TV stuff.
Just some brief thoughts on the new TV season. (No spoilers for anything at all.)
New Shows:
Commander In Chief is my favourite new drama of the year. I'm finding Geena Davies slightly annoying, but Donald Sutherland as Templeton is terrific, and there was just no way I wasn't going to love a drama with a political setting. It's nowhere near as good as The West Wing's early season, and probably still slightly inferior to the current West Wing, but still really good. I loved the first episode of Reunion, and the premise is terrific, but it went very bad very quickly. Neither Supernatural nor Bones inspired me to watch past the first episode, though I'll give Bones another go some time because I feel guilty giving up a show that has a BtVS actor in a starring role. My favourite of all was Head Cases, of which I loved the first two episodes, and had high hopes for it becoming one of my favourite shows as the season continued. Of course, it got cancelled after just two episodes. I just don't get American audiences sometimes. I despise the networks for cancelling the shows, but they wouldn't cancel shows if millions and millions of people were watching them. I really wish mainstream taste was more in sync with my own.
Comedy wise, I absolutely love Everybody Hates Chris, and I really enjoy My Name Is Earl, but I gave up on How I Met Your Mother and Kitchen Confidential after a few episodes. I feel guilty about that too, for obvious reasons, but I laughed so few times watching them that it just wasn't worth it. The latter was especially disappointing because I really do think Nicholas Brendon is an enormously underrated and under-appreciated actor, and it would have been nice to see him in a show where he could really show how good his comedic timing is, but I guess it wasn't to be.
Returning Shows:
Veronica Mars is having an even better season this time, which is saying something. Episodes 1 and 3 were terrific. 2, 4 and 5 were mediocre, I thought, but since then the series has kicked into gear and the last run of episodes have been really high quality. Alias is having its weakest season yet I think, though it's still incredibly disappointing to hear that this season will be the last. I'm enjoying Rachel Nicholls in it, though it's a sad reminder that another really superb show, The Inside, was cancelled after so few episodes. Lost is another show that I thought had an excellent pilot, then had some mediocre episodes towards the start of the season, but has had a strong run of episodes. It's still doing some things that annoy me (like not answering loads of the unanswered questions it has posed over the past season and a half!), but I'm still looking forward to each new episode. I think Smallville is having its best start to a season yet, where as The Amazing Race is definitely having its worst season. I'm sure they realise that this family thing was a mistake (I had high hopes for it, but clearly that was foolish of me!)
I really watch way too many TV shows.
My top 5 shows of the year so far:
1) Veronica Mars
2) Smallville
3) Everybody Hates Chris
4) Lost
5) The West Wing
I just found out that if you cancel SkyPlus, you can't even watch the shows you've already recorded. That sucks! We cancelled Sky because it just wasn't worth spending such an enormous amount of money when we only watched a few shows on there. It has stopped me from catching up with the first season of Desperate Housewives which I had been watching on E4 (until I get an external hard drive and can start downloading seasons again), I have to wait a few days to watch wrestling, and I can no longer watch Without A Trace since unfortunately that doesn't seem to be a popular show among downloaders so I never see full season releases online, and I'm over a season behind. But other than that, the effect is small. Proving that spending £50 a month on it was not good value. At all.
I really hope Sky get some strong competition so that they'll have to lower prices!
New Shows:
Commander In Chief is my favourite new drama of the year. I'm finding Geena Davies slightly annoying, but Donald Sutherland as Templeton is terrific, and there was just no way I wasn't going to love a drama with a political setting. It's nowhere near as good as The West Wing's early season, and probably still slightly inferior to the current West Wing, but still really good. I loved the first episode of Reunion, and the premise is terrific, but it went very bad very quickly. Neither Supernatural nor Bones inspired me to watch past the first episode, though I'll give Bones another go some time because I feel guilty giving up a show that has a BtVS actor in a starring role. My favourite of all was Head Cases, of which I loved the first two episodes, and had high hopes for it becoming one of my favourite shows as the season continued. Of course, it got cancelled after just two episodes. I just don't get American audiences sometimes. I despise the networks for cancelling the shows, but they wouldn't cancel shows if millions and millions of people were watching them. I really wish mainstream taste was more in sync with my own.
Comedy wise, I absolutely love Everybody Hates Chris, and I really enjoy My Name Is Earl, but I gave up on How I Met Your Mother and Kitchen Confidential after a few episodes. I feel guilty about that too, for obvious reasons, but I laughed so few times watching them that it just wasn't worth it. The latter was especially disappointing because I really do think Nicholas Brendon is an enormously underrated and under-appreciated actor, and it would have been nice to see him in a show where he could really show how good his comedic timing is, but I guess it wasn't to be.
Returning Shows:
Veronica Mars is having an even better season this time, which is saying something. Episodes 1 and 3 were terrific. 2, 4 and 5 were mediocre, I thought, but since then the series has kicked into gear and the last run of episodes have been really high quality. Alias is having its weakest season yet I think, though it's still incredibly disappointing to hear that this season will be the last. I'm enjoying Rachel Nicholls in it, though it's a sad reminder that another really superb show, The Inside, was cancelled after so few episodes. Lost is another show that I thought had an excellent pilot, then had some mediocre episodes towards the start of the season, but has had a strong run of episodes. It's still doing some things that annoy me (like not answering loads of the unanswered questions it has posed over the past season and a half!), but I'm still looking forward to each new episode. I think Smallville is having its best start to a season yet, where as The Amazing Race is definitely having its worst season. I'm sure they realise that this family thing was a mistake (I had high hopes for it, but clearly that was foolish of me!)
I really watch way too many TV shows.
My top 5 shows of the year so far:
1) Veronica Mars
2) Smallville
3) Everybody Hates Chris
4) Lost
5) The West Wing
I just found out that if you cancel SkyPlus, you can't even watch the shows you've already recorded. That sucks! We cancelled Sky because it just wasn't worth spending such an enormous amount of money when we only watched a few shows on there. It has stopped me from catching up with the first season of Desperate Housewives which I had been watching on E4 (until I get an external hard drive and can start downloading seasons again), I have to wait a few days to watch wrestling, and I can no longer watch Without A Trace since unfortunately that doesn't seem to be a popular show among downloaders so I never see full season releases online, and I'm over a season behind. But other than that, the effect is small. Proving that spending £50 a month on it was not good value. At all.
I really hope Sky get some strong competition so that they'll have to lower prices!