Sherlock
I seem to be alone in rather enjoying this most recent series. It hasn't been without its frustrations, the primary one being that the show has, for the most part, given up on mysteries, with the final episode having a twist instead of a mystery central to it, the second episode only having one that's hardly dwelt on, and the first being mostly concerned with the mystery from the previous series, with an added silly one where Sherlock can't count.
Ultimately though, its been about the characters, and for the most part its been funny, sweet and interesting. I like Sherlock and Watson, I like Mary as a new edition, and I enjoyed watching them get up to things. While the final episodes twist (where Sherlock solves a mystery in the most straight forward way) was disappointing to some extent, it was character driven, and underlines just how much Sherlock, a character now given to showing feeling, has found himself compelled to love Watson, and by extension Mary.
Labels: review, television
Marvel's Agents of bland
This program really had to be the televisual disappointment of last year. A new show with Marvel characters, with Joss Whedon involved! How could that fail to be good?
How indeed.
Lets start with structure. The overarching plot has been fundamentally dull. Theres been some slow burning plots in the background, but they've been pretty unexciting. The terrible truth about Skye's parents, Coulson and his death. While I appreciate that perhaps the reveal will be awesome, taking a few minutes every episode to mention that Coulson probably did die or something just doesn't excite. The utter failure for that plot to have any moment until the most recent (in the UK episode) really stymied that one.
The bad guys in the background were sort of interesting, although they really failed to present much of a threat until, again, that final episode (on which.. why no back up? Why did they not respond when Coulson wandered off?). Still, at least they have some personality.
Sadly, personality is something the main cast really lacks. Coulson probably comes the closest, but most of it was nabbed from the films, where he managed to be much more interesting with much less dialogue. The other main leads? Skye's obsession with her parents is tedious, and her obsession with pushing boundaries boarders on the obscene. There hasn't been an episode where she hasn't been annoyed at not having access to every single level of a super secret organisation, despite proving herself repeatedly to not be trustworthy with that information. I've actually forgotten the name of agent bland, but less said about him the better really, and the same with May. Fitz and Simmons are a bit more likeable, but they really don't get a great deal to do. I think the best episode so far was when Simmons leapt out of the plane, because I found myself actually caring. A character was finally in peril!
Thats what I think it all comes down to, a distinct lack of peril on the show. The problem of the week is rarely compelling, and you don't really get the feeling that there's anything a well equipped local police force couldn't have dealt with a lot of the time. When you get down to it being able to throw a good punch isn't that great ability when the police have access to guns. In some episodes, the threat is so minimal as to be hard to spot. For instance, the episode where the mining magnate kidnapped someone. His evil plan, as far as I could tell, was to use the awesome gravity device to do more mining! That may have led to some unforeseen consequence, but that certainly wasn't communicated very well on screen. We did get Coulson claim that he was a bad dude, but really no evidence behind that!
I mena, I get that we can't have the whackier stuff from the Marvel universe, that theres been a (boring) creative decision to limit everything to sciency explanations, so we miss out on the funnest lunacy of the Marvel universe. But we can still have peril, right? 24 manages that without a wibbly gadget that makes people a bit grumpy, so Agents of Shield can too, right? On the evidence so far, it apparently cannot..
Labels: rant, review, television
On spoilers
I consume a fairly large amount of media. I've read a lot of books, seen a lot of films, watched a lot of television, played a lot of video games, and seen a fair few plays and musicals. Despite all of this, there are massive gaps in my cultural knowledge. I've never watched a Marx Brothers film, only one Chaplin, and until a few months ago, hadn't seen any Buster Keaton. I have read one Jane Austen novel, two Dickens and very little other classic literature. While I'm vaguely familiar with the shape of much Sherlock Holmes, I don't think I've ever read a story to completion I haven't seen Rocky, the 39 Steps, the original King Kong, past season one of the Sopranos or Dexter, any of Boardwalk Empire, even a complete episode of Poirot. Hell, I still haven't seen the end of the Great Escape thanks to the video cutting out.
So it always annoys me when someone dismissively says "urgh, hasn't everyone seen that yet?" There are very few pieces of media that can be claimed that everyone has seen. Even pieces of culture which have become ingrained, such as star wars, still need to be watched at some point. If you'd gone back in time to child me and ruined the reveal in Empire Strikes Back I would have done... well nothing because I was pretty young, and my ability to get revenge was limited at that point, but I'd definitely be annoyed.
Look, there is more to most stories than the dramatic reveals at key points in the story, and I have watched many things that have been spoiled for me and still enjoyed them, but spoiling thigns can rob that key moment of surprise. I watched Planet of the Apes unspoiled and was actually surprised by the ending (although I have a feeling rewatching it would reveal it as a bit hokey now), and am glad I got that opportunity.
Yes, there are plots you can spoil for me if you want to, and theres not much I can do about it, and by doing so you will have made the world just a tiny bit special. Congratulations, I suppose. For me, I'm going to do my best to let people experience media on their own terms and then have a discussion with them about it.
Labels: books, film, rant, television
DVD regions
I don't like to download shows. I know a lot of people who do it habitually, but for me it just feels... a bit off. If I have the option of watching the show in the format its sold in, I will, whether thats DVD or on tv with the ads. If I like a show enough, I want it to have my custom, so its creators get to make more great tv. That seems only fair to me.
So why do the media companies want to make it nearly impossible for me to do so? I recently got the first season of Community on DVD for Christmas, and absolutely loved it. Its incredibly funny, just some great television. This DVD only became available in November. Community has now shown
three seasons in the US, but I can only get season one on DVD?
Now there should be a solution to this, right? I should just be able to import a DVD from the US. It'll cost a bit more, but then I can watch to my hearts content. Except, of course, to do so I would have to
also buy a new DVD player and set it to region 1. Weirdly, I'm not willing to do this.
The thing is, its not very hard for me to go and download Community. I totally could, and watch it at my leisure, owning it for life, with no irritating copyright messages sprawled all over it. Its an infuriating message, and something a lot of big media don't get. The more inconvenient you make it for me to pay for your product, the more likely I am to switch to the free version. The free version should be
worse than the paid version, otherwise you are doing something very, very wrong.
