Ringer Review...well sort of.
Sep. 15th, 2011 11:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatDead tired. Long day. When Landlord came to my door at 7:30 pm with a bucket of paint and a brush and wanted to know if he could paint my bathroom ceiling. I said, not now, with a groan. Bloody sick of people. Need a break. (Note - how you can tell if you are an extrovert or an introvert? Simple - do you feel drained of energy after a cocktail party or party, or do you feel wired and energetic? Do you need alone time, just vegging, by yourself to re-charge, or do you need to go to a party, bar, or social gathering of some type?)
Watched Ringer - it's not bad. But I don't have very high expectations when it comes to a)American Television and b)CW TV Programs and well c) anything featuring a Buffy alum or writer. (at least not any more. Seriously they all suck post Buffy.Even most of the writers ( okay maybe not the writers). It's pathetic. And sort of makes you wonder if you were seriously stoned while watching Buffy and that's why you remember everything in it as being the BEST!THING!EVER! Of course that would not explain why some of us still think that..occasionally upon re-watching.) Also, it probably should be noted that my criteria is fairly simple - does it entertain me, are the characters mildly interesting, and tonight? Do I have to think very hard? No? Lovely!! Now...if I only I could apply the same criteria to comic books...I'd still be reading them. Snobby, aren't I? But then aren't we all?
Impressions?
* Will you like? Most likely not. Especially if you are a TV and/or cultural snob - which, let's face it, is basically most of the people posting reviews online. Well not unless you have a weakness for noirish soap operas about rich people (which I unfortunately do, I blame my mother she got me hooked on Westerns, soap operas/serials, and noir at a very early age - I've never quite shaken the addiction. Why else would I watch Gossip Girl and General Hospital - which is not really noir, but it keeps trying to be.). And are a die-hard and somewhat obsessed fan of Sarah Michelle Gellar - which actually may be more of a distraction.
TV Snobs on my flist? You won't like it. Actually I'm not sure my mother will be able to tolerate it - she loves soaps, but they have to be "daytime" soaps, she has 0 tolerance for the stupidity and blandness in primetime soaps. She's not wrong, ironically daytime soaps are more creative, better written and better acted than prime-time soaps - I've no clue why. I personally find it rather puzzling. You'd think it would be the other way around. But, no, not so much.
* The comment is made throughout the series that the character Gellar is playing, Bridget, is aneorexic. I kept saying yup. But so is the other character she is also playing, Siobhan, simultaneously. They are both aneorexic. They keep saying she's lost weight. Siobhan didn't look any heavier. Granted Gellar is playing both...
Ion Gruffold to Siobhan/Bridget: You are too thin.
ME: Thank you!
Gellar is so skinny, a wind could push her over like paper. She's also not aging well. Of the Buffy actresses, Gellar and Emmar Caulfield are in a dead heat for the most pinched and peaked look. Both are far too thin, the type of thin where your mouth takes over your face? Gellar looks better with a rounder face. Oddly, she looked better in the television promotional spots during the show. Which means she really needs to fire her make-up, camera and costume people. (Gellar's also a producer).
* The acting in the pilot felt stiff to me or stilted. Which makes me wonder about the director, since I've seen these actors do other things and they aren't usually that stiff. The writing also lacks something...not quite sure what? Chutzpah? Pizzaz? It feels very recycled somehow. As does the plots and plot-twists.
* The plot? I thought half-way through, with a bit of a laugh, this reminds me of harlequin suspense novel or a harlequin novelist's attempt to write noire. Too many cliche or formulaic plot-twists. (Character is having an affair with her best-friend's hubby, oops she's pregnant, no maybe not since she's not actually Siobhan, so Siobhan is pregnant...)
But I'll stick with it. I find Gellar's twins interesting. There's something going on under the surface that has me curious - I like convoluted manipulative con-games and double-crosses. Some people get off on serial killer storylines, I get off on convoluted double-crosses. For example, I've no clue what Siobhan's hubby is involved with and called off, or for that matter what Siobhan is up to - just that it is revenge related, but against whom? Bridget, her sister? If so, why? There's a lot of why, what, who questions - and those types of questions fascinate me.
