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Legion 2.6 Review – “Chapter 14”
Loading...Could they still make a show like this without such a versatile acting demon as Dan Stevens in the lead? Maybe, but I don’t know if I’d wanna watch. It’s probably insipid to say that Stevens’s portrayal of David Haller runs the gamut in emotion and intensity. David is a monster, a victim, a romantic lead, and total head case, a dangerous destructive criminal, and a sweet little brother who wants ice cream. Spoilers, such as they are, for “Chapter 14” follow.
If I had to have a complaint about tonight’s ep, and I’m not necessarily saying I do, it would be the age makeup. TV audiences are pretty savvy when it comes to aging characters up or down, and we’re not as willing as we used to be to accept cheap prosthetics, hasty application, or laughable effects. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that David and Amy’s age makeup was terrible. But it wasn’t great. Legion sets viewers up to have very high expectations, so when any aspect of the show doesn’t hold up as well as the others, it’s more obvious than it would be on a lesser show. Okay, now let’s never speak of that again.
I’m a great fan of unreliable narrators, and David Haller is among the best out there. He would be fascinating even if he couldn’t read minds—a gift known to be both a blessing and a curse. Seeing the story through David’s vantage point makes us confused by his confusion, complicit in his crimes, and terrorized by his illness. We love him, but we’re afraid of him. We want him to succeed, even as they explain that it might destroy the world and everything on it. Combined with the concept of quantum multiverse theory (which I learned about by watching Futurama) we’re treated to scenes of David overmedicated and stuck in terrible joe-jobs. We see his rise to become the richest person in the world—with a fun appearance by Molly Hagen as Laura. We watch things work out with Philly (remember her from Season One?), to the tune of a house and 2.3 kids. We see David strung out and rambling, old and homeless, barely alert and living with Amy. We see scenes we’ve already seen, going as far back as S1E1, though different than the first time we saw them. Remember when Lenny was a dude? Comic fans do.
Amy is a great sister. We see several scenarios where she becomes David’s nursemaid to the exclusion of everything else in her life. And yet…we’re bummed to see that when David is the richest guy ever and Amy goes to him for help—he gives her a nosebleed and tells her “no more houses.” We’re left to wonder if Amy becomes the victim in a life where she never had to rise up and take the reins? Did their roles reverse because the main difference between insanity and genius is monetary success? Is David just a selfish asshole? Does Amy prefer to be a martyr? Legion asks a lot of questions, but then leaves us to figure out the answers. This was extra, doubly apparent this week.
What are the main differences in all of these scenarios? They seem to suggest that David wouldn’t hurt anyone if he didn’t have to. If cops didn’t shove civilians around, if random droogs didn’t reenact scenes from A Clockwork Orange then David wouldn’t have hurt most of the people we see him injure this week. They also show us that David is pretty much unstoppable when sufficiently motivated. When provoked, he’s more akin to a magician than a mutant—swiping people aside like he has the friggin’ force. Still, we had to watch David get shot in the back, and sliced in half by Kerry Loudermilk. Yikes. That chick is such a badass. But in what reality is it a good idea to kill David? With a guy like David, he’s only dangerous if people are assholes to him. So on this planet, David is very, very dangerous. People largely suck, especially to the mentally ill.
I love the way Legion explores so many sides of mental illness. Yes, people who are mentally ill are victims and are just as sick as someone with cancer or diabetes. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t responsible for trying to make themselves better. Chapter 14 shows us that even if we want to have empathy for mentally ill people, the guy yelling or grunting as he walks by us on the street is scary, jarring, unnerving, and best avoided. The conflict between wanting to help and being terrified is something that has followed David Haller around his whole life. He’s not wrong when he says mentally sick people don’t often get to have normal lives. They don’t get houses and children and days where they wake up feeling safe and happy. That’s why suicide sometimes made sense to David. It’s also why it’s the not-sick people always blathering on about how life is worth living.
The discussion about foreign languages was short but fascinating. It is a curse that different languages evolved, keeping people from different parts of the world from communicating effectively. Even with all the tech we have now, we still run into language barriers between world leaders. David as “The Great Uniter” sounds better in theory than in practice. I wonder what Amal Farouk would say about that, since he speaks a bunch of languages.
Hallucinations. Mental illness can cause them. But so can the meds used to treat mental illness. If a mouse on your desks starts dancing and singing, consult a physician. For serious. What I wonder is why a mouse, or anyone really, would pick such a crappy song when the rest of the music on this show is so friggin’ incredible. The cover of “I want to change the world” this week was among the best covers of the season thus far. Anyway, our flashback/forward/alternate realities with David takes us right up to the point when Amy drops him at Clockworks after his last attempted suicide. What’s next? Does David die young? Does he live a long life of barely functioning? Was he really that adorable as a baby? Farouk says that “you” decide what is real and what isn’t. Does he mean David? Or us? Is Amy really dead? Is Lennie? Are those machines for sale someplace?
We’re just over the halfway point of Season Two, with plenty more to happen. I won’t even try to guess what’s coming, because there’s no possible way I could get into the mind of Noah Hawley. Maybe that’ll change after I watch Fargo, which I’ll do soon since I got Hulu back to watch Handmaid’s Tale, but I digress. I will predict that we’ll see more of the rest of the cast in “Chapter Fifteen.”
See you’s next week!
