It’s all an illusion.
Warning: Full spoilers for the episode below.
iZombie deals with plenty of serious material, but the humor is always present. And sometimes, well, sometimes it’s king. “Abra Cadaver” was packed with laughs across the board thanks to witty dialogue and perfectly timed performances and delivery — especially from Rose McIver and David Anders. Can they please join forces all the time? Blaine’s terrible, sure, but he’s so entertaining, and his devil may care attitude is a lovely contract to Liv’s more serious personality. Anders handles smarmy quips so well it’s no wonder he gets the best lines. This will surprise absolutely no one who knows me, but I particularly liked the “Help me, Zombie-Wan Kenobi” bit.
It’s a testament to the charm of Blaine and Anders that despite all Blaine’s done — killing Lowell, for example — it’s easy to root for him and Peyton. Blaine has a soft edge about him; it makes you want to believe he can change and be the sweetest boyfriend ever though it’s never going to happen. Basically, he’s maxed out in the charisma category of his character sheet. He’s not a dumb guy, but he’s excellent at projecting certain portraits of himself to different groups. He’s a chameleon like Liv without ingesting various brains.
And about those magician brains. Watching Liv do magic tricks was fun but seeing the way she channeled Sid’s showmanship was a blast. McIver got to play with the theatrics that come along with being a magician, and she wrapped around those scenes wonderfully. Clive’s begrudging tolerance to the effects of this brain were equally fabulous.
iZombie: “Abra Cadaver” Photo Gallery:
iZombie: “Abra Cadaver” Photos
iZombie: “Abra Cadaver” Photos
iZombie: “Abra Cadaver” Photos
iZombie: “Abra Cadaver” Photos
There was a missed opportunity. Sid Wicked was obsessed with death. Liv is in a unique place what with having the death obsession and actually being dead. She acted appropriately dark, but given her status, there was room to go deeper with the theme. His morbid tastes opened the door for her to ask questions about her mortal state and learn valuable lessons to share with us in a voiceover, but it didn’t happen.
The case of the week was one of the more amusing investigations of the season so far, and that’s due in part to Smoak and Meers. The duo, inspired by Penn and Teller, was hilarious. Their time on screen was brief, but they more or less stole the episode. The mystery, however, was ruined from the instance Meers was shown. The makeup used to conceal his true identity wasn’t well done, and it made the killer obvious. The method of murder was a little boring too considering Arrow recently featured a card-throwing killer.
Other than Liv and Blaine starting to look into the missing zombies together, this episode was mostly on the procedural side of things and that’s not necessarily bad. It was well written and performed, but some follow up on recent events would have made the story better. For example, a lot recently happened to Blaine. Maybe his singing “Danny Boy” was meant to be a melancholy nod to him processing what he did to his grandfather, but if so, it wasn’t enough. An action on that level should stretch into the next episode, and iZombie occasionally stumbles when it comes to carrying those consequences forward.
Tonight’s iZombie wasn’t quite the huge plot mover like other episodes this season, but it was packed with sharp dialogue, humor, and terrific character moments. Rather than coming across as filler, this episode provided a nice pause to take a deep breath and still moved a step forward by putting Liv and Blaine on the missing zombie case.