Also? It's just the pilot and most tv shows that I've liked tend to have bad pilots, as a general rule. While tv shows that disappointed me and ran out steam, had amazing pilots. So I tend to be more wary of the latter. There are exceptions of course. Heck, if I went by pilot's? I wouldn't have watched Dollhouse, Firefly (okay maybe Firefly), Buffy, Angel, The Good Wife, Doctor Who, the list goes on...and on. Modern audiences are too impatient - they want perfection in the pilot. Which is absurd, particularly when you know that the network has tweaked it, rewritten it, cut out a ton of it, and tested it too death. You have to give a show a chance..to get it's footing.
There are exceptions of course - for example if you don't like soap operas, you might want to give this pass. Because it's not going to change. It's a soap. We have people having affairs, romantic entanglements are emphasized. If that ain't your thing, you probably won't like this. For the rest of us? eh. Give it about five or six episodes...assuming it lasts that long, this being the CW, it most likely will. But you never know. I don't see it grabbing the Buffy fan base. The Buffy fan base really isn't about an actor or writer, even though everyone thinks it is. It's about the show itself. All the components. Sure you have your off-shoots, the Marsters fans, the Head fans, the Gellar fans, the Whedon fans, etc...but the vast majority? Weren't. That's why the comics and Whedon's other shows never really took off. So no, Gellar can't sell a show on her name alone. Even is she was playing Buffy - the audience wouldn't come along for the ride unless she had everyone else in the mix too. And oddly, Gellar hasn't had any on-screen chemistry with anyone since James Marsters - I say oddly, because I doubt they got along, which may be why they had such great chemistry - the very fact that they did not get along.
So why am I sticking with it? Because I have a weakness for mindless soap opera noir tv shows. Hello? Have you forgotten, I watch True Blood. And General Hospital. Granted both are better written and better acted and better produced than Ringer appears to be...but we're only on episode one. Also.. I like these types of brainless guilty pleasures, far more entertaining than sitcoms, police procedurals, the news, talk shows, and reality shows in my opinion.
Watched Ringer - it's not bad. But I don't have very high expectations when it comes to a)American Television and b)CW TV Programs and well c) anything featuring a Buffy alum or writer. (at least not any more. Seriously they all suck post Buffy.
Impressions?
* Will you like? Most likely not. Especially if you are a TV and/or cultural snob - which, let's face it, is basically most of the people posting reviews online. Well not unless you have a weakness for noirish soap operas about rich people (which I unfortunately do, I blame my mother she got me hooked on Westerns, soap operas/serials, and noir at a very early age - I've never quite shaken the addiction. Why else would I watch Gossip Girl and General Hospital - which is not really noir, but it keeps trying to be.). And are a die-hard and somewhat obsessed fan of Sarah Michelle Gellar - which actually may be more of a distraction.
TV Snobs on my flist? You won't like it. Actually I'm not sure my mother will be able to tolerate it - she loves soaps, but they have to be "daytime" soaps, she has 0 tolerance for the stupidity and blandness in primetime soaps. She's not wrong, ironically daytime soaps are more creative, better written and better acted than prime-time soaps - I've no clue why. I personally find it rather puzzling. You'd think it would be the other way around. But, no, not so much.
* The comment is made throughout the series that the character Gellar is playing, Bridget, is aneorexic. I kept saying yup. But so is the other character she is also playing, Siobhan, simultaneously. They are both aneorexic. They keep saying she's lost weight. Siobhan didn't look any heavier. Granted Gellar is playing both...
Ion Gruffold to Siobhan/Bridget: You are too thin.
ME: Thank you!
Gellar is so skinny, a wind could push her over like paper. She's also not aging well. Of the Buffy actresses, Gellar and Emmar Caulfield are in a dead heat for the most pinched and peaked look. Both are far too thin, the type of thin where your mouth takes over your face? Gellar looks better with a rounder face. Oddly, she looked better in the television promotional spots during the show. Which means she really needs to fire her make-up, camera and costume people. (Gellar's also a producer).
* The acting in the pilot felt stiff to me or stilted. Which makes me wonder about the director, since I've seen these actors do other things and they aren't usually that stiff. The writing also lacks something...not quite sure what? Chutzpah? Pizzaz? It feels very recycled somehow. As does the plots and plot-twists.
* The plot? I thought half-way through, with a bit of a laugh, this reminds me of harlequin suspense novel or a harlequin novelist's attempt to write noire. Too many cliche or formulaic plot-twists. (Character is having an affair with her best-friend's hubby, oops she's pregnant, no maybe not since she's not actually Siobhan, so Siobhan is pregnant...)
