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Random TV Ramblings

October 3rd, 2012

What Has Been Shocking And What Has Been Predictable With The New TV Season

Barney Is At It Again — What A Surprise

Every fall as the networks roll out new TV shows and bring back their old one’s the first few weeks of the new television season bring us some unexpected surprises and some totally predictable performances. Here are a few from the first week and a half of the 2012 Fall TV Season:

Predictable: We Still Don’t Know Who The Mother Is

HIMYM has been stringing us along forever and it isn’t likely to stop anytime soon. Was anyone honestly thinking they were going to pan up and show the future mother’s face (why don’t they by the way? You could still keep plodding along with your comically drawn out story and still give the fans a chance to see the person. Unless it is Robin or Victoria in which case you will have an angry mob on your hands).

Shocking: NBC Won Week 1

Sure, they won mostly because of The Voice and the juggernaut that is the NFL, but those ratings count. What has to make NBC feel better is the performance of Revolution. Thus far (and to say this is an early statement may be the biggest understatement of my life time) Revolution is the only bonafide hit of the new season. It is hanging on to the bulk of its The Voice lead in and is easily winning its time slot with the key demographic (if you are under 18 or over 50 you do not count apparently). What’s better for NBC is that the show actually seems to be finding itself. I was worried after the first episode (see my review here) but I think it has gotten better with each of its now three episodes. Add to all of this the reasonably decent performance of Go On and The New Normal and NBC may actually start to look like a real network again, not simply a punchline.

note: all of this seems great but we can’t discount how much of the week 1 victory was due to The Voice. The problem with that is that The Voice has now finished its audition phase and is moving to the unwatchable “battle rounds”. NBC has added a twist (something about stealing team members) but in each of the first two seasons of the show the ratings begin declining the minute the chairs stop spinning.

Predictable: ABC Still Can’t Find Anything To Go Before Grey’s Anatomy

Who Could Have Guessed That A Submarine Drama Wouldn’t Play Well With The Doctors of Seattle Grace?

Last year they tried Charlie’s Angels (am I the only one who wishes they had kept the angels on the air? It was so horrible, in every way, that my wife and I would be laughing throughout. It had to be one of the most “unaware of how awful they were” shows in the history of television) which lasted four episodes. Then, in the spring they brought us a movie star looking for her son (Missing) which they ended up airing all of the episodes and calling it a miniseries in a vain attempt to garner some Emmys (almost worked too, they were actually nominated for a couple) in spite of rating that nearly mirrored Charlie’s Angels. Now comes Last Resort and the outcome is nearly identical again. They should just move Private Practice into this slot and make it their Sandra Rhimes night.

It is too bad about Last Resort because the pilot was quite entertaining (in fact it named best pilot by a number of TV critics). Much like Revolution‘s pilot it is hard to see how they will make a series (although, as I said, Revolution may be figuring it out) but the first hour was terrific. Now it appears like it will join Lone Star as the critical favorite pilot that somehow became one of the first shows canceled.

Shocking: How Many People Are Leaving Partners And Still Coming Back For 2 Broke Girls

Partners was on every critics short list of worst pilots, so it’s failure shouldn’t be that surprising, but how it is failing is pretty impressive. 8 million people watched How I Met Your Mother, then nearly half turned off the TV, changed channels or read a book only to come back en force a half hour later to watch 2 Broke Girls. Rules of Engagement has survived for years by simply being barely good enough to have lazy people not change the channel. Partners makes the lazy stand up and say no.

Predictable: CBS Knows How To Make CBS Shows

Hey, It’s Just Like The Mentalist

I don’t remember the last network (maybe NBC with sitcoms in the 80’s and 90’s) that was as adept at making a specific kind of a show as CBS is at making procedural crime dramas. Even when you think the show may not entirely be that, like in the case of Vegas or to a lesser degree Elementary, that is exactly what they make. They all appeared to be filmed the same way, with similarly high quality production, they all hit the same story beats, they all have deeper back stories that they never let get too much in the way of the weekly who done it, and they are all entertaining. Was I hoping for something a little different from Vegas? Sure, but I probably shouldn’t have been. CBS has been ruling the roost of the networks for years by following this formula, they would be idiots to stop now.

Here are a few other things that are shocking/predictable:

Predictable: That Callie and Arizona were never just going to be in a happy healthy relationship on Grey’s Anatomy

Predictable: That Carrie would be brought back to the CIA too soon

Shocking: That The X Factor would do worse after adding Britt and Selena

Shocking: That Dexter may be interesting again

Predictable: That Boardwalk Empire still isn’t that interesting, even if we want it to be

Predictable: That Modern Family and The Big Bang Theory are still a funny way to kill a half hour, but neither are as funny as they used to be.

Predictable: That the talk show was not the problem with Up All Night

Shocking: That anyone actually cares about Jim and Pam anymore

Shocking: That Parks & Recreation isn’t a bigger hit

Predictable: That a TV show starring a british actress playing a “Jersey Girl” who is also a lawyer became the worst premiere in recent history of CBS

Shocking: That even with the lead-in of Once Upon A Time and Revenge 666 Park Avenue still tanked … OK, just kidding, that wasn’t the least bit shocking.

Predictable: That a show called The Mob Doctor isn’t doing well

And finally, the most predictable thing of all is that the networks still can’t create a TV drama that is half as good as the best of cable TV.

