Primeval 3.05: Spore!

[aelfgyfu_mead]

I spent the first 5/6 of this episode enjoying it, saying, "This is why I started watching Primeval--for fun that makes absolutely no sense!" Spoilers for the episode follow, of course.


Fun
The mushroom men were hilarious. That spores would turn people into mushrooms with some kind of intelligence, more than human strength, and vaguely human shape was so ridiculous I couldn't help but enjoy it! These are the Primeval moments I'll remember: Mushroom Men; Stephen stabbing a worm with a plant stake and then photocopying another one; Abby complaining about the garden center on a Friday afternoon (I loved that episode); Jenny prodding a dino with her heel and happily announcing that while her friends liked Pony Club, "I preferred clay pigeons."

Becker was also hilarious, though I don't know if his actor meant to be. He's absolutely, completely useless! Danny's right: their security is rubbish! Helen didn't need to send in a clone! She just had to jump the fence! Brilliant Husband points out Becker may not be responsible for internal security. As the ranking officer, he ought to be. Someone should be canned. But Becker's pretty, so we may as well keep him. (Much as I like Danny, pretty he is not!)

I'm nearly certain Lester will regret calling Christine in to witness him appointing a man with no scientific background whatsoever and whose best qualifications seem to be that he's not Captain Wilder. Well, okay, Danny seems to be good at everything. Still, rubbing Christine's face in it is no doubt a bad idea.

Giving the keys to his London flat to Connor, might, however, be even a worse idea. Lester has a heart! I knew it all along! Lester is my favorite character now (though it's much less to do with his heart than his mouth--and the suits do help, at least a little). James probably will "profoundly regret" it, but he's looking out for Connor.

I loved action!Jenny. I'm so miffed that we're losing her I shouldn't start. I spent her last scene going, "No, she'll change her mind! No, she's going to turn around! NOOO!" I was not spoiled for this development at all. I am still ticked as anything, maybe more so because I didn't see it coming.

I love the new lab. Too bad it's now just wreckage. Man, that's some climate control!

Flame throwers! "How hard can it be?"
"The management accepts no responsibility for personal loss or injury!” (from hestia8)

I am full of love for Abby and Jenny. I am now determined that I must write that Abby and Jenny scene I've been playing around with in my head; it's concurrent with my "Fresh Scars," but I haven't got it right yet, so I haven't even started writing. I need to (especially now that I've told you all!).


Makes Absolutely No Sense!
What good is Becker if he can't stop a train! Why did they send three people to St. Pancras? They had more in the sewers or wherever they were (weren't those the tunnels along the canal in the mer-people episode, too?), but they had a total of three people searching the whole St. Pancras station, and I'm telling you as a short woman myself, Abby had a significant disadvantage!

What good is ARC security?

The spores turn people into mushroom people? I mean, seriously? You inhale, get sick immediately (chills within five minutes or less, I think), then turn into a walking fungus?

How convenient is it that they got the new lab online just before the invasion of the Spore People?

The place is called the ARC. They have kept animals there before. I really think their design is deeply flawed if the only place they can take a creature from a truck is the main area with all the sensitive equipment (which Sid just chewed up).

Christine's spies stink if they can't recognize what Sarah is working on.

I love Danny, but it really makes no sense to me to appoint New Guy head of the team. He knows nothing about creatures. He kills them. Have we all abandoned Nick's principles of keeping them alive and returning them to their own time if at all possible?

Jenny's "death" was ridiculous. Even in brutally cold temperatures, it can't have been hypothermia that fast, can it? But she should have suffered some serious skin damage: if it was cold enough to stop her heart, it was cold enough to give her frostbite. And where the frell are the medical personnel? Heck, even I know that if someone has no pulse, giving her oxygen won't help: you have to circulate the blood carrying the oxygen. Someone had to do CPR! Yes, warm IV fluids are good; give her warmed air, don't just bag her.

I'm really not impressed with Jenny's reasons for leaving, partly because her death or near-death experience was so patently wrong. She's fighting the creature, suddenly falls to the floor, and is dead within moments? On what planet?


I feel sure I've left out some things I meant to say. I wonder what they were?


Questions for Discussion:
1. Why can't Connor find anywhere else to sleep? They really pay them that poorly? He can't even afford a cheap hotel or hostel? He has no friends left? And he won't tell Abby because he has no friends left?
1a. If the "small place" is where Lester stays when he's "in town," where is he staying when he's at the ARC? And where, for that matter, is the ARC, if not "in town"?

2. Why does Abby throw Connor out? Let her brother sleep on a couch! I'd do it! Brilliant Husband thinks Abby doesn't want Baby Brother to know that she's living with a man, even if it's (sorta kinda mostly) platonic (for now).

