Black Lightning - Season 4

[Maskripper]

So, a trailer has surfaced just about 2 weeks prior to the first episode of season 4 of Black Lightning (February 8):


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This will be the last season before the will "continue" with a Painkiller spin-off.
I enjoyed the 3 seasons so far, looking forward to this one as well.

[shevek]

I'll watch anything with Thunder and Lightning in it, including the Painkiller spin-off (if they're involved).

But at :23 please tell me that's not Nafessa returning to that drab Blackbird costume.

[Maskripper]

I'll watch anything with Thunder and Lightning in it, including the Painkiller spin-off (if they're involved).

But at :23 please tell me that's not Nafessa returning to that drab Blackbird costume.

Yep, these two were a great addition to the show.
And yep, it looks like Blackbird.
I'm very fine with that as she has the coolest mask in the show, that actually covers something....you know my mask taste
The other three costumes incl. Black Lighting are having sunglasses as masks....more or less

[Maskripper]

Watched episodes 1 and 2 by now.
Solid episodes, but some aspects aren't so good for me.

Spoiler

Jefferson is behaving completely reckless and he and his wife are spending quite a lot of time talking to a shrink about their problems with each other and their own problems as well. That's not something I wanna see in such a show....at least not in that amount.
I hope Jefferson will get back into his role quickly

I like that Nafessa Williams still plays Thunder AND Blackbird. Very rare to have a character that plays two different masked heroines/vigilantes for such a long time.
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Yeah, it not a big issue but I hate what the other Pierce daughter did with her hair. I have rather short hair myself, but when a woman has even shorter hair than me...


^Season 3
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^now in season 4
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And that strange mask that her mother now is wearing. That just looks like a glowing, sci-fi ....medical mask. Who came up with that? Especially in these times?
It disguises her quite better as Thunder and Lightning....at least. But god, is that mask ugly.
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What I do enjoy is how Tobias is

Spoiler

teasing them with his knowledge of all of their secret identities

.
I wonder where that all will lead to.
I think they have to kill him, even they don't wanna do that as heroes. But otherwise, he would be always a danger to the family.

[Maskripper]

Well, seems like it's only Shevek and myself posting about this ... #odd
Watched episode 4.
I was kind of on a "this is....well....nice.....but not really interesting" level (like with LoT most of the time for me).
Until the very end of the episode, there wasn't anyone in costume...but then this happened:



Well, certainly something you don't get every day
Guess I will make a blog post about this scene on Sunday.

[Maskripper]

Episode 5

Spoiler

I forgot that China Anne McClain decided to quit as she isn't really into her acting career anymore.
So, the ending was quite a surprise to me. Pretty weird to have to swap one of the major roles in the middle of the last season....but here they have a solution that works in the story.
Even it involves a lot of sci-fi-fantasy stuff to explain it. But well, as I told I wasn't happy about her new look in the season anyway....so I don't mind getting her swapped.
Of course, it will depend on who the new actress will play the part. I guess not only her looks have changed.

I hope now the season gets really into the story and delivers some memorable episodes before the end. There was way too much drama ....and way too less story and action in it so far (even by CW standards).

[shevek]

Here's an article explaining why China left and was replaced by Laura, and they accounted for it by her body literally "dissolving" and then being put back together. It looks like China went super Christian and perhaps even got a bit based.

https://tvline.com/2021/03/09/black-lig ... a-kariuki/

I got to episodes 4 and 5.
As usual, one of the things that keeps me watching this series is how strikingly beautiful Nafessa Williams is.
But Chantal Thuy is stepping things up as well.
Now that Grace and Anissa are married and sharing a loft apartment, we're seeing more of Grace and how she
interacts with Anissa as a lover. More closeups on her, and more scenes where they profess each other's love,
is a good thing. And the scene where Grace shapeshifts - her eyes glowing - and she transforms into the sexy
tight black costume you see above in the photo? That was good, and even Nafessa's character has to admit
it was pretty hot. Unfortunately they didn't use any CGI, the camera just looks away and Grace is transformed.

Episode 5 is an epic, written by Lamont Magee. Besides the Tobias and La-La plots, it's basically there to smooth
the transition between China and Laura in playing the Jen/Lightning character. The conceit is used that there's
a "pod" in Gambi's Sanctum where Lightning is reconstituting herself, complete a huge amount of dry ice smoke
from which she emerges dramatically - the whole situation is quite campy almost in an Electra Woman or Power Rangers
way, which should make it appealing to members of this forum. In fact, the whole set of the Sanctum just screams early
80s sci-fi goodness...especially how everything is glowing and blue, and the secret code that Anissa has to enter into
a keypad after lifting a fake wall fixture. It's classic Batcave stuff!

In the final analysis, Laura looks *nothing* like China.
Wonder if they're doing that to set up an uncomfortable incongruity within the Pierce family, but we'll see.
I was also very interested to see T.C. come to serious tears over Jen - I really hope those two make a love connection,
because a sensitive black nerd technopath genius could use a nice break.

