Liv and Major took the spotlight on iZombie this week, in an episode that felt a little bit like a filler episode, but still provided plenty of entertaining moments throughout to keep you interested.
The reunion of Liv and Major is something that iZombie has been teasing ever since the show premiered back in March, and yet it was still a surprise last week when they kissed. That being said, it was incredibly refreshing when Major finally (finally!) told Liv that he didn’t care about her zombie-ism. He just wanted to be with her because she makes him a better person.
This is the most apparent when he lies to Gilda about the humanity factor of the people on the list of potential zombies she gave him, so that will undoubtedly come back to bite him in the ass. He also flushes his remaining utopium down the toilet. While it is great that we didn’t have to sit through a whole season of Major hiding his drug addiction, it did seem a little too quick of a downward spiral for the character. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad that he’s back to normal and is focused on Liv, but I didn’t completely buy the transition.
Speaking of utopium, Ravi sort of had a breakthrough with some tainted utopium that Scott Eberhard’s twin brother (whom you may remember from episode 11 of season 1) brought by. Unfortunately, he doesn’t seem to be making any progress with the cure, since he had to witness the rather gruesome death of drug dealer Gabriel from last week. This leads to what may have been one of the best scenes iZombie has ever done: an expertly choreographed “fight” between Ravi and Blaine as they scrambled the get the remaining amount of the tainted utopium. Of course, there is no way Ravi can realistically create another cure, otherwise Liv would be a regular ol’ human again and the show wouldn’t be called iZombie (though that would be sort of clever, wouldn’t it?).
Clive is getting brought into the fold more than ever now. iZombie has not benefited from keeping Clive in the dark about Liv’s secret, and Clive has come off as rather daft in recent episodes because he has not once questioned Liv’s constantly changing personalities. Hopefully Suzuki’s widow bringing him a tupperware of brain that she found in her late husbands freezer (and Bozzio mentioning that astronaut Alan York’s hair was found in the Meat Cute drain) will give him a little nudge to finally discover the zombie epidemic overtaking Seattle. Until then, if we can get more moments between him and Bozzio then iZombie will be all the better for it. Their chemistry is great and they are a treat to watch together.
The mystery of the week revolved around a basketball coach who moonlit as a night watchman getting shot in the heart while on duty one night. Essentially, this was just another “wrong place, wrong time” murder, with Mike (the coach) being collateral damage for a man who murdered his bookie.
These mysteries of the week have crippled iZombie since the show began. The show has a strong one every now and then, but it is at its best when the mystery plays second fiddle (or is absent altogether). Rob Thomas’ other show, Veronica Mars also worked on a semi-procedural format, but the mysteries on that show were more compelling than the ones iZombie has been dishing out. They don’t all have to be home runs, but there haven’t been any good ones this season so far.
“Love & Basketball” was an alright episode of iZombie, which by iZombie standards means that it was a better-than-average episode of television. There were plenty of fun moments peppered throughout the episode to keep you interested, but it wasn’t a particularly standout episode for the series. Now that Major and Liv are a team again, it will be fun to see where the show goes next.
Random Notes
- Chapter Titles of the Week: Make Out the Zombie; Hot or Not?; Smells Like Teen Spirit; Fists of Fury; Tainted Love; Rats from a Slinging Ship; He Who Dealt It, Melted.
- Brain Recipe of the Week: Brain Omelette!
- I’m not going to lie, everything about sports bores me. From the sports themselves to the “team” environment to shouts of “hustle,” I just hate it. So I’m probably not the best person to judge Liv’s personality this week.
- I just noticed that Gabriel was played by Yani Gellman, aka douchebag Paolo Valisari from The Lizzie McGuire Movie, a movie that I unabashedly love. This bit of trivia made me smile.
- “Shot through the heart…and who’s to blame?” – Ravi, on discovering Mike’s corpse.
- Liv faking trying to get a vision when Clive came in before she had eaten Mike’s brain was hilarious.
- “It’s like watching my mother trying to refold a map.” -Gilda, who is quickly becoming my favorite TV bitch.
- “We can watch Hoosiers.” -Liv, to Major. I hate Hoosiers, but my mom always wanted my sister and I to watch it, so this line made me guffaw.
- Liv let it slip to Gilda that she made out with Major. Uh oh!
- Clive beating up RJ’s dad for child abuse, while absolutely warranted, was a little out of character for Clive. Methinks this hints at something terrible that happened in his past.
- No Peyton this week? Sad face.
- iZombie brings gambling back next week. I’m not incredibly enthused, but the title of the episode is “Max Wager,” so I am a little intrigued.