The Book of Rannells: Sofia the First: Season 4, Episode 8 – “The Mystic Isles: The Mare of the Mist” (2017)

A second episode with Skye the unicorn totally confirms my belief that he’s at least semi-inspired by Reepicheep – very fun and very cute.  This episode is enjoyable enough, even if the message is kind of eye-rollingly telegraphed.

Sofia’s first encounter with the Mystic Isles ended up with her becoming a Protector-in-Training, sworn to defend her home realm from whatever magical threats might seek to harm it, and it looks like her training for this role is probably an on-and-off plot over the course of the season.  Here, her Protector mentor comes along with a magical MacGuffin for her to collect as a vital part of her training.  More importantly, Sofia is informed that she needs a winged “Protector steed” to get her from magical realm to magical realm, and she’s got two flying equestrians vying for the job:  her old Pegasus pal Minimus and her newer unicorn acquaintance Skye.  Sofia struggles to choose between them, and as the two constantly bicker and try to prove their own worthiness, they threaten to disrupt the mission.

I appreciate that there’s at least a little thought put into the mentor, Chrysta’s, rigid insistence that Sofia has to pick one and only one Protector steed, but it’s still perfectly obvious that a children’s story isn’t going to end with the heroine picking one friend over the other.  That said, the squabbling between the two is amusing (I suspected, correctly, that Minimus was voiced by Eric Stonestreet, which is fitting since his Modern Family costar Ariel Winter voices Sofia) and the episode takes time to show that both have their own strengths and weaknesses.  From Andrew Rannells’s other episodes of the show, this seems pretty par for the course.  Definitely kiddish, but charming and non-annoying enough, with its heart in the right place.

Like I said, Skye gives off even more Reepicheep vibes in this one (possibly with just a dash of Puss in Boots,) probably due in part to the fact that his flying skills have improved and now more closely resemble his boasts about his abilities.  This episode ups the chivalric-knight speech tendencies, peppering Skye’s lines with words be “prithee” and “thither and yon,” which is fun.  It’s a nice contrast to Minimus’s more down-to-earth personality, and it makes an amusing juxtaposition with Skye’s more immature qualities; I like how he keeps harping on the fact that he’s a unicorn as proof of why he’s the obvious choice for a Protector steed, and Rannells’s chastened-but-petty delivery of, “I blame myself… and also him,” got a genuine laugh out of me.

Another song, which is again pleasant but mostly forgettable – it’s a duet between Minimus and Skye, each trying to one-up the other and convince Sofia to pick them.  It’s a bit more melodic and smartly written than the song from “The Mystic Isles,” but it also doesn’t give Rannells much opportunity to show off his voice, so it winds up kind of in the middle for me.

Ms. Marvel, Vol. 1: Destined (2019)

Other than Doctor Who stuff, Ms. Marvel is the first comic I’ve read long enough for the volume numbers to reset back to one. I’d been aware that comics did this, and while I admit it makes sense (if you’ve been running as long as, say, Superman or Captain America have, saying “volume 6,823” is going to be a mouthful,) it kind of skews wth my sense of order and organization. But that’s not a major concern, not nearly enough to get in the way of this neat new chapter in the saga of Ms. Marvel! (Premise spoilers.)

Facing giant monsters in the heart of Jersey City isn’t too far off from a regular day for Kamala, but things get turned on their head when it turns out that the monsters are a test engineered by representatives from Saffa, a distant planet. They fear a long-prophesied disaster on their world, and according to their ancient texts, Kamala is the Destined One, the only person who can save them. As Kamala accedes to taking her superhero game intergalactic, she tries to get her footing on an alien planet while she grapples with the story of who Ms. Marvel is.

Part of Ms. Marvel’s charm is her “teenage hometown hero” vibe, but despite the much larger, planet-hopping scale here, that attitude isn’t missing from this story. On Saffa, the hometown hero travels to a much bigger pond, one where her fame precedes her. This presents a tumble of emotions – her driving motivation, always, is to protect others and step in the path of the bad guys, but she’s also flattered at the attention, overwhelmed but determined at the enormity of the task placed before her, and at least a little uncertain about whether these people’s faith in her will pay off in the way that they need. Along the way, she’s flanked by a few characters from back home who try and keep her remembering who she is, but who don’t necessarily see the complete picture. All that said, the new locale does mean pretty limited time with some of the other regular characters from the comic, and that’s a little disappointing, because I enjoy all of them.