Labels: rant, television
Buffy Season 8, slaying the metaphor
Warning, I'm going to spoil the hell out of the Buffy Season 8 comics (and the show itself). So if you don't want me to do that, probably stop reading now.
So at the end of Season 7 there was a very, very explicit message of feminist empowerment. Buffy gives all potential slayers the power they deserve. This couldn't be more clear if Joss Whedon had appeared, waved a flag and said "women should be empowered, damnit!" As metaphors go, it worked pretty well (there is an issue with the selective nature of it, but one can overlook it), and was a fairly good way to go out in style. The series as a whole was a call for feminine empowerment, while being about growing up in general (with the theme of letting go of power to your children, represented by the potentials in the final series).
Of course, there are more stories to be told. The universe is pretty rich, and the characters are fun, and comics allow the authors to try out stories they had not before, so Whedon was tempted to write an "eight season" for Buffy. And, indeed, it was a lot of fun. Demons could be bigger and nastier, threats could be more epic, battles much larger, because budget was no issue anymore. There were problems: comics don't translate dialogue as well, so Buffy, which has always been a wordy show (with notable exceptions) had to portray its characters in different ways, leaving some characterisation feeling a bit rushed.
There was also the issue of brining back old characters purely for fan service: Amy and Warren are back, even though they don't make a great deal of sense, because we recognise them, and the writers weren't brave enough to build up new enemies.
Still, my biggest problem was the thematic arc. Throughout the series the leads are threatened by a deadly force called Twilight, who aims to bring an end to all magic, and attacks our heros at several points. Finally it is dramatically revealed that it is Angel, who um.. well isn't evil. He was pretending to be evil to protect Buffy. By violently attacking her. And bringing together forces who clearly wouldn't have joined up without Twilight. Um. So yeah. But anyway, turns out that Buffy and Angel are to be rewarded with magic sex and a new lovely universe while the old universe, where all their friends, and lives, and everything they fought for, gets blown up. Um. So yeah. So obviously Buffy doesn't accept this deal, because who would, and she heads back, and finds the seed of magic. And chooses to destroy it. Oh, and Angel, who is evil again, murders Giles. Um. So yeah.
So Buffy undoes the act of good she did at the end of Seaosn 7. The reason she does this is that Slayers simply cannot be trusted with their power. Rogue slayers are killing people, and even Buffy decided to rob a bank. This imbalance was going to destroy the world, so power had to be taken away. From women. Because they couldn't be trusted with power. Um. So. Yeah.
Now the comic has dropped the previous metaphor. Its done this before. In season 4, magic=gay sex. Thats pretty obviously the metaphor, and was there to deal with network qualms primarily. As the show got more adventurous, the metaphor got unattached, and magic became something of an addictive force, basically equalling power in season 6, or sometimes drugs. There was... some.. anger at Tara's death and Willow's craaazy killing spree because people were hung up on the old metaphor, and were thinking the show was saying that gay sex makes you go on a craaazy killing show. Which it was not. It was saying grief and an addiction to power makes one do that.
So the comic was doing the same, and replacing the metaphor witha "power corrupts" story. Only the show had actually rejected this as kinda bad- Season 7 argued that you can't just ignore power, you need to harness it for good, because its not just going to go away, and you can do good with it. I really hate this luddite notion that the
only thing humans ever do with power is abuse it because historically it isn't true. Its certainly true that people abuse power when given it, but people also use power to save people's lives and make it better. All the goddamn time.
So all in all... not a massive fan of Season 8 of Buffy, it has to be said.
Labels: buffy, comics, rant, television
Lost season 6- A review (spoilers, but of course)
So I felt that season 6 did provide a reasonably coherent answer to what happened on the show. What did I feel about the season in general? (this will, of course, contain spoilers!)
Well, it was a mess, no doubt, but Lost is always a mess. The flash sideways sort of worked to introduce an extra mystery to the show without over burdening it, while the main show continued with a reasonable sense of urgency. Certainly not-Locke was a compelling presence, who oozed threat, and made good on his promises, and there was some fairly good journeys this season. Yet the flash sideways, which I'll take about in a minute, meant that some of the journeys just didn't really conclude. I'm gonna take a look at individual characters and see what worked and what didn't.
Sawyer, who had lost Juliette, was clearly a man who had lost his way for a while, but was still pretty decent- the show did not forget the growth this character has experienced since the first season. He was mostly compelling throughout, and a lot of fun to be with. Unfortunately I really want to see what life he got off the island. Because the show shows us who leaves the island, then has them in the afterlife (and way to explicitly state that show..), it doesn't give us time to finish off their arcs when they leave the island. A little closure here would be nice. After all, Sawyer never did leave the island. We can assume he won't go back to being a con man, but it'd be nice to see what.
I have the same problem with Kate and Claire, although slightly less so- we can sort of guess that they'll work together to raise the child, but after Kate finally declared her love for Jack (oh, and show, we don't fucking care about Kate and Jack. We have not cared since the second season.) it seems a bit funny that she's never gonna come back to the island to check on him. I guess she left with the impression that the island was going to collapse, but she didn't
know.
Claire and Sayid were also a mess. Why on earth did the show introduce that stupid infection thing? It doesn't actually make a great deal of sense- the infection was pretty clearly shown before as being the Dharma initiative basically lying, and introducing another element during season 6 seemed so pointless. Both Sayid and Claire seemed genuinely deranged and evil, until they weren't. Sayid suddenly sacrifices himself, having been utterly evil up to that point. What was going on there? He rose from the dead long after the restoring waters were meant to help him. For that matter, the entire scenes at the temple were a distraction. For a season that was meant to wrap the show up, it seemed to have a lot of time to waste. Every single scene in the temple was a waste of time that didn't further the plot, and added another needless level of confusion (wait, how come no-one has EVER mentioned this before!). The show did this when it simply didn't need to- why introduce that bodyguard only to blow her up? It just wastes time. I guess there was an attempt to get some emotional weight from Kate feeling guilty about Claire's state, but Claire literally vanished (this wasn't explained either), so the audience sympathies are hardly with her.
