The Facts Are These . . .

Well, rumor has it that "Pushing Daisies" is gone after the thirteen episodes ABC ordered for this season (I'll forgo the obvious death jokes). That's too bad, it was a really great show, though, admittedly it was probably a bit to quirky to survive on network television. Still, I'll definitely miss it. The good news is that, apparently, creator Bryan Fuller plans to wrap up the story in a comic (so I'll get some closure). The other bright side, if his earlier statements are true, Fuller will return to "Heroes" now that Daisies is cancelled; maybe he can help right the ship over there (though I'd much rather have new "Pushing Daisies").

Oh well, yet another show to add to the "Brilliant, but cancelled" list.

Farewell, Doctor

Sad news.

David Tennant has announced that he won't be back as the Doctor when Doctor Who returns in 2010 (though he will return for the four specials scheduled to run through next year). I'm sorry to hear it as Tennant has become my favorite incarnation of the Doctor, and I'll miss him terrible when he leaves. Still, I see his point, better to go out on a high note that wait for everyone to get sick of you. He's right about something else, one of the most fun times to be a Doctor Who fan is when you know a new Doctor is coming. Let the speculation on the eleventh Doctor begin. One recent rumor involved an actor named Patterson Joseph, that's him below:



I've only seen him in a couple of things, so I can't speak to how good he'd be in the role, but I like the idea that the producers might be willing to go with a non-white Doctor. I'm sure it would be controversial, but really, the Doctor changes age, height, weight, eye and hair color, and personality with each regeneration, is skin color really that big of a deal?

At any rate, I look forward to Tennant's final four adventures as the Doctor and look forward to seeing what comes next for him and for Doctor Who.

Jumped the Shark?

It's been fashionable since season two to dump on Heroes (for that matter, some folks started their griping as soon as the first season finale aired), and, of course, with that comes the inevitable (and cliched) question, has Heroes jumped the shark? While I don't think it's that bad, I do feel like something's missing from the show. After a promising start this season, the show has gotten bogged down in too many characters and too many of those characters making strange or stupid decisions. Entertainment Weekly has an article this week titled "'Heroes': Five Ways to Fix a Series in Crisis" detailing what the writer thinks should be done to return Heroes to form. Some suggestions I agree with, some I don't. Taking them point by point:

1. "Retire Some Capes"
Agreed. The cast as is, is too big. C'mon, they killed off Nikki last season, that was a good start as it both thinned the main cast as helped show that there are life or death stakes here. Unfortunately, the writers decided to bring the actress back as a new character, so it's all ended up as a wash. For my money, Tracy and Nathan are the easy picks for dead-weight. I've always kind of liked Suresh, but I think, with this season's story, his story is at an end. I do disagree with the article's suggestion to eliminate Parkman. I see Jeff Jenson's (the article's writer) point, the shows writers really don't seem to know what to do with the guy, and so he would logically be a good candidate to be cut, but I just really like the character so I'm going to ignore logic here. The indispensible core, I think, remains Peter, HRG, Hiro and Ando, and, maybe, Claire, though with Claire I think we again have a character that the writers aren't sure what to do with. As for Sylar, I've got mixed feelings. He's a great villain, but if he's to remain a villain, then maybe it's time to draw his story to a close. On the other hand, they seem to be trying to redeem him this season, which, if they'll commit to going down that road could make for an interesting turn. I've got a soft spot for redemption stories, so I hope this is where they're going with him. If he flips again, things could start to get repetitive, as every season seems to end up boiling down to "we've got to stop Sylar."

2. "Make the Heroes Smarter"
Yeah, agreed. One of the big problems with this season has been characters making inexplicably stupid decisions. The article hits the highlights.

3. "Get Back to the Heroes' Roots"
This one, I hadn't really thought about on my own, but now that I do I think there is some truth to it. When the show started it was about ordinary people coping with extraordinary abilities. Now it's about extraordinary people coping with shadowy conspiracies. Maybe it's time to give the Heroes a clean victory, end all the big, scary organizations, and return to real life. The motivating question then becomes, what now? That could be an interesting story arc.

