Laughing at TV

[shadowkat]

Can't tell from reading flist, but did the first, oh ten to fifteen minutes of Heroes make anyone else laugh hysterically for fifteen minutes? Or am I the only person who found the introductory sequence with the Cheerleader absurdly amusing? In a Snakes on The Plane sort of way?

Made me laugh long and hard. ROFL. Was pointing at TV and giggling hysterically. Can't explain it.
Just hit my funny bone.

Other things that made me laugh - Studio 60 on The Sunset Strips - baby sketch (which they didn't think was funny enough) and Nancy Grace (you'd have to see Nancy Grace to understand). Oh and the bit about the reality show - which was an excellent satire on true reality shows. Studio 60's biting satire on the tv biz continues to amuse and comfort me.

I think NBC may own me on Monday nights. Two favorite Television Nights are Mondays and Fridays.
Mondays: Heroes and Studio 60
Fridays: Grey's Anatomy (yes, it's on Thursdays too, but if I miss Thurs, can watch the repeat on Fridays at the moment), and BattleStar Galatica.

Oh other shows watching : Veronica Mars, Lost, Ugly Betty, Nip/Tuck, and Desperate Housewives.
Although Nip/Tuck and Housewives are on notice. I am very close to skipping these two entirely and do not feel an overwhelming need to watch either. I'm only watching Housewives for Orson/Bree and Edie. Only watching Nip...don't really know why I'm still watching Nip when Boston Legal has just added Craig Bierko - yet another actor I've followed about ever since he played a villian in The Long Kiss Goodnight. Oh that's right, the "legal" part of Boston. Lost is also on notice, the current storyline with Sawyer/Jack and Kate is annoying the heck out of me. And, it may just be me, but I'm not sure it's a good idea to over psychoanalyze your characters or other people for that matter - that just ends badly. Sometimes you have to just sit back and let a cigar be a cigar. Do like Veronica Mars and Ugly Betty though - nice comfort shows.

Keep trying to like Doctor Who, not sure why - didn't like the original Doctor Who so odds are would not like this one, but everyone else appears to adore it. So keep trying. May just not be my thing. To be honest - Dr. Who is the type of sci-fi that I'm not fond of. Which is why I've never been given the sci-fi membership card. To get it - you have to like Dr. Who and Red Drawf. Don't. Also you should be a die-hard fan of the original Star Trek. Not. And Star Gate. Ditto. Sigh. But I like STNG, Voyager, BSG, Bablyon 5, Farscape, Star Wars, Bladerunner... Yes, I admit I have wildly unconventional tastes.

Comments

[cjlasky.livejournal.com]

What I liked about the cliffhanger was the confidence Tim Kring and his staff have in the story and the characters. It could have been taken as the worst sort of deus ex machina (and to an extent, it IS), but I see it as Kring telling us: "This is only the start of our heroes' journey, but we're going to show you Hiro when he's a little farther along, just so you know that we have this very well planned out."

BTW, the episode was written by Bryan Fuller (creator of "Dead Like Me" and "Wonderfalls") and directed by Ernest Dickerson (Spike Lee's long-time cinematographer and the director of "Juice"). Damn, that is some high-powered talent Kring has backing him up...

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Yep, I noticed Fuller's name as the writer, which gave me pause since he's one of those writers I'm sort of following about - mostly because of Dead Like Me. Jeff Leob wrote last week's I think.
(And Loeb is as you probably already know one of the premiere X-Men, Marvel writers out there.)
Sounds like Kring is taking the Whedon approach to writing a TV series as opposed to the Aaron Sorkin approach, which is hire a group of really good writers and trust them. Collaboration is really the only way to do it on TV. Rod Serling figured that out with the Twilight Zone.