3. Since Helen no longer has Nick and Stephen to keep her interest, will she leave the ARC alone? More importantly, now that they no longer have Stephen and Nick to torment, will the writers lose interest in Helen? I have a bad feeling about this.

4. Do they really pay next to nothing?

5. Where's Lester's mammoth? Have they repatriated it? (I ask especially since Lester said, "At the risk of sounding like someone from the old testament, is there a sane reason why you’re keeping animals in the ARC?" Thanks to hestia8 for the quotation!) Or did Lester finally get to take it home for the kids?

6. For extra credit: What else did I mean to say?

Comments

[reggietate.livejournal.com]

I must admit, I liked quite a lot of this ep, too, though the plot was in many ways hopeless. But I was really not happy about losing Jenny. With a guy like Danny in the lead, you need someone like Jenny around to hold him back.. This is where the 'true' Primeval ended for me - I watched all teh rest, and enjoyed most of it to varying degrees, but it's not my show any more. Next week's is great, though, despite that.

The fungus creature was fun, but batty. Far better to have the spores drive the infected person mad or something - the risk of having it spread is danger enough without them turning into ambulatory mushroom-creatures.

The lack of soldiers was silly (again). They should have cordoned off the area once they found Sir Whatever-his-name-was. You don't even have to see them, just have dialogue saying that's what they're doing!

Frozen Jenny, though wonderful in drama terms, was definitely daft. They're usually a bit smarter than that. I could have handwaved it better if they'd shown her recovery as being in the next day, I think.

Though I don't exactly hate Danny, I think he's the wrong person for the job, and his Superman tendencies are really annoying. It's like they wanted to erase Cutter by making Danny way, way bigger a hero than him - major fail as far as I'm concerned.

Connor was great. I loved the bit where he's watching them try to resuscitate Jenny, muttering, 'Not again, please not again'. At least he remembers Stephen and Cutter.

[aelfgyfu_mead]

With a guy like Danny in the lead, you need someone like Jenny around to hold him back.
Yes! sigh I'm not sure it has really been my show since we lost Nick--or possibly since the end of 1.06, when we lost The Dashing Captain Ryan, Stephen turned out to have slept with Helen, and the focus seemed to change from cool if scary monsters to conspiracies and betrayals!

I really do like Danny, but he's not the sort of person who should be in charge, even if he had the background! He doesn't have the background, being completely new to the team and having no science training. I don't see him as a "big hero" so much as a loose cannon; a man lacking in proper self-preservation instincts (even more than Stephen!), which makes him a danger to himself and others; and the sort of person you can't have dealing with the public! Without Jenny, who will keep a lid on the big secrets?

I do wonder if Lucy Brown left on her own. She had reason: she'd been through two and a half seasons and seen tremendous turnover in her co-stars, and I read she got engaged during or just after this series. But was it that she wanted to go, or that the writers couldn't handle the number of female characters? (Sarah was quite useful on site in A Night at the Museum, but she doesn't go out on any calls?)

Connor was great. I loved the bit where he's watching them try to resuscitate Jenny, muttering, 'Not again, please not again'. At least he remembers Stephen and Cutter.
Absolutely. I feel for Connor the most. He seems now to have no friends outside the ARC, and he keeps losing everyone. At least Jenny isn't dead, but still, he's going through complete turmoil, and he doesn't even have a set place to live!

[reggietate.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure it has really been my show since we lost Nick

Definitely - though the producers etc can't really be blamed for that unless they made no effort to persuade Dougie to stay a bit longer. But I didn't mind series 2, and I liked the idea of the timeline changing and Cutter being standed in a world not quite his own. Most of the problems of S3 stemmed from Nick going, I think, but also from the lack of continuity in the writing team and Adrian Hodges' obvious lack of interest in the show.

I really do like Danny, but he's not the sort of person who should be in charge, even if he had the background!

Yes, this is the aspect of it which most dissatisfied me. Danny felt shoehorned in, rather than as a natural development. Would have been much better if Jenny had remained a few eps longer in the lead and Danny gradually showed himself capable of replacing her (he could never really replace Cutter!) I agree he seems a loose cannon, but that's not what they play to in the remaining eps, to a large degree - if they had, I'd have been a lot less annoyed by his Superhero, can-do-anything schtick.

I do wonder if Lucy Brown left on her own.

There was speculation on various forums about her being pregnant, but I didn't really see evidence of it beyond some loose blouses (she's always been kind of buxom anyway *g*) and the like. I suppose it's possible. But my guess would be they just wanted to ditch any reminder of the whole Nick/Jenny/Claudia thing in favour of the shiny new characters. As for dealing with the public, they seem to have abandoned that altogether!