On needless death, I felt like the Kwan's deaths was just mean. Its my strong belief that main characters should almost always be killed in emotionally compelling ways. For instance, the redemptive death of Charlie- he has betrayed many people, and dies trying to save everyone. Thats compelling because it has meaning- he is being karmically punished to some extent, but he also chooses the death. The Kwans, however, spend the entire series wanting to be together. They get their wish in death, I suppose, but its an arbitary element- Sun gets trapped, and there aren't enough oxygen tanks. This isn't something they brought on themselves, and their death doesn't help anyone. They just die. Its nasty. It sort of sets up a motive for the others to kill not-Locke, but that was pretty damn present as it was- Sayid's death would have done it.
On characters that did work, Jack and Hurley were pretty good all season. I usually don't like Jack, but I actually think his frustation, then acceptance of the island was pretty damn nifty. I enjoyed it a lot. Hurley, who is always good value anyway, settles into the role as the new Jacob in the most natural way- he seems a sensible fit, for a more caring island.
Finally Ben was sadly a bit of a mess anyway. While he's always a fun character, it was pretty damn clear that the writers did not know what to do with him. Still, his terrible pain at having lost his daughter, and his final revenge on Widmore, was splendid fun.
On the episodes themselves, they were mostly fun. I actually wish they'd replaced the flash sideways with the flash back back episodes. i'd have much prefered to see the plot exposition spread out across the series than dumped into some pudgy episodes in such a clunky method. The main problem with the flash sideways is that its claimed that these people are all soul mates and will find each other in the afterlife to go heaven. Well fine, but that would have happened
no matter what happened in life, so do I really need to see it? And I can live without another sodding slow motion hug, thanks a lot Lost. Jack seeing the plane fly off is carthatic, everyone smiling at each other in a church... not terribly. That said, earlier bits, when lost lovers found each other was genuinely pleasing, and it would have been a shame to miss lovers reunions.
So, a conclusion? I think this series could have been a lot better. It had some right ideas, but it padded badly in places, and didn't so some characters the justice it could have. But it was fun, as Lost always has been, and could have been so much worse.
Labels: review, television
Lost season 6 an explanation (obviously contains spoilers)
Yes, spoilers will abound from here on out. I will be unapologetic, so leave now lest I be forced to mock ye for not reading properly.
I went into this season incredibly late, but unspoiled, with the strong impression that this season wasn't very good. The mysteries were not, apparently resolved, and the show turned into a bit of a mess. So I was set up for disappointment, and as can sometimes happen with this preperation, I found myself mostly enjoying it.
For the most part, the mysteries are resolved, or at least a convincing narrative can be done to explain the mysteries. I've seen some blog posts which dismissively call the solutions magic, to which my response is
a)what scientific response for mystic numbers would make you happy?
b)magic is a fine solution as long as its relatively consistent.
Now I'm not sure the explanation entirely works throughout, but for most things its pretty good. So here's my impression of the answers behind the show.
Some time in the past, an island was created which was the source of good and evil for mankind. Whether it existed before humans did is not terribly clear. Still, once humans existed the island needed protection, because it (or its creator) knew that humans might want to abuse the source for their own gains. So a protector was appointed. This was potentially the mother, but it could have been someone before her. The protector was capable of setting rules for the island, was incapable of death by aging (and maybe by physical harm. This is not incredibly clear). The protector was not all knowing, but had an intuitive connection with the island which gave them an idea of what to do. In particular, they could certainly be wrong about things, too mean or mistrustful. The mothers attitude towards people is very different towards Jacob's for instance. When a protector felt that their stewardship of the island was coming to the end they could pass their powers on to a worthy succesor.
We skip to 44 AD, where the mother sees the chance to raise children who she believes she can make "good" (she is convinced that men are evil and venal creatures), and thus good enough to replace her. She favours the man in black, who is an extremely smart child. Jacob sees this, and is filled with sadness and jealousy. Eventually the man in black realises that his true mother was murdered by the protector, and he decides he wants to leave the island. He teams up with some men on the island, who have investigated the properties of the island.
While the source of the island cannot be accessed directly by anyone other than the protector, it has an impact on the island itself. In particular, the island is almost impossible to get to or leave, and has some crazy physical properties. In certain places the sources reaches up, causing massive electromagnetic fields. These can be harnassed to do various things- possibly giving free energy. The man in black has accessed one, and is planning to use it to move the island, which will presumably give him his freedom. The mother cannot allow this, and kills everyone in the camp (I'll note here that I'm not sure the man in black leaving the island is awful at this point, but accessing the source will be. Also, the mother is a leeetle crazy). The man in black kills her in response. Jacob, outraged by his actions, makes a massive mistake, and hurls the man in black into the source. Such an act, fueled by Jacob's envy and anger, creates a monster where a man once was.
For a time Jacob and the man in black coexist relatively peacefully, with Jacob trying to prove that man isn't as bad as his brother and mother believed, and his brother trying to prove him wrong. However, with the coming of Richard, the man in black actively tries to kill Jacob. Jacob realises that if he dies, its possible that the man in black (incidentally, thanks SO much for not giving him a name, show) could leave the island and cause much suffering. Jacob realises he needs to not just search for a replacement, but for someone who can finally kill the man in black. As a result, he recruits Richard to aid him in this, and to set up an active community of people who work for Jacob. He also hires some bodyguards to try and protect against obvious attacks on his life.
Fast forward, and the Dharma initiative has discovered the island. They intend to manipulate the island for its properties. They probe hard, and cause the incident by drilling into access to the source, which nearly destabilises and destroys the island, forcing them to set up the hatch. Jacob, at this point, appears to have become non-communicative, leading the others to sieze on to a new leader, Ben, who notices the obsession with Jacob and pretends to be able to communicate with him. Ben wipes out the Dharma initivative and changes the Others into a religion worshipping the idea of Jacob. The notion of lists comes from Jacob's candidates, but I believe that its basically a religious copy of the notion, without any help from Jacob. I'm not entirely sure why Richard doesn't step in here- presumably Jacob has stopped talking to him, or he's too busy doing research into the Oceanic flight passengers for Jacob to notice the others being subverted, and by the time he gets back its too late.