4. "Get a New Bag of Tricks"
Fair enough. Let's have a moritorium on bleak futures for a bit, eh? And as much as I love the art of Tim Sale, maybe the next time we need a precognitive character they can manifest their ability in some way other than painting.

5. "Find a Big Vision - and Set an End Date"
This point I disagree with. The argument is to create a long term plan for the show mapping out a path to a definite conclusion, citing "Lost" as an example of this. There's a segment of genre fandom that tends to push this idea as being universally the way to go. I don't think so. Certainly some shows are suited to this type of long-term planning; I don't watch "Lost", but I would offer "Battlestar Galactica" as an example of a show that fits this model, as it's a show with a single question embeded in the premise. Therefore, the overall thrust of the show needs to be about answering that question. That's not true of "Heroes". "Heroes", I think, would be better served following the "Buffy" model of plotting out arcs by the season rather than trying to clearly map the series as a whole. This is sort of what they've been doing, they just need to up their game a bit.

So, with a few minor quibles, I'm generally in agreement with the article. That said, I'm still with "Heroes", I haven't contemplated jumping ship yet. Let's just hope things start to get better.

TV Review: Crusoe

Friday, NBC premiered its new show, Crusoe. Apparently it's a limited run, thirteen hour series. If the first two hours are any indication, the remaining eleven won't be worth the trouble.

Last week, I read a commentary on Ain't It Cool News about the current state of Heroes. The writer brought up the idea of the "idiot plot" (a plot that only works because the characters behave like idiots). Crusoe seems to have fully embraced the "idiot plot." My favorite example of this comes near the end of the episode. The combined forces of the pirates and Spanish sailors lay siege to Crusoe and Friday in their massive tree fort (I'll talk more about this place later). I didn't count how many of these guys there were exactly, but they had to outnumber Crusoe and Friday by at least five to one. So, what's there plan for dealing with our heroes? Constructing a trebuchet and lobbing lit barrels of gun powder at them.

What could possible go wrong with a plan like that? Well, you've probably already guessed what goes wrong.

Now, I might just chalk this flawed planning to the bad guys just being stupid, but these are the guys that were able to construct a working trebuchet out of available materials.

Speaking of construction, lets talk about that tree fort Crusoe lives in. It appears to be a pretty impressive feat of engineering. It begs the question, if he's had the time, material, and know-how to build this thing, so why doesn't he just build a freaking boat and get off the island.

There are so many things that don't work with this program that I could keep going on and on, but I've already expended far too much thought on this show. I'll just leave it at this: If you've been waiting for a faithful adaptation of the novel, you'll be waiting a while longer.

Lives on Mars

Two episodes of the American version of Life on Mars have now aired. I didn't have much to say about the first episode, largely because it was pretty faithful to the first episode of the British series. I did really like the shot that established that Sam was in the past: the camera pulls back to reveal the World Trade Center in the background. That's the advantage of having the show take place in NYC; the British show had a similar shot, but it didn't have that iconic building with all that emotional baggage to play with. The cast is pretty solid, though I'm not quite sold yet on Gretchen Mol as Annie, not that she's bad in the role, I just liked the British Annie so much more.

Tonight's episode was the American show's first opportunity to exert its own individual identity. The episode didn't blow me away, but it was good enough to keep me watching. It looked like they're picking up at least one plot point from the original, the flash of the woman in the red dress running through the woods. It'll be interesting to see if they go the same place with it. The hippy next door neighbor is a new addition, and maybe she'll end up being a great character, but right now I'm thinking she might get real tiresome really quickly. Another change, that I find more interesting, is that this Sam seems to have a stronger connection to the present than his British counterpart. We get a flashback (or flash forward, geez this is going to get confusing) this week where we get a little glimpse of Sam's relationship with Maya in 2008. Maya existed in the British version, but she wasn't much of a presence beyond the pilot (I think she might have been completely forgotten by the time they got to the final episode). My only major complaint so far is that the dialogue can be a bit clunky in places, mostly with the Gene Hunt character. I don't think the writers have quite got a handle on him yet.

