Covert Affairs had a big development with potential job change for Augie — I hope he’s not leaving the show, he’s one of the parts I like;
Suits had a great episode about romance — for just about everyone, and Mike made a big decision that hurt his chances at the firm but helped him reaffirm the kind of lawyer he wants to be (hint: going “soft” in a cross-examination because the witness is a friend is not a selling feature for associates);
Secret Circle had another death, keeping the force going, and the binding ritual has been completed;
NCIS was kind of stupid, with storyline about a foster child with a Peter Pan complex;
Lost Girl brought Kenzi into the Fae fold as an ex-slavic girl who fears a female boogeyman; and,
How I Met Your Mother reintroduced “Victoria” as a long-lost Ted love, and she was great in the episode but with huge revelation that Ted still has a thing for Robyn (but we know from previous years that she becomes “Aunt Robyn” so she’s not the titular Mother).
But the real surprise for me was Ringer. I mentioned earlier that I like the character, but hate the actress (Sarah Michelle Gellar) outside of her Buffy action roles. Yet, here’s a kicker — she was good this week. Maybe she’s growing on me? We got to see her settling into her new character, and that was good. Get rid of the Siobhan mystery for a couple of weeks, and it could actually be good.
The week of premieres continued last week, although I got a bit behind fast in my TV watching with life interfering. I did however manage to watch Castle, Hawaii Five-O, Unforgettable, Revenge, Law and Order: SVU, Big Bang Theory, Charlie’s Angels, Person of Interest, The Mentalist, and Nikita. 😆 Plus another new show, a surprise one.
But as you read on, don’t forget — SPOILER ALERT. This is your upfront warning.
Castle ended last season with a bang — literally. The conspirators behind killing Kate’s mother years earlier came back with a vengeance, killed off Captain Roy Montgomery, and shot Kate at the very end. You find out in the premiere that Kate survived, didn’t want to see Castle and didn’t for three months (she said she’d call, and she didn’t — sound familiar? of course, same deal last year with shoe on other foot), broke up with her boyfriend (except she’s wearing an engagement ring on a chain so you know there’s more to that story), and wants to get back in the saddle chasing the killers. However, a new by-the-book Captain named Yates (oops, Gates — she was Cassidy Yates on Star Trek: DS9 a few years ago) is going to micro-manage every detail. Including assigning her other cases cuz her shooting went cold. You also find out that the mysterious package of files that Montgomery mailed at the end of the season actually went to no one anyone knew — someone completely new who owed Montgomery in the past. So, he’s keeping the files and reached out to Castle to tell him the deal is that Kate remains safe as long as she doesn’t investigate. Which Castle sort of convinces her to do. Which also means, ta da, back to life as a normal procedural. Kind of unfortunate. The only real “twist” was you realize that Kate’s claim that she doesn’t remember “anything” from the day of the shooting was a lie — she remembers everything. Including Castle telling her he loves her. Now, I’m hardly clairvoyant, and even I saw she was lying at the start of the episode. Overall, the episode was confused, unsatisfying, and went nowhere. Loved it anyway! 🙄 I’ll keep it on my A list.
Hawaii Five-O also ended their last season with a bang — the shooting death of the Governor. With McGarrett framed for the murder and arrested. They brought Terry O’Quinn back to Hawaii (sorry, I wasn’t a Lost fanatic) and he is a decent addition to the group so far — he plays McGarrett’s ex-mentor and someone who knew his father. We get a bit more info about McGarrett Sr’s investigation, and of course, we clear McGarett and put the team back together. Richard T. Jones joins the cast as the new Lieutenant Governor, and I used to enjoy it when he was on Terminator, so I hope they give him something to do here. Episode was choppy, too much going on simultaneously, some weird stuff with Danny and his ex-wife. But the only truly game-changing part was the last 30 seconds — big spoiler alert, I suppose, is warranted — when you find out that the CIA analyst who’s helping them is actually a mole for Wo Fat. Whoa! Give it a B overall.
I admit I am extremely pleasantly surprised by Unforgettable. The premise was attractive — ex-cop who has a perfect memory of everything, except the day her sister was killed. Very much like the Mentalist or Lie to Me, maybe even L&O: Criminal Intent — the quirky outsider who brings an unique point of view and skill to criminal investigation. But I was really hesitant because it stars Poppy Montgomery, who was often a good reason NOT to watch the show Without A Trace. Any episode where she starred in the ensemble was usually painful, regardless of the premise. But, I may have misjudged her. I liked her in the pilot, and will give it a go. Not quite sure how it will work in the future though — the pilot was for a crime she more or less witnessed. Won’t be the case for fresh investigations, and I don’t see where it goes after season 1 … presumably you’ll need to see some resolution on the sister’s murder, at least someone caught for it. But I’ll give it a B for now and see if it even makes it that far.
Revenge debuted last week too. Premise is somewhat straightforward, although it didn’t seem as clear in the promo ads. Basic line is that her father was convicted of some massive company fraud, but he was framed by a bunch of rich people who summer at the beach. Fast forward 10 years-ish, and she’s now a young eligible and rich little lady (compliments of her dad’s investment in a huge computer company before he went and died in prison), and she wants revenge on all of them. Emily Van Camp stars as the lead, and is pretty solid. My wife used to watch Brothers and Sisters where she played Rebecca, and she seemed okay in the few scenes I saw here and there. I never watched Everwood but she was apparently good in that too. My big hesitation on this show is actually Madeleine Stowe as Victoria, queen of the group. I didn’t like her in The General’s Daughter, Twelve Monkeys, or Stakeout. And yet she wasn’t quite the same here — more polished, more formal, more reserved. And it relatively worked. Not great, but good. But there’s an inherent problem in the series — the premiere showed how the season ends (with the death of a character), and then flashes back 5 months. Seriously? You show me that’s how it ends? Could have been a twist and it goes awry at the beginning? Could have been faked, hard to say. I’ll give it a B for now and see if it makes it that far.
Law and Order: Special Victim’s Unit is one of those shows, like all the CSIs, that tend to run together for me. I know the Emmies love Mariska Hargitay’s portrayal of Olivia Benson, a daughter born out of rape, but I am not overly excited when she has her emo moments. I like her, but I don’t love her. What I do like is that the writing often introduces more twists and turns, and unlike the other L&O franchises, you have extra cops to carry the investigation load. Last season, though, I hardly watched any of the procedurals regularly, and maybe a handful of SVU episodes at best. But the new season promised change — Stabler has retired, Olivia’s supposed to make Captain (not sure what that means for Kragen), and there’s a new female detective played by Kelli Giddish. I absolutely hated her in the show Chase, but couldn’t decide at the time if it was just her as an actress or her + her character. I only saw her briefly in the SVU premiere, which was modeled on the DSK rape case in NYC, but she seemed watchable so maybe I just didn’t like her previous character. Assuming Olivia becomes Captain, curious to see who Giddish gets as a partner. C for change, I guess.
Those who have read some of my TV posts before know that while I don’t particularly jump on board for sitcoms, I watch The Big Bang Theory religiously. I really enjoy it, partly for the smart talk by the characters who aren’t focused on gossip all the time and actually seem to have productive lives rather than turning into boozefests every day, and partly just to watch Sheldon’s character figure out social mores. It’s kind of like watching Data from Star Trek in a comedy. They rebooted the show at the end of last season, and it was hard to tell if it was a “jump the shark” moment or what it was — Penny apparently slept with Raj and everybody knew. So new season, Penny’s really embarrassed, thinks she’s destroyed her life enough, plans on moving back to Nebraska. Which will devastate Raj cuz he thinks he’s found true love. Big spoiler alert again — they didn’t really do it. Cuz Raj lost his mojo before they started. But they’re saving that news for a drunken revelation to Leonard sometime in the future, probably. Episode was okay, nothing special. But show remains in my A list.
Charlie’s Angels was on Thursday, and I watched it on the weekend. I rarely feel embarrassed by camp shows, I’ll admit to watching just about anything. But this was just plain bad. If you wanted a complete throw-back to the original series, this would be it…same feel, same female worship of the guy on the phone, etc. They even kill off one character to replace her with another in the opening, something vaguely reminiscent of the way Jill Monroe aka Cheryl Ladd was introduced to replace Farrah Fawcett. But here’s the thing — it was watchable for the 1980s, but almost unwatchable now. Sure, they updated the technology, and gave us a kick-ass Bosley. But the rest stayed the same. Yawn. Give it an F, and thanks for freeing up my Thursdays at 8.