Would agree the cliffhanger worked better than it should have. Usually I find those things sort of silly and yes, I've seen that done before. Nor was I too surprised by it. But it worked. Because it showed a Hiro who is *completely* different than the one we are currently following and a Hiro who states how *Peter* is completely different from his future self. So I'm now even more gripped by this series before - not because of the plot, let me make that clear - but the characters - I want to see how these characters evolve and the creator has given me evidence that he knows how they evolve. He has a plan. His writers have a plan. They aren't shooting at the hip or planning it as they go along, which can lead to all sorts of continuity errors. I don't see this happening with Heroes - they've got a plan, not just a plot arc, but an actual emotional/motivational arc for every character in the show. I think the only other two dramas on TV that are doing that are: BattleStar Galatica (and not quite to that degree), and The Nine. Everything else feels more like the writers are just seeing where the story leads them and we both know where that leads. It was Fury's problem with Lost and Egan's problem with Smallville - the realization that the head guy did not have a plan.

Oh speaking of writers we follow about, guess who has joined the writing staff of the Fox series "The Standoff"? Tim Minear.

[cjlasky.livejournal.com]

Oh speaking of writers we follow about, guess who has joined the writing staff of the Fox series "The Standoff"? Tim Minear.

He'd better hurry. Watched "Standoff" approximately 1-1/2 times, and it put me to sleep. The leads are boring, the romance angle is boring, the hostage crises are boring, and this show has imminent cancellation written all over it. It'd be nice to see Minear working with Gina Torres again, but this series could be gone before a Minear script ever hits the air.

It was Fury's problem with Lost and Egan's problem with Smallville - the realization that the head guy did not have a plan.

I always suspected that Fury quit because Abrams, Cuse and Lindelhof were pulling it out of their butts, but I was never sure. Makes sense. Never knew that about Doris. Does she explain why she quit on her tightropegirl website?

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Agree on "Stand-Off" - I've tried it twice or 1 -1/2 times as well and it put me to sleep.
Or rather, I started reading a magazine during a commericial and just kept reading out of boredom.
I admit, I'm tough - Bones puts me to sleep for example, so does Friday Night Lights. Conventional dramas and procedurals don't work for me anymore. Not sure why.

I honestly don't think it will survive past one year. Am very annoyed with Fox for coming up with the brilliant idea of flipping it and House's time slots on Tuesdays after the World Series.
This means I have to choose between House and VM. VM will win, because I think it's more likely to disappear on me. While House I can pick up in reruns, also it's episodic, so not necessary to see every episode.

According to interviews with Fury - that was the reason more or less. Though he put it in a much nicer way. This was confirmed by Stephen King in Entertainment Weekly recently - one of the Sept issues, I think - in which the writers more or less told King in an interview/writers roundtable session that yes, they are figuring out the story as it progresses - or seeing how it evolves. King respected that, because hey he does that - most novelists do it. But he makes an apt comment - I want to be able to trust that you care about these characters and know where they are going. And aren't going to jump the shark on me. I want a satisfying resolution. See - King and Doris Egan, you and I, all know something that most TV writers don't seem to get - which is there is a big difference between writing a novel and just seeing what it evolves and doing that with a TV series. We can go back and make Chapter 1 fit Chapter 20 before we publish it. They can't do that.
They are stuck with Chapter 1. They can go back and look at it. Rewatch it. But they can't change Chapter 1.

Egan discussed Smallville on her blog about a year or so ago. She does a long explanation about where she thought Smallville was going when she joined the writing team. And discovered that no, the writers had not developed a five year or even a two year plan - they were in fact throwing stuff on the screen to see what stuck. It was not about Clark and Lex and their emotional journeys, but just whatever they thought would make the fans go squee! LOL! I've summarized. She says it a lot nicer than I just did or Fury does about Lost for that matter. But when I read it, it explained quite a bit. I'm not sure if I saved it as a memory or not. I don't think I did. And I'm not sure I could find. She wrote is sometime in 2004, I think.

[cjlasky.livejournal.com]

And that's why I don't watch Lost or Smallville anymore. The writers burned me too many times. buffyannotater said he was seriously thinking about quitting Smallville because Gough and Millar (the showrunners) could never get their sh** together and produce two good episodes in a row. I tend to agree. The Lex/Clark story--the birth of a classic rivalry--has been so thoroughly mishandled that I can't even watch the wonderful Michael Rosenbaum without choking on my disappointment.

