SGRoA: Blood Ties S1 E16: Bugged

Happy Halloween, Snowflakes! I hope you all have as spooky a weekend as you'd like, and get or give as much candy as you want, and that everyone thinks your costume is the coolest. Let's get spookily started!

We open on two goths leaving a club. One of them isn't feeling well; he "shouldn't have had that last hit, I told you," says the other. "You're doing too much." Sick Goth says he's not doing enough, and refuses to get on the last bus home. Well Goth leaves him, and he drinks blue liquid from a little vial, calling it "sweet poison". He proceeds to fall down dead, and bugs swarm him.

get swarmed!

Club owner shows up at Vicki's office, of course, and the look on Vicki's face perfectly encapsulates how I would look at this woman, too, which makes me rethink all my life choices. Girl is gothed to within an inch of her life, and has come to request Vicki's help because "the Reaper's influence has fallen over my sanctum." Like, look, I understand committing to the bit, I just... don't go that hard, I guess?

Oh, of course, she's friends with Coreen. Lexia (who sounds like an electronic home assistant more than mistress of the dark) wants Vicki to investigate the death from the open, a kid named Dante. Lexia apparently has enough issues with the city already, but, like, won't the city be investigating? Is his death natural? Ruled an accident already? Why are you immediately asking Vicki to do a maybe-homicide before cops have even been there? Or have they been?

Look, y'all, I know it seems super nitpicky, and that the following scenes are going to answer at least a couple of these questions, I hope. But these are not questions that make people continue watching (or reading) some piece of fiction. These are questions that just make your audience disgruntled because they make you look amateurish. Leaving all these common-sense issues just hanging over the narrative might seem like they'll get people invested, but they're cheap mysteries that someone in the narrative should have already asked or answered. Most people watching know how a procedural works, and not answering why the cops haven't yet been involved just makes it look like the writers don't know how a procedural works, and therefore like they have no idea how to write at all. Just a tip to keep in mind in your own projects, should you have any.

Someone has left Henry a present: a dead girl on his doorstep. That's it, that's the scene. Dead blonde, scarf around her neck, no one in the hall. Okay.

Mohadevan has Dante's body, though she calls him Gene? Because no one named their kids Dante back in the day?

sure, why not

Anyway, he looks way more decomposed than he should, and Vicki points out he's been swarmed. Looks like he died of anaphylaxis, which no one thinks can happen from bug bites, and, like, okay, wtf. Why is everyone so fuckin dumb this episode? Vicki was so great last week, time looping like a champ, all that tight, informative dialogue, and now this?

anaphylaxis from a bug?!?!?!

Feh! Yeah, I said it, FEH. Double feh! Get the fehck outta here with this, honestly. No one wanted the scab writers back from the beginning of the season, why are you torturing us like this, Blood Ties? I want to like you so bad!

Henry's dead girl has her throat slashed, but, like, by claws, not a razor. Vicki asks him along to the club, but he says he's busy without mentioning the dead girl.

Vicki and Coreen head to the club, and Coreen's hair has grown three sizes. They're using more wigs in this episode than Marina Sirtis has worn in all of Star Trek history, it's honestly an accomplishment.

just... an ungodly amount of hair

And this club scene tells us almost nothing. They serve only wine and absinthe, because that's all Lexia drinks. Well Goth from the opener has some survivor's guilt for not putting Gene/Dante on the bus. He'll ask Gene's mom if he had any allergies. And yes, the bartender says, there are drugs in the club. It's a club, duh.

No answer yet on whether the police have any sort of anything going on in relation to this death, btw. All those questions I had a few paragraphs ago are still up in the air.

Me, watching right now.

Henry goes to Mike for help. With a lot of preamble, he tells Mike everything he needs to know: Another vampire in town is leaving dead bodies for Henry to find, because he wants Henry's territory.

... yeah, you were thinking it too

There's another scene at the club where Vicki and Coreen talk about investigative technique and it's dumb and boring, and Coreen's fake hair is wildly distracting. Doesn't advance anything, not even Coreen's investigative skills, don't know why we're here.

Henry officially reports his dead girl so she ends up in Mohadevan's office. She asks Mike if he doesn't want to wait for her official report; he tells her they both know this won't be in the official report, because it's a vamp. He also tells her that Vicki is "just so busy"; let's leave her out of this one. Mohadevan agrees, just as Vicki comes in looking for Gene's tox screen. Mike hustles her out before she can see the vamped body.

