End Of Season Review: Fringe

While futilely attempting to catalogue the weekly TV events of the 2008-2009 season, I spent a long time agonising over Fringe, the wacky science fiction show from J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci. As mentioned in my In Treatment review, there were many other shows on our to-watch list, some of which were actually reliably good (Friday Night Lights and The Shield spring to mind), and yet I felt compelled to keep watching this first, much to Canyon's bafflement. Much of this I can put down to my nerd heritage, but it was also a consequence of the imminent end of Lost. With that show on the final stretch, I need something to replace that, something with a needlessly complex mythology that is filled with Easter Eggs for me to feel good about spotting. Dollhouse looks to be building some interesting ambiguity, certainly about the history and purpose of the Dollhouse itself, but the clues about all of that are being introduced with actual narrative force, making these revelations story beats instead of just getting the prop department to mock up a poster for Massive Dynamic with a phone number on it.


The loss of Lost will leave a hole in my life that will be absurdly big for something as trivial as a TV show, but when Fringe turned out not to be just a procedural but just the kind of batshit sci fi continuity smorgasbord as Lost, I rejoiced. Could this patchy show fill the hole? Would it settle down and provide the brain fodder that Lost did? By the time the season finished, it was sadly still a long way off, with Dollhouse providing the mental workout. More on that some other time.

Of all the shows I watched this season, Fringe was probably the most exasperating. A lot of shows turned out to be just as good as I had hoped (returning shows such as FNL and Big Love), some surprised me (Party Down, Leverage, and Sons of Anarchy are currently making me very happy, though I had expected to be disappointed), and some were terrible from the get-go and never recovered (Knight Rider, Eleventh Hour, and The Unusuals deserve their ignominious cancellations). Dollhouse was the show I was desperate to love, started out hating, and then ended up adoring, but Fringe was one that tested my patience throughout. More than once I considered dropping it, until the episode Safe came along and showed that the glacial pace of Lost was not going to be replicated. At the midpoint of the season, everything kicked off, and it seemed like Fringe was going to be my favourite new show of the year. Except that Fox kept taking it off the air for months at a time, wrecking any narrative momentum, made worse by some dire standalone episodes that will be next to unwatchable when going through the season a second time. Lost's first season might not be a patch on later seasons, but it still maintained a higher standard than this.


It was foolish to assume the show would be Lost 2.0. For a start, ABC might not be the most daring network in the world, but they have been more than willing to give Cuse and Lindelof slack to create the oddest and most complex show on TV even as that oddness and dense narrative repels viewers who have lost patience with it. Fox are pretty much the opposite, as shown by their insistence on dumbing down Dollhouse long enough to put off any viewers who wanted something more intelligent than Bionical Woman. While Whedon seems to be incapable of creating anything that doesn't demand great attention from his audience, Fringe comes from the minds of a bunch of guys who are more than capable of creating challenging and entertaining TV, but also know that they have to play by the rules if they're going to avoid cancellation. The result is a show of dismay-inducing lowest-common-denominator standalone episodes that are filled with story beats that make absolutely no sense if you haven't seen every other episode. It's not quite the worst of both worlds, but it's close.

Compared to the first two seasons of Abrams' Alias (which had Kurtzman and Orci onboard as head writers), Fringe has been, at times, an appalling mess. Part of the failure is down to the main character, Olivia Dunham, who is nowhere near as compelling or consistently written as Sydney Bristow (and Anna Torv is no Jennifer Garner). Several episodes in, her mild-mannered responses to the death of her lover and revelation of his betrayal were obviously not working. At the time I thought Torv was underplaying great emotional pain, but in the sixth episode, The Cure, Dunham is suddenly a vengeance-crazed maverick, suggesting the character was rewritten to become more dynamic. Of course, it could also have something to do with her brain being invaded by the consciousness of her evil (or not evil) lover, but none of it felt like foreshadowing, merely tinkering.


As Masticator pointed out in another internet venue, the second half of the season saw her living with her sister and niece, probably in an attempt to make Dunham seem less like an unlovable career woman (can't have one of those on Fox!). If the network feels that's what Dunham needs, then fair enough. After all, Sydney Bristow lived with Francie Calfo and hung out with Will Tippin, and both of them allowed the writers to give Bristow more moments of vulnerability, as well as having a sounding board for her troubles.

