quanticprophecy

Ben Anderson is a Vice correspondent and war journalist who's done the most harrowing stories of real conflict for the past few years going into countless countries and warzones filled with all kinds of horrors, we know this as we have been on this journey following him for years.

Perfect example is the first piece of this episode which is a microcosm of his experiences in the last decade with starving babies, child soldiers and despondent and destroyed communities all in 15 minutes whilst the latter part is pure PTSD introspection.

He spends time with other victims of this affliction who've been doing MDMA treatments (ecstasy variant) but he cannot but remain skeptical at the surprisingly great result they have. But then the crux comes when he does the treatment himself in a revelatory session where he discusses his own personal experiences and how numb it's all become, all whilst b-roll of years of brutal footage is played, before slowly peeling back the layers of the emotions he's been denied all these years cause of survivor's guilt and unrelenting horror, finally giving way for some hope of normalcy and maybe even happiness...

The series is a regular cop procedural with the twist. After a brutal car accident Micheal Britten's world is split in two with every day being spent with a different loved one being either his son or his wife. This sense of duality also extends to his police partner and his psychiatrist who are different is both realities.

While the mystery itself is great the structure of most episodes is where this show suffers. Since this is still a procedural most episodes go like this: Two police cases get opened and solved, Sub-plot with either or both his son and wife, Regular visits to either or both his psychiatrist to determine mental state with case and overall mystery of the show.

That is a lot to cover in 40 minutes. So the whodunnit of the cases is either easy or simply unimportant while the overall mystery is a constant but never the focus until later in the season.

It's a good thing the writing and acting is always on point. Everybody brings it even down to the guest actors every week for the cases. It also looks great with L.A looking good and a nice choice of color palettes with both realities having a distinct color (yellow and blue) making it easy to discern which is which.

The episodes that stray away from it's usual structure are the strongest while also showing how well they managed to balance their multiple realities, characters and plot progression in those regular episodes. I will not go into the ending as i feel this show is worth watching. I will say that it is open-ended but satisfying at the same time.

So if you like procedurals like CSI and law & order or mystery shows like Lost know that this is a marriage between the two. Which also means you're only gonna get half of both genres in most episodes.

This has been a green review

Marvel media be it movies or TV shows have always been the best at one thing... balance. No more is it evident then in this great espionage show set in the late 40's.

Free from the super heroics of it's movie and shield brethren, Agent Carter gets to explore a much darker side of the Marvel universe and whilst doing so proves that Marvel just does great entertainment.

Dark themes and subjects get well explored in this short series with stuff like: sexual oppression, war crimes, adultery, the price of war on the individual and the society, extreme violence like torture on both adults and children, etc.

If all that sounds heavy well this is where the balance comes in, cause for every dark turns there is some great levity. Humor is a constant and fun could very well describe this series. They also don't skimp on the action with the hand to hand combat being a highlight.

It also has a great cast with Peggy herself (Hayley Atwell) truly delivering. The other stand-outs are Jarvis the butler (James D'arci) the ying to Peggy's yang and finally the chief of the SSR Roger Dooley (Shea Wingham) who looks like he's been sucked out of the 40's just to do this show. His performance thought not the biggest left the most impact on me.

So if you're in the mood for a nice period piece with great action, fun cameos, levity and drama in equal measure and a legit cast who brings it all together then please watch Agent Carter since i for one would love to have more adventures of Peggy and the SSR in post-war New York.

This has been a green review