But hey, what do I know? I’m fat.

September 17, 2012

Can Revolution Succeed Where So Many Other’s Have Failed

If you watched the olympics or the first two weeks of the NFL season or if you have been checking out The Voice while it is interesting (because once the chairs stop spinning the show becomes unwatchable) you can’t help but have seen clips of NBC’s new post apocalyptic action/adventure series. NBC has done its level best to make sure the world is aware that JJ Abrams and Jon Favreau have helped bring a “big” show to their network. They have worked really hard to edit their videos to make the show remind you of Katniss Everdeen and her Hunger Games. In short NBC has worked really hard, I’m just not entirely certain that what they worked so hard for was worth all of their effort.

Revolution may premiere tonight at 10 (or 9 depending on where you live) but the episode has been available on On Demand for the last few weeks. It’s not great, but it isn’t dreadful either. The set-up is straight out of science-fiction 101, simple enough to get on its face (the power has gone out, everywhere) but with enough complexity that you can build a mythology out of it (why did it go out and why can’t anyone get it back). The story is even more standard fare. In fact this show is Star Wars, with Tracy Spiridakos playing Luke Skywalker and Billy Burke playing both Han Solo and Obi Wan. As with Star Wars the main character is whiney and earnest and is painfully close to becoming unbearable until in this case she is off set by the more cavalier attitude of her uncle. Sadly, that counter balancing doesn’t occur until 3/4’s of the way through the first episode. I think the people who made Revolution may have recognized how problematic the main character was starting to become because one of the last things her uncle says to her is “if I’m going to come with you you are going to have to turn it down” (like I said, counter balancing).

As JJ Abrams premiere episodes go this is much more like Alias or Fringe than Lost (he does love the one name titles, doesn’t he?). After the premiere of Lost you were left with nothing but questions and no idea where the show was going to go, but you knew you wanted to stick around for the ride (the Lost premiere is one of the top 5 TV premieres of all time so it would be silly to hold Revolution to that standard). With Alias and Fringe the set-up was more obvious and immediately digestible, the only question was how much of the show was going to be about the bigger story and how much was bound to be week to week mysteries/assignments/what-have-you. Revolution doesn’t quite have the procedural component of Alias or Fringe, but Alias and Fringe gave up on the procedural thing pretty quickly. The question with Revolution is how long can a quest take. In that regard it is quite similar to last seasons Missing (not the greatest sign in the world).

Conclusion

As with a lot of high-concept premieres you finish watching the first episode of Revolution and wonder, “how can they make this a series?” Sometimes they can (Walking Dead) and a lot of times they can’t (Terra Nova). For the people running Revolution the worry must be can they make it good enough fast enough to keep everyone on board. Without the benefit of an obvious procedural element it will be hard to loose people and get them back (viewers will think it is too much work to catch up), so Revolution has to be really good really quickly.

The new NBC post apocalyptic action/adventure series premiers on September 17th at 10 pm EST

September 13, 2007

SNL Finally Does The Right Thing

When President Obama became the front runner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008 there were a lot of people excited about an african-american being front and center in a national campaign for the highest office in our country. The people I am referring to of course are male african-american sketch comedians. Too long had their white counter parts been blessed with the relatively easy comedic fodder provided by presidents and presidential election. Female sketch comedians were excited to, what with Palin and Clinton and all of the fodder they provided. The only problem was the most famous and visible sketch comedy troupe in the world, the cast of Saturday Night Live, didn’t have an african-american member who could pull off the impersonation (sorry Kennan Thompson, you body type was just too different). So, in the Spring of 2008 they tapped their ethnic chameleon Fred Armisen to play the presumptive nominee in a role that everyone had to have assumed was merely a stop gap until they find the right person to make the role their own. We all assumed wrong.

Lorne Michaels and the rest of the big wigs over at SNL must have been enjoying Armisen’s Obama, and the viewers have therefore been subjected to four years of mild discomfort. It was almost as if every time they did an Obama sketch you could hear faintly from around the country african-american’s yelling “come on! we finally have a black president and you have a white guy playing him!” Even odder was that they were sticking with a “white guy” who hadn’t provided any memorable Obama sketches or moments over the last four years (not Armisen’s fault really, hasn’t it felt like the writers have had no idea what to do with Obama?) and they have had an african-american comedian as part of the cast for the last two years who does an Obama impression.

Finally, the discomfort is over as SNL announced today that Jay Pharoah, the afore mentioned african-american cast member who does a really good Obama impression, will indeed take over the role of the President this fall. With the debates and election coverage looming SNL has a chance to really create an Obama character that is funny if they can just find the right person to do Romney.

September 7, 2012

Fall TV Preview – The Way I’ll Watch The New Season

The Most Important Show Of The Fall

Just as spring is the time for everybody, and I mean everybody, to do a summer movie preview write-up, even if that is the only movie write-up they do all year, so is September the time for anyone that has ever written anything about TV to do a fall preview piece. They come in all different shapes an sizes, most focussing on the new shows more than the old, and are designed to assist in building your viewing schedule. I am not going to try to help with your viewing schedule. All I’m going to do is show you mine.