Person of Interest also premiered Thursday and I think this is the one I’m most sad about as it has almost no chance of surviving an early cut. It sounded in early descriptions a lot like Minority Report — except that instead of pre-cogs controlling the guilt or innocence of people about to commit a crime, this was going to be some sort of special device. Instead, what you find out is a geeky little guy built a tool that creates probability scenarios for Homeland Security using data from cameras, cell phones, etc. And, when it correlates the data to suggest something “bad” is about to happen, it spits out two sets of people — one set of individuals involved with significant loss of life i.e. terrorists and another set with insignificant people (simple murders, etc.) But the geek built a back door into the system so that he could find the second set of people — people whose lives are about to change forever as a result of being the victim or the perpetrator of a crime. This show feels a lot like Seven Days, Target, The Pretender, or Early Edition, and I liked all of them — basically a show about knowing there’s a problem in someone’s life, but not knowing exactly what the problem is, and the rest of the episode is about figuring it out. If it wasn’t on CBS, but CW/Fox, it might live long enough to grab some low numbers. But this is pretty tech-y, even if the main bodyguard is ex-Delta Force and action oriented. I just don’t see it attracting enough people to hold on unless there’s some glitz coming that I don’t see. I like it, it’ll make my A list, but I doubt it will go beyond a handful of episodes.
The Mentalist premiered last week building off the cliffhanger where Jane shot Red John. Except his gun disappears, and his name and life appear to be completely clean. So Jane is in jail, rest of team is on suspension. Doesn’t stop them from helping Jane prove his innocence. Spoiler alert again — it didn’t stop me from figuring out three major plot points in the show in advance. First, there’s a key on the dead guy’s ring that the wife goes crazy trying to figure out its purpose…which is obvious to me, Jane put on the key ring himself. Second, the dead guy was interested in a missing girl’s investigation earlier, so obviously we’re going to find her (only question being if she is dead or alive) and realize he’s a monster, so the jury can absolve Jane. Third, and this is most critical, it’s obvious the dead guy is far too ordinary to be Red John, so Jane reveals that he pretended to the jury that he was Red John but he knows he wasn’t. So what’s wrong with this picture? All too obvious to the storylines, but each point comes as a surprise to Lisbon. How???? Anyway, I like the show, downgrading it to a B though overall. Starting to get a bit tired.
Nikita also debuted last week, and after an explosive first season with lots of action but little plot, I’m surprised it got renewed. But it’s the CW, and their numbers work very differently. The opening was interesting, as Nikita, Burghoff, and Michael are all together, there’s a new oversight guy running around Division, Amanda’s in charge over there, and Alex seems to be trying to be Nikita, working for Division. Good ending though as Nikita basically showed her that she is NOT at Nikita’s level yet — with Alex ending up with a broken wrist and shot in the leg to keep her down on the farm for awhile. Burghoff has some great new toys though, and the show worked okay with the new format. Perhaps even a bit more streamlined although it runs the risk now of being smash-and-grab rather than finesse to solve spy-like problems. Keep it a C, watch where it goes.
I also seem to have inherited another new show that wasn’t on my radar — Against the Wall. The premise of this show is a young police woman who finally makes detective. But the only available jobs for detectives are in Internal Affairs, so she takes it. She wants to eventually work homicide, but in the short-term, she’s willing to do her time. But IA is not a popular job, as she finds out very quickly from her three cop brothers and cop father. Interesting investigation stuff, and cute secrets as to who she’s sleeping with (her brother’s partner). The lead actress is played by Rachel Carpani and I knew she looked familiar, but couldn’t place her. Thanks to IMDB, I realize now she was on The Glades in the first season as a love interest for Jim. She looks very different here, and far less “annoying”. Partner is good, support cast looks good. Almost like Blue Bloods but with lead being a woman. Really good show so far. Now, if someone can just kill off the mother character played by Kathy Baker. She was big in the 90s in Picket Fences, and I hope she goes back there. She can’t act to save her life, and please no more “I’m a tortured mom caring about my son” storylines. Absolutely awful, and I can’t hit the fast-forward button fast enough. An A overall, I’m really enjoying the show, although I doubt it will last long. Come to think of it, feels a bit like a grittier Cold Case. Maybe it’ll find an audience.
I have another five premieres taped, wish me luck this week!
Active Shows
Rating
Title
Status
Comments
A
Covert Affairs
Returning
Ben Mercer’s plot is dormant, good to see Annie finding home roots and figuring out her life. Wicked line this past week by adulterous journalist to Joan.
A
Suits
New
Love the new show, with premise being brilliant Good-Will-Hunting-like student who never went to law school being hired by high-end lawyer as fake associate.
A
The Secret Circle
New
Pitch-perfect focus on the “magic”, and so long as writing doesn’t turn it into Magic 90210, should be good for at least a season or two.
A
NCIS
Returning
Thought it was getting a bit long-in-the-tooth, but opening premiere was first-rate. Count me in.
A
Castle
Returning
Not a great premiere, but reboots / resets the drama of last season and a return to focusing (perhaps) on procedural episodes.
A
Big Bang Theory
Returning
Cliffhanger of Penny sleeping with Raj was addressed, Penny threatens to leave for Nebraska, and then got an acting gig for the first time.
A
Person of Interest
New
Good vibe, but suspect it won’t attract enough viewers very fast. Not fantasy enough for the Fringe-crowd, not mainstream enough for the L&O crowd, not action enough for the remaining groups.
A
Against the Wall
New
Chicago policewoman makes detective but only jobs available are in Internal Affairs, which doesn’t sit well with rest of her cop family. Has a “Cold Case” feel to it.
B
Lost Girl
Returning
I like the new politically active “Ash” but the soap opera of Bo and Dyson is thin.
B
NCIS: LA
Returning
Opening spent way too much time navel-gazing at Callan’s past, time to get back to procedural focus.
B
Hawaii Five-O
Returning
Confused return, couple of good additions to cast, we’ll see if they give them anything to do.
B
Revenge
New
Decent acting by lead, okay support, and writing intriguing but showing season finale first was odd choice.
B
The Mentalist
Returning
Okay premiere, too many obvious pieces though.
C
The Ringer
New
Don’t care for Gellar’s acting, but I like the character. No idea whether the writing will hold my interest.
C
How I Met Your Mother
Returning
Nothing earth-shattering in first two episodes, starting to feel tired.
C
Law & Order: Special Victim’s Unit
Returning
Okay episode, nothing resolved for Olivia yet, and introduced new character to replace her. Wait and see.
C
Nikita
Returning
Nice to see the writers mixing it up, changing the base structure, and altering alliances. Could be interesting, as long as it doesn’t become Rambo Part 12.
D
Warehouse 13
Returning
Too campy for my tastes.
D
Franklin & Bash
New
Too much suspension of disbelief for smart-alecky rather than smart writing.
D
Alphas
New
Just not coming together — is it a show about mutants or a show about mutant terrorists? The characters need more backstory.
D
Whitney
New
Not super-funny comedy, although some funny lines. Maybe another episode or two to see if they can make it an ensemble show.
F
Charlie’s Angels
New
Yo’ Barrymore, the 80s called and they want their show back.
Pending Review
Rating
Title
Status
Premieres
?
The Playboy Club
New
September 19
?
Prime Suspect
New
September 22
?
Fringe
Returning
September 23
?
Blue Bloods
Returning
September 23
?
Pan Am
New
September 25
?
Being Erica
Returning
September 26
?
Chuck
Returning
October 21
?
Grimm
New
October 21
?
Once Upon A Time
New
October 23
?
Allen Gregory
New
October 30
Other mid-season shows to come: Alcatraz, The Finder, Republic of Doyle, Merlin, The Frame, The 2-2, Missing, The River, Touch, Awake, and The Firm.
Season Completed
Rating
Title
Status
Comments
A
The Glades
Season completed
Nice ending, no cliffhanger, good but somewhat obvious mystery in last episode. And all ends well for Callie and Jim.
B
In Plain Sight
Season completed
Cliff-hanger ending (ooh, the baby is coming!) but liked the twist that the wedding didn’t happen.