Meanwhile Jacob, who has gone through a long list, only has the oceanic passengers left. They are his lost shot at finding a replacement, and he directly inteferes to make sure they land all at once. Every time he has tried before the shadow monster has manipulated the candidates into turning on each other. And again, with the landing of the survivors, the smoke monster tries to do the same, and when that fails, endeavours to have them leave the island.
Then, with Ben, mad with jealousy, murdering locke, the shadow monster has an opportunity. Locke had been positioned by Jacob to replace Ben, who had corrupted the others, and as such was considered a prophet like figure by them. With his corpse to copy, the monster was able to finally engineer Jacobs death.
Events follow as on the show from now on, and are pretty straight forward for the most part. By depowering the island Jack depowers Locke, which allows him to kill the smoke monster, then save the island.
The only thing left is the flash sideways. Thats pretty explicitly explained on the show, but I have my own little pet theory. The explanation of it seems to take any agency out of the hydrogen bomb, which apparently didn't work at all. I prefer it to mean that the hydrogen bomb allowed the central cast to draw themselves into this meeting place before they moved on, a fantasy that they created together, to retreat to in death. If its just something we ALL go to, it hardly has any significance for the show, so this gives it some relevance. (hint, this was not my favourite thing about the last season)
So theres the explanation. Some thoughts on what I felt about the show in my next post. I think this explanation covers most of what needs to explain. There are a few holes
-why didn't Richard know Ben was faking it?
-The whole Claire's baby thing was apparently a red herring
-The infection nonsense makes no sense, and doesn't even seem to be true! (both Claire and Sayid act nobly in the end) I'll talk about this alittle more in my next post
-The numbers are technically not explained, but I think thats ok- they're just numbers with mystic significance. I'm not sure what explanation would suffice here
-I've skipped some points on Widmore and Juliette, but they're pretty self explanatory, I think.
Labels: ramble, television
Apprentblog
7th season and its feeling a little tired. Despite the new prize for the winners, the format is essentially the same, with some tasks, where the candidates need to do one on one selling, making even less sense than previously. Still, its got the silly fun that it always has, and its a good viewing.
That said, I'm sick and tired of bullshit firings. When someone is obviously responsible for the failure of the task, its pretty ridiculous to fire the one Alan has decided he doesn't like. Edna for being in HR, and then Glenn for being an engineer. Those were both essentially his entire bloody reasons, and Jim, who was UTTERLY responsible for the team's failure can only have been kept around for entertainment value.
One thing I found weird about the magazine task was that I didn't really understand their responsibilities. Did the apprenti really have to write the whole magazine? That seems an unlikely task for them to succeed at, unless they've all got secret histories as journalists. Yet each team had articles clearly at least pitched by that team. Oh well.
So who do I want to win? Well currently I despise Natasha, who deserved to have her seedy little porn mag get her fired fired fired, Zoe is miserable and Leon is a homophobe. Susan I find kind of amusing, because she is ready to declare how unfair everything is every 5 seconds. Helen is just generally competent thus far, and is dead on to win currently, simply because I don't see her competition. Tom... Tom is wonderful. He's generally right about everything he says, even though no-one listens to him, and actually comes across as a decent human being, a rare task on the human freak show that is the Apprentice. He's even right for the position- yes he can't sell worth a damn, but he's starting a business, which I suspect he'd be fine at. He almost certainly won't win though. Likely winners in my mind are either Helen or Leon, unfortunately
Labels: rant, television
Glee, a bit of a damp squib
So as my facebook status indicated, I was deeply disappointed with the season finale of Glee. As a stand alone episode of glee it wasn't actually that terrible, but as a wrap up of a season? Distressingly poor?
Season 1 closed with the wonderful intercutting between bohemian rhapsody and Quinns pregnancy. This season closed with.. well a whimper frankly.
Season 2 in general has been a mixed bag. It irritatingly reset the clock on several relationships which had been key last season, in particular Rachel and Finn and Mr Shue and Emma. This is always a really bad idea, as it takes the audiences victory away from them, and sets up the possibility of the audience simply losing interest.
Simply put, the show has not known what to do with the adults this season. Shue has been tedious in the extreme, with his boring boring love life, and his patronising speechifying. Coach Bieste was actually reasonably interesting, but she didn't have much to do, other than buy Artie magic legs (SERIOUSLY, WHAT THE FUCK?). Sue, while always funny, has also been a mess, changing from one extreme to another. Yes, shes had some good moments, but the show has lost sight of who the character is. I certainly don't know anymore.
If wild character inconsistency had been present only in the adults then I'd probably be ok with it, but unfortunately the sickness spread to the kids as well, with Quinn becoming rapidly ill defined. She basicaly forgets any character growth she might have had, and becomes set upon a dream of prom queening, and keeping Finn at home with her. This has kind of come from nowhere, but as I'll get to, the show doesn't even follow through on that.
Worse are the kids the show hasn't known what to do with. Tina has been relegated to occasional gags, not even getting solos anymore, and Mercedes? Good grief. Her plots were wanting to eat tater tots and being a diva or something. The latter plot was just embarrasing, as it involves Rachel helping the poor misguided Mercedes be a star (this exact same plot is basically repeated in the finale with Sunshine).
So has there been good things about this season? Well its still pretty funny. The show still gets a lot mileage out of how small these kid's world is, and Brittany has been incredibly funny throughout. More importantly, there are plots that worked. Puckerman and Laurens romance has been hilarious and sweet at the same time, along with being unexpected.
More importantly, the main plot of Kurt and Karofsky really worked for the main part, and evoked some decent emotions along the way, which led to the even more of a slow burner of Brittany and Santana, characters we could really root for, with the other romances being damp squibs.
So finally we get to the finale. Which of these plots does the show decide to focus on?
1)Mr Shue is going to broadway
2)Finn wants to get back with Rachel
3)Quinn has an evil plan
4)Rachel is worried she can't be with Finn because she's moving to new york.
1 was utterly tedious and pointless, and rather self indulgent (and seriously, a guy was waiting to tell him that he was really talented? For fucks sake)
3, carefully set up beforehand... was resolved by Quinn getting a haircut. Right. I don't really know how to respond to that.
