(This post should have appeared September 30, but didn't for various reasons, chief of which was that I hadn't yet written it.)
So, Stan dismissed Parthenon today.
I have mixed feeling about this, actually. One the one hand, he did utterly botch the whole "be a role-model and relate to kids" test, and when commanded by Evil Clone Stan Lee (god, did I just write that?) not only took that woman's cane but also left it on the other side of the street.
On the other hand, this was his first time up on the blocks, ever, and until today was pretty much a paragon of superheroism (girlish shriek aside.)
Compare this to Hygena, who has been up on the blocks how many times now? Or even Hyper-Strike, who committed the nigh-unpardonable sin of revealing his secret identity to those schoolchildren.
I dunno. I guess I'm saying that while I understand why he was eliminated, I don't think it should have been today. Yes, he messed up, but so have Hyper-Strike and the Defuser, both of whom are strong contenders for winning.
I guess Stan wanted gender diversity in his final three? As others have speculated, I wonder if Stan really is making these eliminations, or if he's just a mouthpiece for the producers. I also wonder if the finalists haven't already been chosen, due to some of the spurious choices for elimination that have been made this season.
As always, the after show interview can be found here. You may not like him because of his sexuality, but you cannot deny the man knows how exit with style, grace and dignity.
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ReplyDeleteok, here's my opinion. I havn't ever actually seen the show since I don't get cable TV, but I've always kinda suspected on these shows that the winners are probably mostly predestined to win by the producers. Do you ever wonder if you decided to be a superhero like one you've created in City of Heroes, how they'd stack up?
ReplyDeleteI can't imagine that Lee does anything more than show up, read a script, and get his check.
ReplyDeleteAs for Hyperstrike's name reveal, I don't see the problem. Those kids know his last name, which can't be horribly rare, and nothing else about him. He didn't pull a Parker and completely out himself, and it was a great way to build empathy with those kids. It was really only something to criticize him for, I felt, since he didn't really make any other missteps during that episode.
Parthenon, though it was his first time on the blocks, screwed up really badly, and should be able to discern at this late date that the stated objective is never what is important when it's time to send someone home. And the suits got rid of the gay character as quickly as they could manage. And they needed a woman in the finale to bring in the female viewers.