Carnivale 10-26-03 (Spoilers)

[LightPhoenix]

It's been a while since I've seen a post about this show. Are people still watching it?

I'm glad Ben finally used his powers to heal someone. I was fully expecting him to revive the dead dancer (whose name I forgot), and it never happened. He was in a huge field, he could have stayed behind to dig the grave... very frustrating.

Justin is by far my favorite character, and I'm glad he finally learned that he was being proud in the bad way. I wonder if the scene with the children was a vision sent by God, or Justin just simple remembering the story.

As for my current theory about what's going on...

Many people have stated that Justin and Ben must be good and evil. I disagree. I think they both have the potential to be either, and their actions will define what side they fall on. Justin, being a holy man, is being tempted by the seven deadly sins - most notably Pride, in thinking he was God's chosen. Whether this temptation is by an evil being is debatable. Ben similarly is being tempted by the Blind Man (whose name I also can't recall). Only with Ben, it's a temptation to use his powers, much like Scudder did in bringing down the cave on the miners in Babylon. Ben also caused the black storm - obviously he is a source of great power. This is why I think the Blind Man got all upset over Ben healing the slow kid (I really need to learn some names). Ben didn't use his abilities the way he wanted - he used them to fix his screw up, breaking the kid's arm. Compassion and all that.

So right now I'm looking at both Justin and Ben being potentially Good, and temptation being the primary Evil, though I suspect it will manifest itself in Scudder, who succumbed to temptation.

 

[RatPunk]

It's been a while since I've seen a post about this show. Are people still watching it?

I'm glad Ben finally used his powers to heal someone. I was fully expecting him to revive the dead dancer (whose name I forgot), and it never happened. He was in a huge field, he could have stayed behind to dig the grave... very frustrating.

Justin is by far my favorite character, and I'm glad he finally learned that he was being proud in the bad way. I wonder if the scene with the children was a vision sent by God, or Justin just simple remembering the story.

As for my current theory about what's going on...

Many people have stated that Justin and Ben must be good and evil. I disagree. I think they both have the potential to be either, and their actions will define what side they fall on. Justin, being a holy man, is being tempted by the seven deadly sins - most notably Pride, in thinking he was God's chosen. Whether this temptation is by an evil being is debatable. Ben similarly is being tempted by the Blind Man (whose name I also can't recall). Only with Ben, it's a temptation to use his powers, much like Scudder did in bringing down the cave on the miners in Babylon. Ben also caused the black storm - obviously he is a source of great power. This is why I think the Blind Man got all upset over Ben healing the slow kid (I really need to learn some names). Ben didn't use his abilities the way he wanted - he used them to fix his screw up, breaking the kid's arm. Compassion and all that.

So right now I'm looking at both Justin and Ben being potentially Good, and temptation being the primary Evil, though I suspect it will manifest itself in Scudder, who succumbed to temptation.

Just for the sake of helping you learn the names...

Dead dancer = Dora Mae

Blind Man = Lodz

Slow kid = Gabe

I agree that at this point neither Ben nor Justin seem evil (although previews for next week lead me to believe that is about to change...). I find Justin's storyline to be the more interesting one at the moment, but that could just be because it has the most going on right now. A friend and I had theorized early on that Justin and Ben were actually on the same side and Justin was "preparing the way" for Ben's eventual arrival. Recent events have pretty much discounted that idea, though.

All in all, an excellent series. I can hardly wait to see where it's all leading and I hope HBO picks it up for next season.

 

[A2Z]

Justin is by far my favorite character, and I'm glad he finally learned that he was being proud in the bad way. I wonder if the scene with the children was a vision sent by God, or Justin just simple remembering the story.

You do know that those two children were Justin and his sister right? It wasn't just a story it was their story. Right at the end after Justin's sister told the story we saw a picture on the wall of the two of them as children. They were the same as the two children in the flashback.

So, Justin killed the man they had found by the river. Just by looking at him he broke his neck. In the flashback Justin was remembering things from the man's viewpoint. It wasn't him it was the man he had killed.

So, my opinion is that Justin is the evil one and Ben is the good one. One can heal, the other can hurt. Although I could be wrong I think that's the way things will stand.