2 and 4. Now Finn wanting to be with Rachel is kinda stupid, considering he desperately wanted to be with Quinn before, but sure, I'll go with it. But 4? Rachel has spent the whole goddamn season pining over Finn, so introducing a dilemma JUST for the finale just didn't work at all. Annoyingly Rachel's desire to move on (which, again, magically appeared), and Quinn's desire to stay at home could have worked really well to introduce drama, but that would have involved semi-decent writing...
And the subplots I actually care about? Well they get mentioned in the last 5 minutes. Great.
Now down to nitpicking
-the "my cup" song, while funny, is basically the exact same joke as "my headband".
-The songs, were, in general, dull. Wicked song was kinda fun, but the original songs were tedious. I get that the network makes more money from them, but if they keep doing original songs they'll kill the show
-Speaking of the original songs, the plot required that the glee club write them the night before the performance. WHAT? How did they practice it? How did the band know what to play? How were they any good? How did they even come 40th, let alone 12th?
-Jesse has no point in this show
-I actually forgot Sam existed. But he's with Mercedes now. Well I guess its something to do with the new character....
Season 3 is going to sky. I can't say I'm going to miss it greatly.
Labels: rant, review, television
Why the last epsiode of Buffy the vampire slayer is the worst, and best, episode of Buffy the Vampire slayer.
The final episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Chosen, is a great piece of television. It brings together themes that have existed in the show from the beginning, and the victory is entirely about female empowerment.
The episode begins with Buffy splitting Caleb, the embodyment of misogny (and a terrific villain) in two, and a quick unification with Angel reminds us of Buffy's journey. She returns home triumphant, with the spoils of war, and forms her plan for the final fight.
The final battle is triumphant and epic. Hordes of vampires descend on to girls who quickly become women as the power of the slayer is finally taken from men (in the form of the watchers, who are usually male), and given to all the potentials there. This is the reason why they win, because they have dared to do something different, something unthinkable.
Along the way we tie together loose ends, and we have a lovely moment with the original 4 which ties directly to the start of the series again.
In a moment of sheer genius, the whol of Sunnydale gets dragged into the earth, meaning Buffy has to make an exciting roof top, leading to that final moment of joy as Buffy realises she is finally free of the burden of responsibility she has carried for seven years.
Of course, thats all nonsense.
Caleb is a terrific villain who brings a sense of pace this series badly needed. So he is killed at the start of the show, a massive mistake. Next, the conflict set up only last episode is apparently resolved, but not well- the writing basically resets half the characters to earlier status (including Giles). While this means that we get back our likable cast, it makes no goddamn sense. The magic axe, and plan associated with it, seems to come straight out of the writers arses, and worse yet, its not even the item which ensures the heroes victory. Instead a magic amulet
found in a different series is what really kills off the horde of evil vampires.
The entire episode sacrifices sense for theme, with vampires who were originally incredibly hard to kill going down more easily than standard vampires and Buffy collapsing from a fatal wound and then apparently being fine. With the main villain dead, the First evil, represented by a ghostly Buffy, lacks menace, as she has all series, and while her army presents a threat, its a somewhat mindless one, and certainly has no deeper thematic meaning behind it.
While Spike's death makes sense, Anya's does not. Understandably Joss Whedon wants to show that this is a battle where people will die, but by having the deah off stage we have to be fine with it in the space of a few minutes, which is more than a little frustrating.
Ultimately the final episode of buffy is a blending of the problems and successes of the rest of the show. It doesn't really hold a candle to the Gift, an episode which was originally intended to be a possible end to the show, even if the ending to that was a lot darker.
Labels: buffy, rant, television
leaders debate
I watched this with some interest, not so much as to from my political opinions, but to see if it might shape others. The specific set of skills required to take part in a television debate are not equivalent to those needed to govern the country, and while most people have praised the debate, I do worry that it could trivialise politics.
That said, the level of the debate was fairly healthy and interesting, and went at a reasonable pace. All of the leaders did pretty well, the biggest losers probably being itv, who's opening graphic was god awful, with the show starting late, and Allastair Stewart being a clunky host (more than once cutting people off far too early, and not giving politicans a chance to respond to points the others made: his cutting between leaders seemed moderately insane at times).
There were no big mistakes from the leaders, other than Clegg repeating Cameron's assertion about 4000 pages being sent to schools each year (there were a few smirks in the audience at that) without realising it. (note.. is this that bad? What are these pages? Over a year thats not all that much, and these could just be health and safety things...)
So Clegg did best, and he always was going to- he represented an alternative to the others, and they did their best to ignore him, probably thinking attacking would be counter-productive. The lib dems stood to gain from last night- most people will now know what Clegg looks like, and have an idea what the lib dems stand for. They will probably have a misguided idea of what Cameron stands for (the conservatives policies do not match their current rhetoric...), who could have done better (for the love of god Dave, stop thanking people). Brown could have been awful, but I felt like he came off pretty well- not enough to change opinions, I suspect, but to remind people that he is a fairly substantial politican, and not some ogre. He will poll the worst simply because most people do not like him.
I have many posts to write on politics in the coming week or so, so you can view that statement with the dread or joy that you think it deserves.
Labels: politics, television
critics, e4, and the curse of trailers
"Why would you base your decision to see a film on the opinion of a critic?"
This is a question that has been asked of me more than once by several people. They point out, quite reasonably, that there is no guarantee that said critic will be correct. I might well enjoy the film anyway. Its true, I might, and if I had infinite time and money, I'm pretty sure I'd see practically every film that was on. I don't, however, and must make targeted choices. What do these people base their opinions on? Trailers. Trailers are the devil, as I shall expound later.
A good critic should not just give you their opinion for a film, they should also give their basis for it. If you understand them, and a good critic should be able to communicate effectively, then you should be able to appreciate whether you'll agree with them. This won't always work- you can see cliches as fun or awful, depending on your particular take, and two very smart people can see very different things in the same film. Still, good reviews (I should really seperate critisism and reviews, which are seperate things), should give you an idea of what someone would like or dislike about a film.