However, Francie and Will were also used brilliantly to complicate her life, especially in the second season. For two characters that, at first, had seemed extraneous, the amazing second season finale would have been nothing without them. Dunham's sister Rachel (played by Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist scene-stealer Ari Graynor) adds nothing. She kinda flirts with Peter Bishop (the almost eternally smirking Joshua Jackson), and her daughter almost gets her brain melted by an improbable evil scientist in the desperately bad episode The No-Brainer, but other than that, there really is no purpose for them in the show other than to have a child around that Dunham can hug. Look! That woman is reading a story to a child before bedtime! I no longer hate and fear her. Good work, focus group.


Other characters have little or no purpose too. Astrid Farnsworth (Jasika Nicole) is little more than a lab assistant with a wicked 'do, added just so Walter Bishop (John Noble) has someone to throw exposition at when Peter isn't around. Phillip Broyles (Lance "Intensity" Reddick) either gives Dunham some props or some earache depending on what is needed for each episode. He also seems to be simultaneously jaded by the mad science events in the show, and absolutely shocked by them. Happy though I am to see Reddick getting regular work, I wish he was given more to do. He needs to shoot a motherfucker or two in the second season.


Nina Sharp (Blair Brown) has proven to be significantly less interesting than Ben Linus, or even Charles Widmore. There's a bit of back and forth about whether she's a good guy or a bad guy, but compared to my endless pontificating about the alignment of Linus, I'm really not that bothered about her. When it's revealed on the show, I'll give a damn then. Charlie Francis (Kirk Acevedo) has proven to be such a disposable character that he has been fired and not fired with great rapidity. I have no idea what the showrunners are up to there, though it does strongly suggest that people shouldn't drink consolation rum and then go posting on Facebook. Or wear certain egregious hats.


With almost all of the characters leaving me cold, the mad science has to keep me occupied instead, and a lot of the time it fails at that too. For every amazing, creepy visual like The Sealant (which makes your orifices close up, suffocating you to death), or a weird worm crushing a man's heart, there is some stupid Chimera monster on the loose, or a syphilitic cat woman that drinks spinal fluid (what the hell were they doing that week? Someone should tell the writers that three bad ideas do not equal one good one.). The main arc of the show is the thing that saves it, with Walter's tinkering in parallel universes causing a war with a technologically superior version of humanity.


The moment that was revealed was when I mentally committed to the show through thick and thin, as it promised some mindblowing stuff later on, but even then, we find out that Dunham was once a test subject for Walter and William Bell (Leonard Nimoy, in one of the most heavily promoted, and utterly awesome, surprise cameo appearances ever), in order to prepare her for battle as a psychic soldier. Shades of Scanners and X-Files there, and not a problem, except that Sydney Bristow, in Alias, was also trained as a child as part of the absurdly named Project Christmas. It's one thing to complain about how shows by J.J. Abrams seem to focus a lot on father issues, which is kind of unfair as it's not something he is alone in doing, but having two shows feature two special agents who have had a mysterious childhood is really taking the piss. Though still, psychic super-soldiers are a lot more interesting than just your regular super-soliders. I love Captain America, but is he as cool as Michael Ironside and his ability to blow someone's head apart? Exactly.

So, most of the characters suck. Some individual episodes are horribly goofy and uneffective. It can be dismayingly derivative. The format means most episodes end with a race against time, with, at best, a chase sequence or, at worst, Dunham talking someone out of setting fire to her with their brain (didn't they do that twice?). The science is offensively bad, even when you assume a daft sci fi show is liable to fudge the details somewhat. There is far too much evidence of the showrunners playing it safe and doing what the network demands. Why bother with it?


Because JOHN NOBLE IS LOVE, bitches! I can take any amount of dreary Dunham home chat, or Peter Bishop-style smarm, because every so often John Noble wanders into shot, and takes even the stupidest dialogue - yes, even the endless digressions about various foodstuffs - and turns it into a heartbreaking, shocking, hilarious soliloquy (yes, all of those emotions at the same time!). What's best about that is that he actually gets the best dialogue on the show, so imagine how incredible that sounds. His performance as Denethor in Return of the King left me cold, but in Fringe he performs miracles. In the season finale, There's More Than One Of Everything, he has some scenes in an old beach-house during which he has a minor breakdown in front of Peter. Kudos to Joshua Jackson for stepping up to the plate, but the real genius is being displayed by Noble, who is alternately terrifying and vulnerable.



Next to Gabriel Byrne and Michael Emerson, he's the best thing on TV.