Monday 8pm

The nice thing about The Voice premiering earlier than most of the fall shows is that I can get my audition fix out of the way before the scripted shows nudge The Voice out of my rotation. The audition/spinning chair phase of The Voice is the only watchable part of that show anyway.

The Reviews Have Not Been Kind

I will DVR Bones and How I Met Your Mother to watch later on that night when I can skip commercials and bail out on any given episode if it just isn’t doing it for me. The bailing out admittedly happens more with HIMYM than with Bones, a show that at this point simply is what it is (you either enjoy Booth, Brennan and the gang or you don’t). I am not one who feels HIMYIM has gone entirely off the rails the way some do, but there is no debating it is not as consistently funny as it was in its first couple of seasons. I watch it now not because I care who the mother actually is, I watch it on the off chance Robin Sparkles or The Slap Bet will come back into play.

I’ll give Partners a watch or two because I like David Krumholtz and when I am tired I’ll watch even the most dreadful sitcoms. The reviews have made it sound unwatchable, so maybe I’ll only watch one episode.

Dancing With The Stars, like Survivor, has just felt too repetitive to me so I just don’t bother any more. And I didn’t watch the original 90210 so I am certainly not going to watch The CW’s incarnation.

Monday 9pm

Frankly there is nothing airing here that I will watch regularly. This hour will be spent catching up on Bones, HIMYM and whatever else is on my DVR or putting my so to bed (or during the fall Monday Night Football). Sorry Gossip Girl, Dancing With The Stars, The Voice, The Mob Doctor, Mike & Molly and 2 Broke Girls.

Monday 10pm

This is an hour where my wife and I have to do a little coordinated watching. My wife like Grimm, I can watch it but I don’t feel like I’ve missed something when I miss it. We both like Castle (see blooper below) and we are both curious about Revolution (Hawaii 5-0 is fine but gets nudged aside by the three shows that are, to us, a little more fine). My wife will likely go upstairs to watch Grimm in our bedroom while I DVR Revolution and Castle (we can’t DVR two shows and watch a third at the same time on our system). I will say that, like Terra Nova last year, Revolution has a real chance of flaming out quickly. If it does than our viewing is radically simplified.

Tuesday 8pm

Like Monday’s at 9pm there is nothing here that I will watch regularly. Fox’s sitcoms, the new Ben & Kate and the sometimes funny Raising Hope, will suck me in on occasion. The Voice when they are still auditioning will get my wife and I to watch in the background as we clean up after dinner (she likes Adam Levine). I’ve never watched a second of Heart of Dixie and I doubt I will start now and I watch NCIS on USA Network when there is nothing else on, not when it actually airs. Oh, and the there is more Dancing (see my remarks above). All extremely missable stuff.

Unnecessary Rant: In fact, hours like this are the hours that make me realize I watch too much TV. They are the hours that make me realize I am addicted to TV. That is the only possible explanation for ever seeing any of these shows. I see them only because I can’t turn off the TV. I need to turn off the TV. I’m not going to turn it off, but I really should.

Tuesday 9pm

Pick your quirky/sassy sitcom pairings. Do you like ditzy/sassy? Then check out The New Girl and The Mindy Project on Fox. Do you like a little more mean spirited sassy, then check out Happy Endings and The B in Apartment 23 on ABS. I like the mean spirited more, so I’ll be watching on ABC (Happy Endings may have been my favorite network sitcom last season, check out the clip below). Maybe I will DVR the occasional The New Girl episode if my wife wants to watch it, but I think she kind of checked out somewhere in the middle of last season so I doubt she will feel the need to watch it later. More likely, just because of our love of Matthew Perry, we will DVR Go On, the former Friends star grief sitcom. The pilot had a moment here and there, but not sure if it is good enough to ever get me excited to watch.

I live in Utah so I’ll never have a chance to watch The New Normal, which is fine because it is getting terrible reviews anyway and I feel the exact same way about NCIS: LA as I do about NCIS.

Tuesday 10pm

I’ll be watching Vegas, the new Denis Quaid TV show about 1960’s sin city, while my wife is upstairs watching Private Practice (way too soap opera for me). Sons of Anarchy also comes on Tuesday’s but usually later on my cable system so I will watch it after Vegas when I feel the need to get my biker gang fix. I don’t even know or care what else comes on here.

Wednesday 8pm

I Know It Is Going To Be Bad But I Can’t Look Away

I’ve already shared my feeling about Survivor. X-Factor may get me to watch and episode (or part of one) just to see crazy Brit (does anyone call her that?). The Middle is one of those sitcoms that seems to be hanging on just because there has never been anything else on and The Neighbors looks painful. Not as painful as the pilot of Animal Practice mind you and Guys With Kids must have been green-lit before the unmitigated failure of What To Expect When You’re Expecting proved no one wants to watch guys complain about being parents. The only thing that comes on that I am genuinely interested in is CW’s Arrow, the Green Arrow TV show that is sure to be dreadful but that I have to watch at least an episode or two before I can dismiss it entirely.

Wednesday 9pm

My wife LOVES Supernatural, so it will be on the DVR. We also like Modern Family and Suburgatory (maybe even Suburgatory more than Modern Family) so we’ll DVR those as well. Here is our problem, we also like Criminal Minds (I am a sucker for a serial killer story). Maybe my wife will just watch Supernatural upstairs while I DVR Criminal Minds and the ABC sitcoms. As for L&O: SVU, it used to be better and the reruns are always available, so why bother with the new episodes.

