“There’s nothing wrong with MSG, my friend.” Spoken like a true Doper!
My new claim to fame.
So cooooll!!!
Also, mad props to Sean Sullivan for capturing that personality as an elderly man. I had nearly two seasons of watching that persona in a sixteen-year old body. Seeing that style and mannerisms in a sixty-some year old man was oh-so-satisfying.
Five is easily the best part of the show.
My interest level when the characters are on their own (not interacting with the rest of the family):
- Five
- Klaus/Ben
- Diego
- Vanya
- Allison
- Luther
That being said, Luther shoots up whenever he’s with anyone else. The “Olga Foroga” scene had me rolling.
Yes! that scene had me in stitches.
I’m usually a fan, but I really hate Ellen Page in this show. Everything she does is just so wooden and uninteresting. She’s supposed to be the big star of the show and intended to draw folks in but she is straight up getting her (acting) ass kicked by literally everyone in the main cast and at least half of the supporting characters.
In the last 3-4 episodes I got tired of rolling my eyes and yelling at the TV so I just skipped every scene where she wasn’t directly interacting with her siblings. I found my enjoyment of the show was inversely proportional to how frequently Page was on screen.
At least she stopped crying about not being called special and she no longer shrieks when she’s using her abilities.
I agree that the family interactions are the best part. My rank would be:
- Klaus/Ben
- Five
- Luther - I really identify with his “firstborn”/eldest sibling syndrome
- Allison
- Diego - I’m kind of bored of his one-note hothead character, but he’s more fun when he’s with Lila
- Vanya - Sooooo dreary
The point about Vanya is that she’s supposed to be plain, dreary, unnoticeable. She spent her whole life drugged and believing she was a failure and a nobody compared to her superpower siblings. That’s how she looks and that’s how she acts, although we saw signs of her starting to come to terms with her new reality - consider the scene at the table where she blows up the fruit display. I mean, in show time she’s barely had any time at all to get a grip on this - she was a tad unhinged at the end of S1 and she spent half of S2 with amnesia. And Page is playing the character the way the character is. It’s frustrating as hell but that’s the actual story, not a failing on Page’s part.
If anything bothered me about the character, it was the Sudden Onset Bisexuality thing. Again, Vanya is confused in a lot of ways and perhaps this is her finally coming out to herself but it was awfully narratively convenient.
I’m hoping for Vanya to have a better storyline next season. I feel like her “Dream” sequence in the FBI building was pretty much the resolution to her entire arc so far. She already seemed a little better in the last episode.
If this is true then Page is fucking killing it. She is doing such a good job I literally can’t stand watching her in this role. I want to blame this on bad acting but I suppose great acting could explain it as well even if it feels counterintuitive.
I think you have it right. She’s never been that great at acting, and she’s getting too old to play kids anymore.
I liked it. I was hesitant for a couple episodes because it was a bit weird for my tasted, but then I started getting into it, and was fully enthralled when they went heavy in time travel (always a favorite of mine).
I know the character is supposed to be dreary. I just find the experience of watching her also to be dreary. The one doesn’t necessarily have to follow the other.
As for “sudden onset bisexuality,” what are you talking about? Does Vanya have to declare her bisexuality at the beginning of the first episode for it to be realistic? From what I know of bisexual people (which, granted, is not a tremendous amount), they don’t wear a “I’m a bisexual” label, and an outside observer might never know until the person shows up with a different gender.
I’ll say it plainly: Ellen Page is the worst part of this show. She sucks. There’s absolutely nothing about her or her acting here that I like. She’s fucking awful in this role and has zero chemistry with anyone else in the cast. FFS, she was outdone by a mile by both Sissy AND Harlan as far as decent acting and screen presence.
She is forgettable, but the character kind of is too. I think they could have put anyone in the role and it would make little difference.
I do think she’s completely wasted. This seems like something she’s just doing for the money. She gets to be a headliner but is the closest to a side character of the entire cast.
I think she is right for the role and is actually good in it. I just find the level of abuse she suffered to be very hard to take. And also I object to the suggestion that abuse makes someone so broken she can’t help but destroy the world. Almost twice.
There must be a TV Trope for this. I think Eleven in Stranger Things almost did this? Maybe Jean Grey as well?
Broken is broken regardless if it was easily done.
I do find her push-back against Allison (#3) to be weirdly strong. Allison tried to be friends but Vanya (#7) was having none of it.
I understand that this was important for the story arc but I never quite got Vanya’s hatred of Allison. Pissed a bit…sure. But she was soooo resistant to Allison trying to make friends.
I dunno…I love the series. These are nitpicks.