But I'll stick with it. I find Gellar's twins interesting. There's something going on under the surface that has me curious - I like convoluted manipulative con-games and double-crosses. Some people get off on serial killer storylines, I get off on convoluted double-crosses. For example, I've no clue what Siobhan's hubby is involved with and called off, or for that matter what Siobhan is up to - just that it is revenge related, but against whom? Bridget, her sister? If so, why? There's a lot of why, what, who questions - and those types of questions fascinate me.
Also? It's just the pilot and most tv shows that I've liked tend to have bad pilots, as a general rule. While tv shows that disappointed me and ran out steam, had amazing pilots. So I tend to be more wary of the latter. There are exceptions of course. Heck, if I went by pilot's? I wouldn't have watched Dollhouse, Firefly (okay maybe Firefly), Buffy, Angel, The Good Wife, Doctor Who, the list goes on...and on. Modern audiences are too impatient - they want perfection in the pilot. Which is absurd, particularly when you know that the network has tweaked it, rewritten it, cut out a ton of it, and tested it too death. You have to give a show a chance..to get it's footing.
There are exceptions of course - for example if you don't like soap operas, you might want to give this pass. Because it's not going to change. It's a soap. We have people having affairs, romantic entanglements are emphasized. If that ain't your thing, you probably won't like this. For the rest of us? eh. Give it about five or six episodes...assuming it lasts that long, this being the CW, it most likely will. But you never know. I don't see it grabbing the Buffy fan base. The Buffy fan base really isn't about an actor or writer, even though everyone thinks it is. It's about the show itself. All the components. Sure you have your off-shoots, the Marsters fans, the Head fans, the Gellar fans, the Whedon fans, etc...but the vast majority? Weren't. That's why the comics and Whedon's other shows never really took off. So no, Gellar can't sell a show on her name alone. Even is she was playing Buffy - the audience wouldn't come along for the ride unless she had everyone else in the mix too. And oddly, Gellar hasn't had any on-screen chemistry with anyone since James Marsters - I say oddly, because I doubt they got along, which may be why they had such great chemistry - the very fact that they did not get along.
So why am I sticking with it? Because I have a weakness for mindless soap opera noir tv shows. Hello? Have you forgotten, I watch True Blood. And General Hospital. Granted both are better written and better acted and better produced than Ringer appears to be...but we're only on episode one. Also.. I like these types of brainless guilty pleasures, far more entertaining than sitcoms, police procedurals, the news, talk shows, and reality shows in my opinion.
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no subject
Date: 2011-09-16 04:51 am (UTC)Anyway, from my perspective the writing was the weakest element, and Gellar, who has many talents in reagrd to her craft, does only so-so with poor writing. Some actors can be given a turd of a script, and somehow pull a diamond out of the thing, but those people are rarest of the rare. Gellar isn't one of them.
Personally, the premise is fine with me, and if the shows improve over time, it could be very entertaining. Success with this show might convince people that Gellar isn't doomed to be typecast only as Buffy.
I'm certainly going to give it several more episodes before I make any detailed evaluation.
BTW, glad you're enjoying Fringe. I'm very much looking forward to the new season myself, having followed it from show one. Started out good, flailed quite a bit midstream, got better, got way better last season. Worth sticking with through the weaker eps-- as you've noted, it does build quite a bit on all that went before.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-16 04:22 pm (UTC)Fox is notoriously bad in this regard. Unless you do "great" immediately - FOX tends to drop the show, with few exceptions. You are lucky to get 13 episodes out of Fox and it usually depends on how enamored whomever is in charge is of the show-runner and the series. (Ex - Raising Hope? The network head honcho loved the concept. Same situation regarding Glee. If they love the concept and can see how to market it - across venues? And if it gets awards?
It can survive mediocre to poor ratings.)
ABC, CBS, and NBC - the other big three, tend to be a little nicer, but not by much. TV shows premiering on ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox - are in a tough spot. You have to do well right out of the box - or you are dead. With a few exceptions. Time was - they'd give the show at least 22 episodes. But cable has changed all that - too competitive. Instead of four channels competiting for advertising dollars, we have over 500. In short - it's a buyer's market. So the ad people have their "marketing" people research and determine which shows are most likely to pull in the best consumers/demographic for XYZ product. In the preview/pilot season - networks do a lot of testing inhouse to see which demo's that their show fits in and then they send trailer to ad agencies to sell ad space. The ad agencies will often determine based on "Nielsen" and other similar companies market research data which shows upon airing ratings fit their needs.