Wednesday 10pm

Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s are just not filled with great TV. Wednesday at 10pm is a prime example of that. Old and tired CSI, Nashville (isn’t this the exact same plot as Country Strong except I doubt Connie Britton is going to die at the end of the pilot like Gwyneth did) and Chicago Fire, a TV show overtly made for gay men and house wives so they can stare at really good looking, sweaty fireman run in and out of burning buildings. I’ll be watching movies (after all, I am The Fat Film Guy not The Fat TV Guy).

Thursday 8pm

The Big Bang Theory is always worth recording, even if you don’t watch it that night. What may be worth watching is Last Resort, the new submarine drama. People who have seen the pilot have been raving, although many have been curious how they might be able to sustain the drama week after week.

The rest of the hour is filled with stuff other people like. Vampire Diaries, Two and a Half Men, X-Factor, 30 Rock and Up All Night all have fan bases, I just don’t happen to be a part of them.

Thursday 9pm

Look How Happy We All Were Way Back When

All I ever hear his how terrific Parks & Recreation is but I have never invested in it. For me this hour is about two drams, one that has grown on me and one that I am stuck with. The drama that has been growing on me is Person of Interest — it can take itself too seriously at times but it does a nice job of mixing mythology with weekly mysteries and I kind of have a thing for Taraji P. Henson. Grey’s Anatomy I am just stuck with at this point. I don’t hate it, but I can’t say that I love it anymore either (and Lexi was my favorite character so it hurt when they killed her off) and the dumb things the characters seem to do in order to insight drama make me wonder how I am supposed to think of any of them as smart or talented people. But I’ll still watch it every week.

I haven’t watched The Office since season 2 or 3, Glee was always a “well, there’s nothing else on” kind of a show and the CW is making a Beauty and the Beast where the beast isn’t ugly, I think I can skip that.

Thursday 10pm

Scandal had moments last season so I’ll probably check it out again this year. Having said that I am really scared it is going to move much more toward the soap opera nonsense that is Private Practice and I don’t know if I can take that.

OK, So Elementary Wont Be This Good

I am excited (maybe interested is a better word) about Elementary. Will it be as good as BBC’s Sherlock? Not even close (by the way, if you haven’t seen Sherlock go watch it on Netflix. The first season is only 4 episodes I think and they are all terrific). But it should be like the first season or two of The Mentalist, which isn’t an all together bad thing.

On a different note, is Rock Center the biggest white flag in the history of TV? NBC is just giving up Thursday, a night it owned forever. I don’t know if sad is the right word, but it is something.

Friday (all night)

I will be mostly skipping it all. I know Community is supposed to be great, but like Parks & Recreation I have never gotten into it. I may watch the occasional Blue Bloods and my wife will sometimes watch Nikita, but neither with any frequency. For me this is a movie night, either at the theater or on VOD.

For the sake of being comprehensive, the other shows on Friday are Fringe (you need to have been watching to really get what is happening), Whitney, Last Man Standing, CSI: NY, and news magazines (does it really matter which one’s?).

Saturday (all night)

Movies, movies, movies. If I watch any TV it will be to catch up on DVR stuff so I can keep the system from getting too full.

Sunday 8pm

Another “watch one tape the other” here in the film guy household. Whether we watch The Amazing Race and save Once Upon A Time for later or vice versa will be a factor of where we have Sunday dinner (if it is at the in-laws we’ll watch The Amazing Race with them).

The Fox comedies get left behind, which is OK since they will be on TBS 20 years from now. As for NBC, well, who am I kidding, from September through December I will only see The Amazing Race and Once Upon a Time on the DVR because Sunday is all about football.

Sunday 9pm

I’m still watching football and I think my wife will be watching The Good Wife or Revenge (she kind of enjoys both of them). On replays I may give the new season of Dexter and maybe Boardwalk Empire a chance, but not much of one (they have each lost me over the last couple of seasons). And while I know for many Sunday means The Walking Dead I have yet to get into that one and like I said, Sunday’s are for football.

Sunday 10pm

Homeland!! What a nice cap to a day of watching the gridiron, I get to watch Damian Lewis play a “maybe” terrorist and see a crazy Claire Danes chase him. Awesome.

I may DVR The Mentalist because it is still fun to watch. It is kind of like House was in the latter years, the running back stories are silly and the cases are repetitive but I still find myself laughing a few times every hour.

Treme is boring (sorry David Simon, I still love The Wire) and 666 Park Avenue (see, 666 is the sign of the devil) looks like a hate watch kind of a show.

Conclusion

There you have it. My week. I’ve got to say, other than Sunday Night Football and Homeland I think I can miss everything and not feel too bad. Maybe I should give up TV. I won’t, of course, but maybe I should.

But hey, what do I know? I’m fat.

September 5, 2012

How Are MTV’s Video Music Awards Still Around?

Forget the VMA’s, MTV should give out the RMA’s

Generally when I put something up I have thought it through at least a little. But, when I saw that the VMA’s are airing tonight I had to write down my thoughts immediately and therefore by definition entirely off the top of my head. I had to write because I cannot figure out what the awards could be for anymore. Honestly, does MTV EVER show videos? That was a joke 20 years ago, but 20 years ago they still showed the occasional video in between Real World replays. Now, honestly they don’t air music videos. FUSE still shows videos (are they sister companies?), but MTV doesn’t. And since they don’t show videos how are they giving out awards for said videos? It makes no sense! Shouldn’t MTV give out RSA’s (Reality Show Awards)? Snooki or J-Wow, Real World versus Road Rules, the Jersey shore versus wherever the last Challenge was as best location.