B
Torchwood: Miracle Day
Mini-series completed
Decent storyline, but should have been a lot shorter or tighter. Ending was worth it, but took a long time to get there.
I did it! I survived the summer of reruns and, at last, there is fresh food in the TV world! (Okay, so my excitement is a little extreme, but give me the remote, and nobody gets hurt.) So far I’ve seen both new (Secret Circle, Ringer, Whitney) and old (NCIS, NCIS: LA, and How I Met Your Mother). And of course, don’t forget — SPOILER ALERT. This is your only warning.
Last week, The Secret Circle and The Ringer debuted ahead of the main pack of shows that are all debuting this week. The Ringer is one of two “identical twin” shows this season (the other one, The Lying Game, doesn’t appear to be on regular channels in my market, so have no idea how it is), and the big buzz for this one is that it is Buffy! I mean, Sarah Michelle Gellar! Returning to TV after a series of lackluster movie roles, some home time, and oh, yeah, the desire to make money kicking her ego to the TV curb. And we waited so long, why not give us twice the fun with twins? The twins she plays have been separated for the last six years. The rich powerful twin, Siobhan, hasn’t wanted to see her and moved on with her life — new hubby, lots of money, and lots of toys to play with (gadgets, houses, boats and other women’s husbands). Bridget, by contrast, is an addict who witnessed a brutal murder (she bails on testifying at his trial and instead runs away).
In Episode 1, she runs to Siobhan who takes her in, they go for a boat ride, Siobhan apparently commits suicide, and Bridget tries to take her place. Only to find that Siobhan’s hubby doesn’t like Siobhan, she’s cheating on her best friend with her husband, a step-daughter comes out of nowhere that really doesn’t like her, etc. Meanwhile, people are looking for Bridget (police, FBI, killers, etc.). Sound complicated? It is. And not terribly well done. It looks like a TV movie of the week, complete with soap opera-style “identical twins that are really different”. About 20 minutes in, I started to remember the episodes where Buffy wasn’t killing things and SMG was trying to emote. Most of the time it didn’t work, and I wasn’t that impressed here either. But here’s the weird part…I knew Siobhan wasn’t dead, I knew she was up to something, and at the end of the episode, you find out indeed she is. A few episodes in and you’ll find out she’s getting revenge too on Bridget as some kid (likely Siobhan’s son, maybe a little brother, unlikely to be Bridget’s kid) died as a result of Bridget’s behaviour (likely to be drugs or alcohol related). Siobhan will still blame Bridget, Bridget and her will eventually have tearful reunion, blah blah blah. It’s okay for a season, but where the hell will you go for season 2? Guess I’ll find out. I’ll give it a C for now, and probably try a few more episodes to see if the mystery plot picks up (I know the acting won’t).
The Secret Circle, by contrast, was pitch-perfect. Girl has to move to live with Grandma in small town (think Twilight-like) where weird things happen. Magical things. Because, oh, yeah, she’s a witch and didn’t know it. And she’s the descendant of one of six witch families in the area whose power amplifies around each other. Of course, she moves there cuz an adult witch kills her mother at the start of the episode, so you know it’s not just going to be Charmed with kids. There is definitely murder and mayhem afoot. Plus romance, with one of the other young witches, played by Thomas Dekker (previously John Connor in the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles). I like him as an actor, and the lead actress (Britt Robertson) seems solid. I can only hope that the writers remember it is called The Secret Circle i.e. “of magic”, not the Gossip Circle 90210. Amp the magic, keep the teen romantic angst to a minimum at the start. Not everyone watching is 14. I’ll give it an A for a solid opening, with some fun little twists and turns as they introduce who the characters are (particularly the parents).
Whitney is the new sitcom starring Whitney Cummings. She’s brash, she’s biting, she can’t act her way out of a wet T-shirt contest? Okay, if you’ve read any of my previous TV posts, you know I’m pretty harsh on sitcoms. The only two I watch regularly are The Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother (sometimes only sporadically). After that, I watch the writers / pitchers die slow deaths each week — Hey, Fat People are Funny, right? (Mike and Molly) Cantankerous People? (**** my father says, anyone?) Coloured people, funny speaking people, unemployed people, people living with their families, whores, virgins, aliens from other planets? All have to be funny, right??? Umm, no. Most suck canal water. Don’t even get me started on the stupidity of shows like Corner Gas. I’d rather have root canal surgery. Daily. Now, Whitney isn’t THAT bad, and there are some REALLY funny one liners from the drunk single friend or the lovestruck married friend, but not enough to really anchor their characters. They were barely even introduced, except as single note caricatures. And then there’s the big climax scene for the episode where Whitney pores out her epiphany in fear, and then when it doesn’t happen, says “Oh, thank god.” Except, there’s no tension or excitement in the scene — so no “drop” when she’s relieved. Just all the same mono-emo for the scene. Ho hum. I’ll give it another episode, maybe it’ll pick up, and the one liners were good, but man cannot live on one liners alone. D for a rating so far.
How I Met Your Mother kicked off the season with back-to-back episodes to confirm Barney will get married at the end of the season (wife unknown), Robyn’s pining for Barney, Marshall has a new environmental law job working for Martin Short, Lily is pregnant, and we still have no idea who the Mother in the title is. Not much else going on, although the episodes were okay. Give it a C, probably only sporadic watching this season too.
NCIS: Los Angeles picked up where the last season ended — finding out all about G. Callan’s past as a young Romanian. Hety was missing, held hostage by a Romanian family, etc. We find out in the new episode that he’s the son of a family involved in a long-time family feud, Hety knew his mother, there are intrigues upon intrigues going on, etc. It’s rare that I want a procedural-based show to go back to the procedurals, but this show spent way too much time navel-gazing at Callan’s past. Show is still a solid B, and I’m in for the duration at this point.
NCIS is getting long in the tooth, but the season opener was one of the best episodes I’ve seen. I thought it would suck when it became evident that the whole episode would be slow flashbacks. But it was expertly done, and the choice of scenes almost perfect. A little weak on one part near the end, and totally unclear where Gibbs gets a certain file from, but otherwise solid. A good A for Awesome, and I’m re-hooked.
I’ll post my previous ratings below and update as we go…I’m looking forward to watching a taped version of the Castle premiere tonight!
Active Shows
Rating
Title
Status
Comments
A
Covert Affairs
Returning
Ben Mercer plot is dormant, good to see Annie finding home roots and figuring out her life. Wicked line this past week by adulterous journalist to Joan.
A
Suits
New
Love the new show, with premise being brilliant Good-Will-Hunting-like student who never went to law school being hired by high-end lawyer as fake associate.
B
Lost Girl
Returning
I like the new politically active “Ash” but the soap opera of Bo and Dyson is thin.
D
Warehouse 13
Returning
Too campy for my tastes.
D
Franklin & Bash
New
Too much suspension of disbelief for smart-alecky rather than smart writing.
D
Alphas
New
Just not coming together — is it a show about mutants or a show about mutant terrorists? The characters need more backstory.
Pending Review
Rating
Title
Status
Comments
x
Castle
Returning
x
Season Completed
Rating
Title
Status
Comments
A
The Glades
Season completed
Nice ending, no cliffhanger, good but somewhat obvious mystery in last episode. And all ends well for Callie and Jim.
B
In Plain Sight
Season completed
Cliff-hanger ending (ooh, the baby is coming!) but liked the twist that the wedding didn’t happen.
B
Torchwood: Miracle Day
Mini-series completed
Decent storyline, but should have been a lot shorter or tighter. Ending was worth it, but took a long time to get there.
Before I get to my analysis of the upcoming season, I have to confess three things up front. First and foremost, I am a TV junkie. I rarely get to the movies anymore, and I love serialized storytelling. So weekly shows are good for me. And a PVR makes my addiction all that much easier to manage. Digital taping? Check. East coast / west coast feeds? Check. Ability to fast-forward through stuff I don’t care about? Check. Ability to use programmable menu to adjust taping schedules? Check. Public acknowledgement of my addiction? Check.