The main problem with S3 is not just that Cutter is gone - everyone connected with him is gone too: Nick/Jenny and the whole Claudia Brown thing, his relationship with Connor, the science, etc. And while the new characters aren't actually bad, they don't have any proper connections, and kind of aren't tied in to what was, only five minutes ago, the main story of the whole show. The anomaly map Cutter created in ep two is sadly wasted - I loved that idea, slightly mad though it was (it fitted Cutter's personality and approach perfectly, and made a much more interesting visual than the same idea on a computer screen. And the whole previous two years of backstory seem to have been blithely tossed on the scrapheap, instead of being subtly woven into the episodes.

[hestia8.livejournal.com]

Becker, remember, has inherited the rubbish security from series 2 where they didn’t have many (any?) soldiers. So points for trying to improve it, I suppose (gosh, check me, not taking the opportunity to call him dumb as a box of rocks – oh, no, wait, there we go).

While I loved that Jenny did finally go ‘oh, fuck this noise, I’d like to make it into my thirties, thanks’ (because I’d been waiting for *someone* to), the fact that it was Jenny made me very sad.

The whole thing with St Pancras was bizarre, but there is this thing we tend to have on British tv where Government Organisation A (for argument’s sake, the ARC) never call in B (call it MI5 – Helen must count as a terrorist by now), C (the police – unless they’re there for comic relief or to be obstructive), or in this case, D (British Transport Police – the big London stations have their own police presence). And so you end up in this universe with a bizarrely low level of police officers etc.

However also take into account that since St Pancras was refurbished as it got the channel tunnel rail link, it now is all nice and shiny and has the longest champagne bar in Europe or something, and so TV people can’t keep away from it (there was an episode of the last series of Spooks that also featured much running around St Pancras, and the good guys only had about three people then as well…)

I wonder if ARC security is so bad because they just aren’t very good strategists – maybe Helen was such a big perceived threat (from alternate series 1) that they went all out to stop her but didn’t think of her using proxies? (or, sensible security = no episode).

Maybe the ARC is full? Although tbh who knows what’s going on in that building?

Danny’s Gary Stu tendencies are really, really annoying, and why they put him in charge, I don’t know. Why isn’t Abby in charge, ffs? (I would guess the answer is some variation on the nonsense that is ‘boys can’t identify with girl leads’)

When has any medical thing on this show ever made sense? Ever?

Like I said above, I’d been waiting for someone to think that actually, this was all very exciting but they’d rather not be in constant fear of getting eaten, so while I was sad to lose her, I’d rather she walked away than that she got killed.

Discussion:

1. Because doing anything sensible would involve introducing another character and they can’t be bothered. And also part of the mythology of the show – which they don’t do very well imo – is that their work rules their lives. Why he couldn’t live with someone else from the ARC, however, I don’t know (and it would have been easy to get humour from that!)

1a. For quite a lot of people in Greater London, ‘in town’ means ‘in Central London’ (I do this myself a lot – it’s odd, when you think about it). I think that the ARC is supposed to be somewhere in the Home Counties/greater London, so it would make sense for someone who went up to Central London to meet with ministers etc a lot to have a place (or if they were that rich, the rest of his family probably use it as well). And I would imagine his family home is somewhere else in Greater London/home counties. It’s plausible, although it does increase my estimation of Lester’s wealth somewhat (I always thought it was a shame they dropped the Sir after the first series – you can explain away a multitude of sins with aristocracy).

2. Who the hell knows? And the problem with applying BH’s explanation is – why would Abby care? And also, how does he not know when Abby and Connor have been living together for about two years? (unfortunately, my assumption is that this entire storyline is there ‘because it’s funny’, to which I would say: not that funny).

3. Helen will find something else to do, because she’s that good. (ha, got the explanation in there again! It’s totally all-purpose!)

4. Probably. The budget must be horrific even before the wages. Although, thinking about it, no, not when you look at where Abby and Connor live – trust me, that’s total TV accommodation because they couldn’t afford anything like that in real SE England.

5. I assumed they’d put it back somewhere in between episodes/seasons – shame there wasn’t a reference.

6. I have no idea.

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Why isn’t Abby in charge, ffs? (I would guess the answer is some variation on the nonsense that is ‘boys can’t identify with girl leads’)
Yes, I think that may have been one of the answers to #6: I meant to go on a rant about not putting Abby in charge. Abby knows animals and has been on the team from the start. She is in fact the only surviving of the team never to have been sacked, since Cutter sacked Connor briefly over his inability to keep his mouth shut (1.02), so she clearly has the longest tenure on the team. In my experience, guys don't care if they can identify with the leader if she happens to be good-looking! When Starbuck became CAG on BSG, did anybody complain? I think the male audience were quite pleased!

sensible security = no episode
Sensible anything would seem to mean no episode for most of the show's run!

here is this thing we tend to have on British tv where Government Organisation A (for argument’s sake, the ARC) never call in B (call it MI5 – Helen must count as a terrorist by now), C (the police – unless they’re there for comic relief or to be obstructive), or in this case, D (British Transport Police)
Now that you mention it, I've seen it! I've seen only a few episodes of Spooks, but I seem to recall it from there. Torchwood, of course, is Above the Government (or was it Above the Law, Behind the Government?). On Life on Mars, Gene Hunt just doesn't want to share with anyone, including other units within Manchester Police, though I'd thought of that as just him.