MTV do yourself a favor, either start actually showing some kind of music related programming or start to give out awards that reflect what shows up on your channel.

August 27, 2012

True Blood Season 5 – The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

True Blood finished off season 5 last night with what might have been their best season finale to date ***SPOILER Bill dying then rising from his own blood as Lilith’s chosen one SPOILER*** capping off a solid second half of a season that truthfully did not start well. Now seems like the perfect time to look back at all that was right, all that was wrong and all that needs to change before season 6 rolls around.

The Good

Eric finally being Eric again … Bill turning crazy/evil … Bill and Sookie NOT being together … Tara as a vampire … Sam shifting into a fly, flying into a vampire’s mouth then shifting back into a person inside the vampire … the entire finale … Pam … Russell … Steve Newlin is still alive … faeries are crazy … Lafayette is amoral again (and not perpetually sad) … Salome is dead … the Authority is no more … Andy has six faerie children … Sam Trammell playing Luna being Sam … vampire hate group (“hate groups are about more than just hate”) … Edgington/Newlin love connection … Andy and Jason trying to solve cases together (I will always contend that an Andy & Jason buddy cop spin-off would work) … Lilith …

The Bad

The slow moving Lilith story line … Scott Foley (normally he’s great, but he just did not work here) … Christopher Meloni (dido) … the smoke monster and war crimes … vampire politics … vampire religion … werewolf politics … werewolf religion … depressed Jason … Hoyt moping … Lafayette being possessed, again … Jessica (and I never thought I would say that) … Eric’s sister … too many stories no one cared about … too much Arlene … “V” addicted werewolves (we’ve seen it already) …  

The Ugly

The problem True Blood is having is that they have expanded the roles of too many characters. Andy, Arlene, Terry, Hoyt, Alcede, Sam, even Pam and Jessica and Lafayette, they all better served the show when their roles were smaller and decidedly supporting. They better served the show not because they aren’t good, but because now the show has to go in too many directions simultaneously. The season finale alone had to wrap up five major story lines, and the season had all ready told another three. Heck, not even Game of Thrones is juggling that kind story telling. Look, I hated the Sookie/Bill relationship in the end as much as anybody, but bring the focus back to the core of the story, Sookie Stackhouse and how she is dealing with all the vampire crazy that keeps happening all around her. That doesn’t mean her and Bill or even Sookie and Eric, it just means that their needs to be a central focus, a central story that we can really get invested in and that the investment will be paid back to us every week.

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August 23, 2012

The Newsroom – The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

As The Aaron Sorkin Drama Comes To A Close It’s Time To Take A Look At What Has Made The Freshman Drama Fun, Frustrating and Downright Maddening

Some people hate it, some people love it, The Newsroom has become Exhibit A for Sorkin at his best and at his worst. Truthfully, from week to week I am not sure if I am watching because I think it is really good or if I am “hate watching” it (a Louis CK term that I love, ironically). With the finale airing this Sunday it seems like a good time to take a look that all that was right and all that was wrong with probably the most Sorkin-y of all dramas.

The Good

There hasn’t been a single episode where there wasn’t something that I really enjoyed. Here are some random “goods”… Jeff Daniels has been making Sorkin’s dialogue sing … “What does God sound like? How is that not the first question?” … Sam Waterston in anti Law & Order mode … David Krumholtz can still play smart better than almost anyone … Dev Patel believes in Bigfoot … Thomas Sadoski is one of the most likable assholes on TV today … Olivia Munn isn’t unwatchable.

The Bad

We get it, you hate the Tea Party … Simply saying your lead character is a Republican does not make you seem unbiased … I doubt Ted Turner is scared of the Koch brothers and I can’t figure out why his ex-wife would be … extremely opinionated news is successful all over cable TV, why is News Night so different.

note: as anyone who knows me will attest I politically line up with most of what Sorkin is slinging on The Newsroom so it is not the POV that I have a problem with. What doesn’t work is the slavish way Sorkin keeps telling us that they are not being biased, that they are not being one sided. It is the same thing that drives me nuts about Fox News or Glenn Beck. Own it! You are being politically biased, you are not presenting both sides of the issues equally. It is OK, you aren’t fooling anyone anyway.

The Ugly

Sorkin has issues with women (at least as a writer). EVERY woman is ditzy and narcissistic and insecure about their relationships with men. You might be able to get away with Allison Pill’s Maggie going back to her boyfriend who treats her like a child if Emily Mortimer’s McKenzie wasn’t so needy toward her ex, Will. Even the woman who is in the position of most power, Jane Fonda, is spineless and weak when faced with outside pressures. The lowest point was probably this past week when Olivia Munn’s character, who is supposed to be extremely educated and self confident, freaks out when someone suggests her butt might be big. Sorkin hasn’t written a really good female character since CJ on The West Wing, here’s hoping he can turn that trend around in season 2 of The Newsroom.