Second, I prefer drama over comedies. With the exception of the Big Bang Theory, I haven’t found a mainstream “must-watch” comedy in years. Most of them rely on themes like “rational person in a sea of crazy people” or single-note stereotypes (Corner Gas and the clones) or let’s show a group of people who are blacker / whiter / fatter than somebody else cuz different is funny (Molly and Me) or men as morons (Two and a Half Men, Rules of Engagement, Everybody Loves Raymond, Home Improvement). Sure, they all have funny moments. But mostly they grate on my nerves like yesterday’s laugh track. And at 22 minutes long (without commercials), if I fast forward through the grating characters, there’s not much left to watch. So I usually pass on the comedies. Ditto for most reality shows, unless there’s a travel element (Amazing Race) or obstacles (Wipeout), but neither are “must-see” TV for me.
Third, I am willing to give a lot of schlocky things a chance if they have a chance of becoming interesting or at least entertaining. Often I only make it an episode or two and bail, but each September, I plan my TV schedule with the passion of a fantasy league for couch potatoes. This year? Not so much.
For returning shows, I will watch:
How I Met Your Mother — it was kind of lame at the start of last season, but picked up near the end…it’s not a lot funnier, just a bit more oomph in the storylines with issues like fatherhood and death. This year, the driving force will be who Barney marries at the end of the season and it will keep me around most weeks, but not necessarily every week. Prediction: Pickup for another season;
Castle — as an aspiring mystery writer, I love the premise (mystery writer teaming with detective) and the chemistry between the two leads can be great as long as they stay out of each other’s arms (they had a kissing scene last season that was supposed to be hot, but the acting by Stana Katic was laughable, although Nathan Filion did no better — note to writers: the longing is better than the having). The big topic for this year, although it might be resolved early, is Kate’s apparent “death” at the end of last season;
Hawaii Five-O — I thought this would suck last year but tuned in for an episode or two to try it out, and stuck around…probably will last another season, but doubtful for third, too much macho crap at times. But the season finale was fantastic with every character at loose ends;
NCIS — Gibbs is getting a bit long-in-the-tooth but the procedural part is still strong, and suspect that this will be the last season;
NCIS: LA — I like the extra action this one offers, although please stop Kenzi from trying to emote. And please don’t drag out the “who is Callan, really” for too long..prediction: potentially the last season;
Big Bang Theory — I think if I had to choose one show per week to watch, it might very well be this one…the writing is first-rate, and mixing it up last season to give Penny some female friends was great (without turning it into Friends-with-high-IQs). Plus I give props to Chuck Lorre as producer for ditching Charlie Sheen like the train wreck he is on that other show. Not much of a prediction to say almost guaranteed renewal.’;
Blue Bloods — I like Tom Selleck in this role, and Mark Wahlberg comes across great as a lead detective. I hated the Blue Templar wrap-up last season (should have been more detail much earlier in the season, and built to a climax) as way too easy to solve andit will be interesting to see if the show can make it through mid-year cuts;
The Mentalist — I was a late arrival to the series, and in fact only started watching after enjoying Lie to Me (now cancelled) and Psych (which I can never find)…great season finale, looking forward to the new season to find out if it was indeed Red John that died;
Chuck — The network has announced only a handful of new episodes before it finishes for good, and with Morgan as the intersect, it may very well be pitiful. Might as well see the end though.
Nikita — Too many changes in the final episode for me, not sure the future will be bright with other viewers likely losing interest too;
Being Erica — This is a great Canadian show that has been picked up by the U.S. and has a decent future if it can figure out what the heck to do with Erica outside of her lovelife!;
Fringe — I liked X-Files but was not a full-fledged fan, yet Fringe captured me early on because of the female lead (Anna Torv) and J.J. Abrams’ original creation stamp; and,
Rookie Blue — Already launched for the new season, need to get back to the police storylines and away from Andi’s romance woes.
I also really like Psych, White Collar, In Plain Sight, and The Glades, but have trouble catching them reliably on my Canadian stations. Merlin and Torchwood are easier to find (on the Space channel), and I’m looking forward to Endgame, Lost Girl and Covert Affairs to pick up again on the specialty channels. All of which totals up to 18 returning shows to tape, and another four if/when I see them on the list. Total: 22 shows, 21 hours.
For new shows, I will give a shot to:
Alphas — this is a pseudo-“X-Men for TV” show although the abilities of the alphas are far less visually demonstrable (more down-to-earth than superhero) and has already started…I doubt it will survive the season, but I’ll give it a go in case a cult following grows, has some interesting bits so far;
Once Upon a Time — Storybrooke Maine becomes home to host of fairy tale characters. I have no idea if this premise will work, but it’s at least partially original. I’ll give it a go, but prediction is 4 EBIC;
Person of Interest — Similar to the Tom Cruise movie, Minority Report, based on the Phiip K. Dick story, the leads will be cops who can try to stop crimes before they occur. One of the downsides of the movie is you didn’t get to explore some of the ethos of being a preventative cop. Count me in, and I’m hoping for cult following.
Ringer — Sarah Michelle Gellar? Great! Playing twins? Umm, not so great. Has anyone seen a twin show that worked in the last 50 years? Didn’t think so. I’ll give it a go, but SMG isn’t exactly Meryl Streep and seeing her play twins might be more painful than entertaining. Prediction: 3 EBIC.
The Secret Circle — I am ashamed to say I watched Charmed even during the bad years (you know, every year it was on?). Witches are interesting. Cool even. So count me in. And I’m thinking there’s a chance of cult following. Prediction: Pickup, even by me.;
Unforgettable — I really like the premise of a detective who can remember everything. Sort of like Psych or The Mentalist or Lie to Me with a twist. And if the lead wasn’t Poppy Montgomery, who killed every episode of Without A Trace she led, I might have hopes. I doubt I can stick with this one, but I’ll give it a go. Prediction: 2 EBIC.”; and,
Whitney — not really sure where the episodes will go, but saw some trailers with Whitney talking about upcoming show, and she has some serious edge. I’m not familiar with her work, but if she can keep some sarcasm going, maybe it’ll be funny. I’ll give it a try, but my threshold for comedies is a bit high. Prediction: 3 EBIC;
Charlie’s Angels — Since Hawaii Five-0 survived the reboot, and Drew Barrymore is producing, I’ll take a shot. Prediction: 22 EBIC:
Grimm — Supernatural is still alive and well, err, alive anyway, so might have same demographic pull here. And has better chance at edgy stories over the Once Upon A Time. Prediction: 15 EBIC unless it finds some Fringe-like legs.
That makes another 9 shows, 8.5 hours of time. Other new shows that will go straight to a “pass” for me are:
2 Broke Girls — If the best thing you can say is that it is a “modern-day Laverne and Shirley”, then I’m going to ditch it for The L Word or something else with a bit of edge…prediction: 8 episodes before I’d cancel (EBIC);
American Horror Story — People buy a haunted house? Yawn…prediction: 3 EBIC;
Enlightened — Interesting, character going from rehab to spreading new approach to life? Sounds interesting…oh, wait, stars Laura Dern. Prediction: 2 EBIC;
Free Agents — Hank Azaria in a lead for romantic comedy? Tuesdays with Morrie and Herman’s Head setup some respect, but nope. Prediction: 3 EBIC;
A Gifted Man — Doctor talks to dead wife…pretty sure, Eli Stone (lawyer and visions) was already done. Prediction: 3 EBIC;
H8R — Ordinary joes explain to celebs why nobody likes them? A train wreck of a premise that will likely have some eyeballs even with D list participants… Prediction: pickup by network but I would cancel before even one episode
Hart of Dixie — new doctor finds life is about more than money while in smalltown America. Paging Dr. Hollywood? Snooze. Prediction: 5 EBIC;
Hell on Wheels — historical revenge western with railroad construction as the plot driver…umm, I can’t think of five thematic words that say CANCEL ME NOW more than that. Prediction: 1 EBIC;
Homeland — Intelligence officers and Mandy Patinkin. Sorry, those words don’t sing to me. And once you solve the initial mystery, where do you go? Prediction: 2 EBIC.
How to Be a Gentleman — Like the 2 Broke Girls, this is update of “Odd Couple”. Focusing on men behaving doofusly. Pass, prediction: 1 EBIC.
I Hate My Teenage Daughter — I’ve read the description of this one three times and still have no idea what it’s about other than mother daughter issues. Pass, prediction: 0 EBIC.
Last Man Standing — Tim Allen is back as a home husband. I like Tim’s stand-up, but he’s a tool in most shows. Pass again, prediction: 1 EBIC.
