Game of Thrones Season 4 Finale Review

A few things happened in this episode the definitely set up the show for next season. As I've stated previously, this show climaxes in episode 9 and episode 10 tends to be more of an epilogue than anything.

Here, we saw how Stannis seized the Wildlings with Mance Rayder and the dead were all burnt from the previous episode. Ygritte, of course, was burned separately after Mance and Tormund reminded Jon that she loved him, no matter what. And she died in his arms last episode, so that was tragic. Yet another character death.

Then, we go and see Daenerys in Mereen. A man's daughter has died because Drogon burnt her to death. The girl was three years old and Daenerys is forced to lock up the two dragons of hers that she knows are there while Drogon roams free in places unknown to her.

[Addendum:]

Somewhere in the episode Bran appears with Hodor and Meera and Jojen and Summer and they finally find the tree that they have been looking for. Jojen dies before he reaches it by being stabbed by a skeleton and The Children are finally shown. These faerie type creatures appear and Bran reaches the three-eyed crow telling him that he can never walk but will learn to fly.

Afterwards, Cersei confirms that she and Jaime have been having an affair for the longest time and Tywin denies it and she decides to go back to Jaime and stay in King's Landing because she wants to stay near both her brother and her son.

Jaime, later on, releases Tyrion and lets him know that Varys is willing to take him to the Free Cities to escape his execution and Tyrion, before going, wishes to visit his father and give him some sort of farewell only to find that in his father's chambers and within his own bed is Shae. Shae calls Tywin "My Lion" the same way she called Tyrion and Tyrion is obviously hurt by this. He is even more hurt when she attempts to kill him and he is forced to kill her to live. He even sheds a tear and apologizes after she has died. When this is done, Tyrion grabs the crossbow and goes over to visit his father who is in the loo. Tywin tells Tyrion that he is his son and that he should leave the restroom so that they can have a more civilized talk elsewhere. Tyrion disagrees after telling him about Shae and Tywin calls him a whore. After being given a warning not to utter the word whore, Tywin does it once more and gets shot by Tyrion. After being shot, he says that Tyrion is not his son and never has been, which prompts Tyrion to denies this and shoot his father once more, killing him. Tyrion then goes back and gets taken by Varys to leave for the Free Cities and after Varys hears the bells tolling, he decides to leave with Tyrion as well.

One of the final, and more important, scenes is the one that takes place after Podrick loses his and Brienne's horses. Brienne finds Arya and she and The Hound fight to the death, unbeknownst to either of them, I presume. This fight was intense as both lose their swords at one point and decide to kill each other brutally and mercilessly. Arya hides whilst this happens and later on finds the Hound. He practically begs her to kill him and all she does is steal his silver and leave him to die. After she walks away and takes her horse, she rides to a small harbor and asks a man to take her away to the Wall. He refuses, naturally, and says that she cannot have a cabin and will not even let her work to be aboard the ship. After he mentions that he is a Braavosi man she says the famous words Valar Morghulis and gives him the coin which was given to her in season to and he responds with the appropriate Valar Dohaeris and we see her leaving Westeros aboard the ship looking towards the small harbor from whence she departed.

This season finale is extremely important considering how both Tyrion and Arya left Westeros after struggling for the longest time, and how Tywin is finally dead. Additionally, Brienne now knows that she's lost Arya and that will be major next season. This was a good season finale, although far from perfect because it's execution felt a bit iffy at parts and the pacing certainly made the plot points feel less important than they actually are. Nonetheless, the show continues to be good and will definitely have a good season next year, as much has happened and the set up will be interesting for the fifth season premiere.

Samurai Flamenco EP1 Review

The first episode of Samurai Flamenco was very...interesting.

At first, it begins with the certain formula of guy being the straight man, kind of like in a comedy, and he lives alone and he's a cop so it's all good. This guy is Goto.

Then, as we witnessed at the beginning of the episode, he encounters our second main character, Masayoshi.

This guy is a model. He grew up with superheros and the like and then found himself wanting to be one. He is eponymous (the show is named after him) and is much more fun and quirky than Goto who is slightly more serious and down to Earth. They have the popular best friend dynamic that is popular in anime and media in general that for some reason really reminds me of Domeki and Watanuki from xxxHolic.

Anyhow, onto plot and stuff.

