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The Magicians - SyFy [SHOW SPOILERS ONLY]


RedEyedGhost

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Episode needed more Alice, but other than that it was a great opener to the season.

2 hours ago, SpaceChampion said:

I enjoyed the subtitles for Elliot & Margo's geek-speak code.

That was phenomenal.

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

I especially enjoyed the fact Elliot hadn't actually read anything.

That was completely unsurprising. 

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

How come Penny can travel?

The fact that he was talking about the monsters still having their abilities at that same time (and because their abilities is in their DNA), says traveling is simply in his DNA or that he is a monster.  Also remember that in season two he could still travel even though he couldn't perform other magic after the White Lady regrew his hands (he could travel and perform magic when he was able to stabilize his reattached hands, and then couldn't after he had Quentin chop them off again).

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

And I'm not crazy about the fairy sub-plot.

Me neither.

1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

The Cock seems a very childish joke, but his comment sounded like a big hint the Quest will take the entire season, right?

It sure sounds that way.

Meeting Prometheus sure would have been fun....

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So the Cock mentions Elliot's friends: the one eyed conqueror, Margo, the one touched by a God, Julia, the Traveller, Penny, the tomato person, Josh, the Fool, who I assume is Quentin, which I hate because the series really harps on denigrating him, and the Torturer. Did I miss someone? Perhaps that could be Alice, and what she did with the lamprey, but I suspect that'll be a side plot and the torturer is Poppy. Which once again is 

Spoiler

totally different than the books

 

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1 hour ago, Fragile Bird said:

the Fool, who I assume is Quentin, which I hate because the series really harps on denigrating him

He was "The Fool" when Jane was trapped in the snare and "The Witch and The Fool" came to save her.

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6 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

So the Cock mentions Elliot's friends: the one eyed conqueror, Margo, the one touched by a God, Julia, the Traveller, Penny, the tomato person, Josh, the Fool, who I assume is Quentin, which I hate because the series really harps on denigrating him, and the Torturer. Did I miss someone? Perhaps that could be Alice, and what she did with the lamprey, but I suspect that'll be a side plot and the torturer is Poppy. Which once again is 

  Reveal hidden contents

totally different than the books

 

There's also the warrior, which is Kady.  In the trailer when the Cock went through the list, they had Alice as the Torture Artist.  Although there was no Poppy in the trailer so maybe that's a reveal for a later day and she'll fit in there somehow.  The Dean was also shown a lot on the trailer, though with no official purpose for the Quest.

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7 hours ago, RedEyedGhost said:

He was "The Fool" when Jane was trapped in the snare and "The Witch and The Fool" came to save her.

As I said, the writers really denigrate him. I don't even remember an episode called The Witch and the Fool. :P I'm curious to see how they are going to deal with the ending. 

Spoiler

Ember and Umber had to die for Fillory to be reborn, and Quentin rebuilds it, without any gods this time. Quentin in fact is very god-like when he does. Which puzzles me about killing them not even hallway through their planned seasons. He seems like anything but a fool. 

 

2 hours ago, Dr. Pepper said:

There's also the warrior, which is Kady.  In the trailer when the Cock went through the list, they had Alice as the Torture Artist.  Although there was no Poppy in the trailer so maybe that's a reveal for a later day and she'll fit in there somehow.  The Dean was also shown a lot on the trailer, though with no official purpose for the Quest.

Ah, so she must have tortured The Lamprey. 

eta: and of course, Poppy hasn't even shown up yet, so she can't be in the list of friends.

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So forgetting about the faerie invasion was exactly what their queen wanted me to do.

Penny did say some of us aren' t completely human before he took off from gun guy, so his bloodline maybe has been interboinked by supernatural beings, then it maybe surfaces in later generations as a recessive?

The party had lots of effort from the set builder,  but it was the low point because we didn't have access to the drugs.  (Have you begun a BYOB tradition yet?)

 

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While I enjoyed tonight's episode, I really had to gag over the changes they've made to the plot. I finally understand why many GoT fans have stopped watching the show. I understood the need to cut down a massive, complex work like GoT, and the need to take shortcuts, but The Magicians jumped the shark quite a while ago.

The illustrations to the story were kinda stolen from Harry Potter, but in colour. The sentient ship was outright thievery from Robin Hobb. Creatures taking over bodies is so unimaginative, like Grade 3 stuff to anyone who's a geek!

Other book comments:

Spoiler

So weird of them to totally turn around the story of the keys. It's the father who searches for his daughter in the books, as she has been stolen away by her witch mother. And we eventually meet him, of course. And taxes are collected, since the island has lots of gold. The daughter-to-the-fairies of course is invented, and the plot is sort of creepy. The sloth should be on the ship! And will there be guardians at the end of the world?
Also, the clock. I guess we will not see Venice or go back to the house. How small is their budget anyway?

 

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I liked it. I think it's hilarious that the show is very purposefully reusing some fantasy cliches, and they're so meta about it.  