Man Up! — getting in touch with their macho side. Which the actors can do while playing golf, as their schedules should open up after three episodes — Prediction: 3 EBIC;
New Girl — Zooey Deschanel in some sort of Three’s Company parody but with three guys instead of two girls? I have no idea how this premise works, but with Zooey guesting everywhere, someone apparently wants her on TV. Not me, but someone. Prediction: Pickup by the network, 2 EBIC.
Pan Am — Mad Men, with stewardesses. And Christina Ricci as the lead. I am soooo not there. Prediction: 1 EBIC.
The Playboy Club — Mad Men, but at the Playboy Club. Maybe it will surprise people by becoming a pseudo-Sopranos type show, but it will need to amp up the sex or violence pretty fast or disappear. Prediction: 3 EBIC.
Prime Suspect — female cop in male-dominated world. And I’m supposed to care why? Prediction: 1 EBIC.
Revenge — pretty little wench seeks revenge on country club set. Maybe the Gossip Girl set will chime in, and the networks will pick it up. Personally, 2 EBIC.
Suburgatory — Oooh, let’s move to the country or the ‘burbs where it is safe and my daughter won’t get knocked up. Fish out of water shouldn’t last long. Prediction: 2 EBIC;
Terra Nova — Dinosaurs? Spielberg? Time travel? What doesn’t this show have? Me watching it. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen the movie and three other TV shows with same premise over the last few years. None worth watching. Prediction: 3 EBIC.
Up All Night — Christina Applegate. Parenthood. Hoorah. Pass: prediction, 1 EBIC.
The X Factor — Oh, look, it’s So You Think You Can Be Discovered singing/dancing/acting/something with a contest. I don’t watch any of those contests and I won’t watch this one either. Prediction: The network will pick it up, everyone will complain about Simon Cowell, and I’ll miss every episode very happily. Prediction: 0 EBIC.
For a grand total, ta da (!!!), of 31 shows and 29.5 hours of programming to try. While that sounds like a lot, there were over 45 shows to try last year, closer to 50 in September. Not including mid-year replacements. So, down about 40%. Which is all good for managing my addiction.
I am addicted to serialized story-telling. There. I admit it. I like it in almost all forms. It started at a young age in paper form — the Bobbsey Twins, the Happy Hollisters, Tom Swift, Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, Rick Brandt, Cherry Ames. You name it, if it was a series, I was “all in”. My biggest addiction was the Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators series. And I am still more intrigued by characters with continuing storylines — the era of Sherlock Holmes, Jane Marple, Hercule Poirot are gone, but we still have Harry Potter, Stephanie Plum and Jack Ryan.
My love affair extends to its most common form these days, TV series. I am a sucker for an interesting plotline or set of characters that can be developed over several episodes or even seasons. Given that it is relatively cheap plus I can time-shift, I invest a lot of time in it that I’m sure raises the national average. Sure, lots of people complain “there’s nothing good on TV”, but I am not one of them.
Whereas some people are fanatics for new seasons of specific reality shows like Dancing with the Stars or American Idol, I like returning characters who can grow over several seasons. I just can’t invest in reality shows where the characters change after a few episodes. Not to mention the false drama the shows try to create according to the latest formula. But give me a new list of pilot dramas, and I start salivating.
I look forward to September’s launch of new shows and returning shows the way a sports fan gets excited for opening day of baseball, or the first kickoff of the football season. If there was a fantasy TV pool (not including some of the box office games), I’d probably sign up. Instead, I anxiously await the fall TV preview issue of Entertainment Weekly (now that TV Guide is basically grids) and I read almost every word about every new series to see if it is something interesting. I’m looking for entertainment, not the Discovery Channel, so some of my choices are not exactly the stuff you brag about over the water cooler. And to show you how anal I am, or excited if you prefer, I plan out my TV taping for the week so that my PVR can capture shows on East coast or West coast feeds, various channels, up to two at a time, etc. At the start of the season, I’m willing to give a lot of shows a shot, knowing that after one or two episodes, I may drop them. Think of it as me speed-dating a lot of TV shows. I prefer to be an early adopter of shows, and it would be the rare show that would escape my early attention that I would start watching later.
Sunday
This past September, Sunday night looked like it would be all about The Lost Girl on Showcase. The main actress had done stints on Being Erica and was solid, and it has a fantasy element — she’s a succubus (think energy vampire) who finds out that there are fae in the world and she’s one of them. Add in a recurring mystery about some of the other characters, their backstory, and her missing identify, and it had potential. Generally, it paid off for me…I like the characters, you get to see some interesting beasts-of-the week (sirens, werewolves, etc.), and the acting is solid even when the dialogue is campy. Plus the main actress is easy on the eyes, so eminently watchable. The pilot was solid, and while the next few episodes were about the actors and writers finding their feet, the writing was surprisingly good (not including dialogue). I don’t know if Season 2 will be a “go”, but I hope so (bearing in mind it is Showcase, it doesn’t need the same numbers as NBC or Fox, and they are short season arcs, usually 13 episodes).
Mid-season, Showcase added Covert Affairs starring Piper Perabo. The trailers were superb, making it look like a cross between Alias and the Bourne movies. The show held up, but not to the trailer — it is more like the movie Recruit than the perfect spies of Alias and Bourne. Piper’s character is whip-smart, but she’s new and makes mistakes. A decent cast of recurring characters spread over multiple plots kept it interesting, mostly solid acting, although one of the actresses playing a sub-character also acts on Lost Girl and she’s horrible in both (fortunately with limited screen time). It is also a short season pickup, and I’m hoping Season 2 happens.
I used to watch Amazing Race on Sunday nights, but skipped this entire round — the stunt casting (oh, let’s find someone and make them seem like a freak) plus the false “unscripted” drama (really, this is what passes for “impromptu” dialogue?) were really starting to grate — so I would tape it, watch most of it in fast forward (no pun intended), and just see what the challenges were. This season, I couldn’t even muster that much interest, and that’s even on a night with limited alternatives. I tape Brothers and Sisters for my wife, but it is too soap-opera-like for my tastes, and I’m not surprised this was the last season. They jumped a year ahead last September following a car crash cliff-hanger the previous year, and that is never a good sign. Heck, you might as well have introduced a long-lost brother or sister too — oh, wait, they did that too. RIP Calista, ya killed another one. And Sally Field? Yes, I really really like you — in the Flying Nun, Smokey and the Bandit, and Murphy’s Romance, not this show.
Overall, Sunday was shaping up as “okay” with Lost Girl and Covert Affairs, but not “must-see TV”. Then The Gates premiered. The premise here was a wealthy gated community where a lot of the residents are not what they seem. Enter a new police chief with a big public mistake in his past who can’t figure out why he was hired, one who shouldn’t rock the boat, but who starts to probe the residents’ lives anyway. Nothing major to find — just vampires, witches and werewolves. All living as “normal humans” in a safe community. Some of the storylines were a bit too “obvious” and not all the actors were of the same calibre, but the police chief and the lead vampire were both really solid, and the writers were letting out sub-plot details in a controlled fashion. Pretty well done, heavy on philosophy/mystique of the characters and less so on the gore factor, kind of an adult Buffy without the intentional camp or Tru Blood without the sex and gore. I was hooked from the first episode, loved the police chief character as he slowly finds out what he’s signed on for and why he was hired. Overall excellent writing, with moderate to good acting, and I came back to see each week what was happening. Fast forward about 8 episodes and ABC pulled the plug. Too bad, I really thought it had some potential to become a cult favorite.
Monday
Monday nights would theoretically have been busier for me according to the initial plan — eight shows to tape, four of them new. How I Met Your Mother is one of only two sitcoms to make my regular taping roster, and over the last season and a half, they’ve gotten more serious and dialed back the one-off joke episodes. It’s still funny, but the extra “meat” in the episodes have allowed you to care a bit more about the characters. The two big storylines were Barney meeting his father (great casting of John Lithgow, who I normally just find annoying) and Marshall losing his father. Not your normal sitcom fare, and the performances and storylines have improved as a result. I was debating dropping it entirely, but with the improved writing, I stuck around.
