every imagination came to a clash.

Black Mirror - Happy! - Runaways
pop culture dailies 010

At least this has a semblance of a central theme around them, a confrontation of love, help and truth ...

Black Mirror s03e04 San Junipero

Following the major buzz around the original two seasons of the series from across the pond, I am intrigued and my curiousity got paid handsomely with the level of writings and concepts they could came out with based on the current and upcoming technologies, and the level of execution certainly matched the potential, and then some! Truth be told, the change of guard from England to USA didn't live up to their expectation and the level of quality has dwindled down comparatively but this one in particular is the standout of the third season, a rare exception of the unfortunate trend. There are a number of ways the directors could approach in revealing the concept of each episode since they are almost non-identical to one another, whether straight away let the audiences know what the grand concept is and see how the main characters interact with the world or see the world from their perspective is and slowly unraveling the world around them and why the decisions were made in the first place. This episode is firmly in the latter category, letting us live in a throwback era while the two main protagonists interact with the world and each other, feeling the vibe of their surroundings and eventually between them. The overarching arc of the series always have a dire and often negative outlook on technology and even if the advancement are a little higher, you can always see that our society is heading down that road eventually but in this instance it has comparatively much more positive values even with a morbid overtone, going through the emotional journey that they couldn't go through before in their heyday that now they're in their twilight, enabled by the advancement of technology for the betterment of their mental health. Being vague without trying to spoil the storyline itself, I want you to enjoy the viewing experience itself, seeing how they embrace their true selves and accept each other for who they are ... isn't that beautiful!

Happy! s01e01 Saint Nick

Comic books was never in the everyday conversation in the pop culture and being viewed as an eccentricities that only a few people would incline to gravitate to ... well, look at how a decade has shaped the face of the industry! Thanks to Iron Man and the burgeoning Marvel Cinematic Universe, superhero properties are being adapted even more now than ever before and the overabundance of slight varieties of the same sub-genre on the market force the studio's hands to turn their attention to other less popular intellectual properties that cover much more obscure topics and more specific demography, going away from the human with superpowered abilities cliches and delving into more out-there concepts and sensitive subjects. With television being the perfect platform to adapt these episodic graphic novels, not every project was a straight away home run but among the dozen attempts, there are a few survivors that stood out in the crowd by being a unique creature of its own i.e. amc's Preacher and CW's iZombie. As they are being more and more outlandish and bizarre, the reception of the audiences let the studios know they are more accepting of a more complex storytelling hence the desire to adapt something bizarrely macabre with its own dark humour in Grant Morrison's Happy! The pilot hit the ground running as we follow the hardened and gruff main protagonist (played by perfectly casted Christopher Meloni) disposing a number of bad guys pretty handily even though he suffered almost a lethal overdose of pills that he took for his pre-existing conditions. Gun violence, deaths and near fatal trip in the ambulance being somehow balanced with crude yet fitting levity by his one liners and quips ... and an imaginary friend Happy the unicorn (Patton Oswalt FTW!) to top it all off, confirming it as a wild ride. Oh, don't get me started on the craziest third act! Watch it for the fun of it, but beware of the language and the violence ... it's definitely not meant for kids!

Runaways s01e09 Doomsday

It finally come to a head between the children and the parents at the end of the episode as the former was betrayed by an adult that they reluctantly put their trust on. The slow buildup into this eventual unfortunate clash throughout the series proven to be effective as we learn of the parents' initial motivation that we learned in this episode although they have been misled and manipulated despite their noble intentions. The head of PRIDE is finally asserting his authority over them while the kids having 'accidentally' lost their only evidence against them in a fit of rage were taking a drastic action against the organization directly after taking a breath to embrace who they really are (in regards to their stance against the parents and emotionally as well) and taking a step that they would not be able to go back from. How is this massive clash and its aftermath going to be will keep me tune in!

-

Well, that's all folks! Thank you for your time and please do come back for my future posts! :-)