Blah blah. Blah.
In which I randomly blather on and on about my (disappointing?) TV today: House, Smallville, Heroes, Greys, Lost & Supernatural
Ding Dong the strike is over!!
So, yay, on that front… if only we wouldn’t be losing 5/6 eps per show. :( Supernatural will be back with about 4 eps, which means a season of around 16 episodes. I don’t blame the writers and good for them, but I’m sorry about what we viewers are losing!
Although… when I make a rundown of shows I follow, I come to the conclusion that:
House: My fan favourite of last year has completely lost my interest, which is incredible considering the obsession I had with it only 6 months ago. Since they tossed the 3 ducklings in favour of 3 new ones, I just don’t know what the point is anymore. We spent 3 years (besides the medical mystery!) on House developing relationships with his collegues (other than Wilson and Cuddy who are his general support group), who he slowly unravels, but who also slowly crack his armor, and then *poof* he loses them and the whole thing starts over again with 3 new (vastly uninteresting and poor) substitutes. If all the characterisation, build and progress of the last 3 years is undone just to bring in a fresh face and the show dumps the people I’ve invested in all that time (read: Chase!), why should I care to keep watching? I think Thirteen (is she still called that?!) is simply Cameron2. I was never a big Cameron fan but I appreciated her presence and I would have preferred the original over the new! and improved! and even more damaged! MS version. I thought I might like Kumar, but found him bland and boring. Taub? Eh, don’t we already have a character who struggles with fidelity issues (re: Wilson)? What’s the point of these new people? Just to have House shock them all over again by injecting/electrocuting himself? We’ve done all that. Where’s the repercussions of House’s growing mentorship of Chase who seemed to be starting to equal him in diagnosing, his sort of opening up to the femininity and conscience of Cameron, his struggle for authority with Foreman? All gone. Sure, they’re kinda sorta around (to keep viewers like me hanging, I suppose), most prominently Foreman (my least favourite duckling after learning he abandoned his of Alzheimer’s disease suffering mom because it was ‘just too darn difficult to face’), but it actually would be better if they’d all just gone. I would’ve stopped watching then with ep 4.1 instead of wasting my time on the first 8 or so eps. I haven’t seen the last few eps cause I can’t be bothered anymore.
Smallville: Is getting more and more ridiculous (and I realise that’s saying something). The Lara clone? The Julian clone? Lex’s little rainy ‘Why, God! Why?’ moment on the roof after having his faux!bad actor!brother shot? The never-ending Clana? Even Chloe does little more lately than make hokey little quips and invent nicknames while she continues to pine for Jimmy Olsen (I mean, wtf?). The lacklustre acting (mostly by Kreuk and Welling) is certainly not helping. Especially Welling is looking like he’s just boredboredbored with the whole thing, and I realise he’s not the best actor and maybe I’ve excused it in the past or something on account on him being so very pretty and all, but it seems like he’s not even really trying now. Perhaps even he is tired of the repetitive, endless Clana scenes. Just break them up already! How long can this soulsuckingsuckage continue? And let’s see a (sort of) good storyline for a change (writer’s be good!), as I don’t think I’ve seen one since season 5. Just because Smallville is craptastic, doesn’t mean the plot is negligible, far-fetched or not. Let’s have Lex do something, Lionel evil something, and Clark ‘n Chloe actually solve a plot again.
Heroes: Talked about my problems with the plot and characterisation earlier. I loved the first season, and have not bothered to rewatch a single ep of the second one, which for me is saying: boring and dragged down by its own clutter. I really hope Kring manages to create something worthwhile for season 3 to bring this show out of its slump, because it had such great potential. Perhaps getting rid of the huge amount of (new) characters and creating a tighter plot will do wonders?