He's not the only reason I keep watching, though. That amazing series concept, so much more interesting than "FBI investigates odd science things, has great potential. The episodes that furthered that arc the most were the season highlights, showing up the standalones for the silly mistakes that they were. The ratio of good to bad episodes is tilted in the wrong direction, but even so, the bad episodes often featured some moment of trickery that justified them. The Easter Eggs, mostly involving Michael Cerveris' cameos as jalapeno-loving curio The Observer, are always fun to look for, though again, how much the show will reward rewatching will depend on whether there are even more clues than we thought, and even more future plot twists have been foreshadowed without us even knowing it. Of course, that excludes the heavily sign-posted revelation that Peter is actually Alternate Universe Peter, a twist that was blatantly obvious very early on in the season (though I have to give props to internetter Diane Court for putting her finger on that before me). So far, though, I'm not quite sure what the lens flares mean. Is it to do with crossing back and forth from one universe to the other? Or just a test run for Abrams' dazzlingly bright Star Trek?


Speaking of The Observer, just how cool is he? His introduction in The Arrival was the first hint that Fringe was up to something more than just solving a case a week, and captured my imagination just as I was beginning to think the show was a misfire. It's a good thing too, as the pedigree of the showrunners promised something better than the humdrum introduction. As I am human, I tend to be more disappointed than usual when something doesn't live up to expectations. Kurtzman and Orci get a lot of flack for their film work, and sometimes there is a point there. Their script for The Legend of Zorro was a depressing failure, and the controversy surrounding The Island is the most interesting thing about it. However, they wrote some of the very best episodes of Alias, and only someone with a heart of stone couldn't love their Star Trek revamp. I also didn't hate Transformers, and will not apologise for that, even if judged by God him-and/or-herself (though I reckon God loves Transformers as much as me and has also watched it four times in one week like I did last month).

I'm not sure how much input they have in the show (according to Orci's IMDb page, they're developing nine projects, and that's in addition to their work on the next Star Trek movie), but hats off to them for hiding the real arc of the show for about half of the season, and for gathering together a strong team of writers and directors. Though it was sad to see X-Files legend Darin Morgan depart the show after only a few episodes, the showrunners managed to get some terrific writers like Jeff Pinkner, Zack Whedon, and J.R. Orci, and talented TV directors like Gwyneth Horder-Payton, Lost veteran Paul Edwards, and Christopher Misiano, among others. They also got Brad "Transsiberian" Anderson to direct some of the best episodes (including that excellent season finale), and, in a surprising masterstroke, brought in Akiva Goldsman. For a long time he has been loathed by cinephiles and nerds the world over for writing some of the worst movies of our time, but Bad Dreams, the episode he wrote and directed, was a taut forty-five minutes filled with creepiness, humour, and horrifyingly effective shocks. He can be extremely proud, and I can ease off the urge to scream when his name appears in credits. Give him some better projects to work on, and he might surprise even more people in future.


In the end, I like the idea of the show far more than I like the actual show. It's extremely gruesome, which I always appreciate. It's full of truly awful TV science, but the showrunners have at least made the mad science machines look like real world instruments - all dials and switches and rheostats - which is a lovely touch. The cast is largely forgettable except for one acting titan (Noble) and a bona fide sci fi legend (Nimoy), but I don't really mind, even though that's often a deal-breaker. This is your actual "damned with faint praise" review, but even though the things I love about few and far between, I still do love the show. A surprising amount as well. I can't really explain it. Maybe it's because it's the sort of show I get a kick out of even when it fails, like when you buy a car against everyone's advice just because you like the shape of it, and you can forgive it when the seats aren't that comfortable, or there's a weird smell that never goes away, or the windscreen wipers don't work when they get wet. It doesn't matter. This is the car you wanted! Sometimes that's enough.

People used to say that Heroes was Lost for Dummies*, but in fact it is Fringe that, right now, feels like the low IQ version of Cuse and Lindelof's epic. I don't mean that as an insult, especially as I strongly believe that after this opening season of promising set-ups, quirky narrative experiments, and interesting concepts, the best is yet to come. Let's hope I'm right about that, because after Lost leaves us fans bereft, with Dollhouse unlikely to make it to season three, and Goyer and Braga's Flash Forward an unknown quantity, this might be all we have left to cling to.

* In case you were wondering, Heroes is actually Smallville for Dummies. True fact.

The Return of TV, The Departure Of A Blog Feature

For a while now I have plugged away at writing enormous posts, filled with screengrabs, about the various weeks of TV, a task I once enjoyed and slowly came to dread, simply because even if I had some fun with it the process was horribly time-consuming, which made posting even more irregular than it already was. My reading time was overtaken by attempts at writing comments with every spare moment I got, which eventually became a source of much frustration as my ever-shitty TyTn II phone kept crashing and deleting my work. The last time that happened ended up removing the majority of a Week in TV post, and though I didn't realise it at the time, it was the final straw. I've said it before, and I'll say it again; THE TYTN II IS THE WORST PHONE IN THE WORLD! Do not even think of buying that buggy-assed fucking shit.

