappointed that I didn't get that. I didn't like that Clarke bowed to her. Not at all. But I get why she made her decisions. Sigh. But goddamn it. That Clarke and Lexa ship better not happen! Not even a kiss. I don't want it. I don't get it. It shall not happen. Clarke should still be angry. Sigh.
And ugh. Everyone leaving Bellamy. Sobs. I don't approve. And ahh, I love the siblings. <3 But daaamn it. It will end so badly. I hated that moment in the trailer. I don't want it to happen. Sniffs. I won't forgive O for it. I just won't :p
I was also excited about Echo being back, sort of. But didn't really care that much. And I hope she will be gone now, lol. Bellamy saved her. Sort of. She was mean. Not okay. Hmph.
Also. Yessss. Raven is AWESOME 😀 I adore her. But I hate her for breaking things off with Wick. Ugh. They better end up together again. I want that badly. <3 And yesss, NO JAHA 😀 lol. That was the best part 😉
I didn't understand that fridging thing until now, when you linked to it. Ugh. Not good. But aw. I understand all of your feelings about it.. but I don't really agree with it :\ As I loved this episode when I watched it. Though I can understand so well what you mean. But I'm not worried yet, as I still love it, but yeah. It could end up going badly in the next episodes o.O I just hope not. <3 And I am so, so sorry that you didn't like this episode sweet girl 🙁 All the hugs. <3 I really, really hope the next one will be amazing for you 🙂 Thank you for sharing all of your lovely and honest thoughts. <3
Carina Olsen
But also, about Gina. I didn’t like her at all. I’m glad she’s dead. Which might be mean of me. But I just. I didn’t get WHY she was made as Bellamy’s girlfriend, and then we knew nothing about her, and then she died. It made no sense to me. Shrugs. But I’m happy that she died, instead of having gotten to know her better :p I don’t want Bellamy with anyone other than Clarke, lol. Which might make me a mean person. But I can’t help it 🙂
Meg Morley
Huh, that’s weird about the email. I have honestly no clue how that’s all hooked up. If it keeps happening let us know and we’ll look into it, it could’ve just been a one-off.
I think you better brace yourself because Clexa is definitely happening and I’m actually glad about it (though very, very, very, wary of the way it looks like it’s being set up to happen/end). Clarke setting aside her personal feelings and moving forward with the alliance is super in character to me so I get where she’s coming from, I just wish we’d gotten the screen time to see her work through it so the point where she did make her decision had more weight, you know? It all felt so rushed for the sake of moving the plot forward X amount which is basically my least favorite way to tell stories.
ANYWAY
I do think there was an element of Echo getting Bellamy specifically out of MW that was her way of trying to pay him back for getting her out in the first place? Like, obvs her first loyalty is to her people so this was kind of the best she could do on a not screwing him over entirely. Whether or not that’s good enough for people is up to them, I’m not sold, but I do appreciate the nuance.
Tbh, as much as I liked Wick (though loathed the actor, dude was gross), I’m glad we’re getting a non love interest story for Raven. She’s got so much more going on and has up until this point been used predominantly as a plot device (need a bomb? just call Raven!) and love interest which is a huge disservice to both the character and the actress.
Yeah, fridging is some basic level bullshit and from interviews I get the impression that Jason/the writers were concerned the audience would think Bellamy’s arc was OOC without her dying which says one of two things to me: a) trust your audience to not be stupid and to know these characters, we’ve spent 2 seasons with them at this point or b) if you do trust your audience and are still concerned MAYBE YOU NEED TO LOOK A LITTLE HARDER AT THE WRITING. If it seems OOC without shitty tricks, it’s probably another example of sacrificing character development for plot which, again, NOT GOOD.
For me, it’s not even about whether Gina was likeable as a character (I would argue that, in a continuing disservice to her, the writers barely put any effort into her as a person, let alone likeable before killing her because the plot demanded it or whatever), she occupied a weird middle status halfway between red shirt and character and if her entire point was to be a plot device and Bellamy arc motivator, she shouldn’t have existed in the first place.
Okay, wow, sorry to rant at you, apparently I’m not done having feelings about this episode.
Carina Olsen
I shall let you guys know if it happens again 🙂 Might just have been my hotmail acting up, lol. I also didn’t get a newsletter in the beginning of the month. Hmph.
But.. but.. ahhh. I don’t want Clexa to happen :p But yeah. I do get what you mean. It feels like it will happen. Curious to see how it will be handled, even so 🙂
Huh. That thing about Echo, that makes a bit sense. She did get him out of the mountain. But she also almost had him killed at Polis; they could have killed him right away when he arrived with weapons. So I’m not sure if she took him there as a good thing, lol. Either way, I’m not that fond of her right now. I liked her in season 2, though 🙂 Sort of.
This is true. But aw. I liked Wick, lol 😀 Thought the actor was sort of cute. Never seen him before, though. But yess. I do agree with this. I do love that she isn’t with anyone right now 😀 She’s awesome all on her own. Though, my sister suggested that she should be with Bellamy. I’m sort of curious about them together. I mean, they have already been together once, hih 😉
Ahh. Yeah, I do pretty much agree with all that you say about this. Don’t have any other thoughts to share than that, lol. You wrote it so well. I just. I hope the writers don’t mess things up any more. But they probably will. Things will go bad for Bellamy, and that is already breaking my heart. Ahh. I just want him to be happy and loved 🙂 I must admit, one thing I love the most about season 3, is that Finn is still gone gone gone. lol. He was the only issues I had with season one and two. He annoyed me like no other character. Hmph. I do love that Clarke is over him. Just wish she would move on with Bellamy, and not others 🙂
Aw, I don’t mind ranty replies 😀 They are always the most fun. <3 And I love hearing your thoughts about things.
