Wednesday, December 3, 2008

The Harrowing Adventures of TAAG


Oh Jonas, oh that body...

I've been addicted to lonelygirl15 for maybe a month and a half now, and ever since I got caught up on the current series, LG15: The Resistance, I've been following it religiously every day. Each evening I'm eager to see what new video or blog post has been posted for the day, and on Saturdays I'm thrilled to check out the latest weekly episode. I've completely fallen for Jonas, Sarah, Reed, and Maggie, the current lineup of the Teen Angst Adventure Gang...though only two of them are actually still under 20. TAAG is all grown up! Kind of. Their fighting brings out their inner 15-year-olds, but they're working on it.

Anyway, the last few days of the Resistance have been AMAZING. In last Tuesday's episode, "Taken", Reed was kidnapped by a guy from Lifesblood Labs after leaving the group on Monday, and the others have been looking for him ever since. The previous Thursday, Jonas and Sarah had tried to break into Lifesblood Labs and were arrested, and Reed had to bail them out; this caused Reed and Jonas to get into a fight (and I have to say, Reed looked pretty damn hot punching Jonas out...) and both Maggie and Reed to flee, though Reed spoke as if he didn't plan on returning to them while Maggie said she needed some time. It's not surprising that LBL decided to make a move while the group was split apart and vulnerable, but taking Reed is the worst thing they could have done. Reed is still new to this life of being on the run and fighting the Order, and it's not exactly something easy to get used to.

Last Thursday, Maggie posted a blog entry saying that she'd be in touch with Jonas and Sarah, as she had an idea of where Reed might be. He'd been forced to make a vlog telling them he was fine and not to look for him (it was very obvious that he was being forced to say those things), and when forced to make a blog entry also stating that he was fine, he included a fairly obvious code in it that spelled out "Help me." So on Friday's episode, "Lost and Found", the other three reunited, and went looking for Reed in the facilities Maggie was held in during her time as a test subject for Lifesblood Labs.

This episode was absolutely brilliant. Kidnappings and rescue missions are nothing new in the Breeniverse (it feels weird calling it that when she hasn't been on the show since 2007, though), but this episode features a great plot device in taking Maggie back to the setting of her painful memories. The seriousness of the situation hits you when you see Maggie standing in front of the building looking at it, determined, even while Jonas tells her she doesn't have to do this. In a truly creepy moment, Sarah brings the camera over to Maggie to reveal that she is standing at the doorway of the room she stayed in during her time at LBL, the bed stripped of its sheets and the room brighter than it looks in any of the LBL security camera footage. "This isn't you anymore, Maggie," says Jonas as he joins her. She replies, "Then why...why am I so scared when I see this place? I need to know." Then we see her frantically searching through a dark room, yelling in protest when Jonas tries to tell her they should go, until she finds some object and replies to Sarah's "What is it?", "Answers." All set to Tokyo Police Club's "The Harrowing Adventures Of?", complete with its own music box effects that might even remind one of the Hymn of One music.

BRILLIANT!!!


I love the way he's looking at her.

Saturday's weekly episode, "Chapter 11: We All Fall Down", only made me even more excited. In the pre-escape Maggie security footage, the great escape continues, and Beaumont speaks more lines than he ever has before. AND I FALL IN LOVE WITH HIM JUST A LITTLE. He's doing everything he can to help Maggie, and when he puts his hands on her face I could care less about the Maggie/Jonas pairing. And THEN, THEN! He tells Maggie that he is part of an organization fighting to save girls like her. When he said "Come with us," and Maggie said "Us?", my computer shut down and I had to turn it back on and reload the video, but I was on edge for those 10 minutes, not wanting to get my hopes up about what he was going to say, but HOPING he would say what I wanted him to say. And then, he said it. Exactly what I'd wanted to hear.

IS THE RESISTANCE STILL ALIVE, AFTER ALL?!?!?!

Many people aren't quick to believe this, as we've been led to believe that the Resistance was out there before, only to find that it was a trap. But someone else pointed out that they probably wouldn't reuse a plot element like that, and I agree that that makes the most sense. This would be the first time that we've heard anything of the Resistance still being out there, and this series being LG15: The Resistance, a development like that only makes sense. And what a freaking exciting development it is!!! I got so excited when I watched the episode that I started babbling about it in caps lock to a friend who's never watched a single episode of LG15. The Resistance is alive! I have to believe it.

So, after the usual Sunday break, we got the awesome video "All Eyes" on Monday. This video features clips of Sarah, Maggie, and Jonas watching Dr. Alderman of LBL in his home and leaving in his car, with text coming up on the screen that reads "How does it feel to be watched? How does it feel to know we're so close?" They continue to follow him once he's reached his destination, as well. At the end, there's this epic shot of the three of them from behind, and then you hear Maggie's voice: "We see you." The music, Celldweller's "Birthright", makes it all that much more epic. God, we've watched TAAG be followed ever since 2006, whether it was Bree and Daniel being followed by Watchers from the Order, or Reed being followed by the "creepy van man" from Lifesblood Labs this past fall. It's terrific to see TAAG doing the following, for once. They may not be following an Elder from the Order or anything, but LBL is an enemy worth bringing down, and succeeding at doing so would sure send a message to the order that the Resistance is stronger than ever, now.

