The Shannara Chronicles - 'Safehold'

"San Francisco. I was born there."

Our heroes have reached Safehold, which turns out to be the underground areas of the former San Francisco. With the Golden Gate bridge just a couple of pylons and a memory, Amberle suggests they make like the Jam, which Wil is a complete wet blanket about (it might be flooded, there could be trolls, it's dark and the might be spiders, and what if I get bats in my perfect silken locks?) until he realises that the ancient roadsign above the tunnel entrance explicitly dubs it 'Safehold', or at least 'Saf Old', which is just less catchy all around.

"Geddit!"

Back in Arborlon, the death of Cephalo has freed up an over-40s speaking slot, allowing Councillor Sourface to bitch off at Ander for not letting her be queen. Knowing that a coup is in the offing, Ander sends Captain Twofer - whose actual name is Diana, it turns out - to secure his alliance with Slanter and the gnomes in order to establish his regal chops. Meanwhile, Allanon trains Bandon, who gets possessed/influenced by the Dagda Mor again, tries to kill various people and goes homicidal just in time to prevent his relationship with Catania going past PG-13.

Magic sepsis!

In the tunnels of Safehold, our heroes have to clamber along pipes above a cave full of sleeping trolls. Wil drops the Elfstones, but that's a mere distraction. The important thing is that Eretria loses her jacket, so that we can see her tattoo magically expand into a subway map to guide them to the Bloodfire.

The Bloodfire itself is guarded by a couple of freaky floating women who spin in circles and try to turn the questers against each other with their cunning psychological machinations (by which I mean ham-fisted schoolyard bullying.)

Duh-na-nana-na-nah. B-b-bad to the bone.

Councillor Sourface has Ander thrown in chokey and announces her glorious five year plan to... I don't even know. Anyway, Gnomes arrive and the coup is off, as everyone is impressed that Ander has secured alliance with their ancient foes.

Never mind Ander; I'm impressed Slanter has managed to persuade his people, rather than being thrown in an institution for Stockholm Syndrome sufferers when he suddenly turns up after a decade being all 'yeah, elves are okay, or at least better than demons.' Also, someone suggests that the numbers for the army of the free runs into the hundreds of thousands and I laughed so hard I nearly burst, because I'm not convinced that there are that many people in the entire Four Lands.

Make a little birdhouse from your soul.

In Safehold, Eretria gets cut and it turns out her blood unlocks the Bloodfire. Wil Elfstones the floaty chicks (are they demons then?) and Amberle stands in the fire. The flames go out, Amberle is gone and Eretria collapses. I'm actually almost sorry this wasn't the season finale.

As our epic quest along the west coast, through uncharted lands occupied mostly by people that our heroes know in some way draws to a close, and as the ultimate battle of good vs evil shapes up with literally dozens on each side, The Shannara Chronicles continues to be bedeviled by the same fundamental failings. It has no sense of scale, and very few of its characters really have room to be. Councillor Sourface literally had no lines prior to this episode. We never got to see Slanter persuading his people to trust him, let alone to trust Ander. Instead, our love triangle is arsing about, watching the last Star Trek clip and hanging from ceiling pipes.

Season 1 wraps up next week with 'Ellcrys'. I'd worry about what I'll snark at now, but Channel 5 is already promising me magical schools and humping spell books in 'The Magicians', so I imagine I'll get by.