Majulah Singapura! As a former Singaporean resident, I was just so pleased to see it referenced here. Outside of PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN and that one episode of CAPTAIN PLANET, this is maybe the only time I’ve noticed it show up in... well... any kind of entertainment. It makes me want to jet over to Chiangi and hop on the MRT to grab some ice kachang at the nearest hokker center before taking a relaxing boat trip through all the Taoist hells in Haw Par Villa.
And if any of those references made sense to you, you get +9000 honorary XP.
Getting back on subject (as we must,) I imagine an Entre must be in a constant state of apprehension and confusion whenever he’s outside of the financial district. How are you not going to lose your mind when the whole world around you changes so frequently, randomly and drastically depending on the outcomes of battles? If you have memories of a whole country that never existed, what really differentiates you from a schizophrenic? Hell, Yoga’s talking to kid who disappears on him mid-conversation. That's an existential gauntlet to endure, no?
The scene of the Professor trying to kill himself was a tense one. This show isn’t cold or overly logical, but it is taking an economist’s approach to character drama and emotional health. The “reality” of losing his kids might not have set it, but it did take his whole future away in the end by making him a broken shell of a man. Yoga responds to man's troubles in a way that keeps him sympathetic as a lead;burning his money in renunciation and desperately looking into bargaining with "the man in charge" to broker some kind of deal. I'm wondering if the shoe's ever going to drop for a "heel turn" in the kid.
I’m always a big proponent of a show having ambitious scope, but I wonder if it’s stretching the metaphor too far here past what seemed to be the deal in the original premise. I feel like a regular championship - - vis a vis his relationship with the girl - - might have allowed for some unconventional dialogs about morality (even if it seemed conventional at first.) However, this business with reality shifting seems to make the world too malleable with all the differences that would surround an individual Entre after he started. Even Yoga says that, in a present with all these roaming possibilities, the future has no meaning. It feels a little like a short story that’s been stretched out like so much literary taffy.
Watch this episode “Confidence" below, decide for yourself and then read my comments on the previous episode here.
Tom Pinchuk’s the writer of HYBRID BASTARDS! & UNIMAGINABLE. Order them on Amazon here & here. Follow him on Twitter: @tompinchuk