I also tape Chuck (for fun, I don’t pretend it’s great writing) and Castle (which is fantastic for its weekly storylines and expanded ongoing investigation of the murder of Beckett’s mother). Castle’s season ender was a real cliff-hanger, but the loss of one of the major characters was trite, obvious, and quite frankly, a stupid attempt to make the audience go “Whoa”. Instead, I went “uh-huh, moving on people, nothing to see here”. Chuck’s ending was almost identical to last year’s and wasn’t much of a surprise, even with a funny twist. I expect the twist will disappear by episode two of the next season, which the network has promised is the absolute last, only picking it up for 13 episodes until some mid-year replacements are ready.
Law and Order: SVU was listed locally for Monday nights, and this year represented a change in my general approach to procedurals. I normally tape SVU (fast-forwarding through the boring parts i.e. anything with Munch or Tutuola), L&O: Criminal Intent (loved Jeff Goldblum as an extra character, not a replacement), and the three CSIs. But, all of them, across the board, are way past their prime. There’s nothing new happening, it’s just same old, same old. The acting has improved, sure, but if you miss an episode, it’s no big deal. This year I decided to just skip all the episodes. Besides, maybe this way I’ll be surprised when a rerun shows up and I haven’t seen it.
That left four new shows to try that looked interesting. First up was The Event — the one pitched to replace Lost. It started interesting, a plane from nowhere that disappears out of the sky, hey kind of funky. And it had John Ritter’s son, who I don’t mind. Blair Underwood doesn’t suck normally either. But then they started doing stupid flashbacks to build fake suspense — in other words, the writing in normal fashion wasn’t strong enough to hold interest, they had to go with gimmicks to make it mysterious. I was reminded in some ways of the movie Memento, and from my perspective, that is not a compliment. Yawn. I bailed after Episode 1, and watched announcements to see when it would die. And the dang thing wouldn’t. Finally, they pulled the plug at the end of the season, and even though I heard it had improved mid-season, they had lost me at hello.
Lone Star did the same — a great premise of a grifter who starts to fall in love with the mark, and wanting to go straight. Great potential for interesting storylines, but I lasted only two episodes before the acting of the father was just too painful to watch and the high-and-mighty-turn-to-ethics conversion of the main character was apparently so strong that he thought bigamy would be the right thing to do. Really? This is your main character doing the right thing? Fortunately it lasted only about two more episodes before the TV gods restored my faith and killed it.
Chase presented the same issue for me, in a way. The premise was promising in terms of weekly conflict and action — U.S. marshals chasing fugitives. Think The Fugitive without the one-armed man. But the characters had no chemistry together, the fugitive of the week was boring, and the lead was just a pale outline of a woman with daddy issues. Two episodes in and you had to wonder about not only the writing but the casting also…the lead was just not convincing as the impressive Marshal who everyone respected. But it made it to the end of the season before getting cancelled — I lasted a total of two episodes, and really, I want those two hours back.
Now, while I had high hopes for the previous three, I expected Hawaii Five O to completely and utterly suck. No way would it make it — hell, they pulled Boomer off of Battlestar Galactica and threw her in a bikini. Nah, the exploitation would start, and unless they found a sense of humour, I was sure it would die. But I remember the old series in reruns, so I figured it was worth a go while it lasted. Kind of a classic Stephen J. Cannell-type production, even if he wasn’t involved. Then I watched it, and two of the characters were solid — the main actor, Loughlin, was fun in a previous outing as Mick St. John, vampire detective, and I like him, so I already didn’t mind his character. He’s too falsely intense, but he stays in character well. More interesting though was the acting of former Lost series regular Daniel Dae Kim as Chin Ho, a disgraced ex-cop who left under mysterious circumstances from the force. His presence is fantastic on the series, and I wish they’d dump the Danny character (i.e. Book ’em, Danno) and focus on Chin Ho. Renewed for another season, the cliffhanger ended with McGarrett arrested for the murder of his boss, Kona arrested for theft of $12M, Danny’s family headed back to New Jersey, and Chin Ho working for Honolulu Police Department. It’s not the best thing on TV by a long shot, but it’s watchable, and the writers upped the ante for the finale. Count me in for the premiere next September.
Tuesday
Tuesday night started off ambitious in my plan too — five shows as possibilities. I have liked Mark Harmon in precisely two shows — St. Elsewhere where he ended up as a baddie and NCIS where he leads the good guys. I’ll watch no matter how bad it gets, and well, it tested me this season. The cliffhanger from last season (will Gibbs be blackmailed by the Mexican family whose father he killed? will he be killed? arrested?) wrapped up with really boring episodes that went nowhere. Similarly for the rest of the year, they got closer and closer to the other procedurals (L&O, CSI) that I’m already avoiding, and any attempts at character development were completely irrelevant to the storylines. But I stayed to the end of the season and they finally jettisoned some extra characters. The big cliffhanger is a new Secretary of the Navy assigning Tony a special undercover/Internal Affairs assignment at NCIS, ready for next season’s intrigue (an NCIS agent is selling secrets — but fyi, there are only five “agents” active in the storylines, so it isn’t going to be a jaw-dropping revelation of who is suspected when it happens). Yawn.
Not so however with the spin-off of NCIS: Los Angeles. The show is much campier than the original NCIS, but the tech support characters are great, the boss Hetty is oddly entertaining, and G. “I don’t know what the G stands for” Callan is almost letter perfect as the lead agent character. I have big doubts about the season finale and the ongoing storyline though — it reveals (potentially) Callan’s background far too neatly and that it wasn’t as big a secret as everyone thought. It might lead somewhere, though, and I am hoping the tech characters get more time next year while downplaying the acting time of the other agents. Their storylines are okay, but the acting is generally one-note.
I gave Detroit 1-8-7 a try for precisely two episodes. I think it was aspiring to be the “NYPD Blues for the motor city”, but the writing just couldn’t rise to the grit of the original and the acting was ho-hum. I’m happy to see it was cancelled at the end of the season, again restoring my faith in the TV gods.
As with Monday nights, I have a camp show for Tuesday — No Ordinary Family. The premise was a family of four who are exposed to a special chemical while on vacation and who subsequently develop super powers — Dad becomes super strong and indestructible; Mom becomes the Flash; son becomes Brainiac; and the daughter became telepathic. The initial premise of “how did this happen” and “introduce super baddie of the week to defeat” just went nowhere. The classic formula for any superhero show to work is that you need to see how the characters go from “normal” to “super”, not in terms of just their abilities but how they “hero up”. Apparently the writers forgot that, and without Clark Kent becoming Superman or Peter Parker becoming Spiderman, the draw had to be the abilities, and they were far too ordinary. I watched, mainly because I kept hoping for the “hero” side to emerge, but it didn’t — and ABC pulled the plug. I wouldn’t have given it another season either, at least not without a complete change in writers.
However, pushing all that aside, I was excited by a returning show — Being Erica. A Canadian-produced drama, it’s been picked up on American cable, and it is relatively unique. The premise is that Erica Strange’s life was going in the toilet, and she was at loose ends financially, emotionally, and at work. Enter a mysterious therapist — Dr. Tom — who helps her learn the lessons of her life by sending her back in time to relive certain moments, and in some cases, make different choices to see what the true consequences are. This show is quirky, but the writing has had some solid nuggets to work around — life, death, cancer, romance, drugs, and most of all, family. So I was really excited by its return this year. And then the season started, and it turned everything on its head (no longer single therapy, she’s in group therapy now!) with huge possibilities for storylines…she could go back and relive some of the other members’ experiences or they could help each other learn together. It felt a little bit like Herman’s Head from long ago, and definitely in a good way.
But then the writers did NOTHING with most of those other therapy members. The potential for Erica’s character was enormous, and instead focused on a single romance, weird work relationships, and the ensemble cast — there were numerous storylines about her sister and parents, all of which I kept waiting to link back to Erica (yoohoo, writers, it’s called BEING ERICA not ERICA AND FRIENDS!) and they never did. I found myself fastforwarding through the other storylines, because, really, who cares if sis gets laid compared to Erica going back in time to see her dead brother. Near the end, they gave us another giant twist, hurrah, and then the very next episode, they ignored it completely (hello, she graduated to being a therapist and meets her first mysterious patient who you only see the arm of, but the following episode it just doesn’t get addressed at all?????). I am doubtful that the next season will be any better, but hopefully the extra cash from U.S. syndication will attract some better writers.
