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Oct. 3rd, 2012 09:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. Skipping the American Presidential Debate - really not interested in the speechifying and rhetoric. I know where both candidates stand, it's not like they haven't ran for this before. Plus politics tends to make my blood boil.
2. Note to marketing and advertising professionals - the following terms: "Shades", "50 Shades" and "Shades of Grey" have long passed the marketing saturation point. Please retire them from your lexicons, pronto. I know you aren't used to thinking outside the box or anything, but at least make an attempt.
3. Good Wife (which according to USA Today and the Momster (who read it) is not getting good ratings - it got clobbered by Revenge, Upstairs Downstairs, and Football on Sunday. Stupid people - it was the best of the three. I know, I watched all three. Okay, I skipped Upstairs Downstairs - the first season sucked beans, why bother with a second? Even my parents hated it - and they loved the original. It made no sense. And you all know how I feel about Football. That's not to say I didn't enjoy Revenge, but Good Wife is better written and acted - less soapy.)
The downside? Kalinda's story doesn't quite work. But the case of the week is rather twisty and interesting. As is the introduction of Kristen Chenoworth and Nathan Lane's characters. The Good Wife has become the best show on earth to guest star on. It gives its guest stars amazing writing.
No time to do a full review unfortunately. But I loved it. Right now - Revenge, Good Wife and Once Upon A Time had the best season premieres. And in that order. What Once lacks in crisp dialogue and writing, it makes up for in innovative ideas and narrative structure.
In short, it's not boring.
4. Buffy...
Eh. It's been over ten years and I've been occasionally reading a blog by a wet-behind the ears new viewer. Who reminds me of my Aunt's desire to clip all newborn's tubes and not allow people to have kids until they've passed an emotional/psychological/and intelligence tests. (ie. if you are narcissitic, racist, abusive, psychotic, or have any sort of severe mental illness - then you can't have children.) I told my Aunt that while tempting, this idea takes us down the path of...well, Nazism or Facism. After all, who are we to judge another's fate? Or destiney? We aren't god and we should not play God. That's my problem with holier-than-thou reviewers...they seem to want to do the same thing with tv shows.
(ie. Only those people who agree with or validate my perspective get to create art and be cool. Everyone else is a nitwit.)
Anywho...everyone has their list of controversial tv episodes and seasons. In my experience with the Buffy fandom, spanning over 10 years, and including a variety of new viewers from around the world of disparate ages, cultures, and creeds...the following episodes are the most controversial, and therefore (ironically) the most interesting from an academic, cultural, philosophical and social psychological perspective. This is true of most art, actually. Art that creates controversy, that people either hate or love or want to ban and piss on - is often ten years down the line the most interesting and says the most about the time-period and our culture. Art is odd. It is both pro-active or an instigator of happenings, and reactive or a reflection of what is happening. It can make something happen and comment on it at the same time.
Controversial episodes of Buffy and Angel
* Seeing Red (BS6 - caused a major internet debate on Lesbians in TV and a debate on how Rape is portrayed in media.)
* Lies My Parents Told Me ( racism and feminism...debates emerged)
* Get it Done (see LMPTM)
* I Will Always Remember You (Angel S1)
And I'm blanking all of a sudden. I'm sure you can come up with your own.
2. Note to marketing and advertising professionals - the following terms: "Shades", "50 Shades" and "Shades of Grey" have long passed the marketing saturation point. Please retire them from your lexicons, pronto. I know you aren't used to thinking outside the box or anything, but at least make an attempt.
3. Good Wife (which according to USA Today and the Momster (who read it) is not getting good ratings - it got clobbered by Revenge, Upstairs Downstairs, and Football on Sunday. Stupid people - it was the best of the three. I know, I watched all three. Okay, I skipped Upstairs Downstairs - the first season sucked beans, why bother with a second? Even my parents hated it - and they loved the original. It made no sense. And you all know how I feel about Football. That's not to say I didn't enjoy Revenge, but Good Wife is better written and acted - less soapy.)
The downside? Kalinda's story doesn't quite work. But the case of the week is rather twisty and interesting. As is the introduction of Kristen Chenoworth and Nathan Lane's characters. The Good Wife has become the best show on earth to guest star on. It gives its guest stars amazing writing.
No time to do a full review unfortunately. But I loved it. Right now - Revenge, Good Wife and Once Upon A Time had the best season premieres. And in that order. What Once lacks in crisp dialogue and writing, it makes up for in innovative ideas and narrative structure.
In short, it's not boring.
4. Buffy...
Eh. It's been over ten years and I've been occasionally reading a blog by a wet-behind the ears new viewer. Who reminds me of my Aunt's desire to clip all newborn's tubes and not allow people to have kids until they've passed an emotional/psychological/and intelligence tests. (ie. if you are narcissitic, racist, abusive, psychotic, or have any sort of severe mental illness - then you can't have children.) I told my Aunt that while tempting, this idea takes us down the path of...well, Nazism or Facism. After all, who are we to judge another's fate? Or destiney? We aren't god and we should not play God. That's my problem with holier-than-thou reviewers...they seem to want to do the same thing with tv shows.
(ie. Only those people who agree with or validate my perspective get to create art and be cool. Everyone else is a nitwit.)
Anywho...everyone has their list of controversial tv episodes and seasons. In my experience with the Buffy fandom, spanning over 10 years, and including a variety of new viewers from around the world of disparate ages, cultures, and creeds...the following episodes are the most controversial, and therefore (ironically) the most interesting from an academic, cultural, philosophical and social psychological perspective. This is true of most art, actually. Art that creates controversy, that people either hate or love or want to ban and piss on - is often ten years down the line the most interesting and says the most about the time-period and our culture. Art is odd. It is both pro-active or an instigator of happenings, and reactive or a reflection of what is happening. It can make something happen and comment on it at the same time.
