Hi everyone!
Sorry this review is a little late...I had another wedding this weekend. Tis the season you know. Anyway that’s what VCR’s are for, and now that I’m back I got a chance to sit down and rant a bit about The Choice. As always this contains HUGE HONKIN’ spoilers for that eppy, and all ideas are my own. If we said the same thing well then great minds think alike, right? :-)
Overall:
And Alex is back to square one. You know the Agency will find out about the dead agents Stark killed to get his wife and kid back, so they’ll know Chrysalis has James/Brandon again and will probably assume the information Eleanor gave them was false...so I guess it’s a good thing Alex stuck around a bit, ‘cause she would have been coming back anyway. And while I don’t buy her line about enjoying the interesting cases or the people there, I am willing to believe she stuck around to continue working on taking Chrysalis down. To keep her kid safe means removing the threat to his life, and that means her showdown with Stark is just delayed.
This was also Brandy’s first real opportunity to do more then smirk and be condescending, and she does a good job letting the hurt mother slip out from behind the agent mask she’s usually wearing.
The Good:
-Margaret Thatcher and Allinoria top our quote list this week. And remind me never to correct one of Darien’s quotes, as he’s obviously quite protective of them. :-)
-It’s nice to see that Hobbes has dropped the attempts to buddy up to Eberts now that he knows Eberts won’t raise his pay, and they’re back to snipping at each other.
-Great Scene 1: The whole gang gathers in the basement to discuss the next case. It was fun watching everyone arrive in the basement to whisper as if it would help. Darien’s given up rolling his eyes at these Agency quirks and simply enjoys joking about it, while the Official and Eberts are so serious it’s funny! And I did enjoy watching all the men loosen their ties/shirt collars after Alex’s description of what she can do with a pen when necessary. Hey...maybe she can teach Darien to defend himself with a pen, and he can teach her how to pick locks with one!
-"Not so bad? Being a freak?"
"Ah! Not really a word you wana use when talking to a guy with a
gland in his head that makes him go invisible."
-Watch Darien shake his head and mouth "I did not say that!" at Hobbes as Alex bluntly tells him he’s too old to play Chrysalis. For extra fun watch the halo almost appear over his head when Alex turns to glare at him.
-Well Darien had the chance to stand shocked in a nursery full of Chrysalis babies, this week it was Alex’s turn.
-I love Hobbes joking about how he’s really 19...hey, my Mom swears she’s only 23!
-There’s a great few moments as Darien and Hobbes attempt to break the tension with Alex waiting for the test results to come back...they’re uncomfortable and Alex isn’t helping.
-"This development is...complicated."
"No, tax returns are complicated...this is frinkin’ mind
blowing!"
-While I wish we could have explored it a bit more, I do appreciate that the moral question of DNA vrs Birth Mother was brought up. Having Chrysalis be this secret evil group makes their babies easy choices, but this is a real moral quandary out there with no easy answers.
-I thought the fairy tale version of the Agency Alex told was quite cute, and her descriptions of the rest of the gang were...interesting. Darien as the "invisible knight" and Claire as the "sorceress in a cave" kinda fit, while Hobbes as a "brave dwarf" and the Official as a "grumpy king" are only half right. And poor Eberts...he’s got this cute crush on her and she thinks he’s just the Official’s pet hamster!
-I love the shocked, "WHAT?" look Claire gives Alex when Alex declares this will only end "over someone’s dead body."
-"Oh I’m afraid I can’t let that happen."
"I’m not afraid."
-Great Scene 2: The Official and Darien chew out Alex for going in alone, then Hobbes bursts in and saves everyone’s life by sacrificing Eberts' hatchback. For a bit of foreshadowing check out Darien trying to get the watercooler bomb to actually work. And for extra fun check out the pissed off look the Official gives Hobbes as the agent plows through like a linebacker, as well as Eberts starting to ask if this was about Hobbes’ parking space.
-"I was quoting Allinoria."
"I was correcting your quote."
"Don’t correct my quote!"
-"You know how some people can roll their tongue, or pat their belly and rub their tummy at the same time? Well this is kind of my thing."