Greys Anatomy: I’m not that invested in the first place, but I was bored most of this season (most of last too). The double parter didn’t do it for me this year either while that had me glued to the screen previously. The last ep with Bailey’s baby was a monstrosity in my opinion: really playing on the heartstings with the baby but falling completely flat in its portrayal of married life. I hate how they’ve degenerated the previously stable love-life of Bailey for kicks. I used to love her character, but her constant crying jags and emo-trips are just getting on my nerves now (as as her husband’s whinge-fests). Wish they could have had one successful, progressive couple in the bunch, but apparently it is impossible for a man to be happy to take care of his son and let his wife be the provider despite the fact that the opposite happens all the time without complaint. The fact that Bailey’s baby was pulverised under her medical books was a blunt anvil to the front of the head. Women beware, if you want to have a marriage and a baby, do not aspire a carreer! Your husband will resent you and you will kill your baby! Lucky there was a faith healer in the hospital, eh? *rolls eyes*
I wish Greys could have one single successful relationship: I am actually liking the McSteamy/Hahn flirtation and wish they could just go ballpark with it. He’s so pretty and she not so much. He already showed he really wanted a real relationship with real love and trust with Addison, she’s keeping a distance because she thinks he’s not seriously interested. I would love it if Hahn would just give it a shot and they would just, in a relaxed and non-dramatic manner, fall in love, be together and be professional at work, have a successful career that doesn’t get in the way, and where both are just simply loyal to each other! The fact that it would be McSteamy the secretly homey hubby and Hahn the battleaxe would make it to me both ironic and satisfying. Let’s show some real adult people who share some real trust: with no stupid temptations/trysts/affairs/dead babies. Alas, in Greys world, everyone sleeps with everyone, everyone breaks up with everyone, and everyone is damaged by everyone. Especially if the love of your life has just died, is dying or wants to die, then dumps you.
But at least the Gizzy is over, so who knows how much it’ll improve!
Lost: Just started again so not too much to say. Hated the finale last season (think I already talked about it, but): I don’t wanna know how everything ends, who gets saved and where they’ll end up or that Jack’s a dumb drunk who can’t have a fulfilling life without his special status on the island! I wanted the very final scene of this show to be the rescue of whoever is left, and to fill in the blanks of their return to normal life (if possible) myself. There’s no tension in any dealings with the Oceanic 6 (when we find them all out) on the island because we know they get off eventually, so they’re pretty much safe.
However, with the premiere I also see some potential in the mystery of why only 6 get off the island, and wondering what happened to the rest (still there? Dead?): So I guess the journey is still keeping me hooked, if less invested. The new people from the helicopter are interesting (though the blatant ghost whisperer I find way too supernatural for Lost - it is one thing to believe the Island is ‘special’, but now it’s the world itself too which makes the Island… less special). However, there are so many damn people on or circling the damn Island and so many settlements, boats, ruins, underground facilities etc. etc. that I expect the Losties to turn a tree next and find a McDonalds or a Walmart. Hell, they’d have enough business.
Too many people means very little characterisation… so I hope the plot will be tight and going somewhere at least. Though I am glad the flashbacks have diminished. I always preferred the focus in the here and now on the island.
Supernatural: Since this is my current favourite and great love, I will excuse it a lot. Lots and lots. New eps excite me to no end, so I won’t get into it too deeply, but I do think that season 3 has started out pretty weak. It’s not heading the way I thought/hoped it would, but I am willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Malleus Maleficarum was an aweful ep, but I loved Dream a Little Dream (actually the first ep this season I immediately watched again), and I hope things will start looking up (next one up looks great). Though I enjoyed the first season, I didn’t get into the show until way past the half-way mark that season, and I loved S2 much, much more (I am a huge Dean girl), to the finale AHBLII, which many people have problems with but which is one of my favourite episodes of the show. Season 3 has been compiled of hits and misses (where I loved pretty much every ep of S2) just like S1, but I’m far from done with SPN. In fact, the idea of it getting cancelled because of disappointing ratings is distressing to me!
Luckily SPN abounds in amazing fanfic written by amazing writers: Much more so than most fandoms I’ve been in. Perhaps like Highlander and Hercules it’s the fic and discussion that lifts the show, instead of the other way around (I wouldn’t have said that in S2)? That means the writers really have to step it up. I’ll have to see where Kripke is going with all this anti-Sam stuff, and if he’ll have the guts to send Dean to hell (even if its temporary and we don’t get to see it, I’m really hoping they will). I want the eps to blow me away like they did last season.
