TV meme seen on f-lists other than my own
The story: A supernatural glitch in your DVR occurs. At first you panic, hitting lots of random buttons on your remote control, but then are RELIEVED to discover that no, your entire series recording of Golden Girls has not been deleted! But then, just as things appear to be back to normal, there's a puff of smoke, and a fairy appears! You have apparently freed the TV fairy from a televised hell in which she was made to watch endless reruns of Are You Hot?, and as fairies tend to be when freed, she is very grateful and wants to grant you magic wishes.
Now, the fairy has only TV-related powerz, and so she offers you the chance to go back in time and retroactively CHANGE the history of your favorite TV shows with 3.5 wishes!
Uh, I don't have a DVR. But I'll give it a go anyway:
You can go back in time and erase from the fabric of TV history THREE individual episodes of any TV show you want! The rest of the series(es) will not be altered. What do you choose?
Whole episodes? Well, there are some scenes in particular episodes I'd really like to erase, if only to maintain the integrity of established characterizations, or to rewrite so that the story made more sense or made more effective use of introduced plot elements. Other times, there are episodes that I find a bit slow so I skip them, but I don't dislike them enough to wish for permanent disappearance. There are not that many I'd want to ditch completely and I doubt I could remember all of them anyway.
Without being able to delve into the complete history of my TV viewing, the ones I'd erase completely are:
-- "Emancipation" from SG1 because it was clunkily written back in season 1 when TPTB were trying way too hard to make the then-Captain Samatha Carter "tough" and "equal to any man." Sledgehammer, anyone?
-- Whichever episode of CSI:NY that features the most screentime of the recurring character Det. Maka, played by Kelly Hu. I don't know if she was just miscast or simply can't act. Det. Maka was smug, overconfident, didn't come across as being all that bright, and lacked the chemistry to fit in with the regular cast members.
-- "Malone v. Malone" from Without a Trace because Jack Malone's soon-to-be ex-wife comes off as a completely unsympathetic, heartless bitch even though Jack had cheated on her first. I don't like how her character was made out to be so extremely vengeful. Yeah, custody battles can get really ugly, but this was too much. She became a caricature just to provide a reason to get some backstory on Jack. Really, doesn't he get enough storylines and scenes focused on him anyway?
You can go back in time and revive ONE unfairly cancelled television show and return it to the annals of TV history!
Sorry
jackuon, but I'd pick Miracles, not the incredibly popular Firefly. I consider it to be the smarter, more mature forerunner of the CW's Supernatural, which is enjoyable in its own right. Miracles was favorably reviewed by critics when it first aired in 2003, but its scheduled airing time got switched around a lot and it didn't look like it was promoted enough by ABC. However, ABC (owned by Disney) does get points for producing the possibly controversial show in the first place. I didn't think it was insulting or blasphemous to religion, but there was still the potential to be misinterpreted by the more zealously conservative segments of the viewership. It was sort of a spiritual X-Files from the POV of a character who used to work for the Catholic church but is now questioning his beliefs even as he acts as the moral/spiritual center of the series. The beginnings of an overarching mythology were seeded into the series though most episodes were standalones. The creator/producers have stated they wanted the show to be mostly about the cases the characters investigated, while they put in just enough hints of a mythology to hook the scifi/fantasy fans. Well, it worked on me! I remember I was taken aback initially by their blunt statement of calculation, but entertainment is an industry after all and they hadn't said it in a snobbish, condescending way. They struck a really nice balance between the individual adventures and mysterious mythology. Taking the audience into consideration CAN help writers sometimes -- it's not always about pandering or dumbing down to the lowest common denominator. Balance is something that The X-Files couldn't quite achieve during much of the second half of its run. Too bad Miracles lasted only 13 episodes, of which only 7 (?) aired before ABC prematurely canned it. Fortunately, the DVD set of the complete series was released in 2005.
LIFE AND DEATH! You can now bring ONE character back from the dead... and, to restore the balance, you must also kill off a character! They don't have to be from the same fandom.
Oh boy. Dr. Carson Beckett from SGA should've lived. (It was him or Dr. Elizabeth Weir, but I'm pretty sure they're not killing her off.) I might change my mind later if there's an even more egregious choice for a ratings stunt via death on a show I like. Who should die? Even though I haven't seen season 3 yet, I vote for Lucius Lavin, also from SGA. The character sounds like he shouldn't be used for more than 2 episodes anyhow.
ETA: 6:45 p.m. How on earth did I leave off the third and a half wish? Here it is:
Bonus tradeoff: you can delete a single scene, relationship pairing or plot arc from any series that gave you hives... AND you can plug in any one [scene, pairing, plot arc] that you never got to see!
Any series, but only one...damn. Over on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, I always felt that there wasn't enough time left in the series for everyone to adjust to Ezri Dax. They did a decent job with the time they had though. However, I didn't like the Ezri/Worf pairing. It was a short-lived affair, but it wasn't necessary for Ezri and Worf to sleep together. I didn't mind the feelings of confusion and awkwardness between them. Just the sex part, since it didn't even help resolve the issue.
For some reason, I would've liked to see Jadzia and Julian actually try to date semi-seriously, but then just laugh it off after a couple of tries because it felt too weird. Julian Bashir is a romantic, so he'd always be a tiny bit in love with Jadzia Dax even while knowing from experience it wouldn't really work. See, then that would keep some of the original oddness from when Julian and Ezri were just getting to be friends. And it would make their romantic relationship feel more natural, more like it was something Ezri Dax genuinely wants instead of her being confused by Jadzia's own latent feelings. Yeah, I know they tried to make it clear that the latter wasn't the case when J & E hooked up, but I keep seeing it.
