"The Book of Blood: Chapter Three: The Sange" – Black Lightning S02E07 Review

That's nice. And...?

That sums up my sentiments about "The Sange" and "The Book of Blood" in general. It was basically a "filler" book. We had a menace--Looker and her Sange--introduced and nothing really came of it. They got ticked off because one of their kind had sex with one of the Perdi, which result in twin babies. Looker was racist, because of course she is. We didn't find out anything about her. They only briefly got the jump on Black Lightning because he ran out of juice. Except he didn't because they electrocuted him, so he got loose. Then he got to Looker and the Sange as they tracked down Anaya, Anissa, and Lynn hiding out at an old mall. Black Lightning and Thunder defeated them, broke Looker's control over the Sange, and left her for the ASA.

And that's it. I could write out a recap of the basic plot, but that was it.

There were two Book of Blood subplot threads, both of which kinda got resolved tonight. The first was Peter's death. Which turned out to be a massive feint by the creative team. Which didn't even seem to care that they had "killed" Peter off and then brought him back. Jeff's discovery of Peter's transmitter was both coincidental and stupid: Peter had his SUV set up to self-destruct, but not his transmitters?

We're also left to wonder how Jeff found Peter in his hidey-hole at some hotel room or another. He electrically traced the transmitter signal, I guess. Although it wasn't transmitting. "draws a rainbow with his palms" Imaginaaation."

So Jeff and Peter reunite, and it's the hoary old "It's safer for your family if I pretend to be dead" trope. It would have been nice if Peter was going to pretend to be dead, he would have put a little more effort into it. It's not like Jeff is the brightest bulb in the house, so to speak. If he could figure it out, Tobias sure as heck could have.

The other subplot was the whole Khalil/Jennifer thing. I'm still not buying Khalil (Jordan Calloway) going from the mildly sadistic jerk that he was last year after he got his mobility back, to the sympathetic love interest that he's been portrayed as this season. But I suppose it gives China Anne McClain as Jennifer something to do. Besides hang out with Perenna (Erika Alexander), who we still know almost nothing about. I'm already tired of her oracle-like attitude, and to the show's credit they had Christine Adams gaslight it a bit. I'm also tired of the mental hair salon. And Perenna's weird attitude tonight of having confidentiality. That might make sense if we knew more about her. But she's not a priest or a reporter or a doctor. Rules of confidentiality don't apply to... whatever the heck she is. They wouldn't stand up in court, and they sound kind of bogus when she's telling Jennifer's parents she can't tell them what's going down with their own daughter.

Then again, maybe Perenna is a doctor. Who knows? We still don't know what she is, or much of what she can do, or if she has any kind of backstory. Or how the Pierces contacted her to help out Jennifer.

Tobias shows up very briefly to threaten Khalil after Khalil makes another attempt to warn Holt off, like the one he made last episode. Khalil calls Jennifer even though he keeps saying he doesn't want to involve her--dumbass--and she finds him, blows out some light bulbs so Tobias' men can't find him, and they have some banter as they hide. Granted, it's mildly funny banter. Writer Keli Goff does pretty well with the humor, whether it's Jennifer and Khalil, or Jeff going into protective-daddy mode when he finds the captive baby and gently coos to it while punching out a Sange bad guy.

In the end , Jennifer and Khalil get into somebody's car and go somewhere. It looks like they're driving into Freeland, which seems like a strange place to go if they're trying to get away from Tobias.

Oh, and Inspector Bill (Damon Gupton) shows up briefly to get a comedy reaction shot when Black Lightning asks him to guard the baby while he deals with Looker. We saw he had a wife: I wonder what she thinks of him bringing in a baby.

Thus closes The Book of Blood. It was pretty uninspired reading, all things considered. We got a new villainess with ill-defined powers and an ill-defined motive. We got Peter dying and living and pretending to be dead, only to be found out. I suppose he'll have to stay in hiding, which means we'll have to put up with lots of scenes of Jeff and Peter meeting secretly. Whether Jeff tells the rest of his family, we'll see. I liked Peter's interactions with the three Pierce women more than I did Jeff.

And we've got Jennifer and Khalil together. And judging from the previews, it looks like things are going to heat up a bit in the Pierce household. Anissa blames Jeff for driving Jennifer out, the same way he drove her out. And according to Perenna, Jennifer is a really really powerful meta and is now out there on her own.

All the other subplots either got put on hold (Principal Lowry, Bill hating on Jeff for not telling him his secret ID) or went into a holding pattern (Tobias is up to something, but what, who knows?). Book of Blood seemed like a weird detour that went nowhere and did nothing. There were hints Looker and Black Lightning got their powers from the same vaccine. But Sofia Vassilieva is 26 and Cress Williams is 48. So that doesn't seem to work out timeline-wise. If their character ages are the same as their real-life actors, that means that when Teenage Jeff got his powers, Teenage Looker was roughly... -6 years old? That doesn't sound right. But then, we don't find out Looker's real name or background or much of anything about her.

Oh, we also got some brief bits with Grace, and her creepy-crawly skin. Or tattoos. Or something. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be tied in with Looker somehow. Presumably we'll find out. And I thought Grace had broken up with Anissa, but they're together again tonight. Apparently I missed something. At best, it put the Anissa/Grace relationship into a holding pattern, too.

It felt like one of those episodes that you see on most network TV, where the creative team takes a vacation and the secondary crew step in to write episodes and direct and assistant-direct and all. I don't mind the show feeling tonally different, but they didn't do anything with it.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?