Trailers do none of these things. Trailers are DESIGNED to misleading, and, even worse, they can often mislead you in the wrong direction. Trailers are designed for a demographic, and to appeal to that demographic only, to the point where they can be actively offputting to people not in that demographic.
e4 is my favourite example. As far as I can tell, they assume their audience are half wits who find the twaddle they consider "humour" amusing, to the point where they will undersell perfectly good shows. Watch a trailer for any of e4's comedys, and find me a bit where they actually manage to indicate any of that shows merits. Quite frequently they will simply take snippets from the show and pretend that they are having a conversation. This might be fine to someone familiar with said show, but to someone new, they have utterly failed to give me a reason to watch the sodding thing.
A case in point is the Big Bang Theory. I had assumed from the trailers that it would be devoid of laughs, so imagine my surprise when the other night I decided to settle on an episode. Heaven forbid... it was really quite funny! It wasn't the greatest example of comedy ever found by any means, but it was enjoyable, and certainly a lot better than certain other imports. Thanks to e4's genius, I had been denying myself a perfectly good show.
Trailers are the devil. They will mislead, and they will not help. Avoid them at all costs.
Labels: film, rant, television
Lost Season 5 (will obviously contain spoilers)
I will start with the positive. Since towards the end of the third season, Lost really notched up a gear. By creating a strong plot, and a time limit to tell it in, this forced the writers to stop being quite so self indulgent, and made Lost action packed television. Yes, there is still crazy nonsense, but it is mostly internally consistent nonsense now. There will never be a real reason why the numbers are important, but the fact that they ARE important is enough.
So, now to the issues. Season 5 started with a central conflict which was resolved relatively quickly. Several of the cast were zipping about in time, seeing the island in its past, until finally getting stuck in the 1970s. This device was used brilliantly, with Daniel Faraday explaining the kind of time travel we were existing in (its impossible to change things), and gave us some lovely snapshots of the island in the past. Sadly, the final conflict.. sucked.
While Locke(?)'s quest to kill Jacob was generally excellent and a lot of fun (seeing Ben confused was wonderful), the other plot line just didn't work. Faraday had come back, with a plan to change the future, so the plane never crashed. This would wipe out all the bad (and good) stuff that had happened over the last few seasons.
Heres why this plan sucked:
It obviously won't work. The notion that the writers are going to spend their final season with the previous 5 erased is just absurd. If they do, I'll just be very angry. So in other words, the viewer certainly wants it to fail. We have no emotional attachment to the characters goals, because we're almost certainly opposed to them.
Worse yet, the characters clearly wouldn't want to do it. While Jack, and indeed Daniel, wanting to do it made perfect sense, the other characters very reasonably did not, which meant the writers had to somehow bludgeon in a reason for all the characters to come together.
This led to Juliette acting like a lunatic, with her motivation changing every 5 seconds. She came out as pathetically weak- shes been with Sawyer, happily, for three years, but when Kate come backs, because Sawyer looks at her for a minute, Juliette decides their love isn't meant to be. Sigh writers, just sigh.
So yeah. Now I haven't seen 6 yet, and I don't want to be spoiled, but if they've erased everything that happened I'll be both astonished and really, really fucked off.
Labels: rant, review, television
Gleeeee
This is the most curious piece of television I have yet to witness. A musical drama set in a high school, it presents cliche after cliche- we have the high school football star with inner depths, the shrewlike wife holding the lead back, the gay kid who loves singing... I could go on. At times the sentiment is piled on in an unholy amount, leading to a sometimes saccharine environment.
Yet theres something to it. There are few plotlines here you haven't seen before, but the telling mixes between the joy of the musical numbers and an overwhelming underlying sadness. The story here is kind of about how much life is holding all these characters down, how the town they are born in appears to be dictating how their life will be. The show can be delightfully surreal, and genuinely hilarious at times (with Jane Lynch providing many of the laughs).
There are some serious flaws here at work. The songs feel a bit overproduced at times, which is sad, as everyone there is clearly very talented, so it'd be nice if they'd just be allowed to sing now and then. The biggest problem is the pace the story goes at. Some of the episodes have had arcs that should have taken three episodes conclude in one, which feels rushed and unecessary- part of why the show has been so absurd so far is it has had to reach for more and more ridiculous plots because it keeps concluding stories earlier than it needs to. The show does appear to be settling down, however, and the fourth episode was great. I will continue to watch with interest.
Labels: review, television
Top Gear
I think what always bothers me about Top Gear was it was never that good. I have enjoyed watching it, for sure- the stunts, the challenges, tpically were amusing and interesting enough to make for decent tv. I never thought of it as amazing though.
All three, but especially Clarkson, would spout ignorant nonsense on politics and science, and assume that was funny. In many ways Clarkson's attitudes represent all I despise, so the less I have to hear his opinions the better. The interviews were often embarrasing, but interviews often are. Clarkson was probably a little better than Jonathon Ross, but seeing as he is the worst interviewer there is thats not terribly surprising.
The car reviews are typically very dull. Watch a review of one fast car. Then watch another. Spot the difference. Typically, it will start by the car driving very quickly, and Clarkson making a sexual metaphor. This will go on for several minutes as he spouts nonsense figures, until he gets to the "bad part". Typically this will be about the cars not cornering well, and that the dashboard looks a bit rubbish.
I have to believe that most viewers are not interested in this. These reviews have no practical advantage to most people, as they cannot afford these cars, and even if they could, they couldn't actually use the car for what the top gear people want it for. Whenever top gear reviews a car that actual human beings might use, they make a joke of it.
Recently my disdain for the show has got a little worse. A lot of the things that happen are so obviously set up and scripted it drains the humour, the caravan being a notable example. I'm tired of top gear, but I was never that happy with it.
Are there things to like in this show? Yes, at its best it can be an amusing an affable show about 3 man childs expressing their love for their hobby and getting on each others nerves. Thats great, but a flag ship off television? Ludicrous popularity? People wanting to elect Clarkson? Just disturbing...
Labels: rant, review, television
Fan fiction
Fan fiction is an oft mocked thing. The internet is full of it, and it ranges from weirdness to, I am sure, quality. Creating a story in someone elses' world might seem odd, but its not that strange. It can be fun to be constrained in your story telling, and you may well enjoy the world someone else has created, and want to tell your own stories within it.
