The calm before the Billith

A few days ago I complained about how Jason’s shift towards pure hatred felt especially extreme because of the use of hallucinations. That said, at least it was believable because he’s had feelings like those before – back in Season 2 when he’d gotten himself mixed up with the Fellowship of the Sun. On the other hand, Bill has always been a staunch mainstreamer. It was those beliefs that got the attention of the AVL and those beliefs that got him the assistance of the snipers to take out Sophie-Anne.*

So when you look at a Bill that has for the most part always been fairly pro-human, this shift to a religious fundamentalist felt almost like a 180 degree shift. It’s not to say that Bill was incapable of making that shift; but the mechanism they used – the flashback to his dying daughter – didn’t really work to show us how Bill had made a mistake by not turning his daughter. It was just kind of there. As a result, it left many viewers with this feeling of unease and questioning whether he really believed or was it all an act. Personally, on an Intellectual level I knew he believed – I’d seen the early descriptions of “Save Yourself” and knew that he must be a believed – but on an emotional level, I didn’t buy it.  I only bought into it towards the very end of the season, when he killed Kibwe for even praying by the blood. Stephen’s performance really helped sell it in “Save Yourself” but it shouldn’t have had to have been sold by the acting, but rather by the writing.

As for Billith, it will be interesting to see where the journey takes us with his character. Hopefully it’ll be a better trip than the one we took just to get to this point because Bill (and the viewers) deserve better.

Best Moment – Salome’s Death

Yes, I just used this in the previous post, but it still stands here. It was an absolutely fantastic scene and a reminder that Bill really is a fantastic actor himself, playing whatever part is needed to further his own agenda. He was so cool and so polite right before he killed Salome and that swagger was just awesome. I hope that the Billith we see next season leans more in this direction than in the bloody screamer that Lilith appeared as the entirety of this last season.

Worst Moment – His slapping Jessica.

I can’t help it. I felt for the baby vamp. It was just such a cruel thing to do, and it happened before I fully bought into him truly believing. It was very jarring and hard to watch.

*For those unaware, the extras on the S4 Blu Ray made it clear that a “high-ranking member” of the Authority signed off on the use of the guards. Based on what we saw this season, it stands to reason that Roman authorized it because Bill’s mainstreaming agenda aligned so well with his own.