Oh, KINGS. How can you look so pretty and manage so little?

I review this week’s Kings episode, “Javelin,” over at Tor.com. Before we jump cut, I just want to point out that Javelin is a reference to a Bible verse I used as a pullquote weeks ago, when I thought that plotline was really revving up. Oh, was I a fool!

Anyway, this week Kings takes to the courtroom. Below the cut, some stuff I didn’t mention in my review, none of which is about the Gilboan justice system. (David-based crimes are considered especially heinous. The elite prosecutors who fabricate these crimes are called Jack and Silas.)

CHUNG CHUNG.

- Thomasina’s subplot, planted lo these many episodes ago, seems to have been, “She feels like a bad person, so she kisses that guard who loves her to reassure herself she’s a good person.” That’s…huh!

- Also, seriously, it bugs me that Thomasina is somehow not prepared to order people’s deaths. I get that she’s not as used to it as General Wes Studi was, but seriously, this is royal politics we’re talking about. Surely it came up at some point in the interview process, you know?

- I would really love to know more about her than the show is ever, ever going to tell us.

- See also: Katrina Ghent, who I hope has just faked her death and is living it up on the French Riviera someplace.

- King Silas can be truly terrifying. Not even so much when he’s raging and plotting, but when he dismisses everyone and gently explains to David that David has to go so Silas can be the undisputed king, and David AGREES. (It would be more powerful if it was David falling under Silas’s spell instead of David just agreeing to everything the King has ever asked of him, but still!)

- I really wonder what happened to that king in the basement. We haven’t seen him in six weeks!

- You know what else we haven’t gotten back to in a long time? The Reverend, the war with Gath, David’s brother’s trial, Michelle’s health care plan, Macaulay Culkin, Death sneaking up on Silas.

- WHAT THE HELL DID MACAULAY DO TO GET BANISHED, OH MY GOD, JUST WRAP THAT UP, I BEG YOU.

- Two episodes left, I think. I have to say, the episode ended at just the right time to leave me actually interesting in what came next. If only that had been the case for any of the rest of this series, we might have a second season!