Diane
I actually really enjoyed this episode, though I recognize all the flaws pointed out here. What they did with Gina was some low, low shit, and I honestly expected better. She was brave at the end, at least, which is more than you can say for a lot of fridged women.
I’m still hopeful that Echo will get some nice development. She’s loyal to the ice queen, or at least we’ve been led to believe that, but I have a feeling she was driven more by her hatred of Mount Weather than of the skaikru in her part of the plan. I actually kind of love her a little, but then I’m predisposed to love traitorous ladies.
I totally see where you’re coming from with Clarke/Lexa, but the way I figure it, Clarke/Bellamy could fall into the same traps. All the characters we’re following are leaders, and the fact of the matter is that leaders – good leaders, at least – always put their people first. Clarke and Lexa and Bellamy are all always going to put their people first. Right now, Clarke and Bellamy are lucky enough to be leading the same people, but the way things are going, that might not always be the case. (Also, there’s a fact that I’m approaching this from the significant bias of “I’m a lesbian, so if there’s a bisexual love triangle I’m always going to pick the lesbian option.” I can acknowledge that Bellamy and Clarke would be so much better than each other, but my heart’s just screaming GAY BABIES LOOK AT MY GAY BABIES.)
The episode as a whole was weakly written, but I guess there were enough strong character moments that I enjoyed it anyway. More Octavia and Bellamy, a really great look at Raven and the way she’s dealing, and whether or not you ship Clarke/Lexa you’ve got to acknowledge that Lexa kneeling for Clarke was frigging awesome.
Meg Morley
Judging from critical response and a lot of the stuff I’ve seen floating around on social media, I am definitely in the minority on this ep. I just feel so betrayed by the whole Gina thing? Idk. While I recognize this show is far from perfect, I feel like it’s always been better than this and I keep getting stuck in a loop of disappointment every time I try and think it through from a more positive angle.
ANYWAY
Yeah, I get where Echo was coming from and I actually think it was kind of nice (for a relative The 100 world value of nice, anyway) that she got Bellamy out of MW. I’m definitely with you on liking her character, I think she’s interesting and am also hoping she sticks around for a bit. When I said the thing about wishing they’d gone a different route, I’m more like noooooooo keep trusting people Bellamy! Don’t shut down!! But, obvs, that is not where his arc is going.
Super agree that Clarke/Bellamy can go the route of Clarke/Lexa, it’s actually one of my major fears if the show ever does go in that direction. I’m still clinging fiercely to their season 1 dynamic (while recognizing the futility said clinging and that they’re in wildly different places at this point) because I am very bad at letting things go. I was trying to illustrate why I missed the Clarke/Lexa train in the first place, I guess? Idk, this post was kind of a hot mess in many ways but hey! Feelings were involved. (Personal ship buttons aside, I am very, very glad that Clexa has been/is/will obvs be a thing on the show) (THOUGH THAT DOESN’T GIVE YOU A FREE PASS TO USE SHITTY/LAZY WRITING TROPES ELSEWHERE) (sorry, apparently I will be mad about Gina for awhile longer)
One thing I do know for sure is that I vehemently hate the ‘love is weakness’ theme. When it first came up in s2 I legit started hitting my head against the arm of the couch like no no no no no. I really hoped that they’d take that message and flip it, but if Titus’ side eye is anything to go by, I don’t see that happening and I really dislike seeing characters punished for opening their hearts and loving people. As powerful of a gesture/moment/scene as Lexa kneeling to Clarke was, I couldn’t turn off the part of my brain that was like ‘welp, she’s in for it now’ not for any specific reason as much as I think they’re pretty heavily foreshadowing a Clarke will be Lexa’s downfall kind of deal and that makes me sad.
Holly J
Yeah, this episode wasn’t my favorite either, but I liked it. There were just moments I really loved, and others I super hated.
I still cannot believe they killed Gina off like that. I know I joked about her not lasting long, but I seriously didn’t think they would GO THERE. It was bullshit, and I saw no point in it at all. And I’m super disappointed with them for doing it. I expected better.
I didn’t like the time-jump. I, as well, would have loved to have seen Lexa and Clarke fight. This episode as a whole just felt really, really rushed to me. Because once everything happened during the ceremony and after, I felt like it had all just happened so fast that it was almost unbelievable. (also grrr I didn’t wanna see Clarke bow down to Lexa, though I understand why she did it). And I was pretty disappointed when Echo betrayed them because I got really excited when she showed up, and then, well. I was still in shock about the last ten or so minutes to even process the Ice Queen reveal and fucking Emerson (?) by her side. I think the episode should have been split into 2 also! It would have been so much better.
Here for more Raven Reyes and Blake sibling goodness. The highlights of the episode. I’m also super happy Raven is being given more of a storyline that doesn’t revolve around everyone else needing her to save the world, and love interests. Also when Indra grinned at Kane as she showed him Polis made me squeal too! I really want more Indra/Kane scenes!
I agree with so much of what you said here, and I love how you analyze the episodes because you talk about stuff I don’t think about when I watch it. But honestly right now I’m just hoping episode 4 is better. I’m a little wary after this one, and I haaaate that the writers and everyone else has made me wary. This was one of the weakest, and shittiest, episodes they’ve done since the underwhelming 1st half of the 1st season. Just. UGH.
TV Review: The 100, Watch The Thrones | Cuddlebuggery Book Blog
[…] week another spin on the carousel of emotional massacre that is The 100. I ended last week’s recap with a hope that the show would get back on its feet this week. Did it? It honestly seemed like it […]