Controversial episodes of Buffy and Angel
* Seeing Red (BS6 - caused a major internet debate on Lesbians in TV and a debate on how Rape is portrayed in media.)
* Lies My Parents Told Me ( racism and feminism...debates emerged)
* Get it Done (see LMPTM)
* I Will Always Remember You (Angel S1)
And I'm blanking all of a sudden. I'm sure you can come up with your own.
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no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 01:57 am (UTC)My impression was that IWRY was mostly controversial among shippers.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 10:10 pm (UTC)Have to say, reading the viewers comments on Angel S4 amuses me to no end.
Apparently Cordy is the most moral person in the universe and deserved to lifted to the heavenly layer of saint-hood? Alrighty then. Dramatic Irony and Satire is completely lost on some people. The viewer is not going to be at all happy with Cordy's final arc. Not at all. I was interacting with a lot of insane Cordy fans back then - I remember how they reacted, they put the crazy Spike, Willow, and Angel shippers to shame. Although to be fair, Cordy does have the most bizarrely written arc of any Whedon series to date.
Talk about controversial seasons and arcs. If you liked Cordy you probably hated S4 Angel, if you were ambivalent...
IWRY...eh, both shippers and non-shippers hated that episode. It comes across as very chauvinistic and sexist.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 10:45 pm (UTC)Agreed on IWRY. But I've seen Bangels defend it as expressing the true soul of the B/A relationship. Personally, I thought it, like S8, showed just how wrong the relationship was.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-05 01:22 am (UTC)And yes, the Cordy arc was truly bizarre. (I think part of the problem was they changed the arc half-way through or rather flipped it three times. We had David Greenwalt's vision, then Whedon who despised Greenwalt's vision and chose to bring her back as the big bad, only to have CC get pregnant on him - which meant she couldn't be the big bad, because as Minear put it - a Big Bad Pregnant Woman just did not play and there was no way to hide it. So they wrote in Jasmine.) This is why serialized genre tv is wonky. Actors and writers don't always collaborate in an organized fashion.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-05 01:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-05 01:21 pm (UTC)1. Story arc one was Greenwalt's - which was that Cordy ascended while Angel descended. (Remember Greenie loved Cordelia and had worked hard to redeem her. Giving her the PTB approval, while Angel never quite gets it...had a beautiful symmetry and tragedy to it for Greenwalt. Also Greenwalt is a "theist" and of Jewish/Christian beliefs. Not an atheist like Whedon. Rumor has it that Greenwalt and CC for that matter - thought CC had been fired by the WB/Fox, so he decided to write her character out in this matter.)
2. Greenwalt left for various reasons. (Dochawk stated Fox and the WB wanted him gone along with CC for escalating the production costs. But CC had one year left on her contract. They did not get along with the executive producers and Whedon had to keep stepping in to smooth things over. Greenwalt got another job and just cut ties with Fox. Keep in mind we are talking about Fox and the WB - which Whedon often referred to as Wolfram and Hart. I didn't believe any of this when he told me...but then the stories aired.) Anyhow, Whedon according to Minear did not want a Saint Cordelia. And he had her for one more year contractually. Plus - it was a horror story. And he's an angry atheist. So he came up with this great arc of Cordelia coming back as the Big Bad who Angel would have to kill at the end of the season.
(a la Buffy S2. The exact opposite of the arc he was doing with Spike and Buffy. And had a great symmetry to it. He also, rumor had, would have brought Doyle back as a Big Bad if the actor portraying him had been available. (He wasn't, he died.) )
3. But as luck would have it, CC got pregnant over the break. (In Hollywood, actresses have to tell their producers and writers about family planning issues - so the writers can write around it if necessary. This isn't abnormal - it happens in all workplaces. You need to tell the company when you are taking maternity leave so they can plan around it. CC didn't tell anybody. She just returned to work and said, oh by the way, I'm pregnant. I can see why - she knew they were writing her character out, and that the only one who had her back was Greenwalt. (She also apparently had a good relationship with DB).
So nothing to lose. (Most of this is backstage gossip and has been contradicted about six or seven times over the years.)) Anyhow,
Whedon had to re-write the story so that Cordy gave birth Jasmine. (CC inadvertently and ironically saved her character's image. Although Whedon had to go back to the old horror cliche - Mom gets possessed by evil baby, which he'd subverted with Darla and Connor.) There was another wrinkle in that Cordelia was supposed to come out of her coma and kill Jasmine - further saving the character, and yet another twist on the Darla/Connor scenario. But CC couldn't due to complications with her pregnancy. She was restricted to bed rest. So Connor did it instead.
It's fascinating to me - because it demonstrates how much television storytelling is dictated by actors, producers, the collaborative process and outside forces.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-05 02:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 02:45 am (UTC)This. Five minutes in and I'm wanting to scream at the television. Waste of energy.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 10:00 pm (UTC)And this morning read that fact-checkers were going nuts once again.
Sigh. It's enough to make me miss the Presidential Debates of my youth, Regan vs. Carter, Regan vs. Mondale, Carter vs. Ford (although I have almost no memory of that one), Clinton vs. Bush...those debates were fun. Damn information age.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 04:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 09:58 pm (UTC)They like to cast against type on that series, if they can get away with it.
Sometimes it works - with Michael J Fox, Nathan Lane, Matthew Perry, and sometimes not (the guy who played Kalinda's counter-part and was in FNL).
Nathan Lane has a great part. The actor's very happy I know that much. He mentioned it in an interview recently.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 12:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-10-04 09:56 pm (UTC)But as far as you know the two people I mentioned could be judges of the week.