I am very excited about today’s ep, and annoyed that I’ll have to wait a week to watch it because I’ll be gone a week to go skiing. Stupid social life. :)
Ding Dong the strike is over!!
So, yay, on that front… if only we wouldn’t be losing 5/6 eps per show. :( Supernatural will be back with about 4 eps, which means a season of around 16 episodes. I don’t blame the writers and good for them, but I’m sorry about what we viewers are losing!
Although… when I make a rundown of shows I follow, I come to the conclusion that:
House: My fan favourite of last year has completely lost my interest, which is incredible considering the obsession I had with it only 6 months ago. Since they tossed the 3 ducklings in favour of 3 new ones, I just don’t know what the point is anymore. We spent 3 years (besides the medical mystery!) on House developing relationships with his collegues (other than Wilson and Cuddy who are his general support group), who he slowly unravels, but who also slowly crack his armor, and then *poof* he loses them and the whole thing starts over again with 3 new (vastly uninteresting and poor) substitutes. If all the characterisation, build and progress of the last 3 years is undone just to bring in a fresh face and the show dumps the people I’ve invested in all that time (read: Chase!), why should I care to keep watching? I think Thirteen (is she still called that?!) is simply Cameron2. I was never a big Cameron fan but I appreciated her presence and I would have preferred the original over the new! and improved! and even more damaged! MS version. I thought I might like Kumar, but found him bland and boring. Taub? Eh, don’t we already have a character who struggles with fidelity issues (re: Wilson)? What’s the point of these new people? Just to have House shock them all over again by injecting/electrocuting himself? We’ve done all that. Where’s the repercussions of House’s growing mentorship of Chase who seemed to be starting to equal him in diagnosing, his sort of opening up to the femininity and conscience of Cameron, his struggle for authority with Foreman? All gone. Sure, they’re kinda sorta around (to keep viewers like me hanging, I suppose), most prominently Foreman (my least favourite duckling after learning he abandoned his of Alzheimer’s disease suffering mom because it was ‘just too darn difficult to face’), but it actually would be better if they’d all just gone. I would’ve stopped watching then with ep 4.1 instead of wasting my time on the first 8 or so eps. I haven’t seen the last few eps cause I can’t be bothered anymore.
Smallville: Is getting more and more ridiculous (and I realise that’s saying something). The Lara clone? The Julian clone? Lex’s little rainy ‘Why, God! Why?’ moment on the roof after having his faux!bad actor!brother shot? The never-ending Clana? Even Chloe does little more lately than make hokey little quips and invent nicknames while she continues to pine for Jimmy Olsen (I mean, wtf?). The lacklustre acting (mostly by Kreuk and Welling) is certainly not helping. Especially Welling is looking like he’s just boredboredbored with the whole thing, and I realise he’s not the best actor and maybe I’ve excused it in the past or something on account on him being so very pretty and all, but it seems like he’s not even really trying now. Perhaps even he is tired of the repetitive, endless Clana scenes. Just break them up already! How long can this soulsuckingsuckage continue? And let’s see a (sort of) good storyline for a change (writer’s be good!), as I don’t think I’ve seen one since season 5. Just because Smallville is craptastic, doesn’t mean the plot is negligible, far-fetched or not. Let’s have Lex do something, Lionel evil something, and Clark ‘n Chloe actually solve a plot again.
Heroes: Talked about my problems with the plot and characterisation earlier. I loved the first season, and have not bothered to rewatch a single ep of the second one, which for me is saying: boring and dragged down by its own clutter. I really hope Kring manages to create something worthwhile for season 3 to bring this show out of its slump, because it had such great potential. Perhaps getting rid of the huge amount of (new) characters and creating a tighter plot will do wonders?