As for Lost, the showrunners are talking out of both sides of their mouths. Don't worry folks, we have a plan! Uh, actually, we're just letting the series evolve naturally. We're not sucking up to the Jack/Kate or Kate/Sawyer 'shippers....except we are. Too many blind alleys and fake-outs and not enough character or plot progression. I don't even care about "the answer" anymore, because I don't believe the writers will set it up properly.

Paula loves procedurals, especially the CSIs--yes, even CSI: Miami, even though I mock her relentlessly for her Caruso Love. (She tapes them all and watches while I'm out of mocking range.) But ever since Lost went down the toilet, I've developed an affection for Criminal Minds, mainly because of Thomas Gibson's Hotch. It's such a huge swing from his Dharma and Greg days that it almost seems to be a different actor.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

LOL! That's just so ironic. You've managed to marry a woman who is addicted to the very tv shows that you used to mock, rip to pieces, and declare profound hatred for. But what the hey, it's just tv. TV is well tv.

Criminal Minds and Numbers - are the best of the bunch. You should check out Numbers. Tried both.
They bore me, but that's just because I'm burnt out on the genre and have learned that the characters never evolve, never change. Basically they are just boiler-plate murder mysteries. The only one I like is The Closer - which seems more character driven and reminds me of Prime Suspect.

And you are, unfortunately right about both Smallville and Lost. Am getting very close to giving up on Lost. Except I sort of find the insane social psychology experiment aspect of it oddly intriguing.
That said - no clue how long I'm going to be able to tolerate a bunch of bored surburban social psychologists torturing a plane crash survivors on a bizarre island, even if the plane crash survivors in question have questionable morals. Last episode, I thought, ah, finally, a character who has not inadvertently or intentionally killed anyone in their past. Cool. Gave up on Smallville a long time ago, although will admit - I did watch bits and pieces of it last season to catch Marsters as Brainiac. And ended up feeling sorry the actor. Smallville was that bad.

[cjlasky.livejournal.com]

LOL! That's just so ironic. You've managed to marry a woman who is addicted to the very tv shows that you used to mock, rip to pieces, and declare profound hatred for.

Hee. Well, we both knew what we were getting into. Besides, I have sooooo much fun with my Caruso imitation.

CJL: Paula? [Stands straight, arms akimbo, tilts head, not looking directly at her; long, weighty pause] Did you walk the dogs?
PAULA: Cut it out.

I've watched Numbers on and off for a few years now, mainly because of David Krumholz's Charlie Epps and Judd Hirsch as the senior Epps. The "different brothers" dynamic between Krumholz and Rob Morrow is pretty good, but I find the egghead eccentrics more interesting than the Feds. Ravi Nawat, who was amazingly good in "Damage" (Angel S5) is wasted here...

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Had more or less the same reaction to Numbers - I liked the eggheads better than the Feds and the figuring out of the mathematical equations. Which may be what distinguishs the show from all the other ones. The rest...sigh, you've seen one CSI/Law & Order - you've seen them all.

Paula's lucky in her tv tastes. Because - The plus side of having conventional tastes in TV (ie. loving procedurals, tv game shows, reality shows, and talk shows which everyone else loves) - is you NEVER have to worry about your tv show being cancelled. You don't even really have to bother taping the things - they are all repeated. Was discussing this with a friend over dinner last night - stating how my difficulty with TV is I tend to have unconventional tasts, it's rare that a show I adore is not cancelled. I'm always surprised when they aren't.

Case in point: Seinfield - was almost cancelled in its first two seasons, you had to hunt for it.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - it's status was always up in the air. Angel? Ditto. American Gothic - made it one season. Now and Again - one season. Hill Street - it kept jumping nights and was in the ratings basement. St. Elsewhere - ditto. Homicide Life on The Streets - ditto. Cheers- ditto.
When Seinfield, Cheers, and Homicide got popular? I lost interest. Then there's Wonderfalls, Firefly, Joan of Arcadia, Action, the Others, Space Above and Beyond, Earth 2, Battlestar Galatica (the first version), Bablyon 5 (got cancelled, came back), La Femme Nikita ( cancelled pulled back at the last possible moment). Fame. The list is endless.

My friend, who dislikes Studio 60, looked at me in compassion and said..."You're probably surprised it even made it on the air."

Yep.

LOL! on your David Caruso. Poor Paula.