Posted by Jeanne Rose MacWoW on Thursday, 3 September 1998, at 8:35 a.m., in response to Personally, I liked..., posted by Guinevere W. MacWench, Chief Wench of Connor on Thursday, 3 September 1998, at 6:13 a.m.

I watched it last night and thought - yeah, this is a weak story, but I like it anyway. As long as I like what's going on, I can stand a slower paced story with more "tramatic moments in life" than honest-to-goodness conflict - just for a change of pace. The juxtaposition of the two stories was a little weak, but I thought it worked well enough given the looseness of the two stories. Having just read the chapter on sets and locations in The Complete Watcher's Guide, I found myself noticing the sets and wondering how they came up with such a mess for the subway and how they got permission to use WWII footage. I didn't care for the switching back and forth between the birth and death - it must have sounded good on paper, but the moods were so different it was a little jarring. But I loved the tender, oh-so-quiet death scene. Duncan tends to die rather violently. Usually it has to be that way or he can heal fast enough that he won't die. I found myself wondering if even immortals can fear death if it comes slowly like that. I loved how they just gradually lost consciousness from lack of oxygen (or however it is that gas kills you). I loved the way they started sounding drunk, or drugged, which also makes sense. I loved the way Duncan's voice gets very faint and slow as he describes his memories of, uh, wherever that was in Colorado, with slow tears running down his cheeks. Need I mention the pathos of him dying and knowing it wasn't permanent for him but would be for her? You can hear the sadness and irony in his voice when she talks about wanting half a dozen children and he has the honesty not to imply
that they could have even though he knows he won't have to tell her the truth. And grandchildren . . . wouldn't Duncan make a great grandpa, even without the white hair and wrinkles? And I loved the whole business of Duncan protesting he wasn't a spy (does this fit imbetween the two flashbacks from "The Valkyrie"? interesting implications, if so . . .). As far as the conflict in the present, my favorite part was the other woman, who goes from being panicked and injured to delivering the baby, and has such great lines ("I've had 'em, but I've never caught one!"). I thought it was interesting that Duncan volunteered to deliver the baby (when has he had
experience at that?). And I loved what he did with the house, and especially how he sat over a bonfire with Richie and talked openly and honestly about it. They needed to do that more often.

I understand why many people didn't like it, but, well, I did. In spite of its shortcomings, I'm glad it was made.

Peace,

JR