“In case you haven’t noticed, our popular culture is quite inundated with zombies,” Ravi quips in “He Blinded Me with Science,” with all but a wink at the camera. Truer words and all that, but iZombie has totally turned the genre on its head. A completely fresh take, unburdened by the typical tropes, this show is truly flourishing in its second season. It hit the ground running in the season premiere and has only been gaining momentum ever since. Every episode, iZombie brilliantly intersperses mass amounts of plot throughout its procedural format, deftly using the case of the week to build the larger framework of the story.
It would seem as though packing so much narrative into a single forty-two-minute segment would be exhaustive to watch, but iZombie manages the task with ease. As has become typical when the episode has a hefty dose of plot to unfold, this week’s case wasn’t the most thrilling. Although, they had to have a “the evil twin did it” resolution at some point, no? It doesn’t matter, not really, because the brain of the week was hardly about the actual murder, (which, props to Clive for solving this one by himself) but instead was merely a vehicle for getting Liv to spy on Vaughan DuClark. The victim, Eleanor Cash, was a research scientist who faked her drug trial results, leading to the ruin of some poor girl’s face. In disgrace, she changed her name and started working for DuClark, but the girl’s twin tracked her down and killed her.
It was fun to see Liv in full Rose McIver makeup, i.e. Liv attempting to look a little less dead when she goes “undercover” to snoop around at Max Rager. Thanks to the scientist brain she made a delectable soup out of, she was an ideal candidate to interview as Dr. Cash’s replacement. Of course, she gets caught and booted out of Max Rager, before she can even find the secret basement, which is still better than the incineration DuClark threatens her with when he catches her. I’m still not sure why she thought that trying her fingerprints on a scanner obviously not meant for them was a good idea. Come on Liv, you’re smarter than that, scientist brain or not!
From his introduction, DuClark has always been a very arch villain. Too bad he’s missing a mustache because he’d most definitely be twirling it. However, in this installment, he makes the leap from caricature to full-on monster. When testing Super Max on the zombie they’ve been keeping in said secret basement, DuClark pushes her too far and she breaks free. As he watches the gruesome result of his boyish hijinks play out, he finally realizes that this is no game. Earlier in the episode when he catches Rita’s black eye (given to her by Liv), he almost kills Major, thinking him responsible.
This fatherly instinct is nowhere to be seen, however, once his life is in danger. He ditches his daughter the second he realizes that she’s slowing him down, shuts her out of the elevator and locks himself in his office to have a much-needed drink. Rita doesn’t die though. We don’t see what happens, but it would appear she might have actually defeated the zombie with her stiletto! Despite surviving, she doesn’t get away unscathed and from the scratches all over her face, it’s safe to say that she’ll soon be playing for Team Z.
This week’s brain also enables Liv to help Ravi make necessary adjustments to the zombie cure, which Blaine is now in dire need of since his return to the living dead. Next up, actual death, so he has no choice but to play guinea pig. So why waste the cure on a guy who murdered homeless teenagers just last year? Well, first off, Ravi doesn’t yet know the long-term ramifications of taking it. Aside from that, there’s the fact that Blaine feeds Seattle’s zombies. Therefore, letting him die is tantamount to firing the starting gun on the apocalypse. Speaking of feasting on brains, Dale and Clive find one in Blaine’s missing dad’s freezer. They get it tested and not only discover that it’s human but finally find out that the lab results on the bovine brains were faked, meaning Suzuki had human gray matter in his freezer as well. Those two are finally starting to circle the truth, although they have no idea what they’re in for.
Meanwhile, after a few too many late or missed dates, Liv’s trust in Drake is wavering. She tracks him on his phone and learns of his association with Mr. Boss. Of course, what she can’t know is his association with the Seattle Police Department. As she’s waiting to confront him though, more plot threads converge. Angered by not getting a head’s up about his looming death, Blaine points Major in Drake’s direction. So, Liv thinks that the criminal she was naïve enough to fall for is simply ditching her, but really, her awesome undercover cop boyfriend is now the next zombie to end up in Major’s freezer.