Tag Archives: series

Series premiere: This Is Us – 2016/17

The PolyBlog
September 21 2016

NBC has a new dramedy called “This Is Us” about eight people tied to the concept of shared birthdays. It sounded originally like the eight would all share a common birthday, but I think it is just four plus four additional characters involved with them. There is a link in Ep 1 that four of them are turning 36. Early on you get to meet them:

  • a nerdy black yuppie (Randall) who has tracked down the dad who abandoned him at a fire station after his mom died in childbirth;
  • an expectant father (Jack) of impending triplets; and,
  • a brother (Kevin) whose a TV star of a low-rated TV show and a sister (Kate) who is obese and wanting to make changes in her life.

When I looked at the premise, I thought it had very little promise. Too much like a few ensemble shows over the last few years — a group who won a lottery, a group who were held hostage, a group who grew up together. A combination of fast forwards and flashbacks, but it is hard for a show like that to find and hold an audience’s attention in the cut-throat world of ratings.

My prediction was that I would try an episode, likely pass, the show would get a half a season at most (10 eps maybe), and certainly no chance at renewal. Having seen an episode, I think that prediction might have been generous, because this show might need some time to gather its legs. Which is too bad.

I *liked* it. The father of the triplets is awesome — Milo Ventimiglia who was in the original Heroes series. I liked him there too, but he has some gravitas here. Much more understated.

The TV star brother (Kevin) is played by Justin Hartley. I don’t always love him, but he gets the benefit of the doubt cuz he was awesome on Smallville as Oliver Queen/Green Arrow. Here he is kind of whiny and pathetic so far.

The overweight sister is played by Chrissy Metz and I thought it was going to go “Mike and Molly” or “make fun of the fat person” cliches, but she is awesome. Let’s be frank — she is a plus-sized woman. And she has a scene where she is just in her underwear. I don’t know if it is all her, or they added to the pounds, but it is a pretty brave scene for someone without a ton of acting credits behind her. She starts of a bit cliche, and then nails it in scenes where she isn’t feeling sorry for herself.

Randall by contrast is hard to judge. He seems like he could be a cliche, but instead, he has these self-aware moments that just sizzle. It’s almost like he’s breaking the fourth wall to say, “Hey, I’m living this and it feels like I’m in a sitcom.”

And some of it rocks as drama, but there are sequential light moments that are great.

On top of it all, Gerald McRaney plays the doctor delivering the babies. And he NAILS the character. I have liked him all the way back to Simon and Simon (particularly if I ignore Major Dad) but his cameos either work great or they don’t work at all. This one may be the best I’ve ever seen him. He is absolutely fantastic.

I’ll watch it as long as it lasts, but I’m likely to be disappointed after about 4 episodes when it disappears.

Season premiere: NCIS 2016/17

The PolyBlog
September 20 2016

Last year, Season 13 of NCIS ended with Tony DiNozzo exiting stage right to look after his and Ziva’s daughter, with the life of a single dad not fitting with his NCIS lifestyle. Back when Ziva’s character exited, the producers spent a whack of time over a bunch of episodes playing “agent, agent, who wants to try out as an agent?”. Lots of old characters rotated in and out for an episode, and eventually they added Ellie Bishop. Not all the fans out there love Bishop, I don’t mind her, but I was hoping they wouldn’t do another round of rotating characters. I thought the producers said that one or two of the characters from the last couple of Eps of Season 13 would become recurring characters if not full season regulars, so imagine my surprise with both of the two other agents gone, and not a lot of explanation other than they returned to their agencies.

Season 14 kicked off with a lot of backstory for a Latino agent who has been undercover in various operations for eight years, and recently had his cover blown in Argentina. He’s been off the grid for awhile, NCIS wasn’t even sure if he was alive or dead. But he was alive, still working, and when his cover was blown, the family he was after decided to take out his family back in the U.S. too. Lots of sub-plots around revenge, heart-break, infiltrations, blah blah blah.

