I'm particularly impressed by the way they manage to convey a ton of character information in very little time: the opening scene with Darien both enjoying being a thief but being unwilling to let someone die because of him; the meeting with Bobby; the scene where they show the progressing relationship between Darien and Casey; the relationship between Darien and Kevin.
I know! It's a genuinely good episode and I feel like they used their time very well to give us a good feeling for who the characters are, while still keeping the pace moving.
When it comes to Darien's "madness" = evil thing, I'm willing to give it a pass, because it's not a mental illness. It's something that was specifically designed for the express purpose of turning the recipient of the gland into a raving homicidal maniac, and from what I remember, the series is always very careful to show that this is something that comes from outside of Darien ("someone knocking to get in"). I think the inclusion of Bobby as someone who does have an actual mental illness was designed as a deliberate counterpoint to that.
Yeah, I think it doesn't really bother me because a) it's pure plot handwavium, and b) I am such an enormous sucker for that particular trope (good person is forced to do bad things! see also: Bucky) that I am going to be SUPER EASY for any implementation of it. (That said, I can completely understand if people are bothered by it, right up to the point of it being a dealbreaker for enjoying the series; I just didn't really have that reaction personally ...)
I hadn't thought about the way Darien conceptualizes it as coming from outside himself. Personally I think it's more just a case of the writers not really thinking through the implications of the id explanation + Darien's behavior when affected by Quicksilver. I think the general idea, in the show, or at least what we're supposed to be thinking, is that removing someone's conscience and inhibitions will cause them to indulge in socially unacceptable behavior because they just don't care. Which is a reasonable theory, but Quicksilver-mad Darien is just so gleeful about it. And it's so unlike him normally. Spoiler for "Tiresius": In Tiresius he'd rather shoot himself than accidentally kill someone under the influence of Quicksilver. And in general, he's absolutely horrified by, and consumed with guilt about, the things that he does when he's out of control in that particular way; it really does feel like it's not him. The thing is, I'm not sure the writers thought it through to that extent (I'm fairly sure it really is supposed to be the instinct-driven human hindbrain with the brakes off) but it's actually more consistent with what we see in the show to think that it is actually more the gland directly influencing his behavior, and the science types are either mistaken or lying about what's causing it ...
I'm always sad about Kevin's death. :( He was a good foil for Darien and I liked the way they genuinely cared about each other, even though they'd gone in such different life directions. (It makes me wonder what they were like as kids-- they must have been fairly close for Kevin to so clearly care about him even after Darien managed to screw up his life so completely.)
Knowing that Kevin died, I wasn't expecting to like him as much as I did, or to get so much enjoyment out of Darien and Kevin's interactions. They really do seem to care about each other a lot. Which makes his death all the more heartbreaking, of course ...
"It beats hearing it over America Online!"
Oh man, I keep getting hit with "wait, this was almost 15 years ago" technology-shock. The clunky cell phones! The lack of ubiquitous Internet/smart phones generally. The cars!
I may skip Catavari (it's the one that always bounces me out when I try to rewatch the series. Thus, the reason I've seen the first episode five or six times, and the rest of it maybe once.)
I didn't actually find Catavari THAT bad ... it's not great, but it didn't stand out as being significantly worse than the rest for me. (Tiresius was the one that seemed like the worst of the early season one episodes to me ...)
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I know! It's a genuinely good episode and I feel like they used their time very well to give us a good feeling for who the characters are, while still keeping the pace moving.
When it comes to Darien's "madness" = evil thing, I'm willing to give it a pass, because it's not a mental illness. It's something that was specifically designed for the express purpose of turning the recipient of the gland into a raving homicidal maniac, and from what I remember, the series is always very careful to show that this is something that comes from outside of Darien ("someone knocking to get in"). I think the inclusion of Bobby as someone who does have an actual mental illness was designed as a deliberate counterpoint to that.
Yeah, I think it doesn't really bother me because a) it's pure plot handwavium, and b) I am such an enormous sucker for that particular trope (good person is forced to do bad things! see also: Bucky) that I am going to be SUPER EASY for any implementation of it. (That said, I can completely understand if people are bothered by it, right up to the point of it being a dealbreaker for enjoying the series; I just didn't really have that reaction personally ...)
I hadn't thought about the way Darien conceptualizes it as coming from outside himself. Personally I think it's more just a case of the writers not really thinking through the implications of the id explanation + Darien's behavior when affected by Quicksilver. I think the general idea, in the show, or at least what we're supposed to be thinking, is that removing someone's conscience and inhibitions will cause them to indulge in socially unacceptable behavior because they just don't care. Which is a reasonable theory, but Quicksilver-mad Darien is just so gleeful about it. And it's so unlike him normally. Spoiler for "Tiresius": In Tiresius he'd rather shoot himself than accidentally kill someone under the influence of Quicksilver. And in general, he's absolutely horrified by, and consumed with guilt about, the things that he does when he's out of control in that particular way; it really does feel like it's not him. The thing is, I'm not sure the writers thought it through to that extent (I'm fairly sure it really is supposed to be the instinct-driven human hindbrain with the brakes off) but it's actually more consistent with what we see in the show to think that it is actually more the gland directly influencing his behavior, and the science types are either mistaken or lying about what's causing it ...
I'm always sad about Kevin's death. :( He was a good foil for Darien and I liked the way they genuinely cared about each other, even though they'd gone in such different life directions. (It makes me wonder what they were like as kids-- they must have been fairly close for Kevin to so clearly care about him even after Darien managed to screw up his life so completely.)
Knowing that Kevin died, I wasn't expecting to like him as much as I did, or to get so much enjoyment out of Darien and Kevin's interactions. They really do seem to care about each other a lot. Which makes his death all the more heartbreaking, of course ...
"It beats hearing it over America Online!"
Oh man, I keep getting hit with "wait, this was almost 15 years ago" technology-shock. The clunky cell phones! The lack of ubiquitous Internet/smart phones generally. The cars!
I may skip Catavari (it's the one that always bounces me out when I try to rewatch the series. Thus, the reason I've seen the first episode five or six times, and the rest of it maybe once.)
I didn't actually find Catavari THAT bad ... it's not great, but it didn't stand out as being significantly worse than the rest for me. (Tiresius was the one that seemed like the worst of the early season one episodes to me ...)