Thoughts about season 4

[verdantheart]

I totally disagree.  I think season 3 is miles better than season 4.  I barely recognize the characters that I've devoted 3 seasons to knowing.  We're getting close to the finale, and I'm still having trouble buying Syd and Dixon working for Sloane.  I feel like it's a slap in the face to me and other fans who have seen the past 3 seasons.

[post="1316288"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

You're very entitled to your opinion. However, I disagree. Ever hear the maxim, "Keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer"? How are they going to keep an eye on Sloane if they turn their backs on him?

If anything was a "slap in the face," it was hearing Jack inexplicably insist that Vaughn would have to kill Lauren in order to exorcise his demons and live with himself. Now, how do you square that with the man in season 2 and the man in "Another Mister Sloane" who was so angry over being forced (we're told) to kill his wife?! (grr!) This is the most out-of-character, nonsensical thing I've seen on this series, and if Jack wasn't lying, the writers were totally cracked and were displaying a complete misunderstanding--or complete disregard for--of the character.

I can understand liking season 3 better--but on the basis of characterization? Action, plot, twists, yes, but characterization? It boggles the mind.

See to me S3 is where we LOST the characters and we are only just now starting to get them back.

Funny, I was going to ask just who we were watching in season 3 because it wasn't people I knew very well . . .

Even Marshall became a caricature, interrupting important missions with really pointless ramblings.

[post="1316388"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Hee, hee, well, he always has had a tendency to ramble . . . but not so much on missions . . .

 

[ALiAs_AgEnT_423]

Season 3 -- I'll pretend it was all a bad dream...

But Season 4 is not my cup of tea either....and I must commend you, V for sharing your opinion.

I wasn't sure what JJ's reasoning was this season (granted that he did), but I can say that making a season similiar to S1 and S2 is either a desperate attempt to make amends for long-time viewers or just a bloody insult.

I think a person's opinion about S4 depends on how long you have been a viewer. Those of us from "Truth Be Told" expect more out of this show while more recent viewers have become accustomed to JJ's "style" the past 2 seasons.

I, unlike some, have never been an S/V shipper and didn't mind it, but now I just can't stand it. The scenes seem so forced now! And yet you can't satisfy those S/V shippers enough...damned if you do, damned if you don't--we still have to hear it either way.

Moving on--I can say on the positive side it wasn't until the last few episodes that caught my interest in Season 4. Hopefully, it will only get better b/c despite of all the disappointments--I guess as a true fan you have to stick through the good times and the bad--no matter how painful it can be.

 

[verdantheart]

I can definitely see why some folks are not completely happy with season 4. Like I say, it doesn't blow my socks off like season 1 or 2. But it doesn't frustrate me like season 3 and I see what I think are many signs of good potential. There are a lot of new writers and it takes a while to get going in the right direction . . . last season (when the same applied), sadly, that didn't happen, IMO.

Lately there have been additional rumblings of displeasure regarding a sense that Sydney hasn't seemed to have been involved enough in the past few episodes, which I think is partially a problem caused by unavoidable considerations (Ms Garner's health, for one, and the uncertainty of how long that would last--since you have to write ahead of time, after all). Also, Sydney's continuing story (Irina/the hit/the prophecy/etc) has been mostly pushed into the background and just barely touched upon, whereas Nadia/Elena/Vaughn have gotten more continual maintenance--certainly, that's where the continuing stories have surfaced more in the actual action of the main stories rather than in bits and pieces of conversations. The writers should pick up on that and realize that they need to make sure that Sydney gets her slice of the continuity pie.

I agree, probably no matter what they do, the S/V shippers wouldn't be satisfied--or they wouldn't all be satisfied--or the anti-S/V shippers would be up in arms. I don't ship one way or the other, so that doesn't really affect me one way or the other. It's a non-factor in my personal calculation, so a true negative for many is a big zero for me. I admit that freely.

Oh, and as to this season being similar to 1-2, is it really? In season 1, there was a lot more thematic content and in 1 and 2 there were more continuing threads woven throughout the season even when the episodes were "standalone"--there were a great many more sections of continuing stories embedded in the standalone episodes, if memory serves. Each of the seasons (including 3) has a strong family theme, so it can't be that . . . Is it that Sloane's "back"? But he's working from within now; even if his agenda differs, the premise isn't the same. I don't think the feel of the first couple of seasons is coming back and I don't expect it to. The characters have changed. (Off topic: Actually, that's something I like about this sort of series vs a police procedural: the characters are allowed to change and grow over time, rather than always being static from week to week, year to year. I always thought that was boring and led nowhere. I always thought that a long-lasting series should take you somewhere interesting. But that's hard to do.)

