{"id":6725,"date":"2018-01-25T13:00:51","date_gmt":"2018-01-25T21:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=6725"},"modified":"2018-01-16T19:02:39","modified_gmt":"2018-01-17T03:02:39","slug":"mark-watches-alias-s01e14-the-coup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2018\/01\/mark-watches-alias-s01e14-the-coup\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches &#8216;Alias&#8217;: S01E14 &#8211; The Coup"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the fourteenth episode of the first season of <i>Alias<\/i>, Sydney\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s job takes a bit of a backseat to her personal life. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch <i>Alias<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>HELP. IT HURTS.<\/p>\n<p><b>Vegas<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Even after this show basically told me that Francie was gonna book a last minute trip to Vegas, I still dismissed it as a possibility. So did Sydney, CLEARLY SHE DIDN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T THINK FRANCIE WOULD EITHER. Now that I think about it, it was pretty inevitable that <i>Alias<\/i> would have to deal with Sydney possibly running into her friends while on a mission. I just didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t expect it so soon or for it to have <i>these<\/i> ramifications. I really enjoyed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Coup\u00e2\u20ac\u009d because the action sequences aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the most fulfilling parts. Oh, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re certainly fun! I loved watching Dixon win all that money off of that smug asshole. (And I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even know what Dhalgren did, but his face was so HATEABLE.) And the K-Directorate plot twists were absolutely unexpected, too. (DAVID ANDERS, OH MY GOD.)<\/p>\n<p>But \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Coup\u00e2\u20ac\u009d worked best for me when it examined other characters and how Sydney is dealing with developments in their lives. Her discovery that Charlie really <i>was<\/i> cheating on Francie\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthough not with his music partner\u00e2\u20ac\u201dis devastating all by itself. How the hell was Sydney supposed to tell Francie? Their surprise appearance in Vegas ONLY MADE IT WORSE. Francie wanted to rush the ceremony, and Sydney couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t possibly let that happen. Again, she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a deeply moral character, so I understood why she couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just stay on her mission with Dixon. She had to do <i>something!<\/i> And rather than ruin Francie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s joy herself, she instead leverages her knowledge of Charlie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s infidelities so that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get a chance to tell her the truth himself. Given how difficult that situation was, it was a pretty good solution.<\/p>\n<p><b>Fallout<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Yeah, I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t expect it to backfire as bad as it did. But one element of Francie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s reaction that made a lot of sense was the fact that she used Sydney\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s job against her. Sydney <i>had<\/i> been absent from some key moments during the engagement, and she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also been so strange and distant regarding her employer. So it made sense that Francie would lash out and focus on those details, both because it was a distraction <i>and<\/i> because it really IS a weird part of their life together.<\/p>\n<p>The whole thing is so heartbreaking, though. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m glad that Francie is getting a story of her own, mind you, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one that parallels the whole \u00e2\u20ac\u0153double life\u00e2\u20ac\u009d problem that Sydney is dealing with. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Coup\u00e2\u20ac\u009d doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t provide us with a next step, either. Is Francie staying with Charlie? (I HATE HIM, HOW DARE HE.) Does she want to work things out with him? How is she gonna deal with the betrayal she just experienced? WHEN WILL SYDNEY KICK CHARLIE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S ASS.<\/p>\n<p><b>Closer<\/b><\/p>\n<p>So, I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if anyone else did this while they were on their first watch of <i>Alias<\/i>. Whenever Jack and Sydney are either close to or currently having a nice moment, I brace myself for whatever Thing that Jack will do to <i>completely fucking ruining that moment<\/i>. A lot of times it happens within the conversation! Because Jack is so unused to being a father that he can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t stand acting like one! Sometimes, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a scene or two later. Can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t go too long without crushing your daughter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hope!<\/p>\n<p>You can consider me MIGHTY surprised that Jack did not actively ruin the incredible moment he had with Sydney by that carousel. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a genuinely great scene that shows us that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s <i>trying<\/i> to be affectionate towards her. In small ways, I should add! And he is honest about <i>why<\/i> it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been so hard for him to start opening up, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all <i>good<\/i>? He doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t drop some terrible secret on Sydney? Or walk away in the middle of a sentence? Or act condescending towards her??? CAN HE DO THIS AGAIN OR HAVE WE MET THE QUOTA FOR THIS SEASON?<\/p>\n<p><b>Sark<\/b><\/p>\n<p>WHO THE FUCK IS HE??? I <i>think<\/i> I spelled David Anders\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s character\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name correctly, but in case you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re confused, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s who I am referring to. I still am no closer to guessing who The Man is, but clearly this new player is not wasting time. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Coup\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is shocking because it finally introduces the head of the K-Directorate to the audience, only to have him executed mere minutes after his appearance. Sark leverages the power play to get precisely what he wants for his employer: that mysterious Rambaldi notebook. WHAT IS WITH ALL THE RAMBALDI ARTIFACTS??? Why are they so important? They have to be important enough for The Man to risk wiping out the K-Directorate, right? I DON\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T GET IT.<\/p>\n<p>The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Coup\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded <a href=\"https:\/\/markdoesstuff.com\/products\/mark-watches-alias\">here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><b>Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; <strong>My YA contemporary debut, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.markoshiro.com\/blog\/2017\/9\/22\/i-am-proud-to-announce-my-ya-contemporary-debut-anger-is-a-gift\">ANGER IS A GIFT<\/a>, is now available for pre-order!\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong><strong>If you&#8217;d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, <a href=\"http:\/\/eepurl.com\/ey636\">sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the fourteenth episode of the first season of Alias, Sydney\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s job takes a bit of a backseat to her personal life. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Alias.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[681],"tags":[682],"class_list":["post-6725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alias","tag-mark-watches-alias"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6725\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- WP Super Cache is installed but broken. 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