Another blog entry from Reed yesterday said that he was fine, but it seemed as if the entry wasn't even written by him at all, but by someone from LBL who simply got Reed's password from him. There were no codes this time around, from what I can see, and the entry actually denied that there had even been a code in the last one, though it was completely obvious. This also makes me believe that someone from LBL wrote the entry, as they may have discovered the code in Reed's last entry and decided not to trust him to do anything any more. I just hope they didn't...hurt him. And I hope that they don't if they haven't already. God, I just want Reed to get out of this okay. And uh, make out with Sarah. But yeah.

Finally, we come to today's video, "We Are the Resistance". Much like "All Eyes", this episode could be viewed as something of a trailer for the series. Some fans seem to be disappointed that nothing's really happening in this week's videos, also saying that nothing's really happened at all so far in the current series, and that these videos would have been better at the beginning of the series as a way of promoting it and getting us excited about it. Maybe I'm just easily pleased due to being new to the fandom, but I don't really mind this at all. (If anything, the only time I was frustrated with a lack of things "happening" was on the day of the Boston live event, when there was no auction and all Sarah found was a note telling her to go back to L.A.) For one thing, today's video is pretty much as epic as Monday's was. With Jonas standing front and centre and Maggie and Sarah on either side behind him, our three non-kidnapped current TAAG members speak to the camera, threatening the Order, Lifesblood Labs, and anyone who stands with them, telling them that the tables have turned and their power will only decrease from now on, and indicating that this will all start tomorrow. There's a good chance that something moderately big is going to happen tomorrow, and I can't wait to see what that may be!

The one funny thing about today's video is that it obviously had to have been filmed by someone else, unless they set the camera on top of something in a different position for all three of the main shots. I can't help but picture them pulling some random, timid guy off the street and having him film them, and his expression turning to one of confusion and fear as he listens to what they say about the Order and the threats they make. XDD But this video is great nevertheless. While Maggie doesn't stand out much here, Sarah really grabbed my attention as she talked about the Order taking people's family and friends. Her sister Taylor's life was threatened by their own father, him being a member of the Order, and while Taylor is okay now, Sarah knows what it feels like to have a loved one's life threatened by these people. Being desperate to save her sister drove her to go so far as to help the Order, betraying TAAG, even though she didn't want to. I believe that she has redeemed herself, and that her actions were justified in that she had to try to save her sister and she did try to secretly help TAAG even while she was being forced to give the Order information, though I don't believe even Jonas has forgiven her yet. In any case, I liked watching Sarah say those lines.

And, Jonas. I keep falling in love with him a little bit more with every video where he does something amazing, and he sure had his amazingness going today, that's for sure. But this is no sweet, caring Jonas moment. Jonas is a man who's life has been destroyed by the Order. There's nowhere safe for him to go anymore; people are after him. The Order has tried to take everything from him, and to a large extent, they've succeeded: He couldn't save Bree. His parents were taken from him and he was left to believe that they were dead, and to this day they don't even remember him and want nothing to do with him. Emma was almost killed more than once, though she is safe now. Gina jumped in front of Jonas when a gun was pointed at him, sacrificing her own life to save his.
He wound up discovering that his aunt Alex was working for the order when he, Daniel, and Bree stayed with her, although she wound up helping them later on, prior to Bree's death. He couldn't even save Nadia, the ceremony girl on the boat this past August, despite how badly he wanted to stop another ceremony from happening. (The effectiveness of his line "No, not again!" as he sees Nadia lying on a stretcher is chilling.) An early video from the current season in which Jonas tells the then unidentified Hymn of None Youtube poster "You don't know what I've lost," says everything. The Order has been hurting Jonas in one way or another since he was 13; he has a right to want them all dead. Each time he gets angry, all of his pain shows through his anger, and it's a downright powerful sight to behold.


"We are the Resistance. We will not be stopped." I believe in them. I have complete faith that TAAG are going to bring down Lifesblood Labs, and soon. And after that, the Order will know that they're in trouble now, and that it's only a matter of time. The only way this could get more epic is if our Resistance finds the bigger Resistance and joins them, and the group Jonas's father was once a member of ultimately succeeds and brings down the Order. This, along with the constant references to LG15: The Resistance's season finale as "the season one finale", has me sure that there will be at least one more season to come, if not more, so I am not too worried about the fate of the series after the 12 in 12 finale, "Day of Atonement" on 12/12. (So exciting!!!) Hell, there might even be time for Sarah and Reed to finally hook up.


Plz to be happening soon, thx.

The Resistance will not be stopped! The day of atonement is coming.

(All pictures taken from either inside.lg15.com or lg15.com/lgpedia)

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