Culture of Pop

Powerless Season 1 Review: 1.4: Cold Season

This week’s episode of Powerless season 1 was a solid installment that did some nice character work around Teddy and Emily Locke. Teddy’s rounded out the character, showing how he’s more than just a pleasant guy. Meanwhile, the episode highlighted Emily’s obliviousness which helped a lot with some of my previous issues with her. Now her flaws are clearly intentional and it’s easier to understand her as a character. She’s the spoiled boss who brags about finding conflict-free hummus. Got it.

The episode takes place during “Cold Season.” This is a time when all the cold-powered characters decide to hit up Charm City. There’s no explanation given for why villains would have such an arrangement, but it is a fun piece of business. Which is basically Powerless in a nut shell.

In the set piece of the episode, Emily and Teddy had an emotional argument. After Emily took it way too far, a superhero swung by and was frozen in front of them by a villain. Emily tried to use this as an opportunity to move past the fight, but Teddy wouldn’t let it go. This is the kind of scene that only Powerless can do and it was very well-executed.

The subplot paired Van Wayne and Ron, the show’s two funniest characters. Van kept asking Ron for personal favors outside of his work responsibilities. This included a great bit where Ron had to construct a toy invisible jet. Unsurprisingly, there were a lot of laughs in this plotline.

There are still clunky moments in Powerless. A lot of the jokes go on way too long or are over-explained. But, the last two episodes were leaps and bounds ahead of the first two episodes. Things like Danny Pudi shouting “there are kernels in the bag” and Ron Funches referring to his adorable snowsuit delighted me. Hopefully, it’ll continue on this track.

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