Dresden files

[ysengrin]

This last week's is still holding the bar up. Too bad there's only one more episode.

I don't think it'll be back next season. For those interested, this episode and last episode (10 and 11) are so far the high point of the series.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I only got to see the first half of it due to needing sleep (teething baby in play.)

Care to inform what the found out about the black?

[ysengrin.livejournal.com]

{trying not to be too spoiler-y since lj cuts don't work in comments ... highlight the following blocks of text to read them. The first in general spoilers, the second is more particular.}

In the light of morning I'm also not as impressed with the episode - reflection on it reveals some internal inconsistencies and and a general wonder at how Harry's shop was apparently picked deliberately to be the battleground ...

The black wasn't just a shell; the entire shop (or at least it's interior) was transported into "the other side," the realm of the dead. Yes, it was done by someone in the shop deliberately, but not as an attack on Ancient Mai.

Someone in the shop when the black appears is not who they seem to be, and is (apparently) Mai's attacker, or at least in league with the attacker.

The tension between the high council and Dresden is really brought home; he's used as a case study by new wardens on what not to do ...

The spell to seal the shop was cast (and is maintained) by Ancient Mai. It would seem to have started as an attempt to give Mai a safe refuge, but became a weapon and trap - though not a particularly delicate one - when Mai realized her attacker / one of her attackers is in Harry's shop as well.

The attacker is revealed to be a shapeshifting dragon/drake (the terms are used interchangeably). It's also suggested that Ancient Mai is also a shapeshifting drake. The attacking drake changed back to natural form (a rather smallish, two legged dragon) and is eaten by the expanding Black - which is expanding because Harry drains Ancient Mai to near death to cause the expansion, while Morgan shields them from the drake.

Mai recovers and undoes her spell, and tells Harry that she would have sacrificed all of them - including herself - to destroy the attacking drake. She doesn't explain further. It may be that she chose Harry's shop and set it up as a trap for the drake ... and it's never explained why the drake is playing cat-and-mouse with everyone, instead of just offing Mai before the Black appears. Afterwards - well, apparently Mai's death would have let the Black fill the shop, killing everyone. Apparently the drake was not as dedicated to killing Mai as Mai was to killing the drake.

There's a plot device where the attacker had to be invited through Harry's defenses - but the attacker didn't intend Harry harm (and obviously knows him very well), whereas Mai (who *does* dislike Harry intensely) has been able to pass Harry's defenses in the past without tripping them off.

Oh, the attacker? The drake had taken the form of Murphy, and done so well enough to fool Dresden, Bob, Morgan and the other wardens. The real Murphy is unharmed, and steps into Harry's shop (without being invited) at the end of the episode, after the shop is returned to it's proper location.