And the adventure on Saffa is pretty neat. I have a fondness for stories that mix sci-fi and fantasy elements (why, yes, Thor, I will absolutely take both spaceships and magic,) and that’s on display here, along with some courtly intrigue and fun scenes of Kamala trying to explain things about her life, Earth, and human customs to Saffa’s prince. It’s also an adventure that tests Kamala in new ways and digs a little into the legacy she shares as an Inhuman.

This volume makes really good use of Kamala’s parents as well. We explore her relationship with them and get into some cool dynamics there. Kamala’s parents are two characters who felt very thinly drawn when the comic first started, but since then, they’ve gained a lot more dimension (reflective both of growth in the comic and an expansion of Kamala’s perception of them,) and this is a nice opportunity to take a closer look at them.

Finally, I really like the recurring theme of who Kamala is, with each installment narrated by someone reflecting on their perceptions of her. It’s a cool device that works well with the theme of Kamala being touted as the Destined One, weighing her titles/fame and the expectations on her with her real self.

Other Doctor Lives: The Crown: Season 1, Episode 3 – “Windsor” (2016)

As I mentioned last week, most of my knowledge of the British monarchy comes from movies, and when it comes to this show, it’s nice that I’ve already seen The King’s Speech. Even though The Crown focuses on a different era and a different monarch, the events of The King’s Speech lend important context to what’s happening in the story and help some of the plots hit home better for me.

The royal family prepares for George VI’s funeral, which puts them back in touch with the late king’s older brother David, who’s been abroad after abdicating the throne and ceding responsibility to George VI. David regards himself as an exile who’s been thrown over by the family for the crime of falling in love, while his sister-in-law the Queen Mother thinks David unfairly thrust his own duty onto her husband, consigning him to an early grave. Elizabeth tackles her first days as queen, finding Churchill and his cabinet attempting to manage her on one side, and to a lesser extent Philip on the other.

I feel like the “Wallis and Edward/David” stuff would’ve come across clearly enough in the episode as is, but again, having the background on the two brothers from The King’s Speech gave me a jump on this, and as soon as someone mentions David coming back to England for the funeral, I realized it was going to go down. All this drama plays well, with both sides entrenched in their own perceptions of what happened back then and what’s happened since. Elizabeth is a bit stuck in the middle, not wanting to instantly tar her uncle with the brush her mother uses but at the same time not quickly accepting his “poor old me, I’ve been so cast out” routine either.

Elizabeth navigating uncertain waters is the main theme of this episode. We see it with the family stuff, and we definitely see it with her and Churchill. Right from the start, as the young queen attempts to get off on the right foot with the aging prime minister, he moves to run roughshod over her. He “kindly” corrects her “mistakes,” doesn’t let her get a word in edgewise, and intimates that she’ll need considerably more time than her father to get her bearings, planning to push out her coronation for more than a year. Even though it’s obvious that Elizabeth isn’t a weak or incapable person, he kind of makes her feel like one, and she has to learn to adapt to break through Churchill’s blustery way of “this is how we’ve always done things.” (Side note: I think I’m coming around to John Lithgow as Churchill. I’m settling into his performance more as the season goes on.)

And, unfortunately, we see Elizabeth having to do the same sort of work with Philip, who seems to be having a “two steps forward, one step back” approach to being the queen’s husband. Here, he has some unrealistic expectations about what their lives are going to be like moving forward, and he tries to set the terms without ever really 1) checking in with how she feels about that or 2) considering that, as queen, there may be certain things required of Elizabeth regardless of what she may or may not wish. He doesn’t come off particularly well here.

Although I understand the expected gender roles of the time and how Philip is struggling to recontextualize his place in the household, it’s also frustrating to watch. During this episode, I couldn’t help but think, “Elizabeth was already her father’s heir when Philip married her – he knew she’d be queen eventually. How did he think this was going to look?” But maybe that’s the key. Maybe his notions of marriage and family are so set (even unconsciously so) that it never did occur to him that he can’t be married to the queen and expect that his life will only change to the extent that he wants it to. Matt Smith plays it well, and Philip comes across like a person rather than a Symbol of the Patriarchy or whatever, but I do hope he starts getting his head around this a little more. Elizabeth is up against a lot and will need support, and as George VI informs Philip in the pilot, that’s his most important job now.

I can’t remember if he popped up at all before this (at the wedding in the pilot, I suppose,) but this episode also gives us some longer scenes with Philip’s father, and I realized where I know him from: it’s Greg Wise, Mr. Willoughby from the Emma Thompson/Kate Winslet version of Sense and Sensibility!