OK, are you interested in doing this meme,
jackuonand
racquaon?
Now, the fairy has only TV-related powerz, and so she offers you the chance to go back in time and retroactively CHANGE the history of your favorite TV shows with 3.5 wishes!
Uh, I don't have a DVR. But I'll give it a go anyway:
You can go back in time and erase from the fabric of TV history THREE individual episodes of any TV show you want! The rest of the series(es) will not be altered. What do you choose?
Whole episodes? Well, there are some scenes in particular episodes I'd really like to erase, if only to maintain the integrity of established characterizations, or to rewrite so that the story made more sense or made more effective use of introduced plot elements. Other times, there are episodes that I find a bit slow so I skip them, but I don't dislike them enough to wish for permanent disappearance. There are not that many I'd want to ditch completely and I doubt I could remember all of them anyway.
Without being able to delve into the complete history of my TV viewing, the ones I'd erase completely are:
-- "Emancipation" from SG1 because it was clunkily written back in season 1 when TPTB were trying way too hard to make the then-Captain Samatha Carter "tough" and "equal to any man." Sledgehammer, anyone?
-- Whichever episode of CSI:NY that features the most screentime of the recurring character Det. Maka, played by Kelly Hu. I don't know if she was just miscast or simply can't act. Det. Maka was smug, overconfident, didn't come across as being all that bright, and lacked the chemistry to fit in with the regular cast members.
-- "Malone v. Malone" from Without a Trace because Jack Malone's soon-to-be ex-wife comes off as a completely unsympathetic, heartless bitch even though Jack had cheated on her first. I don't like how her character was made out to be so extremely vengeful. Yeah, custody battles can get really ugly, but this was too much. She became a caricature just to provide a reason to get some backstory on Jack. Really, doesn't he get enough storylines and scenes focused on him anyway?
You can go back in time and revive ONE unfairly cancelled television show and return it to the annals of TV history!
Sorry
jackuon, but I'd pick Miracles, not the incredibly popular Firefly. I consider it to be the smarter, more mature forerunner of the CW's Supernatural, which is enjoyable in its own right. Miracles was favorably reviewed by critics when it first aired in 2003, but its scheduled airing time got switched around a lot and it didn't look like it was promoted enough by ABC. However, ABC (owned by Disney) does get points for producing the possibly controversial show in the first place. I didn't think it was insulting or blasphemous to religion, but there was still the potential to be misinterpreted by the more zealously conservative segments of the viewership. It was sort of a spiritual X-Files from the POV of a character who used to work for the Catholic church but is now questioning his beliefs even as he acts as the moral/spiritual center of the series. The beginnings of an overarching mythology were seeded into the series though most episodes were standalones. The creator/producers have stated they wanted the show to be mostly about the cases the characters investigated, while they put in just enough hints of a mythology to hook the scifi/fantasy fans. Well, it worked on me! I remember I was taken aback initially by their blunt statement of calculation, but entertainment is an industry after all and they hadn't said it in a snobbish, condescending way. They struck a really nice balance between the individual adventures and mysterious mythology. Taking the audience into consideration CAN help writers sometimes -- it's not always about pandering or dumbing down to the lowest common denominator. Balance is something that The X-Files couldn't quite achieve during much of the second half of its run. Too bad Miracles lasted only 13 episodes, of which only 7 (?) aired before ABC prematurely canned it. Fortunately, the DVD set of the complete series was released in 2005.
LIFE AND DEATH! You can now bring ONE character back from the dead... and, to restore the balance, you must also kill off a character! They don't have to be from the same fandom.
Oh boy. Dr. Carson Beckett from SGA should've lived. (It was him or Dr. Elizabeth Weir, but I'm pretty sure they're not killing her off.) I might change my mind later if there's an even more egregious choice for a ratings stunt via death on a show I like. Who should die? Even though I haven't seen season 3 yet, I vote for Lucius Lavin, also from SGA. The character sounds like he shouldn't be used for more than 2 episodes anyhow.
ETA: 6:45 p.m. How on earth did I leave off the third and a half wish? Here it is:
Bonus tradeoff: you can delete a single scene, relationship pairing or plot arc from any series that gave you hives... AND you can plug in any one [scene, pairing, plot arc] that you never got to see!
Any series, but only one...damn. Over on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, I always felt that there wasn't enough time left in the series for everyone to adjust to Ezri Dax. They did a decent job with the time they had though. However, I didn't like the Ezri/Worf pairing. It was a short-lived affair, but it wasn't necessary for Ezri and Worf to sleep together. I didn't mind the feelings of confusion and awkwardness between them. Just the sex part, since it didn't even help resolve the issue.
For some reason, I would've liked to see Jadzia and Julian actually try to date semi-seriously, but then just laugh it off after a couple of tries because it felt too weird. Julian Bashir is a romantic, so he'd always be a tiny bit in love with Jadzia Dax even while knowing from experience it wouldn't really work. See, then that would keep some of the original oddness from when Julian and Ezri were just getting to be friends. And it would make their romantic relationship feel more natural, more like it was something Ezri Dax genuinely wants instead of her being confused by Jadzia's own latent feelings. Yeah, I know they tried to make it clear that the latter wasn't the case when J & E hooked up, but I keep seeing it.
OK, are you interested in doing this meme,
jackuonand
racquaon?