The Newsroom isn’t the best show on TV, but maybe it could be (watch the clip below and then you’ll get that).

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July 27, 2012

Might A&E’s Longmire Actually Be Good?

If Last Sunday’s Episode Was Any Indication The Answer Is Yes

I watch a handful of different kinds of TV shows. I am not talking about comedies or dramas or reality, I am talking about DVR shows and shows I can watch anytime when I am flipping through the channels. That is really the way we all watch isn’t it? Different shows fill different needs. When it comes to scripted shows the one’s I watch fall into three categories; shows I obsess over, shows I DVR and enjoy but never think of as great and shows I know I should watch more but I always seem to forget to watch them. Technically I suppose I should have added a fourth category of sitcoms I’ll watch to kill time before primetime starts (The Big Bang Theory on TBS currently, though everything from Friends to Seinfeld to Cheers to Taxi has held that distinction at one time or another), but really that’s it. Longmire on A&E was firmly in the DVR and watch but never think it is truly great category (like most of the dramas on USA or TNT or A&E), a nice summer diversion that can eat up time on Sunday nights before True Blood and Newsroom come on HBO or more often something I can save to watch when there is nothing on on a Wednesday night. I never, in a million years, would have thought it could ever be something more than that, and I am no saying it is yet, but it sure feels like a show that is figuring itself out.

For those of you who haven’t heard of or seen Longmire the show sounds like just another cop show. Walt Longmire is the sheriff of a county in Wyoming and while you might think that would be a slow an easy life plenty of crime seems to happen there (often of the strange variety) and each week Walt has his hands full trying to figure out who done it. Like I said, sounds like a straightforward cop procedural, and like all procedurals it has a few running story lines that advance slowly underneath the weekly mystery. So why am I spending time writing about something that sounds like TNT cop drama? Because it has two things that if it can tap into a little bit better can make this show really good, and the did both last week.

First, the location can allow for believably odd stories. Last week it was about a cult leader. They didn’t go overboard, they didn’t make him David Karesh, they made him small time, with runaway girls living on a ranch his dad used to own. It was subtle and creepy and the twists worked. Wyoming can provide stories like that in a way a city simply never can. People not only can be isolated, they are isolated, sometimes by miles and miles. Isolation and distance are two story elements that few “cop” shows have at their disposal, Longmire does and while it may not sound like much if they use those elements well it could be really interesting.

One Of The 10 Best Films Of The 1990’s

Second they have what Lone Star had. In 1996 John Sayles brought us Lone Star, a mystery that unfolded in a way that we were able to see how a cultural convergence has impacted south Texas (by the way, if you haven’t seen Lone Star do yourself a favor and rent it tonight, it is one of the 10 best films of the 90’s). In south Texas we had the two you know about (the white people and the people from Mexico) and the third that wasn’t as obvious, African Americans who came to south Texas as part of the Army, who have several bases in that part of the country. The three cultures at once coexist and yet are forever separate and as the murder mystery in Lone Star slowly unwinds both of those truths become more and more evident. Longmire has that same dynamic. In this case it is the white people, the Native Americans and the oil companies. That is such a deeper and more interesting dynamic to mine (pardon the alliteration) than LAPD bureaucracy or the Irish Mob in south Boston or pick your underlying conflict in your favorite cop show if for no other reason than we haven’t seen it before.

Of course they can’t go overboard with the clashing cultures thing or beat us over the head with it week after week. That is why, again, this last week was so good. They touched on the idea of the locals not trusting the oil companies because they are outsiders all the while not recognizing how the “locals” are viewed similarly by the Native Americans who see much of the land as stolen and yet all of those feeling remain under the surface, not quite hidden but not out in the open either.

Is Longmire a great TV show? No, not yet. It still has issues with the supporting cast (Katee Sackhoff has had some great moments, as has Lou Diamond Philips, but they still haven’t quite figured out how to use them consistently and many of the other characters who should be important seem massively under used) and the unknown Robert Taylor has been getting better and better as Longmire but has still not gotten the lead to where he needs to be, but it is always fun to see a show that seems to be figuring itself out, that seems to be moving not just in the right direction, but in the best possible direction. Will it get there? Frankly I doubt it, but I for one am going to keep watching just in case it does.

But hey, what do I know, I’m fat and I write about movies, not TV.

July 9, 2012

4 Things True Blood Needs To Do

What Happened To The Stupid Show I fell In Like With?

When I wrote in June about being the last person to watch and enjoy True Blood I, like every True Blood fan (and yes, I was far from the last one), made a lot of concessions to what True Blood was and wasn’t. True Blood was silly fun, like a Roger Corman movie with a higher budget. True Blood wasn’t thought provoking or sly social commentary masked as pulp TV. My love for True Blood stemmed from embracing the silly and feeling like the writers and actors were doing the same. After watching last nights episode, and thinking back on season 5 so far, I must admit it is becoming harder and harder to find the kind of silly fun that was once the show. One almost feels like the actors, the writers, the directors and everyone else involved in True Blood collectively decided that they needed to go deeper and in different directions, they needed to stop being goofy and start to make these characters “real” and “relatable”, they needed to show the critics that this show was more than just a silly romp through the deep south with monsters. True Blood is making a huge mistake. Fortunately they haven’t gone past the point of no return yet. The seeds of what we once loved is still there, they just need to start doing a few things to get us all back to where we want to be. Here are the 4 things they need to do:

