(no subject)

[shadowkat]

Okay Heroes is improving, actually I think it's going to be quite good. Really unnerved me in a couple of places tonight. Nice and creepy in just the right spots. Although this does pose a question - why is it that every science fiction/fantasy show that appears on film or tv has to be creepy, violent or have elements of horror? Can anyone out there think of an example, that is not horror on some level? (It's not rhetorical, nor meant as a criticism, just curious.)

Am close to giving up on Brothers and Sisters. Tried The Amazing Race and just don't like the people that much, also, well, watching far too much tv right now. Desperate Housewives may be the only one I watch Sundays, while it wasn't as funny or entertaining as last weekend, it didn't annoy me as much either. Also long-time Kyle McLachlan fan - yes he's on the list of actors I've wasted time watching in horrid movies. I grew up with Kyle - I remember being first in line to see him in David Lynch's Dune way back in Junior High, at least I think it was Junior High.



1. Anthony Stewart Head (started with his performance in England in Chess in 1988.)
2. Anthony Hopkins (performance in King Lear in 1987 on London Stage. )
3. Kevin Spacey (Clarence Darrow on American Playhouse, then of course Mel Profit on WiseGuy)
4. James Spader (a very old Kim Richards film no one but me has probably seen, that aired in the early 80's prior to Pretty in Pink)
5. Kyle McLachlan (Dune, then well, Twin Peaks...and many others.)
6. James Marsters (guess?)

And eventually I give up. I gave up on ASH with Manchild, Hopkins with Meet Joe Black, Spacey with David Gale, Spader with Boston Legal, MacLachlan with Sex in the City, and Marsters with Smallville.
Sooner or later, you realize uhm, okay, maybe we should pay more attention to directors and writers instead of cast?

Then again, you never know they might surprise you.


Regarding Studio 60 it's reminding me more and more of Sports Night and less and less of West Wing, which I'm hoping is a good thing. Not as funny as last weeks. Course I saw last weeks on the internet, so there's that. Also last weeks debate over the show tainted my watching of it. Making me realize something -maybe I don't want to analyze and critique tv shows that much anymore. Nor do I want to worry about seeing every episode. I just want to sit back and enjoy the things when I find the time for them, that's what they're for after all. To distract, entertain, and possibly inform. If I hate it? I'm switching it off and going to bed or writing. One of the nice things about not having a roommate is not having to fight over what to watch on the tv set. Or for that matter defending what you want to watch to another person. There's something oddly freeing about that.

Oh, one more thing - on 60 Minutes Sunday night they had an entry about a new procedure being tried in Canada (I believe) that relieves depression for people who've tried everything under the sun. Apparently electrode are inserted in area 25 of the brain, the frontal lobe, and charged for a couple of seconds - they stimulate the brain. Severe depression apparently causes this area of the brain to slow down or the neurotransmitters not to transmit, so colors are subdued, everything is sort of drab, bit like living in a world with nothing but gray, overcast days. It doesn't last and it isn't a cure, but it can relieve the symptoms for a while and for lengthy periods. Anyone else heard of this? Was sort of interesting. May be worth looking into for the folks out there who can't get relief through any other means.

Comments

[cjlasky.livejournal.com]

I like Heroes almost entirely for its characters, not the plot. The indestructible cheerleader, the psychic cop (yay, Greg Grunberg!), the Petrelli brothers, the soulful Indian professor, and especially, ESPECIALLY the Japanese office drone who can bend time and space are all RELATABLE personalities and you root for them--you want to see them come out all right.

(I'm iffy on Schizoid Stripper. Her bizarre situation is more interesting than her character at the moment. Not so enthralled with the superpowered serial killer plotline, either. That's been done too many times before in superhero comix, and this version doesn't seem to have a twist.)

The second episode cliffhanger was even better than last week's.

But you know the show had me when the cop said Hiro was a member of the Merry Marvel Marching Society.

Nitpick: No comic book sold on a newsstand has the writer/artist's address on the back.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

I agree and am more or less tuning in for the same reasons. To be honest - I think most tv shows only work to the extent that you can identify with or fall in love with their characters.
Was chatting to a friend yesterday about the flick "All The Kings Men" - we were trying to figure out why we were the only ones who liked the flick, my friend loved it - even more than I did, and all the professional critics despised it. Came down to a simple thing - my friend identified with and loved the Jude Law character's story thread. It spoke to her. While everyone else was worried about the hackneyed political plot , which didn't make much sense to my friend and I either, she was taken by the narrator's plot and so was I.

In contrast - the film Lost in Translation, which everyone loved, I did not, not because of the plot - but the characters - I did not like them.

In every single writing course I've taken - they've said the same thing, build interesting characters. Plots are a dime a dozen. And they've been done a hundred times over. But characters are unique.

Heroes works for me - because it has some interesting characters, who on the surface may seem somewhat "stock" or "stereotypical" but the actors and writing is going against it. Claire Bennett, the indestructible cheerleader is played with a sense of alienation and vulnerability that reminds me of Gellar's Buffy, and her father could very well be the serial killer on the other end of the dead scientist's answering machine. Hiro, who is played with equal vulnerability and enthusiasm, could be the geeky stereotype if it weren't for the fact that the writers craftily made the character Japanese, living in Japan, and unable to speak a word of English. In Japan - comics are looked at far differently than here. Then there's Nikki, the schizode web porn star - they've put a nice twist on this character as well, who seems at the outset to be one thing, but is another - she's not a dumb blond nor for that matter weak, but possibly the deadliest character on the show. The series employs the ironic twist rather well in how it is developing its characters. The plot? Ah, I'm ambivalent about. But I tend to ignore plots on these types of shows, they are basically about a bunch of people banding together to save the world. Not that interesting. What is interesting is how the people get to that point, how they meet, and how they deal with their powers on the way to that point. In short the least interesting part of the series is how or if they'll save the world. And from what I've seen so far, I think the writers actually get that.