Your opinion may vary--and probably will!

(Actually, let's hope it does. ^_^)

 

[SpyDude]

OMG verdantheart! You make so many good points.
If I had posted a reply the day you started the topic I would have said that S3 rocked and S4 sucks. But the last episodes have been awesome. An awesome storyline has just only begun. I'm talking about the shocking twist that Sophia Vargas, Nadia's former caretaker at the orphanage is actually Elena Derevko.
And I'm pretty sure that the last 4 episodes will redeem the whole first half of the season, what mainly consisted of self-contained episodes. :angry:
The last 4 epiodes will redeem everything that I disliked in the first half of the season because:

Spoiler

1) Lena Olin will be back for the last 2 and apparently Irina is NOT dead. As we have all read the episode descrition it's pretty clear that Sydney and Jack will be re-united with Irina because TOGETHER they have to stop Elena. I'm especially waiting for the moment when Nadia meets Irina. Hope it's going to be a beautiful moment. I had given up all hope, but she's back.

2) Return of Isabella Rossellini as Katya for episode 20. The more Derevko sisters the better.

3)Return of David Anders as Julian Sark for episode 21 and 22.(I'm not very sure about him being in episode 21 but I'm almost positive I read it from somewhere)

4) The Rambaldi story line gets picked up again. Elena trying to fulfill Rambaldi's endgame.

Also we are going to see how Jack will be cured. And I agree that season 4 has concentrated mainly on character development.(which is good )
The end of season 4 seems to be quite awesome. I'm going to comment again when the season's over but I'm sure I won't be dissapointed.

P.S. I don't agree that season 3 made any problems.

P.S. 2 The last episode totally changed my feelings about season 4. I think I bashed season 4 in some Lost topic just before last episode. :lol:

 

[gypsy_silk]

I think it's interesting - but completely appropriate - that a discussion of how we feel about Season 4 has inevitablely become a discussion about how we feel about seasons 1,2, & 3.

First, on season four: I was one of those fans that came in with the attitude "you better impress me" because season 3 was soooo horrible. (Or so I thought at the time.) The premiere knocked my socks off. It had a few minor issues but nevertheless it was a kick-@$$ ep and I was thrilled. Then, week by week, I got less and less excited. I never started hating it, but it just failed to grip me the way even season 3 had. The low point was Orphan, when I watched Alias between commercial breaks of West Wing.

But the past few eps have turned it around for me. Suddenly it seems like we're going somewhere again, both in terms of questions raised within the season and in terms of larger story-arcs from the previous seasons. I finally have confidence again that the Alias creators are taking us somewhere. I care less for specific results than for compelling reasons / stories for what happens. (i.e. I'm an S/V shipper but Syd and Sark could get together and I'd be thrilled if it made sense w/in the story.)

Okay, now back to my intro statement about all the seasons affecting each other. Almost everyone wants to blame season 3 just for being cruddy and for the problems that linger into season 4. But if you blame any season 4 problems on season 3, I think you have to blame the ENTIRE premise of season 3 on season 2.

Or, more specifically, on one ep: Phase One.

Up to that point the premise of Alias had been "Sydney Bristow, Double Agent". Suddenly she wasn't a double agent anymore. I remember thinking at the time "Wow, that was completely unexpected. What in the world are they going to do now that they've completely erased the premise of the show?"

They still had Irina going for them, and that was what saved them in Season 2. But Irina was a plot point, not a premise. And the premise of the double agent life was crucial to how they had constructed the show and Syd's life. W/o it a lot of the tension that drives action / dramas disappeared.

The premise created for Season 3 was an attempt to recreate all the same tensions present in 1 & 2 but for different reasons. The necessity to lie to people you care about (Syd to Will / Francie vs. Syd to Vaughn and Vaughn to Lauren). The romantic tension between S/V which they couldn't act on. The struggle to understand the Bristow / Derevko family relations. (Which should have been a point of continuity but which was unfortunately made difficult by the lack of Irina on-screen.)

Season 3 could have worked - but it was executed poorly. But in defense of Season 3, it's premise came out of Season 2's Phase One.

