iZombie - Chivalry is Dead

** / ****

I have to admit that the fourth season hasn’t exactly been my personal cup of tea. I just preferred the show back when zombies were in secret, Blaine was out and about trying to turn and blackmail innocents until he eventually gets his, Ravi was searching for the cure, and you could still go in and out of Seattle. I’ve never quite been able to find my happy place in this season, but there have been bright spots here and there. The ending of Chivalry is Dead was certainly shocking enough, leaving quite a juicy nugget to gnaw on: the zombie finger scrape that has worked for Liv (serving as a substitute in the Underground as a leader) doesn’t turn a dying human. Zombies turn those alive into undead, a fact that has endured throughout the entire series of iZombie, but something is different with the intruding Isobel who is a chatty teen narrowly making it into Seattle needing to be turned or else she’d die. Liv looks at her finger, tries multiple scratches up and down Isobel’s arm, deep into the flesh, and nothing…just nothing.

The case in the episode is of a victim in a suit of armor, dressed as a knight, laid out in a pool of his own blood, the loser of a sword fight it seems. He was one of those who participates in medieval games, speaks the language, wears the gear, and congregates with likeminded individuals. So his brain is cooked and feasted on by Liv who begins to call Clive, “mi Lord”, addressing her peers completely in Arthurian-speech. That might amuse its attended audience, and while I always admire McGiver’s total immersion into these personas, it does go a bit overboard. Her standing “at guard”, never letting up on her Arthurian, as if the victim always spoke this way without break, a devoted knight to Clive; there’s no modulation or subtle touches between the caricature and human being that enjoyed the lifestyle of a bygone age.

Peyton wanting to help Liv fund the Underground, Major still helping Graves “undercover” in the hopes of discovering where all the brain supply was being furnished illegally, Clive trying to accept his sexual situation involving his zombie girlfriend, and Ravi continuing to work as a mortician (while remaining intimately involved with Peyton, lucky guy…); these are the developments that ultimately matter as the episode closes. Blaine is recruited by Stacey Boss to get his missing money, confiscated and hidden by a crook Peyton visits prior to a prison transfer bus assault, orchestrated by Blaine through the manipulation of his gonzo father, Angus and the church of zombies that follow his lead. Peyton got to the money first (in a locker), taking it to Liv and her Underground allies, but a serious threat to their operation will come in the form of Blaine due to eating the brains of the crook, Casper (Tony Alcanter), who fed the location info to Peyton. It all circles back around in the show. Blaine might seem as if he separates from everything to run his own business but ultimately he’s tied to Liv and her inner circle in one way or another…the creative team of iZombie make sure of that.