What I’m Watching: iZombie (Season Finale)

iZombie: Season 1, Episode 13 “Blaine’s World” (B+)

This was quite an intense episode, one that skewed far more action-oriented and dramatic than most of the installments that preceded it. Having someone find out you’re a zombie never goes as planned, and while Peyton’s reaction was certainly not good, Major’s was entirely unfortunate. After an awesome extended action sequence in which he took out everyone but Blaine, he got felled and marked for death by a brutal stab wound. He could have been spared the pain of knowing that Liv lied to him had Blaine not been so vindictive, and now it seems that he’s gone from being near-dead to a zombie to potentially human again in a matter of hours. Injecting Blaine with the cure was an interesting punishment since he won’t actually pay for his crimes, and it appears that Clive is hot on Major as the prime suspect rather than Blaine, who Suzuki took such care to make sure seemed like the culprit. Liv’s brother showing up just as the place was exploding was pretty tragic, and I feel like he’s either going to have a bigger role to play in season two or his death due to Liv not giving him a blood transfusion is going to drive an enormous wedge between her and her mother and cause Liv to spiral downwards into a depression far worse than what she’s experienced as a zombie. It also seems clear that Steven Weber’s Vaughn is going to become a more major character, which is great, since Max Rager has been identified as the prime cause of this impending zombie apocalypse. His extermination mission with his new number two played by Brian Markinson, who was Arnold Rosen on “Mad Men,” is far more sinister than the cure Ravi has developed, and I don’t think he’d be content to stop at healing those he has injured. This show impressed me so much more than I expected, and I’m eagerly awaiting season two this fall.

Season grade: B+
Season MVP: Rose McIver as Liv