Despite how much I loved S2, I could go into here how Season 2 wasn't exactly a model for tying up all loose ends or completely coherent story lines (Now really, why did Francie have to become Allison? Does anybody really think that was absolutely necessary to story arc?) but that would be too tangential, I think.

I thought I hated season 3 while I was watching it, but nevertheless it kept me glued to the TV week by week. Season 4 has struggled to take the best story threads from season 3 and keep them going while finding at least semi-plausible resolutions to the parts of season 3 that we hated. Season 3 was a struggle to overcome the lack change in premise caused by season 2. Every season looks better to me the farther away from it I get. So I expect that at the end of Season 5, season 4 will look like the most fantastic one ever.

 

[aliasfanjay]

I always enjoy your essays verdantheart, even though I dont read them all. As I've said before, I can understand why people didn't enjoy Season 3 and why Season 4 has disappointed them as well because of it. I know I was thrown when all of a sudden everything Rambaldi disappeared, regular "bad guys" were gone and all of a sudden everything is self-contained.

The reasons you have said why you didn't enjoy Season 3 make sense to me - the lack of character and plot continuity was a major upsetter to most people. However, I never noticed a lot of this during first visit. I will agree that in hindsight, revisiting Season 3 episodes and keeping these problems people had in mind, these things are a let down. But the action and intensity of plot driven stories kept me going. Honestly, they always work to suck me in, and being serialized makes it all the more worth while for me, even on a rewatching. I could have gone on watching Alias like this for ages. I did miss the characters though, and I do recall thinking that it was always more about the story than the characters during Season 3 - but it was always in the back of my head until I rewatched it.

I think everyone has been surprised by the direction that Season 4 has taken so far. I have to be honest and say that at first it annoyed me. But as we came half way, I realised that realisiticly, its not all that different to Season 1 really. Okay, so most episodes rolled from one into the next compared to this season. But even a lot of Season 1 episodes, the events in the episodes outside of the characters were self-contained. Anything that was arching over the whole season was purely to do the characters themselves and anything they had done.

Season 4 may be more self-contained, but rewatching these episodes will still have meaning to me just as any other episode does. The lack of rambaldi and regular villains aside, there were some really great ideas going on there. "Nocturne", "Ice", "Welcome to Liberty Village" were really all 'ripping yarns'. We got episodes devoted to other characters, like in "Ice" and "The Orphan". The whole "Another Mr Sloane" angle was great as well.
All the while we have stuff on characters here. Thank heavens...

There are difference between all the seasons, but I've enjoyed every season on face value on what its delivered to me face value.
Season 1 delivered great introduction to this world of characters, Season 2 expanded, adding richer characters and arching stories to the fold. Season 3 was the most "bang for you buck" which served its purpose as well - the rollercoaster ride that kept you hanging on for more delivered in droves, and the season despite its faulters was fantastic for its mystery and action if nothing else at all.
Season 4 is different chapter - getting back to grass roots, letting us back into the characters minds and back to simple stories again without the intensity and depth of Rambaldi stories from the past seasons. Basicly a breather, but one that is still entertaining in its own right.

In retrospect I hope that more people enjoy Season 4. I know its already started for me and the season isn't over. And really, most people still have faith in the show if they are still watching, even if they aren't impressed the direction the show has taken. Really, in the end though, while I love hearing what other people have to say, the fact of the matter is that I enjoy the show, I always have, and I can't see that changing. Its never not delivered to the standards that I've always expected. I'd really be curious to know how badly this should would have to do to lose me as a loyal fan.

 

[verdantheart]

Well, gypsy_silk, you're not going to get any objections from me about Allison. I'm sure that if you know me very well, you've heard me complain at length about Helix being the most ridiculous idea introduced into season 2 . . . and I still hear threats about it--let its shadow never loom over our TV sets again! :lol:

As to the "action and intensity" of season 3--I'll admit to it being ramped up during the latter half of the season, but it seemed a bit draggy to me in the first half, particularly the first third. But it seems all flavor and little substance, sort of like a breath mint. It doesn't really satisfy one's appetite for good drama. But it's pleasant in its way.

 

[freelancer7]

^^Yikes...I hope the Helix reference did not taint Alias for you tonight. I guess it was the only way they could pull the Irina dead, but not dead thing off. It should be behind us now!

 

[PleaseDrinkMilk]

As to the "action and intensity" of season 3--I'll admit to it being ramped up during the latter half of the season, but it seemed a bit draggy to me in the first half, particularly the first third. But it seems all flavor and little substance, sort of like a breath mint. It doesn't really satisfy one's appetite for good drama. But it's pleasant in its way.

