As per usual live events get in between that get me behind schedule on my hobbies like posting content although now that I look back I dont know what really happen? I did have two rough week at the beginning of the month but I havent been able to post in the past weekend, probably was too tired. As per usual during the weekend catch up on some content and Dark Wolf finale dropped during the week to be honest the ending felt very week compared to the last three episodes, they try to setup this rescue mission to rescue Edwards that really felt like lone survivor at times but the Iranian guys felt like bots on counter strike just too easy to defeat, its been seven episodes of this prequel building up to this moment and I gotta say Edwards character journey felt way more rushed than it should have been specially considering James Reece and him know each other from the OG series so this was suppose to extend the context of that first series and Im not sure how much it did, I might have to watch The Terminal List series to confirm this but just from what I saw, I think the spin off didnt accomplish that much to that aspect although it was a cool action series if we take out the fact its a spin off, almost like there is not much connection between the two. Episode 7 titled The Wolf You Feed basically throws everything at you in the span of about 45 minutes, from that intense cabin shootout to the whole Haverford take down and then ending with Ben deciding to join the CIA, its like they tried to cram a seasons worth of character development into one finale.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26576161/
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The whole cabin action sequence was pretty brutal to watch and definitely the highlight of the episode for me, Ben basically turning himself into bait so Tal could hack into Haverfords systems and get all that incriminating evidence on him, that took some serious balls considering how many Iranian soldiers or mercenaries I guess, showed up to get those nuclear bearings back from him. Ben fight off wave after wave of attackers for what felt like forever while he was counting down those 15 minutes for Tal to work her computer magic, that shit was intense and probably another of the best action scenes from the series, its obvious that the strongest aspect of the series is action and if they only did a little better on the drama department this could have been a very solid series but at least Im ok with it skipping some cliche like Ben not fucking Eliza and got her killed before he could. The fact that James Reece showed up at the last minute to save Ben was both predictable and satisfying at the same time, it always is when the good guy is outnumbered and badly hurt, after watching the ending I also notice that some reviews online mention how Ben sells out James on the OG series so making me think this is an actual prequel, more reasons for me to watch the OG series.
The whole Haverford confrontation felt very crappy, yeah beating up a guy who cant even walk straight could make Edwards look abusive and after all they now paint him as this guy who has more self control than on episode one. After all that buildup throughout the season about this guy being this master manipulator working with Iran to get nuclear weapons, his actual motivation turned out to be some weird revenge fantasy against America for not doing enough after Vietnam and the Beirut bombings. The dude literally wanted to start a nuclear war between Israel and Iran just to get back at the US government for what he saw as decades of weakness, which is pretty fucked up when you think about how many innocent people would die just because this old man couldnt get over some shit that happened before Ben was even born. Hopkins playing the character was fine but the whole villian reveal felt kinda cartoonish compared to how grounded the rest of the series tried to be, like they needed to make Haverford so obviously evil that there was no question Ben was doing the right thing by taking him down.
The political stuff with Cyrus getting taken out by that car bomb was awesome and probably the most satisfying death in the whole season, especially after all the shit he pulled trying to play both sides of this Iran nuclear deal while pretending to be some kind of diplomatic peacemaker. Mo placing that bomb on his car and saying this is for Eliza before walking away, that was some cold blooded revenge that felt earned after everything these characters went through this season, I honestly thought Cyrus was running away because of how at the last second he tries to get out the car, same thing with Artem getting his throat slit in that massage place scene, which was nasty as hell but again felt like justice being served for all the American soldiers and operatives who died because of these guys greed and political games, the series did great at showing Jules as probably a mole within the organization but turn out to be one of the strongest patriots within the team. The way they showed these takedowns happening simultaneously while Ben was confronting Haverford really drove home the ending of the episode, felt them closing all doors and windows to wrap it up, like a coordinated team effort to bring down this whole conspiracy.
But honestly the ending is where this episode and maybe the whole season kinda lost my interest because Ben decision to join the CIA after everything he just went through feels like the writers trying too hard to connect the dots to the original series without really earning that character development, the only thing I could think about is that he got tired of been the boots on the ground getting fucked by the CIA so now he wants to be the one who fucks the boots on the ground??. The whole polygraph scene where hes asked why he wants to join and he says this is where I belong, that should be this big moment of character revelation but it just felt flat because we never really saw Ben struggling with that choice throughout the season, plus having Dash show up out of nowhere to recruit him for some mysterious ground branch operation feels like setup for season 2 rather than a satisfying conclusion to this story and the fact that we still dont know what happened to Hastings or how Ben eventually becomes the guy who betrays Reece makes this feel more like a middle chapter than a proper ending, overall if this turn out to be a prequel would be better if they just shut it down as then you either going to have it fast forward or run two stories in parallel? I think the OG series is getting another season so I wonder how this is all going to play out, after all having multiple spin off running is the new thing for TV series now days. Overall the action was solid and seeing the team work together to take down the bad guys was satisfying but the character work needed more time to breathe, I give this finale a 7/10 but the whole season probably lands around a 6.5 for me.
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