I actually had a bit in the story I'm working on right now where Lester calls on MI-5, but it seemed to give a great deal more detail than needed, so I cut a paragraph or two. Maybe I'll see if I can work a reference back in just because.

When has any medical thing on this show ever made sense? Ever?
Ooh, ooh! I got one! When Stephen gets bitten in 1.02, a doctor tells Abby that even with antivenin his chances are no better than even. I think that's the last medical thing that made sense. Claudia's concussion blindness was a stretch, and just about everything that happened to anyone after that made zero sense. Cutter dying of a gunshot wound with no evident blood took the cake (it would show, even on black! and Connor would be covered in it, carrying him out like that!), until Jenny froze to death almost instantaneously with no skin damage. Where does Jenny get her moisturizer? I want some!

I had no idea of the distinction between Greater and Central London; that's helpful, thanks!

[hestia8.livejournal.com]

Okay, because I am weird and kept thinking about this, here’s a link to a map of London:

http://www.talkingcities.co.uk/london_pages/sights_boroughs_map.htm

I live in Greenwich (which, despite being on the river, is Greater rather than Central London) and work in Westminster (which is Central, and also where some of the big shopping areas are, YAY), so I get the train up to town for work etc. However, this weekend I am going with my cousin to go shopping in Bromley (Bromley is a big town in Bromley borough – Greenwich is also a town in Greenwich borough, yay confusion), which I would never refer to as going into town. Odd. I think I read a description once about London being a city made up of villages, and I think that explains it...

I bet the idea of Abby being in charge never occurred to them.

Well, yes, maybe hoping for sense from this show is a lost cause...

I don't know what it is about Brit tv, but departments not even *thinking* about interacting with each other is pretty much law - I can't think of a single counter example to this (oh, wait - Foyle's War - sometimes Foyle has to deal with an SOE woman, but he's not happy about letting criminals get away with it because of the war effort)

Half of that stuff I hadn't even thought about *g* IDK, the medical stuff kind of washes over me... (possibly because they've never had an ARC doctor onscreen? So realistic injuries are not a priority, obviously...)

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Thanks for the link to the map! I like the explanation of London as a city made up of villages. It's kind of all one, in my head, but now I know that isn't right, and I even know where to look for specifics!

possibly because they've never had an ARC doctor onscreen?
Which is why I created Devi Gupta! They must have a doctor there. I require it. Military medics are fine, but they only get you so far; they're trained to patch people together until they can get them to hospital or an infirmary or something like that. I don't even have first aid training myself, so I figure that if something is obviously wrong to me, it must be really badly and obviously wrong, and the writers could have done better. (I should perhaps make exceptions for concussions, appendectomies, and pregnancy and childbirth, about which I know a bit more because I've been through them all--one each.) Devi would have had a cow if she'd seen their attempts to revive Jenny. She would have shoved them all aside and done it properly.

Well, yes, maybe hoping for sense from this show is a lost cause...
It is now, because they've canceled it!

[hestia8.livejournal.com]

:) No problem.

Exactly! in the billion primeval fics I have yet to finish, I have various doctors, because it's just *stupid*.

I did think that as I was writing the comment, hahaha.

[a-phoenixdragon.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

[nialla]

LJ ate my first comment! Bad LJ, bad! [hits on nose with rolled up newspaper]

Makes Absolutely No Sense should be the name of the show now.

The spores turn people into mushroom people? I mean, seriously? You inhale, get sick immediately (chills within five minutes or less, I think), then turn into a walking fungus?

That was a great big ball of WTF right there. I can see someone having a bad reaction to the spores, but the energy expended to change an animal (human or otherwise) into a new creature instead of just letting it carry around spores seems a bit much. What purpose would it serve in its natural habitat?

I know, I know, we wouldn't have had Mushroom People othewise. [facepalm] When they had a line about the creature preferring the dark, my reaction was "The better to not see the bad f/x!"

[aelfgyfu_mead]

the energy expended to change an animal (human or otherwise) into a new creature instead of just letting it carry around spores seems a bit much. What purpose would it serve in its natural habitat?

You mean you expect science in 'science fiction'? What kind of fan are you, anyway? ;-)

Sorry LJ ate your previous comment!

[nialla]

Apparently I'm supposed to be a "syfy" fan. [shudder]

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Oh, noes! That's it! SyFy is sci-fi without the science!