[post="1345729"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

a breath mint, to me, is something that's gone in about 50 seconds. season 3 to me is rather the opposite. heck, I'm rewatching it right now and I'm enthralled in a storyline that I already know how it ends. to me, that's great television. I wouldn't watch the majority of season 4 unless I was held captive and dragged across enemy lines and forced to watch it as a torture device. it has little to contribute to the main story and it's not enthralling at all (not to me, anyway).

See to me S3 is where we LOST the characters and we are only just now starting to get them back. Syd turned into a weeping basket case, Dixon was a "robot" as Marshall put it, and Vaughn, well, he looked like a total ass for marrying the enemy and losing faith. Even Marshall became a caricature, interrupting important missions with really pointless ramblings. Now the characters have come back from these extremes and seem more like real people.

hmm, true. I'm not sure if I agree or disagree with you on this point. did we really 'lose' characters or just see another side of them in reaction to the happenings? I'm leaning towards the latter, but I think it's definitely debatable.
as to the point someone made about what Jack encouraged Vaughn to do last season...I'll have to get back to you on that. it didn't strike me as incredibly un-Jack-like when I watched it the first time around, maybe because Jack was more of a badass last season and I let it slip by without questioning it. I'm not sure, but you might have a point. and if you do, then I think it might be telling if we truly lost characters last year or if we simply saw a different side of them.

I think they have done a pretty decent job of explaining why Syd and Dixon are working for Sloane. They feel like they are the only ones who can keep an eye on him. As for the CIA pardoning him in the first place, I think his handing over the Sphere of Life would be enough for them to consider using him and his contacts to get an inside view of the criminal world. It's not like Syd and Dix have sat back complacently. As recently as the last episode Dix expressed concern over letting Arvin in on the mission.

I agree that it wouldn't be a bad idea to use him as an asset for intel, but I'm with a previous poster on that I don't buy Syd and Sloane working for him. he's already claimed to be a 'different person' before and then screwed the CIA over (season 3), and then they trust him AGAIN and give him a poopload of CIA assets? in fact, he probably has access to all the CIA assets he could possibly need to get the Rombaldi stuff back if he wanted (*refrains from referring to tonight's episode*) (that's not a spoiler). it's just silly.

*EDIT: now allow me to sweep away any credibility I have at the moment and ask someone to refresh my memory on something: so Sloane gave up the Sphere of Life for...what? to please Nadia? I forget how that whole ordeal ended. seems to me like he would've done his whole evil thang if he had the power to...

 

[verdantheart]

^^Yikes...I hope the Helix reference did not taint Alias for you tonight.  I guess it was the only way they could pull the Irina dead, but not dead thing off.  It should be behind us now!

[post="1346935"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

I can think of at least one other way. I'll discuss everything in my column.

I don't buy Syd and Sloane working for him. he's already claimed to be a 'different person' before and then screwed the CIA over (season 3), and then they trust him AGAIN and give him a poopload of CIA assets?

[post="1346952"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Well, I find it just as believable as the CIA trusting Irina in "wonderful" season 2--perhaps moreso because of the Rambaldi stuff he handed over (and, yes, I thought season 2 was pretty wonderful, despite the introduction of magic Helix, with which we must now again contend). Plus, they did not know the full extent of what he was up to with Omnifam . . . it seemed to be pretty much all about the Sphere of Life, which he gave up.

 

[Mountaineer]

I think that season four was a WHOLE LOT BETTER than any of the previous seasons, but season two does come to a close second. Season two the one where Vaughn and Sydney finally get together that was worth waiting for. Anyways season four is the best of the seasons so far.

 

[verdantheart]

Anyways season four is the best of the seasons so far.

[post="1348059"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]​

Glad to hear you're enjoying it! But why the best? Just curious to hear the reasons. ^_^

 

[i_luv_alias7]

i didn't enjoy the fourth season as much because it just seemed to unreal to me. my favorite season was the third one because the fact that lauren was keeping vaughn and sydney apart made me want to watch it more.i also wanted to find out what happened to her in those two years.

 

[Nitxa]

I think season 4 got interesting right at the end. I was happy that they brought Irina back from the dead... I think she is a great addition to the show. It is unfortunate she is not a regular.

However season 3 was much more mysterious and entertaining.