But the real story is that the former undercover agent, Nick Torres, is now a new agent with the team. Played by Wilmer Valderrama, it’s nice to see last year’s Minority Report secondary actors getting work. I confess both last year and this year that I recognized him, but couldn’t place from where. Double-checking his bio writing this, I was shocked to realize it’s Fez from That 70s Show. I never would have come up with that.

NCIS likes to add a twist though, and they did it this time too. They added TWO agents, not just one. Jennifer Esposito plays Alexandra Quinn, a NCIS trainer that Gibbs pulls out of the academy to join the team. I’m hoping she’s not on the team just to give them a red shirt to eliminate in the future. I loved Esposito as Jackie on Blue Bloods, even if she didn’t have enough to do in the series. I even liked her on Taxi Brooklyn for the short time it was on. Happy to see her getting some work, and she has great presence. Not sure the dynamic with Gibbs since she’s not the spring chickens like the other three.

Finally, while the overall plot for the Ep was so-so, there is a great cameo by good old Bud Roberts. Now a Captain, and still at JAG, he starts to tell a story about Mac and Harm and what they’re up to, and then he gets interrupted and there’s no story. Oh, so close. Cute little scene. But baby faced Bud? He looks OLD now 🙂

Season premiere: Gotham – 2016/17

The PolyBlog
September 20 2016

Season 2 of Gotham last year was sub-titled in part as “rise of the villains”, and rise they did. By the end though it was all about Indian Hill and Dr. Hugo Strange. Finally, in an attempt to save many from a large explosion, Gordon stopped a bomb from going off but Fish Mooney managed to escape with a busload of X-men. No, meteor freaks. No, meta humans. Well, whatever we call them, they’re the results of Strange’s experiments.

I confess I was not thrilled to see Fish Mooney back. Call me Jada-ed (see what I did there?), but it is painful most of the time with her over the top acting and one-dimensional character. There is a small but loyal Gotham fanbase who were thrilled when her character seemed to be killed off, and yet like bedbugs, it’s hard to eradicate her character.

But she was in the first episode, and well, she didn’t suck. I don’t want to watch her but if the rest of the season’s shows stuck to the same level of her involvement, I’d be okay with it.

Gordon is okay as the past-wronged, now enjoying his freedom, ex-cop turned bounty hunter. Still enjoyable. Selina is working with Fish and causing trouble, but even she is having her own trouble adapting. Bruce left town after the Indian Hill and has just returned with stunning accusations to the Board at Wayne Enterprises that there is a cabal among them that is corrupt. Lots of little threads to kick off the season.

But I think I liked the interactions between Riddler and Penguin the best. Still fun, still enjoyable. Love Edward Nigma. Even if he’s nuts.

Season premiere: Lucifer 2016/17

The PolyBlog
September 20 2016

Lucifer was one of two shows last year that I really liked — the other was Blindspot. In Blindspot’s case, it was an amped up approach to a procedural with huge mystery elements behind it. With Lucifer, the producers took the standard trope of “homicide detective paired with someone unusual” (Castle for a writer, Elementary with two genius consulting detectives, Forever with an immortal, etc.) and went big — Lucifer is not just named after the devil, he IS the devil.

The premise was awesome, and the main actor is fantastic. Secondary characters (the police) are all ho hum, although the main police detective woman has potential. But the tertiary characters — a psychiatrist, an angel, a demon protector — were all spot on. Made for some light banter with serious overtones. And Lucifer’s unadulterated narcissism is plain awesome. With the vulnerability added that when he’s with the cop, he’s mortal (he finds out he’s not bulletproof all the time anymore midway through the season). Sure some of the plots were thin, and some of the “twists” were obvious a mile away. But Lucifer is an ace character, delightfully delicious to watch.

