Television

Powers: Episode 10 “F@#k the Big Chiller” Review

April 28, 2015

Powers ends today with its tenth episode and finale to the first season. To reward us it runs a little longer at 41 minutes, but if you haven’t been enjoying the series maybe it’s more of a punishment.

Either way, lets take a look to see whether this episode is worth a look with an overall series review at the bottom, as well.

Powers: Episode 10 “F@#k the Big Chiller” (Playstation Network)

Last week the big bad villain named Wolfe was freed from his depowering coffin housed in the Shaft prison. Now he’s on the loose and the only people who can stop him are powers named Retro Girl, Zora and a rather worthless police force. What makes matters worse is that people have been taking a drug made of his blood and now he can simply suck it out of them from afar to become even more powerful. The police do have a guy with a suit that can depower powers, but no telling if it’ll work. Oh, he also insists the Black Swan or doomsday event is going to occur soon.

What the F is this scene even about?

Which is a frustration I’ve had since he randomly brought up the Black Swan a few episodes ago seemingly to cheaply set up a big climax without actually explaining or showing it. You see, the guy has some kind of machine calculating this Black Swan. Why or how this guy could have something so powerful is beyond me and judging by his ineptitude are we really supposed to believe him? This might be a minor quibble but ultimately this is an example of why this show has been so unbalanced and occasionally flat out bad.

As this character takes charge with his untested suit Walker, our protagonist, is reduced to watching the cops move in on Wolfe from video feeds. He’s standing around shouting orders to them, not really sure why, and they simply walk in on Wolfe as if he didn’t massacre 30 people six episodes ago. The general story beats make sense and could have amounted to a solid finale, but unfortunately the execution is so wonky and off it just doesn’t work.

Meanwhile Wolfe, the strongest character of the series, however brief his tenure, is a let down. Actor Eddie Izzard gets a few bits of dialogue to chew, but it’s just not as compelling as anything he was given before. This may be partially due to his seemingly unplanned suicide mission to run around taking powers, or because he’s lost his crazy and become a quieter, more sensible man. To humanize the monster so late in the game is ultimately a terrible choice for the character.

These cheap looking effects need an upgrade. Stat!

Meanwhile Calista, a girl claiming to have powers since the first episode but never actually exhibiting them, gets caught up with Wolfe. This is a convenient element that allows Walker and Royalle, a teleporter Walker tricked into getting arrested last episode, to team up and show Wolfe what’s up. Royalle wants to protect Calista and will even team up with the jerkweed he wants to kill to do it.

Why however, Calistas think for a moment hanging out with a homicidal killer like Wolfe is a good idea is beyond me; I understand she’s obsessed with getting powers, but she’s a good soul and never exhibited such bad judgement before. Even worse, why does Wolfe care about her? It’s confusing that such a battle tested villain would care about this character. How his story ends in this episode is laughable and undeserved. It’s clearly a way to set the Calista piece in place for season two, but it cheapens Wolfe and Calista by how they did it.

I will give this show props for how its paced in its final minutes. It closes off stories and starts new ones seamlessly, even if some of the delivery is off. Walker’s character gets a proper send off for the episode too and it’s both tragic and finalizing. To think we may not have to hear him whine about getting his powers back ever again will improve season two by far. There have been many lows in this show and some brief highs and I can only imagine it will get better from here.

That is the writing, but the effects may not ever get better. Unfortunately getting more money is the only way to make these effects look good and their low rent quality may never improve. The show tries its hardest to not use powers but tell good stories about its characters, but if the audience isn’t given a better representation of superpowers most will not even bother.

Do girls her age still make collages?

Episode 10: Is It Good?

A longer episode means more uneven execution and low rent special effects for this show. It still has promise though as its lead protagonist, his best friend, and some potentially interesting storylines might make this show far better. Especially with a full seasons experience for the writers.

Season 1: Is It Good?

If you average out my 10 scores (6, 7, 5, 6.5, 9.5, 4, 9, 7, 7, 7) for each episode you come away with a 6.8. That’s an unimpressive, but not damning rating. The show is watchable if given a 3 episode batch, but it’s so uneven it’s not worth counting on and requires the viewer to have a lot of patience.