I present you with- television. Most American drama's are written by a team of writers, which means, in a way, that some of them are writing fan fiction. They are creating stories in someone elses world. They can help make it theirs, of course, but they are still a little detatched.
The question about making it your own world is an interesting one. Russel T Davies did a lot of things to Dr Who. He started by making the doctor the very last of the time lords, with his race extinct, the rules were suddenly changed. Earth soon became a knowledgable place, while before it had existed in ignorance. Many speculated that he might push a reset button on his work, but he certainly did not do that.
In fact he did worse. It was probably clear he was going to bring back the time lords, because Davies has been about nothing if not escalation of the scales at stake. Yet he made them sociopathic loonies who appeared for about ten minutes. By doing this he has pretty much destroyed the time lords. There can be no plots about the beauracratic Gallifrey, because Davies wanted a bit more excitement than another trial for the Doctor (and perhaps that would be retreading old ground, but hell, he did it with the daleks and cybermen, it would be nice to see a foe that the Doctor willingly submitted to). They're basically gone now. To bring back the time lords as a narrative force would be rather difficult for any writer, and would involve a HELL of a lot of flim flam.
This is a little frustrating. Because while Davies did restart Dr Who, its not his, and now, while Moffat has control, he must work within the parameters Davies decided would be fun. Oh well.
[Incidentally, on a complete tanget, a thing I'd like to see would be the notion of galactic history continuing without the Doctor. There were entire wars between the daleks and the rest of the galaxy which the Doctor just knew about, with the Doctor being involved in a smaller story about their resurgance by using human minds. The Doctor doesn't have to make the entire universe tick]
Labels: rant, television
Dr Who
So Russel T Davies has finally gone. Thank goodness for that. He brought a series alive, certainly, and made Doctor Who a lot of fun, but was holding it back towards the end. So, issues?
Russel T Davies was a big fun of plot threads. This was a necessary thing for the new doctor- stand alone episodes tend to be less fun than continual plot, and Bad Wolf was intriguing. Sadly, he was frequently quite poor at not tying these together particularly well- the denoument was kind of lame (yeah, I left bad wolf across time as a message for me to.. open the tardis? Because I wouldn't have done that anyway?). The worst conclusion was Davros, and that ridiculous planet conjunction plot, where various references to the medusa cascade fizzled to nothing, and, once again, a character was only special because in the future they would be special.
At its best was the Master plot, which was just terrific. I know the whole "Doctor is a goblin" plot was lame, but the notion of the planet getting together and helping the Doctor was quite cool, then with the Doctor forgiving the Master, it was quite neat. Although the Doctor's tendency to completely forgive homicidal maniacs who have shown no inclination of reform is beginning to get a tad irritating.
One of Davies biggest flaws was to fail to earn victories for his characters. There was a certain Batmanesque nature to some of the cliffhangers he set up, where the character would face complete peril, and then Davies would pull some flim flam from nowhere to save them. I mark that down to an inexperience with writing science fiction- we know the character has lots of powers, but creating new ones whenever you need something to happen is lame. An example of a cleverly introduced technical device-
In the Family of Blood we discover a device in the Tardis which can allow a time lord to hide by becoming human. This beautifully sets up the Master in Utopia, a few episodes later.
Heres an example of a poorly introduced technical device-
Donna and the other doctors talking nonsense while destroying the daleks by twiddling knobs. It was quite funny, but dramatically was stupid.
Generally speaking with science fiction solutions to problems one needs to use a chekov's gun approach- the element is introduced earlier in the plot, and then used by the characters, potentially in an unexpected manner. This rewards the alert viewer, who might predict it, and will feel more earned. Sadly Davies never seemed to realise this, although occasionally he did succesfully use the trope.
Still, we have Moffat to look forward to now, who has proven adept at crafting Dr Who episodes in the past. We shall see what he does when handed an entire series.
Labels: rant, television
Dollhouse- it gets better
If I watched the first season of Buffy now I imagine I wouldn't like it. It was hokey, the acting was a little poor, and the plot was uninteresting. So Joss Whedon has form (although the pilot two episodes are still excellent). It seems Dollhouse suffers from this. Having watched only three episodes so far, I am watching based mainly on potential.
While Target was generally thrilling, last night we watched Stage Fright, which was generally awful. The issue for me at the moment is who to root for. We can root for Echo, but she is passive (currently, there is evidence this will change), a creation of a rather nasty corporation. We can perhaps empathise with her handler a little, but he is, after all, a willing participant in an utterly abominable project. There is no gray here, it is pretty clear that the dollhouse is a hideous program, run by fairly hideous people with no respect for the lives they create and destroy. To be fair, the program acknowledges it. Its at its best when it does so- seeing the creepiness and the investigation is fun. Watching someone do what they are programmed to do.. less fun.
There is a serious issue currently with the rather traditional tones. After all, Echo is being protected by a man, and the FBI agent searching for her is a man, and Alpha is, as far as we know, a man! It wouldn't have been hard to make the FBI agent a woman. Stage Fright only makes this worse, an episode that appears to have been written to get women to wear little clothing and then sing. Its not helped by an insufferable lead for that episode. I really didn't care at all about anything that happened during that episode.
So I'll keep watching, but it better get better soon...
Labels: rant, review, television
Question Time
I watched it, how could I not? The BBC were pushing this hard, with their news channel reporting pretty much nothing but the event that evening. While the BBC loves nothing more than to report news on itself, this got a little pathetic, to the point where it was clear at least one person in the BBC thought this show would bring excellent ratings. I'm sure it did. Question time was a bizzare format to attack Griffin with, because the nature of the format should be to rove on a lot of topics and not really focus on any particular member. This was, however, no ordinary Question Time.
It was, basically, an excuse to point out Griffin's extremely unsavoury views by a fairly excellent panel. Mostly, it worked well, with Griffin smirking pathetically as people demolished him with his own words, memorably he attempted to say that he couldn't say why he had changed his mind on holocaust denial, because he would get arrested. Jack Straw, in one of the greatest moments of the night, pointed out that he was the justice secretary and to go right ahead. Marvelous!