On 1/9/2018 at 6:51 AM, Jussi said:

I love the books, and I enjoyed the first season. But the second season was too different from the books.

 

I wonder if I am the only one who was bothered with the ethnic composition of the Fillorians in the second season. In the books, every human in the kingdom of Fillory is white. In the TV show most are white, but there are also many black men and women in the population. Not that I have anything against seeing black people in the show, but there hasn't been any explanation for the diversity. The Fillorian society seems to be post-racial, no one cares about skin colour. But that has to be a recent development, because the black people are really dark (they haven't merge in the white population). Is there some kind of apartheid still going in marriage customs? Ore are the black people recent immigrants? The Lorians are supposed to look like Vikings, but in the show they have a black king. The population of Kindom of Loria seems to be ethnically similar to Fillorians in the TV series.

I just wish there would be an explanation. It's like you are watching Game of Thrones and suddenly some villagers in Westeros would be black, and no explanation is given. Changing the ethnicity of Penny and Dean Fogg didn't bother me at all.

Is there a certain reason why the people of Fillory need to be white?  Are they a white supremacist group in the books?  Because if there is no particular reason for them to be white, then keeping jobs from a diverse population just because seems like a pretty white supremacist view on things.

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I was reading an interview with Les Grossman and he points out that his books are a purposeful reimagining of other tales, a grey area, slipping painfully close to fan fiction. Knowing this, I'm rather surprised that book readers are complaining that the show is sticking with the spirit of the books by doing that very same thing.

https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/1/18/16883082/magicians-lev-grossman-syfy-narnia-harry-potter-remix

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1 hour ago, Dr. Pepper said:

I liked it. I think it's hilarious that the show is very purposefully reusing some fantasy cliches, and they're so meta about it.  

Is there a certain reason why the people of Fillory need to be white?  Are they a white supremacist group in the books?  Because if there is no particular reason for them to be white, then keeping jobs from a diverse population just because seems like a pretty white supremacist view on things.

As I said, I enjoyed it, but if the next two seasons are going to be constantly nudge-nudge-wink-wink it will become very boring very quickly. There are only so many unsubtle blows to the head that I want.

I think Fillory as written by Plover was very white, a white American's 1920s dream land. I can understand Grossman making that decision because he was being true to the style of the books of that time. What surprises me is that pretty well all the major Earth world characters are white too. There are two Indian characters that I can recall, a student at Brakebills and one of the thieves in book three. Offhand I don't remember a named black character, though I might not just be recalling them. Just because Jussi is surprised does not make him a white supremacist. I don't think J.K. Rowling is a white supremacist either, and her books did become more inclusive as she continued to write them. I expected Grossman to be more sensitive because he's an American and race is a big topic in the US, and he's a well-respected reporter too. There wasn't a lot of diversity added by book three, except for the aforesaid Indian thief. At least he included characters from different countries, like Anais (not in the show) and Poppy, and sections of the book take place in England, Italy and France. Oh, and Mayakovsky and Antarctica and parts of South America.

Oh, wait, there is a named black character, in The Magician's Land, the botany prof at Brakebills, Hamish. 

 

5 hours ago, Vaughn said:

I though the illustrations were more ripped off from Samurai Jack but I liked them nonetheless. 

I liked them, but since I've never seen Samurai Jack I immediately thought of the story of the three brothers as shown in Harry Potter, since a story was being illustrated. In Samurai Jack is someone telling a story and the drawings illustrate the tale as well?

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20 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

I was reading an interview with Les Grossman and he points out that his books are a purposeful reimagining of other tales, a grey area, slipping painfully close to fan fiction. Knowing this, I'm rather surprised that book readers are complaining that the show is sticking with the spirit of the books by doing that very same thing.

https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/1/18/16883082/magicians-lev-grossman-syfy-narnia-harry-potter-remix

That's so funny for you to say that, when Grossman himself in that interview is so obviously unsettled by what the writers of the tv series have done to his books!

Quote

And when it came to collaborating, to passing this story that I’d written on to other creators, it was definitely unnerving. It provoked a lot of feelings. It was exciting and thrilling and stimulating, but it was also a real gut-check feeling where I had to tell myself, “It’s time to let go, and to let other people find different kinds of meanings in this story, which you’re used to thinking of as your own.”

If Grossman himself has gut-check feelings, I think the readers can to.

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46 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

As I said, I enjoyed it, but if the next two seasons are going to be constantly nudge-nudge-wink-wink it will become very boring very quickly. There are only so many unsubtle blows to the head that I want.

