Criminal Minds and Being Human
I finished watching Criminal Minds season 2. It was about the same as season 1. There were a few decent episodes, there were some really not good episodes. Overall, it hasn't gotten better, but at least it has not gotten worse. Some of the scenarios/cases are over the top in this season. (I say as if any serial killing is not "over the top".....) Specifically, episodes "Sex, Birth, Death" and "The Last Word" are examples of really depraved and twisted killers. In fact, the former is so bizarre and disturbing that I feel its a bit too much to have been aired on network television.
The writers did attempt to develop some of the characters. We see this with the episode ("Profiler, Profiled") that takes place in Chicago and provides us with some yucky details of Morgan's past. This isn't a great episode, but it does represent the entire season. Basically, one of the overarching concepts of this season is that those in the BAU are just as much hunters as the killers in the episode "Open Season." The last episode drives this point home with a scene involving Agent Hotchner.
There are a variety of cases. One involves Muslim fanatical terrorism, another bank robberies, another the Russian mob. However, and this is one of my complaints about the show, practically all the killers/killings are traced back to some depravity involving sex. It seems like the goal of the BAU is to connect how a killing relates to sex - in some way. Now, surely, there are some sexually-motivated serial killers. However, watching this season, I feel like underneath all the variables and circumstances, it all starts with deviant sex. Did Freud write this show? Are the writers channeling him?
I still like Garcia. Elle is gone in this season (and she was the only eye-candy). Overall, I have trouble rating this series. I guess somewhere between 2 and 3 stars for this season. It wasn't very good. However, its "easy" to watch in that one episode just rolls into another and another. Moving right along....
I also watched the first season of being human. This is the BBC British version of the show. It only consisted of 6 episodes. However, a lot of storyline is completed in those six episodes, so I guess the writers did a good job.
After the first episode, I was a little unsure what to expect. It was a lot darker than I thought it would be. And it has, at times, this amateurish camera-work that seems to me to be what would happen if it was filmed by an amateur soap opera cameraman. Not that it is bad, it is just very different from what I am used to watching.
Needless to say, the show is in British. Yes, British. Its that language that I think is like English, but is inflected all oddly and is, therefore, British. I hate British. I hate it because try as hard as I can, I cannot understand it, so I get frustrated. All the inflections seem all wrong. Watching this show took a little bit of work from me because I had to concentrate at times and learn each character's speech patterns in order to grasp the content of the dialogue.
There are three main characters with about three other supporting characters. The three main characters are a vampire (Mitchell), a werewolf (George), and a ghost (Annie). The supporting characters are a nurse (Nina), a vampire posing as a cop (Herrick), and the ex-boyfriend (Owen) of the ghost. Overall, the characters are not entirely likeable, though you don't really hate them. By the sixth episode, you care slightly about them. There is a good deal of blood and nakedness, so not a show for the weak stomached.
Sometimes the show is boring - nothing happening, dialogue boring - and then suddenly, there are some really great funny moments. For example, in episode five, George and Annie have a moment that is so funny, I had to pause the DVD player so that I could laugh. (Its the scene where they beat up the guy in the funeral home and George has a line about "ninjas.") Also, in this same episode, Annie wants to scare Owen and is practicing being "scary." Annie tries to make herself seem scary as she says: "Confesssssssssss!" ---- and I think my household will be permanently saying this word the way she says it in this episode.
Bad things: Annie is stuck in the same clothing. And I hate her outfit and am so sick of seeing it! Also, some of the language is a bit much - even if it is said in British. (In fact, one time a noun is used in such a way as I have never heard it used before. Baffling.)\
Overall, I have to give this three stars because even if it doesn't seem great, in a mere six episodes the writers succeeded more than in 40 episodes of Criminal Minds. Also, being human seems like it could get even better as it develops.