1. Bring Back Cold, Heartless, Super Cool Vampires

None of the vampires have any fun anymore

Remember how awesome Eric was in season 1 and 2 when he just didn’t give a damn about anyone or anything? Remember how fun it was to watch other vampires roll their eyes at Bill for caring about people? Now all of the vampires (with the possible exception of Russell Egington) are serious and troubled and none of them seem to be doing what was so much a part of the show at its start, none of the vampires seem to be enjoying being a vampire. Honestly, if being a vampire doesn’t play to our basest desires and we don’t see most vampires happily acting on those desires then what’s the point? Now being a vampire sucks. Even when Jessica was trying to sell Tara on it last night it didn’t ring true because we haven’t seen a vampire having fun in 2 years.

2. Stop Giving Us So Many Long-Arc Story-lines

One “big bad” is enough. Every character doesn’t need their own.

Fine, you have to have one “big bad” story that carries through the entire season, but do you really need to have different season long stories for each character. Terry is chasing a fire monster, Bill and Eric are dealing with The Authority, Sookie is being dragged into the vampire drama, Tara is now a vampire, Jason is going to try to find out who killed his parents and so on and so on. Sorry True Blood, you are not Game of Thrones. One big story and a lot of short stories that last an episode or two (at the most) and be done. We don’t need to be worried about Terry and Scott Foley or Andy and the fairies or who’s killing shifters or whatever is happening to Lafayette all at the same time.

3. Kill Some People For Good

Would anyone miss Hoyt? Really?

I’m not saying I mind that they turned Tara into a vampire (although I want to see Tara become happy about it and embrace it, see point 1) but can’t we kill off Sam already (if you watched last night you know that might have finally happened)? Honestly, instead of adding and growing new characters they should implement a self imposed rule that anytime they add someone they need to kill someone (and someone significant). Sam, Tara, Hoyt, we could so easily loose all three and end up with a better show (Hoyt in particular, what are they doing with him? He dies and Jessica and Jason go on a killing spree to exact revenge, how is that not good TV?). Hell, couldn’t we off Sookie or Bill?

4. What Happened To All The Nudity

Remember what got you here. It was not your winning personalities

Let’s be honest, seeing the attractive stars of True Blood naked was and is a big draw, but it seems like most of them don’t want to be naked anymore. I get that Anna Paquin has done more than her fair share of nudity on the show and may want to cut back and I am not saying that Jessica or Pam or Tara should suddenly have to get naked, but then you better find some other people to take up the slack. Game of Thrones should not have more skin than True Blood. I’m not saying you have to compete with Spartacus, but sex is a part of what made the show, and I mean HBO sex not FX sex (which is all we seem to get).

Do these four things and the show gets back to what made it so fun. The critics will still hate it, but the fans that made it popular will stick around and be re-energized.

But hey, what do I know, I’m fat and I my blog is about movies.

June 8, 2012

Should I Be Embarrassed I Still Love True Blood?

Come On, You Know You Still Watch It Too

I was listening to one of my favorite weekly podcasts yesterday, the Firewall&Iceberg Podcast, when I was shocked to find out that I was supposed to hate True Blood. Apparently it is stupid and juvenile and doesn’t offer real character development or progression and any kitsch factor that it might have had when it started has been worn out through its perpetual silliness (I am paraphrasing of course). This was particularly distressing since I just git HBO again in time for the True Blood season premiere this Sunday*. If only I had known a day or two sooner I could have saved myself a few bucks each month. It all leaves me wondering what other crappy things I enjoy do I need to give up (let’s face it, anyone who has been a fan of True Blood has always known it was crap, that was one of the reasons we loved it). WWE? The Jackass movies? The Underworld and Resident Evil franchises? Every summer cable show with the exception of Louis CK? Is my only other choice to become a closeted True Blood fan? I’ll watch it, laugh at Jason Stackhouse and Pam and Eric and Lafayette and Andy, roll my eyes at most of the rest of the cast and continue to pray that they keep Bill and Sookie apart as much as possible, and most importantly I will keep my viewing secret. I guess, since I am already paying for HBO, that is the way I will go.

*a little HBO advice, I always re-up on HBO at this time because I can catch all of Game of Thrones on On Demand and get True Blood. Then come August when shows like Hung become their Sunday night staple I just drop them, wait 9 months and do it all over again.

May 16, 2012

What’s Left For House To Do

We’ve missed the real you

Anyone who watched last Monday’s penultimate episode of House could recognize the two undeniable facts about the series. First, that everyone involved can’t wait for it to be over. The actors feel like they are sleep walking through their parts and the writers are clearly like runners at the end of a marathon, they just want to raise their arms as they cross the finish line. The medical mysteries can barely hold the characters attention let alone the viewers and the “House is doing something bad” story lines have gone from funny to stupid (that was something House was never meant to be, stupid). The second problem is something that has been escalating for about 4 seasons and has now reached a nearly unwatchable level – House dealing with consequences.