I think Fillory as written by Plover was very white, a white American's 1920s dream land. I can understand Grossman making that decision because he was being true to the style of the books of that time. What surprises me is that pretty well all the major Earth world characters are white too. There are two Indian characters that I can recall, a student at Brakebills and one of the thieves in book three. Offhand I don't remember a named black character, though I might not just be recalling them. Just because Jussi is surprised does not make him a white supremacist. I don't think J.K. Rowling is a white supremacist either, and her books did become more inclusive as she continued to write them. I expected Grossman to be more sensitive because he's an American and race is a big topic in the US, and he's a well-respected reporter too. There wasn't a lot of diversity added by book three, except for the aforesaid Indian thief. At least he included characters from different countries, like Anais (not in the show) and Poppy, and sections of the book take place in England, Italy and France. Oh, and Mayakovsky and Antarctica and parts of South America.

Oh, wait, there is a named black character, in The Magician's Land, the botany prof at Brakebills, Hamish. 

 

I liked them, but since I've never seen Samurai Jack I immediately thought of the story of the three brothers as shown in Harry Potter, since a story was being illustrated. In Samurai Jack is someone telling a story and the drawings illustrate the tale as well?

Ok, so the books were very white.  What I want to know is why that poster has such a reaction to the show being inclusive.  It doesn't appear the fundamentally change the story, so who careas?  

40 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

That's so funny for you to say that, when Grossman himself in that interview is so obviously unsettled by what the writers of the tv series have done to his books!

If Grossman himself has gut-check feelings, I think the readers can to.

The gut check feeling doesn't deny the fact that the books were reimaginings of other stories, which was the problem you claimed to have with the show.  It wasn't that you had a gut check at the changes, it's that you remarked on the idea that things were 'stolen' from other stories, yet this was the fundamental concept of the books.

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26 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Ok, so the books were very white.  What I want to know is why that poster has such a reaction to the show being inclusive.  It doesn't appear the fundamentally change the story, so who careas?  

The gut check feeling doesn't deny the fact that the books were reimaginings of other stories, which was the problem you claimed to have with the show.  It wasn't that you had a gut check at the changes, it's that you remarked on the idea that things were 'stolen' from other stories, yet this was the fundamental concept of the books.

I have no problem with Grossman being influenced by other writers.  I had never read the books when I started watching the show, and in one of my first posts I said it was like an older Hogwarts with sex with Narnia thrown in too. Now that I've read the books I'm a big fan, and I want to read Codex, which is apparently actually a better known work of his.

For the third time I'll repeat, I enjoy the show. But already it seems like the tv writers have no creative ideas of their own and need to gild the lily. Grossman has done a very nice mash-up of books he's been influenced by, but the writers are just piling it on thicker and thicker. It feels like we are going to end up with a tv series that has more roots in the Airplane farces than in sy-fy/fantasy. And that would be disappointing.

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8 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

I have no problem with Grossman being influenced by other writers.  I had never read the books when I started watching the show, and in one of my first posts I said it was like an older Hogwarts with sex with Narnia thrown in too. Now that I've read the books I'm a big fan, and I want to read Codex, which is apparently actually a better known work of his.

For the third time I'll repeat, I enjoy the show. But already it seems like the tv writers have no creative ideas of their own and need to gild the lily. Grossman has done a very nice mash-up of books he's been influenced by, but the writers are just piling it on thicker and thicker. It feels like we are going to end up with a tv series that has more roots in the Airplane farces than in sy-fy/fantasy. And that would be disappointing.

I'll repeat, I'm not accusing you of not enjoying the show.  I couldn't care less if you do.  I took me a long time and two tries to get into it.  My surprise is that you didn't like the mash up feel even though the books are apparently a mash up.  

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On 1/18/2018 at 3:45 PM, Fragile Bird said:

 It feels like we are going to end up with a tv series that has more roots in the Airplane farces than in sy-fy/fantasy. And that would be disappointing.

Surely you can't be serious. B)

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Quote

 

I have told you repeatedly not to call her/him that!

Also, anyone who is accustomed to anglo entertainment is noticing the new era of inclusion pushing its way into everything, with some successes while in other worlds the presence of a melting pot is more jarringly odd to where it takes you out of the story so that you can take a moment to say to yourself, "okay, so the human torch is black and his sister the invisible woman is not..... which is fine.   Fine!   Yet odd."    So I'm going through my own adjustment period with this issue, and like with gays being the one constant in the TV universe I'll get less distracted by this melanin injection as time goes by until I don't even notice or question it, which I suppose is the desired endpoint for a functional melting pot.   

 

The beginning of Gods of Egypt made me slightly nervous, for example, for its evoking of plantation life at the pedastal of the whiter gods, but then the rest of the movie totally fucked and banged and was so enjoyable that I forgot about the "whitewashing" that other people couldn't ignore.  I was sort of miffed to find out that they were miffed, because the awesomeness of the movie overcame the questionable casting choices... from my vantage point.  But then I must admit I'd be more likely to get hung up on such things if I was darker skinned.  So, in short, see Gods of Egypt because it's a wild fun ride, then go online and do pennance by chastising the casting / portrayal , thus enjoying a fine movie while also washing away the stink of your crime.

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