In the thirteenth episode of the second season of iZombie, this show continues to rule my world. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch iZombie.Â
Trigger Warning: For brief discussion of child abuse.
Good god, this show is unreal. UNREAL. And for an episode so chock full of reveals and twists, it’s actually surprising to me that there’s not much development on Liv’s end, despite that she’s the main character. In a sense, she takes a backseat in “The Whopper” because so much else needs to happen. Which is okay! She’s still a major force in the episode, but the search for the bodies of Vic and Lonny is more important, as well as Major’s role in Blaine’s life. LET’S TALK.
Big Fish
Liv’s use of Big Fish’s brain is used almost entirely for comedic effect here, which doesn’t bother me because it’s such a ridiculous personality. Big Fish compulsively lied, and he did so about everything. I did find it interesting that this episode gave us the first time that Babineaux vocalized his suspicion that it’s strange to see Liv match the personality traits of every case she investigates. AND WHAT A TIME TO NOTICE THAT. Holy shit, practically every lie that Liv tells is more absurd than the last one. (I really liked the one about her inventing the drink, The Orgasm. GODS, DON’T YOU WISH.)
But Big Fish is vital for another reason: his connection to the world of Mr. Boss, which includes the missing drug runners and Drake. In a way, Big Fish’s story is more sad than anything else. He wanted so badly to be involved, to be more important than he was treated or how he saw himself. He invented lives and realities that he’d not experienced, and in the end, he escalated a situation he probably should not have. Did it make him feel important? Empowered? Alive? Cool motive, STILL MURDER THO. Well, he didn’t quite kill Drake, but he did kill Vic and Lonny. Did that make his life better? Did he escape the boredom and mundanity of working for a huge crime boss and delivering arcade games and collecting quarters?
Who knows, y’all. WHY AM I THINKING ABOUT ALL OF THIS?!?!?!!? Because this is what iZombie does for me. Seriously, I love this show.
Captured
Whew, shit, I can barely believe Major and Blaine’s plot in this episode. HOW DID WE GET HERE. HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO COPE WITH THIS. But Major’s capture while on the job as the Chaos Killer is a HUGE development in this season, and I’m shocked and thrilled by what Rob Thomas does with this idea. First of all, I believe this technically qualifies as one of my favorite tropes, albeit in a twisted way. Because by gods, I love it when enemies work towards a single goal! I LOVE IT EVERY TIME. The context here, of course, makes that a lot more complicated, since Blaine threatens Major with death unless he explains how he was able to track down all of his clients.
Even then, it’s still a fucked up plan. Short of revealing that Max Rager is issuing his orders, Major tells Blaine everything: how the list was made, how Major’s been blackmailed, how Major “kills” these people and what he’s been doing with the bodies. So, a trade is made, and I’m sure you can guess what I’m going to say: one bit of inevitability is exchanged for another AGAIN. See, it’s bad enough that Blaine found out the truth, but now, Major’s got Blaine helping him take out zombies for his employer??? Oh god, what doesn’t Blaine manipulate to his favor? EVERYTHING, Y’ALL.
Revenge
That includes how Blaine gets Major to bring him HIS FATHER. In perhaps the most absurd moment in all of iZombie – and I really struggle to think of anything weirder prior to this – Blaine gets his make-up artist to age him. Why? So that Angus will wake up post-defrosting and believe that he’s been frozen for DECADES. In typical Blaine fashion, he gives it all away because he can’t resist gloating, but y’all. HE IS SO EVIL AND HE REVELS IN IT. He just wants to make his father suffer, though this episode reveals another reason why: Angus ignored Blaine when he told him that his servant, Frau Bader, was horribly abusing him. WELL, THIS EXPLAINS A WHOLE LOT ABOUT BLAINE. I’m not always into the whole “abused-person-becomes-the-villain” trope, which season two of Veronica Mars employed, but I think it’s not utilized in the same sense here, since Blaine appears to have always been a pretty terrible kid, not because of the abuse. A small distinction, but one that doesn’t leave me with a bad taste in my mouth. Blaine is a complicated character, and while this doesn’t redeem him by any means, I can still empathize with his desire to get revenge on someone who treated him so terribly.
Drake
So what’s Liv going to do now? “The Whopper” leaves us in an odd place because we have no idea what Drake did with Terrell Johnson. Did Drake kill him and dispose of the body as Mr. Boss wanted him to? It’s not like Drake is a perfect angel, and it’s not like it’s out of the realm of possibility that he killed someone to placate one of his bosses. What if he did what Mr. Boss wanted specifically because he doesn’t like his arrangement with Blaine?
The truth is that Liv can’t deny that Drake is tangled up in this mess, and once more, she can’t escape Blaine. At this point, I imagine that she just craves something normal and stable. Every time she seems to like someone, it turns to chaos and violence and pain. LIV DESERVES LOVE, Y’ALL.
Everything is a mess. EVERYTHING.
The video for “The Whopper” can be downloaded here for $0.99.
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