I'm falling behind on writing the plot summaries for the episodes but I discovered another site yesterday that already writes up the plots for the episodes and now I have fallen into an existential crisis.
Highlights
- Ian McShane singing and performing! 😍
- Wednesday reciting Latin. 😍😍😍
- Shadow has purpose still! I keep emphasizing this because almost the entire first season and the beginning of S2, he was just kinda "there" and I want to re-enforce good behavior. Keep Shadow an active participant!!
- And when Shadow kept Wednesday locked up to question him was A++++++++
- Clark Middleton! I loved him on The Blacklist
- Lou Reed/Velvet Underground
- Bishop's game in action. "Is Martin Luther a Lutheran?" "Yes? I have no idea." 😂😂
- Columbia's dance number 💃
General Thoughts
- Wednesday sent both Donar and Columbia to the New Gods (the American Nazis and the American War Effort, respectively); opposite sides of WWII. Wednesday is a war god. Good, good, good. Love it all. Keep the parallel themes coming.
- Did FBI agent Andy Haddock actually "recruit" the mall cops to help out with his sting operation? That's a particularly genius stroke of grifting to be able to convince them the FBI would send him in with no backup.
- Too bad neither Donar nor Columbia thought to use that newfangled technology, the telephone, to communicate with each other
- Speaking of Columbia, I've seen a few reviews that point her out as evolving into Rosie the Riveter, but I hope she didn't? Rosie the Riveter was based on a real person, not on Columbia, and that feels like erasure.
- I also wouldn't mind seeing Columbia revisited in a future episode, maybe in association with finally meeting Lady Liberty
- We know Wednesday calls in debts and favors so what does Wednesday have over Anansi that makes Anansi align himself with Wednesday for such a long time?
- I didn't really understand Nancy's demotivational speech to Donar? Was his Zarathustra comment about fate and the whole "this has happened before and will happen again" theme? Or was it a throwaway reference to the Übermensch ideal? What about the story where Anansi brought colonizers to his country because he wasn't allowed to rule? What does that have to do with the price of tea in China? That story would have probably fit better in an episode revolving around toxic masculinity and entitlement; you know, Wednesday's areas of expertise.
Thoughts from before
- I'm still waiting for Shadow's backstory on how he became a con man himself
- We finally got some more rules on gods:
- Some of the gods are dying out faster than they should
- In lieu of worshipers, gods can use powerful artifacts as energy
- Wednesday's charms do not work on gods
- Suicide is a permanent death for gods
- I did actually catch the "Somewhere in America" splashed in
Thor'sDonar's suicide blood - Mr. World: "The war begins and nobody sees it." As I mentioned in my review of 2x02, they really over-hyped this war and made it too big a focus of the show. How are you going to stretch it out five seasons without any battles? They've cooled off a little bit in the last few episodes but I fear the damage has been done and now non-readers are going to be disappointed no matter what they do in the series
Lowlights
- I've really loved the way they have been doing subtitles for foreign languages this season and I wish they had done the subtitle thing for when New Media spoke Korean(?) to her followers. Missed opportunity
- This show really likes to present big, heavy ideas and then not do anything with them. This week, it was Nazis. This deserves its own discussion point below
- We've spent like half the season on this Gungnir storyline and . . . seriously? The big seasonal arc is about getting and repairing a stupid spear? 🙄
Discussion
Technical Boy
With the introduction of Telephone Boy, I'm assuming they are slipping in some history on Technical Boy's continued evolution, especially with Mr. World's comments about his "new" friend in response to New Media's request for tech support. I want to know how/if the current incarnation of Tech Boy was actually born in 1987 because I doubt it. With the speed of technological advancements and taking into account Moore's Law, I would think he's reborn every couple of years. The unfamiliarity Telephone Boy had toward Wednesday while it seemed as if Wednesday knew him makes me think he forgets all previous versions of himself. Or maybe he retains some of the knowledge of previous versions of himself (i.e. his CEO friend).
Lynchings and Nazis
S1, they lynch Shadow in the first episode. They bring it back up in the second episode and it actually looks like it's going somewhere but then it becomes a throwaway line in 1x05 by Mr. World and Tech Boy and a mood setting in 1x06. 2x02, they have Black-on-Black crime with young Shadow and they completely gloss over it. Then in 2x04, they have Nancy, Ibis, and Bilquis potentially plotting to create an African gods union to make sure they get fair representation but that has gone nowhere. 2x05, they have another lynching of a Black man and instead of hard-hitting truths and some introspection on America's racist past, it turns yet again into a lecture about Black-on-Black crime.
Now, with 2x06, they introduce American Nazis. You'd think this would be the perfect opportunity to showcase America's problem with white supremacy and racism but once again, nada, zilch, nothing. What the fuck is going on?? Stop introducing these topics if you don't have the ovaries to actually write about them!!
Things revisited
We're coming up on the last two episodes of the season so I'm creating a list of things I'd like to see again before the end of this season.
Plots that went nowhere (yet)
- Whatever happened with the sniper dude from the first episode and where did he get his bullets?
- I thought we'd see a lot more of Mr. Town
- And Sam, for that matter
- Also Mama-ji...
- Is Argus going to be reborn or what?
- And what about Zorya?
- Shadow's mom: what's her deal? And even though we got an episode on Shadow's backstory, it still feels like we know nothing about him.
- What happened with Nancy's African Gods union?
- Laura's love potion (and tbqh, I hope this doesn't go where I think it's going....)
Characters that (currently) feel underutilized:
- Czernobog
- Mr. Town
- Sam
- Argus/Iktomi/Bookkeeper/CEO/Baron Samedi/Columbia/Liberty
- Mama-ji
- Bast
- Ruby Goodchild
I did not realize I needed a musical episode of American Gods but here we are and I loved it. This season has been very much "God of the Week" and some of the episodes have been uneven in their delivery (i.e. The Beguiling Man). This episode is probably the best of the bunch so far; it was self-contained and had a clear structure and plot. 94%