At the end of the season, Lucifer takes a bullet from a psycho brought back to life by the angel to kill Lucifer and force him back into hell (oh, did I mention the reason Lucifer is in LA is that he retired and wants to start a new life?). But just as he’s dying, knowing that his death will lead to the death of his cop partner and his daughter, he made a deal with God — he gets to stay on Earth for now while he searches for his Mom. Who had been cast out of Heaven centuries ago, kept in Hell by Lucifer in prison, tortured by the demon protector, and now, has escaped!

The new season picked up with Lucifer believing his Mom is going to show up in LA to seek revenge, and sure enough, the first case post-escape has a woman killed by embedding metal horns in her head to look like a devil. The case itself is ho hum, but little threads abound. There’s a new forensic specialist who believes in God devoutly. The angel is losing some of his powers (he was mortally wounded at the end of the season, and saved with an angel feather at the last minute). The cop doesn’t believe Lucifer is the devil (mainly because his powers don’t usually work around her) nor does she think he is crazy, but she’s holding out to find out what his deal actually is simply because they work well together and close cases. Or in TV speak, “you make me a better detective”.

But it’s still all about Lucifer. Oh, and Mom came to say hi at the end of the episode.

Falling in love again

The PolyBlog
September 19 2016

Back when I was a wee lad, in the home country don’t you know (well, Peterborough, Ontario, population at the time around 55K), I ordered books from the Scholastic Book Club. I loved the SBC order forms, and frequently started out with 20 or 30 books I wanted, and had to whittle down my order to only one or two. One time, something I had ordered wasn’t available, and they gave me a credit plus a grab bag of three free books.
One of those free books was part of the Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators series. Eventually growing to 42 books, the series was in its late teens volumes, maybe early 20s, but I think teens.

I fell in love for the first time, partly as the lead investigator was about my age, my size, and smarter than most of his friends. I had read some Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, and I would go on to read Sherlock Holmes, Tom Swift, Rick Brant, the Bobbsey Twins, the Happy Hollisters, Louis L’Amour out the wazoo, Travis McGee, dozens of other series. Including my favorite “adult” series, all by Warren Murphy.

But the Three Investigators were my first true love of a series. I tracked the others down. Some through the library, most through the Trent University Book Store and a Coles store in the Peterborough Square. Then I found a bookstore on George Street in Peterborough, a rather small shop with a mix of used and new. And they carried the new 3I series books. Every couple of months, I would find a new one. I didn’t know the business model, but the authors were all on contract. Four or five in total, I think, most of whom got paid relative peanuts to write-for-hire i.e. no royalties, just paid to write in the series.

I have no idea how they licensed Alfred Hitchcock’s name, and eventually they had to deal with his death (the premise was just as Dr. Watson would “introduce” and tell the Holmes’ stories, Alfred Hitchcock would “present” the 3Is’ stories and the intros to the book were supposedly by AH).

Eventually the stories petered out, and it took awhile even to find the last couple. One or two of them I actually had to order, an unheard of idea back in 1980 or so for my pre-teen life.

Later, they tried to release an “update” to the series, with the kids no longer 10-12 but mid-teens. The stories were fine, but the characters were nothing like the earlier versions, more like kids with the same names. Pretenders, not the real McCoy.

It has been said that you can never fall in love again for the first time, but actually I can. I’ve started reading The Secret of Terror Castle, Three Investigators Book 1 to Jacob. I feared it would be too mature for him, but he’s following the story just fine. In retrospect, a ghost story premise is probably not the best of ideas since he thinks there are ghosts in our house and monsters in our basement, but I know the ending and think he’ll be okay with it. Think any episode of Scooby Doo and you can guess the outcome.

Last week and again this week, I’ve been reading to him here and there. We’re about halfway through book one. What I really want to know? If he’ll want to read Book 2 on his own when I’m done, or will want Daddy to keep reading to him. Either way, it’s nice to feel the love in the air.

Of course, I also have Artemis Fowl and Percy Jackson on deck at some point too. Not quite ready for Harry Potter, but he’s got time. There are 41 other books to go.