Overall, I'd say the show is interesting, but with its share of flaws. This actually leaves me optimistic about the show because it invites a comparison to another British import, The Office. The first season of the American Office, while good, was still a little shaky while it found its voice. The show's gone on to be one of the best sitcoms on TV right now. So, I'm willing to be patient with Life on Mars in the hopes that it finds its way to excellence as well.

Life On Mars

I've discovered that BBC America is running a marathon of Life On Mars today, no doubt in the run-up to the premiere of the American version of the show on ABC later this week. What's interesting, is the BBC America is running it with occasional subtitles. Let's think about that for a minute. A show, shot in English with English subtitles. I understand that there are some parts of the UK where the accent is thick enough that it might be difficult for an American audience to understand, but there aren't any real problem accents on this show. Even more ridiculous, I think I notice one of the subtitles that didn't exactly match what was said.

As to the American version, I'm looking forward to seeing what they do with it. It's a show with a strange basic concept (a cop in the present gets hit by a car and falls into a coma, and wakes up in 1973), so I wonder if it'll be able to find an audience on American TV. Especially with such an obscure title (it's from a Bowie song). The other question is how long an American show allow the ambiguity of the situation (is he crazy, in a coma, or is it really happening). The BBC show had the advantage of only shooting, I think, 16 episodes. The American version is going to have to outpace that in one season, so it'll be interesting to see how they stretch out the story.

The Graysons

According to an article posted yesterday on Variety's website, The CW is developing a show based around a pre-Robin Dick Grayson. Clearly the network is trying to find a replacement for the aging Smallville, but I'm not sure this is the right idea. A show about a family of circus acrobats is an interesting idea, and I'm sure a series could be built around it, but I question the value of using the Dick Grayson character, and all the baggage that comes with him, while not taking advantage of his ties to the Batman mythos. Also, from a geeky purist's perspective, the timeline bothers me a bit. As described in the article, I would guess that Dick (called DJ on the show, ugh) would be 14 at the youngest as the series begins. Most likely he'd be a little older, say 15 or 16. So, when is he supposed to become Robin? The standard timeline puts him as younger when his parents are killed and he's taken in by Bruce Wayne. The whole idea is that young Dick's plight resonates with Bruce Wayne, they both watched their parents die at a very young age. Let's say The Graysons starts with 14 year-old Dick. Let's also say that it runs for at least five years (long enough to get to that magic 100 episodes that means syndication gold), the series would end with a 19 year-old, not-Robin, Dick Grayson. Grown-up Robin is stupid, have we learned nothing from Chris O'Donnell in Batman Forever and Batman & Robin?

Ultimately, if the show makes it to air, I'll give it a shot. How could I not? Hopefully the creators will be able to allay my fears and produce a great show.

Chuck!

Chuck's back!

Well, actually it doesn't make it back to television until next Monday, but the season premiere is up online now. As an aside, I think NBC has a pretty clever Internet strategy; premiering certain shows (particularly shows like Chuck or Life that had truncated first seasons due to the strike) early on the web to build buzz.

Back to Chuck, I'd forgotten how much I loved this show. Not surprising given that there hasn't been a new episode since January. The season premiere, Chuck vs. the First Date, was a great reminder of why I like this show. It brings the funny as always, while at the same time keeping the characters and their internal lives and external adventures compelling.

The episode picks up where we left off last season. The government is preparing to activate a new Intersect (apparently built from a first generation Mac. No, seriously, look at it.) and Casey, played by Adam Baldwin, has orders to eliminate the old Intersect (aka Chuck). There's a nice moment in the episode, after Casey has been reminded of his orders, where he chambers a round in his gun and mutters to himself, "I used to like that sound."

Meanwhile, Chuck is excited by the prospect of getting his life back. Yvonne Strahovski as Sarah, does a great job of showing the conflicting feelings of happiness, that Chuck can go back to a normal life, but also a little sadness for herself; she'll miss him.

