Late report
It's probably very unfair to many shows that I watch them now, so soon after finishing The Wire. Brilliant shows do that, they somewhat ruin you for "regular"tv. OZ, Buffy and BSG did that to me before,...until I found Breaking Bad.
So I was pretty underwhelmed by the three shows I watched today, The Killing, The Borgias and Game of Thrones, although The Killing continues to be compelling, and grabbed my attention much more than the other two. As entertaining as The Borgias and Game of Thrones are, for different reasons (the latter mostly for its production, the former for Jeremy Irons' performance and the general prettiness) they come across as quite empty and obvious, or at least lacking depth and creativity.
I'm not giving up on those shows yet because if The Wire taught me something is that a tv series needs time. In the first half of the first season, I wasn't raving about The Wire, even though I was aware of the quality of the show, but now I agree that it's one of the best tv series ever and that it deserves all the praises it got. I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't have been raving about Buffy either if I had watched it the "regular way" at the time, that is from the pilot on.
Sometimes you fall in love at first sight (Terriers, Justified for instance, because they hit all my buttons, or even Breaking Bad), but sometimes you have to be patient before a gem is revealed before your eyes. And even if it isn't a pure gem, a ground-breaking series that is so unique and nearly perfect that you worship it, you may nonetheless be on a hell of a ride with very satisfying pay-offs on the way, moments that will stay with you for ever, and eventually find exciting shows that turn out to be such a fantastic journey that they remain among your favourites(The Shield, Lost, Life on Mars, Caprica etc).
So far The Killing has certain flaws, but I'm already hooked on those characters, and on the mystery. The show is playing with tv tropes, and with its kinship with Twin Peaks (although the tone is very different !), and the red herrings that lead us from an episode to another aren't cheap tricks but pieces of a puzzle, parts of a method that consists in having one episode for each passing day while crossing out the potential murderers one by one, before the final resolution happens. In the meantime we get to know better all those characters, and their secrets will be slowly unveiled. It's refreshing to have a female lead like Sarah Linden (she's the spiritual daughter of Clarice Starling and Dana Scully and yet she's her own woman and has that timeless beauty and mysterious vulnerability) and all the actors do an incredible jobs (Rosie's parents are impressive). I also love that even though the murder case is the core of the show, or rather its guiding principle, it isn't a procedural show and that the "who killed Rosie Larsen?" isn't what matters only. The Killing is more about how a whole world slowly unfolds through a murder case and its connections, from the angle of a fait divers involving a dead girl and the inquiry that follows.
Besides I suppose that, given my love for crime novels and dark stuff, it makes sense for me to like that series more than series belonging to other genres.
Now, time to sleep.
So I was pretty underwhelmed by the three shows I watched today, The Killing, The Borgias and Game of Thrones, although The Killing continues to be compelling, and grabbed my attention much more than the other two. As entertaining as The Borgias and Game of Thrones are, for different reasons (the latter mostly for its production, the former for Jeremy Irons' performance and the general prettiness) they come across as quite empty and obvious, or at least lacking depth and creativity.
I'm not giving up on those shows yet because if The Wire taught me something is that a tv series needs time. In the first half of the first season, I wasn't raving about The Wire, even though I was aware of the quality of the show, but now I agree that it's one of the best tv series ever and that it deserves all the praises it got. I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't have been raving about Buffy either if I had watched it the "regular way" at the time, that is from the pilot on.
Sometimes you fall in love at first sight (Terriers, Justified for instance, because they hit all my buttons, or even Breaking Bad), but sometimes you have to be patient before a gem is revealed before your eyes. And even if it isn't a pure gem, a ground-breaking series that is so unique and nearly perfect that you worship it, you may nonetheless be on a hell of a ride with very satisfying pay-offs on the way, moments that will stay with you for ever, and eventually find exciting shows that turn out to be such a fantastic journey that they remain among your favourites(The Shield, Lost, Life on Mars, Caprica etc).
So far The Killing has certain flaws, but I'm already hooked on those characters, and on the mystery. The show is playing with tv tropes, and with its kinship with Twin Peaks (although the tone is very different !), and the red herrings that lead us from an episode to another aren't cheap tricks but pieces of a puzzle, parts of a method that consists in having one episode for each passing day while crossing out the potential murderers one by one, before the final resolution happens. In the meantime we get to know better all those characters, and their secrets will be slowly unveiled. It's refreshing to have a female lead like Sarah Linden (she's the spiritual daughter of Clarice Starling and Dana Scully and yet she's her own woman and has that timeless beauty and mysterious vulnerability) and all the actors do an incredible jobs (Rosie's parents are impressive). I also love that even though the murder case is the core of the show, or rather its guiding principle, it isn't a procedural show and that the "who killed Rosie Larsen?" isn't what matters only. The Killing is more about how a whole world slowly unfolds through a murder case and its connections, from the angle of a fait divers involving a dead girl and the inquiry that follows.
Besides I suppose that, given my love for crime novels and dark stuff, it makes sense for me to like that series more than series belonging to other genres.
Now, time to sleep.