Whether a show survives or not has zip to do with quality and everything to do with how it looks to the advertisers and marketing people - can it bring in enough viewers for this product?
CW, F/X, AMC, USA, TNT, TBS, Bravo...these networks tend to be more laid-back. Their overhead costs are lower, they don't expect to get high ratings or to even win the ratings war. If they do well in their pre-established demographic? Wonderful. CW's - is young women and men between the ages of 18-34, they are looking to expand on the 25-34 crowd, right now they are highly slanted towards the 18-25...which isn't where the money is at. Also mostly women. F/X in direct contrast is targeting an educated male demographic - 25-45 year old men, higher income level. While AMC is going for about the same demo - smart, highly educated, young men. That's the best demo - because those are the people who buy cars and high-tech - which are the expensive ads.
Yes, evil marketing people rule the world.
from my perspective the writing was the weakest element, and Gellar, who has many talents in reagrd to her craft, does only so-so with poor writing. Some actors can be given a turd of a script, and somehow pull a diamond out of the thing, but those people are rarest of the rare
Very true. It's actually the problem that all the Buffy cast has run into, with the possible exception of Seth Green, Nathan Fillion and David Boreanze (although the jury is still out on him.) Writing and direction are very important in film, more so than acting. The actor has little control in film. Gellar has more than most as an executive producer - but only so far. Also her taste isn't stellar. For TV? Writing is the most important thing. In film? Direction and cinematography (which is one of the many reasons why I prefer TV to film, I'm more interested in the writing and acting than the funky camera work).
And the writing here is weak. It doesn't snap the way it should. The plot feels contrived and too fast in the wrong places. It's clumsy.
But it may get better. How much of it is the writer's fault and how much is the network and Gellar tinkering with it...I can't tell.
Regarding Fringe? It's at its best when it skips away from the Monster of the Week format. Like all tv series - that format has been done to death, and when they rely on it too much, the story loses its focus and everyone looks a little bored. Doctor Who has the same problem, as did Buffy and Angel actually.
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Date: 2011-09-16 04:47 pm (UTC)Ooh, but David Fury worked on Lost and wrote one of its best episodes (Walkabout) that wipes the floor with everything he ever did on Buffy or Angel. And I liked Dollhouse and Caprica, and Dr Horrible is fun. Though Jane Espenson's episodes for BSG were hit and miss. I don't think I've seen any other work by Buffyverse writers. I despise 24, and haven't seen any of the Spartacus shows. What else is there?
no subject
Date: 2011-09-16 10:32 pm (UTC)David Greenwalt - Moonlight, some Billy Crudup thing (blink and you miss it)
Tim Minear - Inside, Drive, Wonderfalls, Terriers...and something else now that I can't remember the name of. (Granted he's not BVTS)
Jane E - Caprica, Miracle Day, Tru Calling, Buffy S8, Dollhouse (which I'd rate B or C for all of the above..while Dollhouse and Caprica were enjoyable both were a bit of a mess plot and character wise.)
Rebecca Rand Kirshner...the later seasons of Gilmore Girls (much maligned), Las Vegas, 90210
Marti Noxon - Point Pleasant, brief and quick gigs on Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, and Mad Men (did not like her episodes on any of these, although I find Private Practice cringe inducing..so there you go.)
David Fury - head writer/show-runner for the last two years of 24 and briefly Lost.
Stephen DeKnight - Smallville - later seasons
Drew S. Greenberg - some episodes of Dexter (so definitely an exception)
They all move around a lot. A friend got me into paying attention to writers on tv shows while watching Buffy.
It's hit or miss, but that's normal. None of them have come close to the writing they did on Buffy though. Even Greenberg on Dexter was just okay. Fury's Walkabout was good, but he hasn't topped it or done anything interesting since that I'm aware of. The best thing Marti Noxon has done to date is Fright Night.
[Hee, I thought I deleted that snarky comment last night...because there are a few exceptions - David Boreanze who has Bones...and well some of the writers haven't done badly. But the show-runners have been pretty bad - Whedon, Greenwalt, Fury and Noxon haven't really done anything that comes close to what they did on Buffy.
But I admittedly haven't seen Marti's Fright Night remake, or Greenwalt's Grim as of yet.]
no subject
Date: 2011-09-16 10:34 pm (UTC)