Looking forward to the rest of the season. The only downside to watching this episode early is that I'll have to wait two weeks for the next new episode. Sigh.

Re: Heroes Season 3 Premiere

Wow. And I thought the X-Men had bleak potential futures.

It seems like no matter what the characters do on Heroes, everything is destined to turn to shit at some point in the future. Season one there was a devastating explosion wiping out most of Manhattan followed by an immensely powerful psychopath becoming president (and so far that seems to be the best of the bunch). Season two we had a glimpse of a world devastated by some kind of super-virus (was it a virus, it's been so long and the season was so short, I've sort of forgotten). This season, in the first episode alone we get a peek at what I think are two different possibles. First we get Dark Peter's future, which seems to be shades of "Days of Future Past" (X-Men reference for my non-geek readers), then we get Hiro's visit to a future with some sort of massive disaster that looks to be wiping out Tokyo, if not the whole world. I'd ask why even bother trying anymore, but then I guess that's why the show's called Heroes.

Other thoughts: Yay, a speedster! And I hope we get to see more of her and Hiro interacting; they're powers are a great match-up. Yay, Kristen Bell's back! I didn't pay close enough attention to the credits to see if she's a regular or not, but hopefully she shows up in a good number of episodes. Yay, Malcolm McDowell's back! Hopefully we'll get to see a good bit of him this season as well, because he's all kinds of awesome. The season's off to a good start, and I'm looking forward to the rest of it.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, we've officially run out of ideas."

Fox has a new reality/game show coming this fall called "Hole in the Wall". The concept behind the game is that the contestants try to match the shape of their bodies to shapes cut into a big yellow wall moving toward them. If they're successful, they pass through the wall as it goes by, if not they get swept into the swimming pool behind them.

That's it. That's all there is to it. This is how Fox proposes to fill airtime this fall.

It's really hard to defend TV sometimes.

The Vast Wasteland

So, it was 3 am the other night (or morning, whatever) and I was still awake, my mind still winding down from the day. I wasn't quite ready to go to sleep, but I wasn't up to start working on anything productive that would keep me up until dawn either. That left me with one option...TV. However, at 3 am I found my choices severely limited. Unless I wanted to watch an infomercial for "male enhancement" products (same infomercial on six different channels, I hope someone's alerted the CDC about this apparent epidemic of need for "enhancement", sounds like a public health disaster in the making), my only choices were a soul-killing dating show on MTV or an author discussing his new book on the Bush administration on C-SPAN. Naturally, I picked the dating show.

After a couple of minutes, though, I could feel my brain cells committing suicide in protest, so I switched back to C-SPAN. The book in question is titled "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder." Cheery title, eh? The author, a former prosecutor, suggests that President Bush can be tried for the murders of all the American troops that have died in Iraq. You can find more information at the book's website here.

He makes a novel argument, but ultimately trying to suggest that the President is guilty of murder for exercising his power as Commander in Chief is foolish and unhelpful. Admittedly, the current administration has used the role of Commander in Chief as a justification to ignore any laws or conventions that it finds inconvenient, but that's precisely why the overblown rhetoric of a book like this drives me up the wall. There is plenty to criticize with how this administration went to war, but an accusation of murder is overreaching and distracts from legitimate criticism. It just seems like more of the trend of politics as bloodsport, and that doesn't do anything to make the country better, it just drags us all down into the dirt.

Admittedly, putting the word "Murder" in the title is certainly sexier than a more reasonable title involving words like "Misled" or "Incompetent", so I'm sure it will sell well to the angry left.

The New Classics?

So, Entertainment Weekly has been making top 100 lists of "New Classics", books, movies, TV shows made since 1983. I tend not to devote much headspace to this sort of thing since, while they're fun to take a look at when the pop up, lists like this are always complete and utter bullshit. That said, there was one thing on this list that puzzled me a bit. Sitting right in the middle at #50 was Baywatch.

Baywatch? Really? This was the 100 best right? Baywatch had its (surgically enhanced) charms, I suppose, but great television it was not.