captain-stevens

I was just thinking that it's been a year since the last BBC Agatha Christie adaptation (Towards Zero) so I looked up if there's going to be a new one and there is! Endless Night is next, and although it's not one of my favourite books I do like the characters and slow dread of the story, so hopefully that'll be fun and not too twisty different from the book. No release date yet, as far as I can tell.

Netflix had their own adaptation recently-ish too, that was The Seven Dials Mystery which I did watch and it had some actors I really liked, and a Bundle I liked, but overall I was mostly meh about it. Didn't care about secret societies when I read the book, and I still don't care about secret societies now, though I do know a little more about their proliferation during that time and during the colonial era, and its use as a social bonding mechanism and creation of a sense of elitism in the same lines as a religion (us vs. them), which clarified quite a few things to me as someone who lives in a part of the world where such societies are so alien as to be scary and malignant, but it's in believing they're scary and malignant that gives them undue power. Anyway the adaptation was fine, it had some changes, I don't have strong feelings either way.

In reading, I have just finished Death Comes at the End, which I knew was set in Ancient Egypt which is why I didn't pick it up for a while. I think the setting allows the story to be simpler, as in Christie puts more effort in describing the world and the way its people think than in creating an elaborate mystery. But I did enjoy it, and I did have fun that I figured it out early based on the actual clues and psychology of the characters, and it does not detract enjoyment of the book at all.

I also read two Poirot mysteries, one being The Murder on the Links, which was fun! A clue-heavy mystery, and Poirot butts heads with another detective who is more clue-focused. There are two layers to the murder, and I figured out the first one based on the clues, and the layer itself is similar to what went on in Body in the Library. The structure is a little different in a good way, in how Poirot breaks down the logic of the mystery halfway through the book (yay!) to Hastings. The second layer was more opaque but I got enough of a vague picture that the final resolution made me nod like, yes, I buy that. Only for the book to throw ONE MORE dramatic left curve our way, dang. Also, although I was vaguely aware in later books that Hastings is married, I was not prepared for this to be the story where he meets the woman who'll be his wife, and all the shenanigans that happen in that subplot.

The other is Dead Man's Folly, and I enjoy so much when characters spell out midway through the book certain fact-connecting revelations that usually come towards the end. That said, the final reveal kind of pissed me off, and after sleeping on it, I think it's because there was no way for us the reader to make the necessary leaps of logic based on the info we were given. Specifically, that there were two murders instead of three, and that two characters have been lying about their identities through the book, and a third character knew about the lying but kept quiet. Basically I think there were too many moving parts to get some sort of handle on what was going on.

I am 114 episodes into 189, and as a twist in this exercise, I found out that the previous playlist I thought was deleted, is back up! Since all the stats are there I would I guess it was set to private and then un-privated. Whatever the case, it is back, and I have those lovely stats and lovely English summaries and all the comments, but on that last one, it turns out I no longer have the patience to go through the comments, because...

I hate Adrian. As a character, as a love interest. Since I hate him, I feel like I'm tripping balls when I read the comments and they're full of Adrian love, of how Adrian is the best, of how Aryana and Adrian are so sweet together. Fiction is subjective and this is far from the first time I've bounced off a character I've seen so much love for, so what can you do. One consequence of this is that I don't read the comments as I did before, and another consequence is that my interest in Aryana's storyline is dipping. Not all the storylines, mind! Just Aryana's.

Because now Aryana has legs again we're back to mostly-mundane school shenanigans but with a third love interest in the mix, and I think it's a problem when a female character who's the lead of a show, has significantly more male love interests than female friends. It didn't feel as obvious when there were just Marlon and Hubert, but now Adrian is there, Aryana's social interactions are overwhelmingly with boys. And she doesn't even hang out with the one female friend she does have! Bebet is only Aryana's friend at school! And then Aryana's family, i.e. her mother, grandmother and uncle, haven't had much to do with her in this arc beyond listening to her boy woes (I was also startled when I realized hadn't seen Ofelia in any significant way for a few episodes in there).

Did viewers not like Marlon because he's too whiny and not like Hubert because he's a pushover? And so they created an assertive third love interest who physically grabs Aryana's arm when she tries to get away from him, and doesn't listen when Aryana begs him to stop, and doesn't believe Aryana when she says she's not interested, because we're apparently doing the thing where no means yes and Aryana is into it actually and all her yelling at Adrian is flirting actually? Shut up!! I do not like this!! I can acknowledge romantic comedy tropes and telenovela tropes and still not like it!!!!

I thought I understood the reason for Adrian, in that Hubert and Marlon both know Aryana's secret, so adding a boy who is NOT in the know shakes things up. BUT THEN Adrian learns Aryana's secret like five episodes after he first meets her, and what are we doing, show. Why are you suddenly going breakneck speed when you teased Marlon finding out and Hubert revealing HIS secret for dozens of episodes, but it takes two episodes for Adrian to find out Aryana saved him and another three to find out she's a mermaid. What the heck. The intensity of the show's interest in Adrian, and giving him top billing of the three love interests despite being a new addition, it feels like they shoved in a hail mary character to revitalize the show, which may indeed be the case and I simply do not know the dynamics of the viewing audience at the time to understand.

Anyway I'm more invested in Megan's storyline now.