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Legion – Chapter 19

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  • Title: Legion – Chapter 19
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Legion - Chapter 19 TV review

Fans of the comic character knew this was coming. The Second Season finale of Legion sets up David (Dan Stevens) as villain (or at best anti-hero) heading into the show’s next season. While I don’t have any issues with how the episode concludes, I do have some quibbles over how it gets there. First, no matter how much Division 3 is afraid of David or how much Syd (Rachel Keller) feels violated by his deplorable behavior, the group of David’s friends choosing the Shadow King (Navid Negahban) as an ally makes no sense. The Shadow King being less of a threat than David doesn’t all the sudden make him a hero. (Ted Bundy murdered more women than Jack the Ripper, but that doesn’t make Jack “good.”) This is, after all, the man responsible for David’s current mental state, not to mention his sister’s death, and various mind-fucking and murdering he’s done along the way. Is David a good person? That’s a central question to the episode. However, even if you conclude David is a bad person (or has the potential to be one) that, in and of itself, doesn’t all the sudden make Farouk a good or trustworthy person.

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Legion – Chapter 17

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Legion – Chapter 17
  • wiki: link

Legion - Chapter 17 television review

Without showing us what she did with Clark (Hamish Linklater), “Chapter 17” fills in on how the Shadow King (Navid Negahban) won over Melanie (Jean Smart). Frankly, it wasn’t that difficult (and pretty much unfolded exactly how you would expect). Despite preventing Clark from fulfilling his part in David‘s (Dan Stevens) plan, the rest of his time-delayed chess peices are all able to perform their actions which end in Lenny (Aubrey Plaza) the desert with the monks and a weapon David believes should be powerful enough to destroy the Shadow King. How crucial was Clark’s role, and will it be large enough to derail David’s plans?

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Deadpool 2

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Deadpool 2
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Deadpool 2 movie reviewThe Rob Liefeld joke was a nice touch. Following the success of 2016’s Deadpool, most of the core cast (including Morena Baccarin, T.J. Miller, Brianna Hildebrand, and Leslie Uggams) return for the sequel featuring more X-Men, more violence, and more irreverent humor from the Merc with a Mouth. Deadpool 2 is quite a bit of fun, although its more complicated plot and larger cast of characters doesn’t always serve the film’s best interests.

Following another crazy opening, the film gets more serious than you would expect before Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) stumbles through prison, a stint as an X-Men trainee, and finally puts his own team together. X-Force Assemble!

Throwing out most of his character’s backstory, the film introduces Cable (Josh Brolin) as a time traveler with murderous intent. Of the other new faces, the lucky Domino (Zazie Beetz) is the real stand-out, Julian Dennison works well as the mutant in crisis who is a the center of several different plot threads, there’s a surprise villain (who I won’t ruin here), and Shioli Kutsuna is fun as an underutilized Yukio.

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Legion – Chapter 15

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Legion – Chapter 15
  • wiki: link

Legion - Chapter 15 television review

The follow up to the most disappointing episode of the season so far circles back around to the themes presented earlier this season about a dangerous idea spreading and becoming a mass delusion. The metaphor of the hatched creatures crawling within the minds of Division 3 literally comes true as Ptonomy (Jeremie Harris), Syd (Rachel Keller, Clark (Hamish Linklater), and Kerry (Amber Midthunder) set out to kill Admiral Fukyama. David (Dan Stevens) returns from his encounter with future Syd in time to suss out what is happening before his mind-controlled friends are able to act on their frantic impulses. David is able to confront and destroy the creature, in an episode that features a number of bizarre sequences, but not before it kills one member of the group. While mostly separate from the season arc of David hunting/helping his enemy, the episode pays off the scenes from earlier weeks (while also showing just how easily David can deal with almost any threat).

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Legion – Chapter 14

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Legion – Chapter 14
  • wiki: link

Legion - Chapter 14 television review

Although it offers some interesting moments, it’s hard not to view “Chapter 14” as a filler episode used to artificially lengthen the series (a process Netflix has made an art form out of). All taking place in a blink of the eye as David (Dan Stevens) discovers the truth about his sister, the episode jumps around alternate realities where David is in more or less control of his powers and mental state. Be it a homeless man, a warehouse worker, or a the richest man in the world, in any reality David’s condition continues to be both a potential burden or boon. Had this sequence taken place in a third of an episode, rather than stretched out over an entire episode, I think the idea would have been more effective and not left me feeling that it was sort of a waste of my time. You could skip this entire episode and not miss a single beat or reference going forward with the rest of the season.

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