OK, so, after a season (4) with only a few real bright spots, namely character-driven stand-alone episodes, Jonathan Nolan, creator and co-runner of Person of Interest, paid it back ... with interest ... THAT was excellent sci-fi
Loved seeing John get god mode
I was happy to see Dominic go, and sad to see Elias go, but that ending scene was KILLER
... and it paid off the debt of so many episodes with so little music -
EXCELLENT use of the Pink Floyd Song, excellent setting
I'm glad they stayed true to form and finished it out with their signature slow-mo with a good song in the foreground
I think the case is the ark, being as the episode is call YHWH (with maybe a very latent veiled reference to Jeremiah's hiding of the ark on the eve of the Babylonian invasion in, I believe, 1 Maccabees ... after all, one of the episodes this season was called "Prophets")
The case could also be the tomb, buried to rise again, in a phoenix sort of way.
But, back along the OT lines suggested by the episode title (YHWH), the theme of mobility is also there, which is a central theme in the book of Ezekiel, when E. sees the Cavod (glory/presence) that is supposed to be limited to the Ark in the temple in Jerusalem, but he sees it by the river Chebar in Babylon (the vision in chapter 1 ... E. was originally a priest in Jerusalem temple, taken to Bab in the deportation of 597, 10 yrs before the invasion and destruction of 587) - E.'s theme is that God is not limited to the temple, but is mobile and can go wherever his people are to aid them (represented visually by the wheel-within-a-wheel structure that can "go every way, without turning")
Lots of possibilities. From the side of concern in my Christian background, I think you can avoid "God is really only an evolution of human/machine." AI is always symbolic of something in humanity. Especially logic is traditionally viewed as part of being made in the imago Dei (I think that was technically redundant, but I didn't think most people would understand assimilating the Latin ablative into an English grammar flow). So, while the imagery is God, the symbolism is still in referent to human existence, and I think its advocating ideas that are actually heresy or anything like that. BUT, the possibility of exploring this theme of stripping the machine down to its core is really interesting. What will the machine look like if reborn? And the whole spin put on the mobility theme is interesting. Before the machine was mobile by being in the power grid - actually it was NOT mobile because it didn't have to move because it was everywhere, so I guess it had all the benefits of mobility without the limitations. Now it has actual mobility, which actually limits it.
For those who dislike seeing religious themes in sci-fi and literature in general, please realize it doesn't have to be a decisive conquest of "ah, you atheist assholes got owned by the Christians again!" (I'm Christian, but I get tired of the triumphalist attitude on both sides ... and ftr, I'm a rather conservative Christian, very in line with hierarchy and formal rites - I like Gregorian organ, and as loud as I like TransSiberian Orchestra and Kings X ... Kumbaya and John Denver don't really do anything for me). Dune used the Messiah theme, and Matrix borrowed it from Herbert; BSG reboot used the Resurrection and the Emmaus road encounter with Thrace/Starbuck; but I don't think you could demonstrate any of those three as distinctly Christian projects; I don't think even Tolkien was doing simple partisan allegory of the Bible, and he used the tropes A LOT more heavily (but you should be wondering why the religious themes work so well for literature).
I'm glad they stayed true to form and finished it out with their signature slow-mo with a good song in the foreground
I think the case is the ark, being as the episode is call YHWH (with maybe a very latent veiled reference to Jeremiah's hiding of the ark on the eve of the Babylonian invasion in, I believe, 1 Maccabees ... after all, one of the episodes this season was called "Prophets")
The case could also be the tomb, buried to rise again, in a phoenix sort of way.
But, back along the OT lines suggested by the episode title (YHWH), the theme of mobility is also there, which is a central theme in the book of Ezekiel, when E. sees the Cavod (glory/presence) that is supposed to be limited to the Ark in the temple in Jerusalem, but he sees it by the river Chebar in Babylon (the vision in chapter 1 ... E. was originally a priest in Jerusalem temple, taken to Bab in the deportation of 597, 10 yrs before the invasion and destruction of 587) - E.'s theme is that God is not limited to the temple, but is mobile and can go wherever his people are to aid them (represented visually by the wheel-within-a-wheel structure that can "go every way, without turning")
Lots of possibilities. From the side of concern in my Christian background, I think you can avoid "God is really only an evolution of human/machine." AI is always symbolic of something in humanity. Especially logic is traditionally viewed as part of being made in the imago Dei (I think that was technically redundant, but I didn't think most people would understand assimilating the Latin ablative into an English grammar flow). So, while the imagery is God, the symbolism is still in referent to human existence, and I think its advocating ideas that are actually heresy or anything like that. BUT, the possibility of exploring this theme of stripping the machine down to its core is really interesting. What will the machine look like if reborn? And the whole spin put on the mobility theme is interesting. Before the machine was mobile by being in the power grid - actually it was NOT mobile because it didn't have to move because it was everywhere, so I guess it had all the benefits of mobility without the limitations. Now it has actual mobility, which actually limits it.
For those who dislike seeing religious themes in sci-fi and literature in general, please realize it doesn't have to be a decisive conquest of "ah, you atheist assholes got owned by the Christians again!" (I'm Christian, but I get tired of the triumphalist attitude on both sides ... and ftr, I'm a rather conservative Christian, very in line with hierarchy and formal rites - I like Gregorian organ, and as loud as I like TransSiberian Orchestra and Kings X ... Kumbaya and John Denver don't really do anything for me). Dune used the Messiah theme, and Matrix borrowed it from Herbert; BSG reboot used the Resurrection and the Emmaus road encounter with Thrace/Starbuck; but I don't think you could demonstrate any of those three as distinctly Christian projects; I don't think even Tolkien was doing simple partisan allegory of the Bible, and he used the tropes A LOT more heavily (but you should be wondering why the religious themes work so well for literature).
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