-I love the bored look Darien gives Eleanor when she exclaims how amazing his disappearing act is. Think he’s heard that a few too many times?
-Poor Alex has a great moment with Eleanor as they’re chatting about taking care of the baby. You can almost see Alex question her abilities to raise this child as Eleanor prattles on about getting on the job experience. It sets up nicely her noble change of heart.
-Watch Claire grin as her eyes follow the tennis match that is Darien and Hobbes talking about Alex leaving.
-I love how Hobbes was all set to take over Alex’s office if she left. Something tells me it’s first come first serve at the Agency, and Hobbes knows to be first in line!
The Bad:
-It appears that now that Arnaud is working for Chrysalis that their plans have become much more...elaborate. If they could deliver a bomb right into Alex’s office, and the only way the Agency would know was if Eleanor tipped Hobbes off, then why tip them off? Why not blow them up, removing both Alex and Darien as a threat, storm the castle and take back the baby?
-At any point in the future are we gonna find out of Alex is/was married, or just decided to have a baby on her own? It doesn’t really matter either way, but this seams like the kind of thing we’d find out about in this eppy!
-"We’re no longer under Health and Human Services." Yea, we all realized that last week with the sign changes...nice of someone to finally mention it. Now can we please get an official reason for the move? I thought Alex brought the Agency to HHS, if she’s still working there why did it move?
-There’s one big problem with story arch that last over several episodes in a season, and that’s filling people in on important background information. IM has taken the We’re Now Giving Backstory Scene approach...as Hobbes, Alex and Darien all spend a few minutes having a contrived conversation outside a Chrysalis facility to impart all the backstory we need. Bleh. I’d rather have a short clip show at the beginning with "Last time on IM..."
-How did Claire get Stark’s DNA so she could match it to the kid?
-Hands up to everyone who was surprised that Alex’s kid was Stark’s baby. Nobody? Yea...me neither. Sorry gang, but the teasers kinda gave that one away.
-I’m all for Alex doing the noble mother thing...but she was the one who didn’t trust Eleanor to being with! Plus why couldn’t SHE take off with the kid into witness protection? Was being a government agent so important that she wasn’t willing to go and start a new life with her kid?
The Crap Count:
-"I feel like crap, OK?" Alex, on how she feels about giving up her son.
The Nitpicky:
-Darien got a new haircut. Looks good. Too bad he didn’t get a new wardrobe to match. Hey gang look, the Pimp Coat is back! :-)
-Is it me or does Alex ask Hobbes, "How are your *schniper* skills?" Whoops...schomeone schlipped.
-That was not "just" a music tutorial...that was Mozart thank you very much!
-I wonder if the San Diego Herald is a real newspaper.
-Rejected Dialogue: Alex, "I’m gonna tell you a little story. There once was a tale of a man who could turn invisible..."
-"There once was a warrior princess." Uh...does that mean Alex is really Xena?
-Someone wana explain what’s up with the black box Alex stuck the baby in when Chrysalis came calling?
-Poor Eberts, looses his car AND his turtle! Although I do wonder what a turtle was doing in his car in the first place.
-Chalk up another victim to Darien and high places...the Chrysalis guy gets sent flying out the window after he’s shot.
-Last week Darien got Germ Theory going by breaking a beaker while trying to just set it down. This week Alex smashes a glass after slamming it down on the desk. Add Hobbes breaking the window with the bomb and there’s more glass being broken then at a Jewish wedding!
-It’s a good thing the entire trip from Agency to train station to Eleanor’s apartment took less then 30 minutes, or else Darien was gonna be as big of a threat as those Chrysalis guys.
-The last leg of Eleanor’s trip was "a TBD vehicle". What the frell is a TBD vehicle?
-I don’t know why the tense changes in Darien’s voice overs irk me so much..."Nothing would ever top what she was doing right now." Wait, either she was doing it back then, or is doing it right now...
"How much confidence do you have in the security protection
program?"
"Remember Jimmy Hoffa?"
-Alex and the Official
...this review dedicated to the memory of Ebert’s Turtle.