 

[Tauric]

I agree with A2Z about the good/evil thing. I think Justin (Alexei?) became a man of God because he was afraid of the power within him, but now that he feels God has abandoned him, he will give into that power.

I also think it's good that Ben finally used his power.

Can anyone help me figure out the timeline?

We know Scudder is Ben's dad, and that Ben was born around 1910 (since the show is set in the early '30s and Ben can't be more than 25, though my wife thinks he's closer to 20).

Then Scudder was in WWI, and he meets Lodz (who then wasn't blind). I assume he hooks up witht he carnival, travels a while, and then becomes the miner in Babylon?

Or does anyone think that he was in Babylon before he fathered Ben, or after that but fefore the war?

The reason I think he was a miner after he was with the carnival is that no one seems to know what happened to him, so he must have left them.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. I'm glad others are interested in the show, too.

 

[LightPhoenix]

You do know that those two children were Justin and his sister right? It wasn't just a story it was their story. Right at the end after Justin's sister told the story we saw a picture on the wall of the two of them as children. They were the same as the two children in the flashback.

No, I completely missed that.

Oops.

 

[RatPunk]

I agree with A2Z about the good/evil thing. I think Justin (Alexei?) became a man of God because he was afraid of the power within him, but now that he feels God has abandoned him, he will give into that power.

I also think it's good that Ben finally used his power.

Can anyone help me figure out the timeline?

We know Scudder is Ben's dad, and that Ben was born around 1910 (since the show is set in the early '30s and Ben can't be more than 25, though my wife thinks he's closer to 20).

Then Scudder was in WWI, and he meets Lodz (who then wasn't blind). I assume he hooks up witht he carnival, travels a while, and then becomes the miner in Babylon?

Or does anyone think that he was in Babylon before he fathered Ben, or after that but fefore the war?

The reason I think he was a miner after he was with the carnival is that no one seems to know what happened to him, so he must have left them.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. I'm glad others are interested in the show, too.

Well, as I said, my friends theory about Justin being good kind of went out the window after the last two episodes.

On to the timeline:

The show begins in 1934 and Ben is 18 when the Carnivale picks him up, which means he was born sometime in 1916, which is right in the middle of WW1 (and just before America's involvement in early 1917).

My guess would be that Scudder got Ben's mother pregnant, then left to fight in the war shortly after he was born. We've already seen through Ben's dreams that Scudder hooked up with Lodz during the war. I would guess that Scudder and Lodz joined the current Carnivale together after coming back to the States, as it's unlikely this Carnivale toured Europe, although anything is certainly possible in this show. This leads me to believe that Scudder and Lodz's "partnership" goes back quite a way and is definately the cause of Lodz's interest in Ben, especially since Lodz obviously knows what Scudder is capable of. I would also hazard to guess that perhaps Lodz's influence is partly responsible for Scudder not returning to Ben's mother when he came back.

Now, as to where the rest of it fits in, that's a little harder to guess, but it has to have been after the war. We know that Scudder leaves the Carnivale, meets the "old woman" that Ben talks to in Tipton (Episode 3), leaves her and goes to Babylon, destroys Babylon and leaves for parts currently unknown.

I suppose it's also possible that Scudder was already with the Carnivale when he meet Ben's mother, but there's some circumstantial evidence (such as Ruthie mentioning that the picture of Ben's mom was Scudder's sweetie that he always talked about) that leads me not to believe that...

 

[LightPhoenix]

My whole problem with Justin/Alexei being the evil is that he's seemed to want to be forgiven at times, and to change. He's exhibited regret.

Compare Justin, Ben, Lodz, and Scudder. Ben doesn't want to use his power - in fact he actively tries to avoid using it. Scudder on the other hand blatantly used his power to kill. Lodz seems to be using any way he can to get Ben to manifest his powers - including beating his wife (is she his wife?). He actually wants Ben to use them. Justin has been using his powers to further his own goals (even though it was good) and paid the price by having the migrant church burn down.

Of the four, Ben seems to be on the good path. Justin is set up to have a revelation and move to the good path. Lodz seems to be doing the opposite - willingly went to the evil path. And Scudder is clearly on the evil path. Of the three evil men, Justin seems to be the least evil and the most regretful.

And as an aside, I worked with a guy at the college radio station named Mark Scudder. So I keep wanting to call his father Mark.