It wasn't all great. Jack Straw was stunningly ineffective across the evening, reading long diatrabes that would impress no-one, and stumbling completely on immigration. The tory policy on immigration is rather similar to Labour's, but Straw utterly failed to communicate this, and undoubtedly switched off viewers and garnered the conservatives a few votes.
I also felt that Griffin's attack on Islam needed a stronger rebuttal, especially considering Sayeeda Warsi was sitting right from him. The attacks were silly, as an audience member pointed out, because its not hard to quote any holy book and make any religion sound dangerous. One could, of course, have an argument just about that, but picking on Islam is just a wholly ignorant thing to do.
Sayeeda Warsi was very effective, managing to dodge a question on homophobia neatly (I imagine if Griffin was there she might not have got away with it), saying that she believes that if gay people want a civil union they have a right to. Well.. yes, thats the law, but that hardly tells us your opinion, does it? It was a tricksy answer. I find such attitudes coming in to the next government rather disturbing, but perhaps its what I should expect of a conservative government.
Still, I think Griffin was mostly shown as the nasty little man that he is, a horrible excuse for a human being. His attitudes on race are not well hidden- the BNP still has voluntary repatriation and a halt to all immigration as key pledges on their site, and now thanks to this show people may become aware of his opinions that had not before. I hope this turns out to hurt the BNP in the long run... we shall see..
Labels: rant, review, television
buffy season 7 (may contain spoilers)
Unless I review season 8, the inferior but enjoyable comic series, this'll be it for Buffy reviews.
Season 7 promises to bring it all back to the beginning. Sunnydale High is open again, and Buffy has a job there. Its interesting, and exciting stuff, with the lovely back drop of girls being murdered at the start of each episode with no explanation. Lovely stuff, and the first few episodes are very strong. They present our characters in a healthier place than they were in season 6, but still with issues to deal with. Sadly, this season doesn't quite work.
It feels very much that there was a need to pack a lot into one season here. Season 7 has, more than ever before, a long, ongoing story, which from Conversations with Dead People onwards keeps going until the end. This is a shame, because while Buffy does good plot episodes, its strongest are usually character episodes, with plot happening in the background- see season 4's Faith episodes for a lovely example of this, or indeed Selfless.
This is made worse by an influx of new characters. I'm not too unhappy that the writers wanted to introduce new characters, as certain members of the established cast were fairly well defined. Xander at this point didn't really need another episode focusing on him, for example, and his gradual reconciliation with Anya in the background. Yet they seem to fail to develop most of these new characters, to a frustrating level.
The most irritating example of this was Willow's new love interest. Kennedy is a frustrating character. She is clearly a contrast to Tara, being loud and forthright, but there's no clear reason for her and Willow to get together. We learn very little about Kennedy to warm her too us, and this is annoying. The Killer in Me deals with Willow's feelings of guilt for moving on from Tara, but I'm still not sure why the writers felt she needed to. It is possible to be single and happy, after all.
The thing is, I imagine the point of Kennedy is to force Willow out of her shell, and make her become comfortable with her magic use. But it doesn't work at all, and past Killer in Me the relationship is barely touched on at all. Its a wasted opportunity.
The only characters that really get arcs here are Spike and Buffy. Spike's, mostly, is good. Having got his soul back he is effectively a new man, and seeing him become whole again is good. Spike was always an interesting character, and still is, becoming someone new, different, and finally worthy. My only main frustration is that Spike occasionally acts as if he hasn't even got a soul- see Lies My Parents Told me, which undermines all this.
Buffys arc is probably my main issue with this season. The idea is sound- Buffy has to cut herself off even more than before, leading an army now she is even more excluded from life. Finally, she finds a solution so that slayers no longer have to be alone. My problem with this is that at the end of season 6, and indeed the start of 7, we really do get the idea that Buffy had seen the light, was more hopeful and happy, yet this is utterly sacrificed (to the point of the conversation with Giles where buffy happily tells him that she'd sacrifice Dawn). Its annoying. Whats even worse is the conclusion of this arc is terrible. Buffy is driven away by her friends after a disastrous attack on Caleb (who we shall speak of more soon), in a scene where she is turned upon by everyone she loves. Buffy, is, of course right about going back in (as she always bloody is, so people really should listen to her), and shes goes in alone and succeeds, while Faith leads the others into an ambush. They then make up for the final fight. Except... there were genuine issues raised by all sides, and they're simply NOT answered. Doing this so close to the end of the season was a genuinely bad idea, as it doesn't give the characters time to repair their relationships enough for the climax to work.
The final episode, is, of course, still great, bringing home the main theme of the season, and lots of lovely drama does make it very much worth watching, but I think it could have been stronger. Just a little bit more of character togetherness would have worked wonders. You'll notice I haven't even mentioned Giles, who goes so far out of character as to be utterly unrecognisable at some points.
One final mention has to go to the fantastic Caleb, who really makes the final arc of the season. He carries a brilliant air of menace, and making him a misogynistic bastard was a lovely offset to the message inherent in the final fight. Its a shame, however, that he was killed off at the start of the episode. It would have made much more sense for the first evil to enter him as part of some final desperate scheme, leading to a bit more of a satisfying conclusion.
Best episode here is Selfless, which is absolutely brilliant. I always loved Anya's character, and making an episode all about her, but also about the characters choices (the argument between Buffy and Xander is fantastic), is genius. This is head and shoulders the best in 7. There are other good episodes, Chosen and Conversations with Dead People, but this is the best for me.
Funniest episode is easily Storyteller, which is not only very funny, I think it nicely points out a tendency some of us do have to tell stories rather than to confront reality. Him is also funny, although it has absolutely nothing to do with anything else happening whatsoever (and is probably the first episode to do this in a looong time!)
The worst episode is harder. I don't think any of the episodes are terrible, I just think a lot of them could have been better. Its probably Empty Places for me, it set ups a dilemma shoddily and unnecessarily, which isn't resolved very well at all.
[I'm aware this isn't the best written post in the world, my thoughts on season 7 are somewhat fragmented. Meh)
Labels: buffy, television