The genius of the Seinfeld “show about nothing” idea was that the characters never changed and the consequences they had to deal with for poor actions were always brief and in that universe believable. I always got the feeling with House that one of the producers read an article some years ago where a critic pointed out that a drug addicted doctor might loose his job and the fact that House doesn’t makes the show feel less than authentic. So they made the writers begin to build the consequences story lines. We had the cop that was going to have him arrested for his drug use , House got out of it. We had House hallucinating so he went to rehab for a month and then immediately came back to work and was back on drugs before the end of the next season with little or no real consequence. We had him break-up with Cuddy and proceed to drive a car through her front window. He went to jail for that, briefly, but still got his job back and his team back and his drugs back and his friends back (except Cuddy, but she left the show). Now, as we near the end, House is still the same person, living roughly the same life and as viewers we are left to look back on it all and cry BULL SHIT! 

It doesn’t matter how good you are, no one who has done what House has done gets the same job back for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is a Hospital could NEVER insure you. What’s worse, like a bad movie franchise that feels compelled to keep topping itself, the writers have made the actions more and more extreme (like I said, now they are often stupid which violates the core of the character). In this last episode House not only causes literally millions of dollars of damage to the hospital (tens of million really) he also chokes a patient and is only stopped when someone uses his own cane to knock him out. Really! And the comeuppance for this criminal behavior? Well, he may have to go back to jail for six months for the vandalism and apparently no one cares about the attempted murder of a patient. Ridiculous.

It is too bad we couldn’t take a time machine back and stop whoever had the idea of trying to change House. This should have been a procedural medical mystery show. Sherlock Holmes in a hospital. A functioning drug addict who is a jerk to everyone and his best friend the oncologist solving mysteries to the end. Nothing more, nothing less. So, I would bid you a fond farewell House, but the truth is you left us four years ago.

Is Game Of Thrones Good Enough To Make Me Subscribe To HBO?

Last summer my wife and I decided our cable bill was too high. With Netflix and Hulu and STARZ and ENCORE for free, we felt like the $10 or $20 bucks we were spending on HBO and SHOWTIME just wasn’t worth it (of course this was all before I launched the site, so that alone may force me to re-think the entire thing). So, we agreed that, as soon as TRUE BLOOD was over (one of my admitted guilty pleasures) we would drop those channels, which we did.

The truth is, I haven’t really missed them much. The movies come out so long after their release that I don’t feel like I am missing anything I can’t see a number of different ways other than HBO’s Saturday Night Premiere (or is it Friday?). And while I was curious about LUCK and HOMELAND and I quite enjoyed the first season of SHAMELESS last year none of the series has seemed worth the price. And then I went on vacation, and our hotel had HBO and I watched the first two episodes of season 2 of Game of Thrones and now I am questioning our decision.

I liked season 1 of Game of Thrones for the most part and I felt like it got better and better as the year progressed. I suppose I felt about the show the same way I felt about the books, they were good, but long and slow in parts and walked a tightrope in danger of taking the selves too seriously. Never did I think that a new season of the show would be THE show that would make me re-think my position. But, as good as season 1 was at the end, I thought the first two episodes of season 2 were even better (I guess that isn’t too surprising because I liked the second book better too). The pacing seems smoother and faster while never feeling forced or rushed. The morality play is no longer as black and white which makes it all much more interesting and the production quality still blows anything else on TV away (and most movies too, to be frank). So what do I do? Today I found myself searching blogs and reviews to find out what happened last night in the 3rd episode and I’m not sure that sounds fun week after week. Of course, it might only take a couple of weeks before I forget how much I liked what I saw on vacation and I can contentedly go back to Sunday’s with nothing important to watch.

What is a good hour a week worth? Probably more than $20.

Alan Sepinwall’s review of episode 3

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If You Aren’t Watching Justified Raylan Given Might Come After You

As a Deadwood fan Justified had me interested before I ever saw an episode. Timothy Olyphant’s Seth Bullock would be on my top 10 or 15  all time favorite TV characters and I have enjoyed many an Elmore Leonard book (Rum Punch is a terrific read, and Be Cool, the Get Shorty sequel, is a much better book than the movie would suggest), TV show (Karen Sisco came and went far too fast) and movie (Out of Sight, Get Shorty to name two). But, as good as I thought Justified might be, I am tickled to say after 3 season it is even better than I had hoped.

A Review Of Last Nights Episode By My Favorite TV Critic, Alan Sepinwall

Justified is that rare TV show where they don’t tell you people are good or bad at what they do, they show you. Think how rare that is in today’s TV. We are told that McDreamy is the world’s best neurosurgeon, so we never question his judgement. We are told which cops are smart, which cops are good. We are told which lawyers are better and how much smarter they are than others. Justified doesn’t tell us anything, it shows us everything. We know Raylan is good with a gun and cool under pressure because we have seen him use his gun and deal with pressure in nearly every episode. We know when criminals are smart because they do very smart things, not because Raylan walks into the office and tells someone “if we’re going up against Boyd Crowder you’ll should know he is really smart”. We know Raylan is hard to live with because we see how hard it would be to live with him. There are very few TV shows (or movies for that matter) that trust their writing and their actors enough to not tell you what they think you need to know, they let you figure it all out.

Of course, with the actors and writers they have on Justified, that kind of faith must come easy. Check out this clip from the season 2 finale …

Do yourself a favor and start watching Justified (season 3’s finale is next Tuesday on FX). And, as a side note, if Seth Bullock is in my top 10 or 15, Raylan Givens has got to be in my top 5, perhaps even my top 3.