Wednesday
Wednesday is a proverbial wasteland for me. With not much competition, I gave a chance to Undercovers — married former spies who return to the CIA to do consulting. Ooh, how exciting … the premise was kind of “what would happen if you took Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s characters from Mr. and Mrs. Smith, made it a TV series, and oh, how daring, we’ll make them black.” What you get is, well, crap. But I gave it a go for a few episodes, it was kind of Alias-like. But I couldn’t stomach it. Thank god it was cancelled.
I also took a peek, I admit it, at Hellcats. I remember the first “Bring It On” movie, and it was watchable at least. The premise of this show was odd to say the least — ex-gymnast now law student is about to lose scholarship, so she joins the cheerleader squad to get a sports scholarship instead. I suspect it was pitched as “Glee with dancers instead of singers”, but there’s a reason why the movie equivalents had sequels that tanked. Once you’ve seen one episode, it’s all rerun after that. It morphed into a Gossip Girl / One Tree Hill / 90210 like series, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Thank you CW for killing it.
The Whole Truth was billed as the next big law show — two lawyers battling it out each week, you’d get to see both sides of the issues, and the strategizing behind the scenes. The paper description seemed to have potential and then they cast Rob Morrow. The biggest scene in the trailer was him running up courthouse steps while telling his opponent to “Bring it, Katie” in pseudo-intense-watch-me-we’re-daring fashion. I can’t believe it got even the first two episodes out the door, and I didn’t even make it past the opening couple of scenes of Episode 1. Heck, Jar Jar Binks would have improved this show.
So, Wednesday is generally a wasteland — except that there’s a Canadian production called The Republic of Doyle. This show is really hard to classify. Jake Doyle, the main character, is a young private eye in St. John’s, Newfoundland. He works with his cantankerous father, father’s rational girlfriend, flighty niece who acts as a drug dealer so that she can make money to go to England, a fanboy named Dez who wants to be Jake, and a brother who is a continual screw-up. The episodes each week are throwaways, really, for the acting that takes place between Jake and his various flings…season 1 was all about his ex-wife vs. a new police sergeant; season 2 dumped ex-wife competition for police and added a new red-hot crown attorney.
Now here’s where I talk about the real star, the writing around Jake’s personal life — this past season had one incredible moment that was just magic. Generally, nothing works out for Jake … he tries hard, but it never quite jives for him, and he’s working hard with some little successes, but no home runs where he can relax and enjoy the outcome. Particularly with his relations with women…every time it starts to go right, something comes along to mess it up. So, in one scene this year, his ex-wife invites him over for dinner with her new boyfriend. He invites along the crown attorney with whom he’s been doing the “will we or won’t we” dance — only to find out his ex-wife had invited a nice lady already, as a setup without telling him. So Jake brings a date to an unexpected blind date. Over the top awkward, and it’s delightfully painful to watch. The crown attorney leaves, Jake follows, they have a bit of a laugh about it, and finally, they agree that it’s a “will we” moment and they kiss. It’s done as magic — very soft, very loving, very mind-blowing for the characters, a very significant moment where things change. But during the kiss, the phone rings, and the attorney says, “I better take it…it’s my husband.” Yep, she’s married. And Jake’s mind is like, “WTF?????”. It was a fantastic scene, perfect foible for the main character, great setup and a beautiful twist. It ultimately went nowhere, but that scene was just perfect writing. Not a huge plot idea, not perfect dialogue, just a small tweak to the plot to ramp things up yet again, and it worked perfectly. The rest of the season, however, was merely okay, mostly complications on a theme, all leading to the grand finale where everything gets wrapped up neat and tidy. Then someone — the writers, the producers, the directors, someone — decided to screw it up completely.
Everything that has made this show great is around his independence — he’s a private detective. Interacting with bad guys, on his own, no backup, no resources, dealing with his family and trying to glean info off the cops where he can while staying ahead of them so he can solve a case and get paid. So what do the powers-that-be do for the finale? They ditch all the sub-characters, and make him a cop — but not just any cop, not just a detective, but the head of a task force on organized crime. Say what? I’ll tune in to see if they can make it work, but I honestly don’t see how. All the parts that made the show watchable will be gone in the new format, which I suspect was a budget issue to dump staff. I won’t miss all the other characters (the father was good, the rest a waste of screen), but I think they just jumped the shark.
Thursday
I already mentioned that I dumped CSI this year, so that was off my schedule. Which meant Thursday night was going to be “comfort night” with three returning shows and one new one.
One of the returning shows was the Big Bang Theory that moved from Monday nights. The writing on this show is just first-rate for dialogue, and the one-, two- and three-liners from Sheldon keep the show snappy and fun. But the big chemistry on the show was always Leonard and Penny — so the writing solution for this season was to make sure they were broken up, Penny pining secretly for Leonard, and Leonard banging anything with a pulse until near the end of the season when he got a permanent girlfriend (Raj’s sister Priya)? The addition of the girlfriend for Wolowicz has gone almost nowhere even though the actress is great as Bernadette, but the addition of Amy as a girlfriend for Sheldon is beyond hilarious. She’s both a fantastic foil and partner-in-crime for Sheldon’s mental gymnastics, and delightful to watch. However, the only real selling point for new writing this year has been the addition of the girls as girlfriends for Penny — she gets to have “girls nights”, and it adds a great dimension. Now, if they could just clean up a bunch of the other crap (see: Priya). I haven’t seen tonight’s season finale, but basically Raj moves in with Sheldon so Leonard can move in with Priya. Bah.
Next up would be the returning Fringe (which moved to Friday night). A good part of the season was Faux Olivia impersonating the real Olivia, but it just didn’t go anywhere during the crossovers. Finally they returned everyone to where they were supposed to be, but until the last couple of episodes, there was a reason that ratings were stagnant — so was the writing. Fortunately, the season finale was mind-blowing, and bodes well for the returning season, provided that they keep Peter and Olivia together (the season finale looked like one of the main characters is being written out, and if so, kiss the show goodbye — I don’t want to spoil it too much, but SPOILER ALERT Mulder needs Scully as much as Scully needs Mulder for the series to work).
A new show for the season was Nikita. This is a reboot of the La Femme Nikita movies, with the premise being a woman kidnapped and coerced into working as an agent / assassin for a covert government group who realizes that the government hasn’t sanctioned everything they do. She escapes and vows to bring down the organization. The best part of the reboot has been the existence of a mole on the inside of the organization — a raw recruit named Alex with a somewhat shady confused past. While some of the episodes have been smartly written, quality has been inconsistent — particularly sub-characters and sub-plots that basically went nowhere, and primary characters that go one way one episode, only to be going in the opposite direction the next without much explanation. The season finale promised huge upheavals to the existing premises, but it will be interesting to see if they do anything with it (they got a partial pickup for next season so far, but I doubt they’ll get extended).
Finally, for Thursdays, I watch The Mentalist. When this show first appeared, I thought it was rather silly in premise, so I skipped it. Then I started watching Psych and Lie to Me and thought, okay, I’ll give The Mentalist a try (similar premise of sorts, all three leads seeing small things that most don’t see to solve cases — Lie to Me is all psychological and cerebral, Psych is physical awareness and observation, and the Mentalist is halfway between the two). Last season ended great, and this season went precisely nowhere with it. Yes, they’re still chasing Red John. Yes, they’re solving other cases while they do it. But an ongoing sub-plot about an internal affairs investigation was long and slow and BORING. All to get them to a situation that could have been done in a single episode earlier. Tonight’s episode will reveal who the mole is…guess what? They revealed that mid-season, although most characters weren’t paying attention when the clue was revealed and neither Lisbon nor Jane were there to see the clue. I’ve seen enough of the trailer to look forward to the finale, but I’m not expecting any resolution or any great surprises — the show has been running on fumes for awhile. Another season will likely end it.