Oh, good, the next scene is nonsense, just what I wanted.

captain kathryn janeway, rolling her eyes

Vicki heads to Henry's to ask him what's going on, because both he and Mike are acting weird af. Henry, instead of telling her, I don't know, fucking any-damn-thing, fuckin, "We're planning a surprise party for Mike's cousin's kids' best friend", just tells her that they shouldn't see each other for a while, and he has to get stuff to his editor, so there's the door! You know, neurotypical "let's force drama by having everyone act like they've never heard of acting human before". There's no good reason for Henry to keep this from her, and it's fuckin dumb.

FEH.

Coreen is still wearing the hair when Vicki gets the background check results for Lexia: no priors, no real trouble of any kind. She also got the tox results for Gene/Dante: unknown substance in the blood. Vicki thinks regular old drugs, but Coreen insists it's paranormal, that there can't possibly be drugs at a nightclub.

Marcia from the Brady Bunch saying "Sure, Jan"

At the club, bartender is talking to Well Goth, says she's sorry about Dante. "Gene," he corrects her. She confirms that he hasn't "said anything" to the people asking questions, then gives him a vial, which he refuses. They argue briefly about whether the drugs killed Dante, and then she leaves - and leaves the vial with him.

Coreen and Vicki come back to the club to ask Lexia if she's selling drugs like another 4 times. She just keeps saying no, and no one is bright enough to ask if literally anyone else could be selling in the club, and then she walks away.

Well Goth has taken the vial, is super high, stumbles out the door to the dumpster, et voila, bug snack.

Lexia goes off on Coreen for being, like, a traitor to all of gothdom, or some shit, jesus. This is the wrong thing to be mad about! People keep getting eaten by bugs outside your club! DO YOU WANT TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM?! (Of course not, that wouldn't be ~*dramatic*~ enough for these shit ass writers.)

Someone finds Well Goth and everyone runs outside; Vicki calls an ambulance. He's still alive, luckily, and Coreen grabs one of the bugs for study. But don't get too excited: this show knows how to waste momentum like nothing I've ever seen, so we're off to Henry and Mike making decisions about what's best for Vicki - a grown ass woman who can make her own decisions, last I checked.

a "keep calm" poster, but it says "fuck this guy"

these guys, I guess, sentiment stands!

OMG, it's a fuckin vampire history lesson. I DON'T CARE, HENRY. I might have cared, if this came at almost any other point in this episode, or if you were TALKING TO VICKI, but no, just ridiculousness from Henry and Mike grandstanding about how the victim of the other vamp was a person. Anyway, they decide not to tell Vicki she might be in mortal danger just for hanging with Henry!

Vicki comes up with the idea that whatever the substance is from the club, it might be attractive to bugs, like a pheromone. She goes to Mohadevan to run it by her, and Mohadevan says she'd need a pure sample to test for that. Vicki also asks about the Jane Doe she and Mike were working on, so Mohadevan gives her the name, and tells her that she's not supposed to tell her it has something to do with Henry.

Mohadevan for the win!

Mike and Henry get a lead on a photographer that might lead them to the vamp, or be the other vamp, and Henry gives Mike a short sword so he can behead the other vamp if needs be. They check his studio out, find not much, then Vicki shows up. They try not to tell her anything. Still. They insist they're just teaming up on a case, not that Vicki is in mortal danger.

We are in the final 10 minutes. Who are we looking for? What happened to these kids? Were the police ever called? Is it a drug? Where is the bartender getting it?

Coreen gets wired up to go back to the club and perhaps get some answers. I think this is all supposed to happen in one night, because the hair is still ominously perching on Coreen's head. And then Vicki says she'll meet Coreen back at the office at midnight? IT ISN'T EVEN MIDNIGHT?!

Vicki goes back to Henry's for more made up drama, as we called it on The Knot message boards back in the day. After she leaves, Henry figures out that the other vamp is his dame, Christina.

Okay, so, bartender is some sort of creature that can inject people with the drug, so she does that to Coreen, then tells her that it's open season on Vicki, and she wanted to be the one to kill her. Some sort of bug demon, there's an unsatisfying fight, no real answers, and then Henry runs her over with a van. I'm not joking. He squashes her like a bug.

There's some more drama about Henry and Christina and Mike and Vicki, but this episode exhausted all my goodwill. Upshot: Henry wants to handle it on his own, and thereby set up a multi-episode arc. Great, sure, whatever, can we roll credits now?!

FEH!