Greys Anatomy: I’m not that invested in the first place, but I was bored most of this season (most of last too). The double parter didn’t do it for me this year either while that had me glued to the screen previously. The last ep with Bailey’s baby was a monstrosity in my opinion: really playing on the heartstings with the baby but falling completely flat in its portrayal of married life. I hate how they’ve degenerated the previously stable love-life of Bailey for kicks. I used to love her character, but her constant crying jags and emo-trips are just getting on my nerves now (as as her husband’s whinge-fests). Wish they could have had one successful, progressive couple in the bunch, but apparently it is impossible for a man to be happy to take care of his son and let his wife be the provider despite the fact that the opposite happens all the time without complaint. The fact that Bailey’s baby was pulverised under her medical books was a blunt anvil to the front of the head. Women beware, if you want to have a marriage and a baby, do not aspire a carreer! Your husband will resent you and you will kill your baby! Lucky there was a faith healer in the hospital, eh? *rolls eyes*
I wish Greys could have one single successful relationship: I am actually liking the McSteamy/Hahn flirtation and wish they could just go ballpark with it. He’s so pretty and she not so much. He already showed he really wanted a real relationship with real love and trust with Addison, she’s keeping a distance because she thinks he’s not seriously interested. I would love it if Hahn would just give it a shot and they would just, in a relaxed and non-dramatic manner, fall in love, be together and be professional at work, have a successful career that doesn’t get in the way, and where both are just simply loyal to each other! The fact that it would be McSteamy the secretly homey hubby and Hahn the battleaxe would make it to me both ironic and satisfying. Let’s show some real adult people who share some real trust: with no stupid temptations/trysts/affairs/dead babies. Alas, in Greys world, everyone sleeps with everyone, everyone breaks up with everyone, and everyone is damaged by everyone. Especially if the love of your life has just died, is dying or wants to die, then dumps you.
But at least the Gizzy is over, so who knows how much it’ll improve!
Lost: Just started again so not too much to say. Hated the finale last season (think I already talked about it, but): I don’t wanna know how everything ends, who gets saved and where they’ll end up or that Jack’s a dumb drunk who can’t have a fulfilling life without his special status on the island! I wanted the very final scene of this show to be the rescue of whoever is left, and to fill in the blanks of their return to normal life (if possible) myself. There’s no tension in any dealings with the Oceanic 6 (when we find them all out) on the island because we know they get off eventually, so they’re pretty much safe.
However, with the premiere I also see some potential in the mystery of why only 6 get off the island, and wondering what happened to the rest (still there? Dead?): So I guess the journey is still keeping me hooked, if less invested. The new people from the helicopter are interesting (though the blatant ghost whisperer I find way too supernatural for Lost - it is one thing to believe the Island is ‘special’, but now it’s the world itself too which makes the Island… less special). However, there are so many damn people on or circling the damn Island and so many settlements, boats, ruins, underground facilities etc. etc. that I expect the Losties to turn a tree next and find a McDonalds or a Walmart. Hell, they’d have enough business.
Too many people means very little characterisation… so I hope the plot will be tight and going somewhere at least. Though I am glad the flashbacks have diminished. I always preferred the focus in the here and now on the island.
Supernatural: Since this is my current favourite and great love, I will excuse it a lot. Lots and lots. New eps excite me to no end, so I won’t get into it too deeply, but I do think that season 3 has started out pretty weak. It’s not heading the way I thought/hoped it would, but I am willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Malleus Maleficarum was an aweful ep, but I loved Dream a Little Dream (actually the first ep this season I immediately watched again), and I hope things will start looking up (next one up looks great). Though I enjoyed the first season, I didn’t get into the show until way past the half-way mark that season, and I loved S2 much, much more (I am a huge Dean girl), to the finale AHBLII, which many people have problems with but which is one of my favourite episodes of the show. Season 3 has been compiled of hits and misses (where I loved pretty much every ep of S2) just like S1, but I’m far from done with SPN. In fact, the idea of it getting cancelled because of disappointing ratings is distressing to me!
Luckily SPN abounds in amazing fanfic written by amazing writers: Much more so than most fandoms I’ve been in. Perhaps like Highlander and Hercules it’s the fic and discussion that lifts the show, instead of the other way around (I wouldn’t have said that in S2)? That means the writers really have to step it up. I’ll have to see where Kripke is going with all this anti-Sam stuff, and if he’ll have the guts to send Dean to hell (even if its temporary and we don’t get to see it, I’m really hoping they will). I want the eps to blow me away like they did last season.
I am very excited about today’s ep, and annoyed that I’ll have to wait a week to watch it because I’ll be gone a week to go skiing. Stupid social life. :)