”I was a hell of a Dungeon Master.”
By Eric Goldman
Warning: Full spoilers for the episode below.
Unlike the last couple of episodes, the victim this time out wasn’t tied into any ongoing storylines – though the murder did happen right in front of Ravi, which, okay, is a big leap considering all that already occurs in these people’s lives. But let’s go with it! Because what followed was so great.
From Gilbert the fake French guy (“My cher, Cher” was awesome) to the differences between the two competing coffee shops in presenting, essentially, the same product to the return of Pam (“Leslie, Leslie, Leslie… in peace, may you restie”), there was so much to enjoy. And man did Rose McIver crack me up with how enthusiastic she was when she exclaimed, “I love those flowers!”, among many other overly positive Liv moments. Plus, The Office’s Oscar Nunez guest starred!
I suspected Kacey Rohl’s Cher was the killer early on mostly because of how her profile is rising (between The X-Files, The Magicians and soon, Wayward Pines, the Hannibal alum is everywhere these days). But not only was it more complicated than it seemed, with her getting Gilbert to do the killing for her, but in a very cool/interesting move, Cher totally got away with it too, escaping with both her freedom and the money. I continue to admire iZombie for not always wrapping up these murder mysteries in a clean, easy way.
Greg Finley as Drake on iZombie
Rahul Kohli as Ravi and Robert Buckley as Major on iZombie
Rose McIver as Liv, Robert Buckley as Major and Rahul Kohli as Major on iZombie
Rahul Kohli as Ravi, Rose McIver as Liv and Malcolm Goodwin as Clive on iZombie
Rose McIver as Liv on iZombie
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Rose McIver as Liv and Rahul Rohli as Ravi on iZombie
Eddie Jemison as Mr. Boss on iZombie
In the midst of this, we finally found out the full story about Drake, as it turned out he’s actually… an undercover cop! Okay, it is a bit similar to Major’s scenario as far as the undercover/not really killing people angle is concerned, but it still is different enough to work on its own – and certainly helps explain Drake’s contradictory actions. Plus, this storyline introduced another Veronica Mars alum to iZombie, via Enrico Colantoni as Detective Lou Benedetto. And more Colantoni is always a good thing.
Boss realizing exactly how dangerous Blaine could be and deciding to have him killed was also a huge escalation – and even though we already had enough info to guess Blaine had become a zombie again and would survive his shooting, it was still a great death scene, with him standing there in his underwear, grinning, asking, “I gave you a run for your money, didn’t I?” before being shot having his throat sliced (whoops, wrong cause of death originally!). The reveal that he’d also turned Candy into a zombie was another cool turn of events.
All of that and… Gilda/Rita was found out! Her showing up when she did made for a suitably awkward/funny moment, complete with Liv’s semi-meta “How weird it took this long for you to finally meet!” line. And that could have been it for now, but no, Major slipping with the wrong name let Liv figure it out – and led to one hell of a satisfying moment when she gave Gilda one hell of a punch, slamming her head into the wall in the process.
iZombie is firing on all cylinders right now. Once again, we had a funny, fast-paced episode that managed to involve a very entertaining victim/brain of the week storyline, while also having a ton develop with the ongoing plotlines. The iZombie writers have figured out their formula to an incredibly impressive degree of late and it’s awesome to behold.