Basically, the show begins with a very interesting first impression where Masayoshi is nude in an alley beside his superhero outfit and Goto meets him and then the outfit is set on fire and through a list of events Goto ends up rescuing Masayoshi after encountering a band of middle-schoolers who just beat him up cause they're thugs and stuff.

While the concept is similar to Kick-Ass, I certainly love the originality here, and the characters. For an anime, it surely seems like it could even be a TV series and is extremely grounded but still has an anime feel to it that is nice and makes it much more lovable.

Looking (HBO 2014 TV series) Review

Alright, so, I will be reviewing this in story arcs and not individual episodes. That seems best for here. Yeah? Yeah. Alright, let’s do this.

First arc let’s go over, Patrick’s. He’s the main character, it only makes sense.

So, first off, Patrick begins the show by doing his thing on OKCupid, and then after a bad date, he meets his love interest, Richie. And he’s Mexican and he clearly charms Patrick (Pato) and then at the end of the episode they meet. Patrick then messes their thing by trying to have sex too quickly and showing interest only in that. Well, after that happens, they meet again at a club and dance together. The next episode is all bonding type shit. Like, seriously. Then Richie meets Patrick’s friends and shit goes down and Richie agrees to go to Patrick’s sister’s wedding and, [sigh], they have an argument and Richie leaves. Then, at the wedding, a drunk Kevin (who is Patrick's boss, by the way) kisses him and Patrick pushes him away. The following episode they hook up after Richie told Patrick that he needed space, and Richie confesses the fact that he’s falling in love and then leave their relationship at a strange place.

Fuck, that was long. Anyhow, out of the three main arcs, I liked his most. So, there’s bias there, but he’s also the main character, so I think it’s logical.

Secondly, let’s move on to Dom. Dom’s story is pretty basic and easy, for the most part. In the beginning, he decides to talk to an ex from long ago. They agree to be friends or whatever, still, his name’s Ethan, I think? Anyhow, Dom asks him for eight thousand dollars that he was gonna use for his business with Portuguese (Peri-Peri) chicken, but the guy refuses because “it was a gift”. Anyhow, Dom then meets a guy at a bathhouse who has a business, and he tries to get help for his business idea. The guy agrees, and they meet with some other guys who have money for investments in the business and eventually this guy from the bathhouse, Lynn, just does a pop-up with Dom even though they have no one else, and after the attitude Dom gives Lynn, Lynn decides to not do business with him, and because there is no business tying them together anymore, just as Doris predicted earlier, Dom kisses Lynn attempting to expand their relationship into romantic territory.

Alright, so, Dom’s story was larger than I thought. Certainly didn’t feel that long when I was watching it.

Thirdly and lastly, there is Agustin’s story, who is also my least favorite character. No offense to his actor, Frankie J. Alvarez.

Agustin’s story is quite a mess, really. In the beginning, he moves out and leaves Patrick behind in pursuit of a closer relationship with his boyfriend, Frank. They’ve been long-term, so, next step? Living together. Anyhow, Agustin is this artist guy, and he gets fired from working with this woman very soon. Afterwards, he decides to make his own exhibit with Pauline, a contact of Frank’s. The exhibit idea he has in mind is one that involves a “sex worker”, as he calls him, named CJ or whatever. CJ actually looks like a sex worker, though, so kudos on that casting. But yeah, though, CJ films Frank and Agustin having sex, and then Agustin films Frank and CJ having sex, and that makes Agustin uncomfortable, so he cancels on the exhibit. Agustin has a confrontation with Frank and Frank tells Agustin what’s up and to leave. His story then just kinda involves him getting high and eventually crashing at Patrick’s and moving back.

The last scene is a laptop turned on and paused on The Golden Girls with Patrick stumbling onto the scene, sitting on the bed, and unpausing the video where the dialogue involves dating and such.

Overall, the season was quite good. Hopefully, it does not pull what Girls did, and having the second season be just awful because the continuity was kinda blotched in the term of themes and mood and tone.

However, on a scale of “Satan invented this TV series just to warn humanity about the tortures he has in store for the future” to “this is proof that god exists” I’d having to say that the series is “pretty good”. It was not perfect, but it definitely has a lot of potential. Lots and lots and lots. All’s to hoping the second season does not change things far too much. (For the worst, anyways.)