The other thing I noticed about Magee's writing is that he drops in tons of Woke buzzwords and phrases.
In Episode 5 alone I counted way more progressive talking points than in the last four episodes, so it almost
has to be the writer's doing. Here's the list:

- a fat criminal says "I can't breathe!"
- a cop says he doesn't want to knock down doors at 2 in the morning for somebody selling a dimebag (Breonna reference)
- Jeff mentions Colin Kaepernick in a story he tells to Gambi
- "[Antifa] protestors being pulled off the street and shoved in vans in Portland" is mentioned
- the "white privilege" of Tobias' right-hand henchman is mentioned by Tobias
- the head of the Meta Task Force is named Hassan Shakur (an obvious reference to both Tupac and Assata Shakur)
- Jeff says "we've got to stop killing each other" to La-La

On the cool side of things, the music just continues to be excellent.
When T.C. says to Gambi "what's the matter, you don't like Go-Go?" with reference to Gambi turning off the "Rollin' With Kid 'n Play" song, that might be the very first time that the Official Music Genre of Washington D.C. was referenced in a comic book show, or
possibly ANY show at all! Wish they'd used a song by Chuck Brown or E.U. in the episode, since Trouble Funk is probably too obscure
to ask for.
And when Jeff joins an underground fight club and whups dudes' asses to the tune of Brand Nubian "Punks Jump Up to Get Beat Down", that's just a pizza chef kiss.

Still watching, Maskripper!

[shevek]

Don't know if anyone else is still watching this series except me (and Maskripper, maybe?) but I'm all caught up, and I thought the latest Episode 11 was one of the best, not because of any action but because it advanced a lot of the plot threads nicely.

New Lightning actress Laura Kariuki is filling the suit nicely and at least giving us a nice display of power (although the CGI lightning is pretty much at the level of any DIY SHIP production we've seen recently) and a bit of peril (as she falls out of the ionosphere).

Here's the comic book graphic at the beginning of the episode - it's one of the better ones I've seen, really shows the appeal of the female chararacters in the series. Lately it really has seemed like they've turned away from featuring Black Lightning and are leaning more towards featuring Thunder, Lightning and Painkiller. Especially Painkiller, who is getting lots of screen time because there's most likely going to be a spinoff series featuring him. I just don't think Jordan Calloway's acting is charismatic enough to headline a TV show but I guess we'll see.

Also..bonus points for this episode's soundtrack including "Death March" by soulful Atlanta postpunks Algiers (on Matador Records).
Not the usual fare you'd hear on Black Lightning, and yet the reasons for their inclusion are obvious.

[Maskripper]

Don't know if anyone else is still watching this series except me (and Maskripper, maybe?) but I'm all caught up, and ......

Yes, of course, I am still watching.
Have to see how it all ends and how the masked ladies are doing in the final episodes.
Haven't seen the new episode yet, but will do that soon.

[shevek]

Hey Maskripper...hope you stuck it out until the end of the series.
Just finished Episode 13 and it's definitely worth watching the wrap-up.

A forum interested in beautiful superheroines should be hopefully interested in what happens in the series finale.

Without giving away too much, the episode includes:

Spoiler

-Wylde (Grace Choi) getting back her animal powers and going apeshit on some mercenary guards while wearing her tight
costume.

- Thunder (Anissa) going into battle in a brand-new nice & tight purple costume with a glowing "T" belt buckle.
Really nice costume design (if a bit hard to cosplay).
There's also some peril, as she faints beautifully in her lover's arms after taking a hit from some energy guns.
A knockout of a spandex-clad masked woman? I'm sure Maskripper will want to capture that image and blog about it.

- China McClain returns! Apparently her series 'departure' was a headfake and she didn't go all "Christian" on us, after all.
She has a knock-down drag out catfight with her Ionosphere-derived counterpart. both in their tight costumes with lots of
CGI effects, and even in the new short hairstyle (I have to admit it, I prefer the longer hair) she looks pretty damn good.
Her character is also in peril several times during that fight, although she is not masked (she removes it at the start of the battle).

- Lightning also fights the Meta Task Force police chief who becomes obsessed and unstable after injecting herself with
a 72-hour dose of power. I do have a couple questions about that, however:
1) How stupid and irresponsible does the police chief have to be to leave a suitcase of power-granting vials in her office,
where somebody like her fellow detective (or any thief, really) could just get in and steal the case by jimmying the lock?
Why wouldn't such an asset be placed in the highest security area of the police station?
2) And...we clearly see SEVEN vials left in the briefcase when the detective opens it to find one missing. He then closes
the door behind him, LEAVING THE VIALS IN THE OFFICE. (Not destroying them and stomping on them, which would have made much more sense and provided closure). Whatever happened to them after the episode ended...is something we may never know.
That was a stupid and weird loose end.

All in all, this was a fairly satisfying way to end the saga of the Pierce family, for now. One wonders whether DC or the CW
intend to pick it back up at some point, or at least incorporate Thunder, Lightning and Wylde into new stories in the DCU.

In the final minutes, when you admire Nafessa Williams (Thunder) in that gorgeous dress (and of course, her "wife" has to wear
a masculine formal suit, because Current Year!), you too will consider it a great shame if you never get to see Nafessa in a tight
superheroine costume (she wore a total of four different ones over the course of the series) again!

What a successful accomplishment - the longest-running and most action-packed TV series about black superheroes ever created.
Love and goodbye to the Pierces!

black lightning resurrection.jpg (157.44 KiB) Viewed 897 times

[Maskripper]

Of course, I watched the final episodes as well @shevek ;-)
This season was my least favorite from this show but even then it was more interesting than LoT.
All in all, it's a good TV show and had some good action scenes, some thrilling episodes and....most importantly....some sexy masked women along the way.
Once there is a complete Blu-ray set of this show...I will get sooner or later and re-watch the whole thing when some time has passed.