Friday
Friday night is the only real night of the week that is “must-see-TV” for me, as it has been for the last ten seasons. I love Smallville as a premise and in realization — as mentioned above, the storyline for superheroes that works best is “how the man becomes a hero”. And that has been the main premise of Smallville for ten seasons. This was planned as the last season, but it was far from the best. It was time for the writers to wrap things up, and they wasted a lot of time this season just going through the motions. Clark and Lois finally had their romance, which was handled well; Green Arrow stuck around and was expertly handled throughout. But they introduced the biggest baddie of them all in the opening, and after two episodes, the baddie virtually disappeared except for cameos for the rest of the season. The finale defeat was short but letter perfect (with a great throw-back homage to Christopher Reeve’s Superman), but it was a looooooooooooong time getting to it. Plus, the series had a lot of old storylines to wrap up, so it felt like every episode was a chance to say goodbye to a character. The finale was not as bad as it first looked in the description, looking way too much like a “I don’t have an episode storyline so let’s just do flashbacks”, but the story did progress in chunks. And then ground to a halt for a special character moment. Then more action. Then ground to a halt again. A giant meteor is about to crush the planet, and Clark knows he needs to go to the Fortress to talk to Jor-El. So for almost the entire last hour, he keeps doing stupid slow piddly things rather than SAVING THE WORLD? Sorry for a spoiler alert, but guess what? He becomes Superman in the last fifteen minutes, including tights and flying. The series is over, and it was a good enjoyable run, but time for it to end. I only wish they had done more this season with the other Justice League of America characters like the Flash.
I also watched Human Target (which moved to another night about halfway through the season), the series about a rogue bodyguard who saves people by waiting for the assassin to strike and then stopping them. This season introduced two female characters, and unfortunately, the writers did nothing useful with them. I’m not surprised it was cancelled, although I still watched to the boring end.
A late season addition was Body of Proof, although it moved to another night too. Dana Delany is the lead coroner, and that set off warning bells immediately. Most of the stuff she’s been in has sucked, or at least everything after China Beach. BoP is not horrible, but there’s nothing original about it either. I feel like I’m watching a female episode of Quincy at times. I lasted three episodes, but I couldn’t watch another episode where they told you how horrible she was with people … there’s a reason why it is called a television SHOW — you’re supposed to SHOW us, not TELL us. And the showing they did give us was Dana being weepy, or sad, or whatever. Pass.
I really wanted to like the new show Outlaw (which moved to Thursday just before the premiere). Jimmy Smits as a lawyer. I loved him in LA Law, and he was fantastic in the final season of West Wing with Alan Alda. So I had hopes. Then the description expanded. He’s not just a lawyer, he’s also a Supreme Court Justice who steps down to take on a case — the same one he just ruled on. Uh-huh…okay, I’ll let you stretch the premise, if you give me some meat. Nope, just basically soapbox-for-an-episode, with the writers trying for Sorkin-like dialogue and failing miserably. It was the first show cancelled of the season, and even I’d already bailed after the first episode.
Blue Bloods was a new addition this year, and I thought it had promise. Up front, it has Tom Selleck as the father of a large family of police and district attorneys. He’s also police commissioner. And Tom is solid in just about anything, even Quigley Down Under, I suppose, so it was promising. Plus it isn’t about him mainly, it is about his son played by Donnie Wahlberg. He’s fantastic, with a great woman partner. The daughter is a bit soapy as the district attorney, but it opens a few more doors for plot, and that’s exciting. But overwhelming in the first few episodes was a hidden mystery — the Blue Templars, a secret fraternal organization of cops formed originally to fight crime by any means necessary including dirty cops but which still exists and are now committing crimes themselves. In the opening, you see the youngest brother, a former lawyer, now becoming a cop — inspired by his next-older brother who was killed in the line of duty. But then the twist — the brother was murdered by the Blue Templars because he had been working for the FBI. Oooh, intrigue. Great fodder. But it then went dormant for almost the entire season, mostly until the final episode, where they wrapped it all up in one swoop. The rest of it was mostly procedural. Wahlberg is fantastic though, and it’s better than average procedural writing, but it was the Blue Templars plot that hooked me initially. Now that it’s gone, I don’t know if I’ll watch next season.
Saturday
Nobody programs on Saturdays, do they? No, not really. It just happens though that I tended to tape two shows that day — Stargate Universe and Merlin.
Merlin caught up with the British schedule this year, essentially showing two short seasons back to back. I enjoy the premise, most of it was “magic person of the week” fare, but the corruption of Morgana is complete now, and Arthur has created the Knights of the Round Table. I don’t know how many more seasons will continue before Merlin and Arthur become their “historical” selves but the writing is starting to strain.
Stargate Universe has been straining since the beginning. I like science fiction, the Stargate series has good serialized storylines, and it had similar plot similarities to Star Trek: Voyager, stranded far from Earth. But the stories never went anywhere. While formula is formula, and not always positive, the formula for Stargate is fairly simple — go somewhere every episode, discover some people with a problem or a puzzle, solve it, come away with a resolution if not always positive. Simple, effective. SGU threw the premise out entirely — they almost never met anyone. They almost never solved anything except how to survive another week. There were damn few successes. And they had an ensemble cast out the wazoo — Stargate series stuck to a cast of 5 or 6 usually, Star Trek went to 7 sometimes, but SGU seemed like there were at least a dozen, increasing the number of storylines and relegating some interesting characters to non-entities each episode. It just never jelled. There are lots of fans who want it to continue, but the premise was just not there. Unfortunately, they left the series in limbo for the finale — everyone in a stasis pod? Really? That’s the best wrap-up you could develop? No wonder it died.
Oh, and I almost forgot, maybe as it isn’t a full series — the new BBC version of Sherlock Holmes is absolutely fantastic. Modernized, but with the feel of the original, and original stories, not just updates. Absolutely first rate, but was only intended as a series of small movies, not a full series, and nothing new lately (there were three episodes done), with talk of more to come now.
Other
There were various other shows that I gave a shot to, most of which were unmemorable and are all now cancelled:
Mr. Sunshine with Matthew Perry and Alison Janney, where both deserved a lot better than a sitcom-like setup managing a large stadium;
My Generation looking back at a group of people who graduated high school together and finding out where they were now — I only watched 20 minutes of it and thought “who the hell greenlit this crap?”, and it lasted about 2 episodes;
V which had a great opening pilot and then just fizzled;
$#*! My Dad Says was a triple threat — bad acting, bad writing and bad dialogue!;
The Chicago Code with a very earnest Jennifer Beal, that was promoted in huge trailers but just didn’t deliver;
Law and Order: LA — after I said I avoided procedurals, I gave this a shot because I like Skeet Ulrich, and loved Jericho as a premise…then the show struggled and who did they kill off? Skeet’s character…I’m glad they borrowed Rubirosa from New York, but that’s not enough to hold my interest; and,
The Cape — I actually loved this show, as they were getting it right most of the time…showing how the man becomes the hero. Unfortunately, they kept going into campy cult stuff with the bad guys of the week, and watching the Cape lament his lost family got old real fast.
I am reassured that the TV gods finally cancelled Medium (dead in my opinion after episode one, pun intended); One Tree Hill (I stopped watching after season two); and TBS’ My Boys (the girl sportswriter premise was too one-note, surprised it lasted as long as it did, even given the lower threshold for ratings on TBS — heck, even when I wanted to watch it, I found it hard to find!).
I mentioned above that I watched Lie To Me, and it has been cancelled too. I liked the premise (micro expressions telling whether you are lying or not) but they needed some more of the psychopaths who couldn’t be read.
My guilty pleasure of the week was the new Christian Slater show, Breaking In, but not in the way you think. I took one look at it, saw it was Christian and said “uh oh”…then saw the full premise, and said, “Okay, bye bye”. Two episodes and gone. Paul Reiser didn’t even get that far with his non-show. I feel guilty about how much pleasure I get from watching those two shows completely bomb. I’m sure somewhere somebody’s mother was looking forward to bragging their son or daughter was the writer for a show on TV…sorry, Mom, your son/daughter SUCKED. Maybe they’ll get it right next time. I wish I could say Molly and Me died the same fate…for all those who say “Oh, but it’s such a nice show”, here’s the reality — they cast two fat people to become romantic because fat people are apparently funny to watch have relationship problems. Kind of like the excitement about The Biggest Loser…if anyone thinks TBL is “inspiring”, ask yourself this — would you watch it if it was a bunch of anorexics and bulimics who were gorging themselves to put ON weight? No? Then why are you cheering others at taking it off?
And that wraps up my season of TV watching. The Glades is starting soon, and a few new shows are launching in June. Nothing that looks amazing though. Stay tuned, and don’t get between me and my remote come September.
There are some serialized storylines coming on, and I’ll be watching all of them. At least once.