So, with the TV season restarting after a Christmas holiday, I might as well admit defeat, even though I have several semi-finished posts filled with pictures littered around the place. Should I even bother finishing the rambling diatribes when I can't even muster the enthusiasm to do anything with them now that a silly amount of time has passed, and I have now found other projects to concentrate on? I don't think so.

So, for now, here is a bit of what I was going to write, just for the sake of keeping track of my responses to the last few weeks of TV, which contained some dreck but mostly some of the best TV of the year, such as a wonderfully consistent season of Friday Night Lights, the grim but entertaining introduction of Dr. Raymond Langstrom (aka Morpheus) on CSI, and certainly the best series finale since the last episode of Angel, as The Shield finished with a staggering, emotionally draining closer that even my favourite show, Lost, cannot possibly top. And then there was this stuff...

Stupidest Science:

Suresh, the crusty unscientist and narrator of Heroes, is already the stupidest and most annoying character on TV, so having him experiment on, and kill, innocent people in order to make his serum work is par for the course of this moronic show. Even so, stating that they need a catalyst to make the proteins bond with the enzymes, as they did many weeks back, is possibly the worst kind of sciencey-sounding gibberish I've heard in years.


Proteins and enzymes don't bond. If they did, we'd never be able to digest meat (or nuts). Considering this is a show that features superheroes and scientists, it's a blow to its credibility that no one who works on it seems to know anything about superheroes or science. It's no wonder Suresh's research creates this.


Plus, for extra stupid points, this poor bastard mutates way faster than Suresh does. If a reason for this was given, I don't know what it is. Suresh can't even fuck up properly. What amuses me most, is that this non-science bullshit carries across the writing staff of Heroes. Here is a panel from Joe Pokaski's dire Ultimate Fantastic Four, set moments after Jeph Loeb ruined the entire universe with his Ultimatum, a comic almost as bad as his Onslaught Reborn mini.


And the way Heroes uses death to lazily generate drama?



Don't get too upset there, Ben. Oh, and because Jeph Loeb continues to be a plague on the world...

Crappiest Plug:

Obviously written before Jeph Loeb got shitcanned by Tim Kring, this episode of Heroes (It's Coming) featured Hiro getting upset about the current state of affairs in the Marvel universe, proving that he truly is a fanboy in his current brain-damaged state. While the shock over the death of Steve Rogers is justified, getting all twisted up about Red Hulk is a waste of time.


Once Loeb is off the title and Greg Pak or Fred Van Lente get back on it, that's gonna get retconned as quickly as Supergirl got rewritten once Loeb left DC. And hey, when Bryan Fuller arrives at the end of this season of Heroes, he can retcon all of his nonsense here as well! It all works out in the end.

Most Annoying Turn of Events:

As I've mentioned before, it's gratifying to see an atheist heading up a TV show, which is one of the reasons we've stuck with The Mentalist so far. Sadly, however, just as with the other big TV atheist, House, instead of letting that stand, the showrunners have to flirt with showing these characters in doubt about their stance. Fair enough if the character is dealing with some terrible event. As they say, there are no atheists on a deathbed. However, having characters doubt their beliefs just because some "supernatural" event has happened is just horseshit. It troubles me to think that atheists are just considered religious believers in waiting, and a bleeding statue or family tragedy is all we need to be pushed over the edge, just as it's horseshit to assume a religious person would automatically eschew their beliefs if presented with examples of terrible mortal cruelty.


House has flirted with this in the past, much to my disgust, this episode of The Mentalist (called Seeing Red, showed our jovial but tortured hero Patrick Jane meeting a psychic, played by Leslie Hope, aka super-unlucky Teri Bauer from season 1 of 24. For much of the episode he calls her out on her techniques, treating her as a terrible fraud. Much James Randi-esque fun is had as he toys with her, but all of that good will is undone in the final scene as the psychic tells Jane that she knows about his family's murder at the hands of the evil Red John, and reassures him that they didn't suffer. As she leaves, Jane bursts into tears.


Now, the worst case scenario here is that Jane is so distraught over this tragedy in his past that he's willing to suspend his scepticism long enough to allow the possibility that this information is real, which is a betrayal of everything he has stood for so far and scuppers the show entirely. That his devout colleague Grace Van Pelt sees him crying could suggest that that is what is intended, her look of sympathy also one of triumph. However, I'm going on the minor information I have about this lightly sketched character. For all I know, she understands that Jane is actually just grieving, having been reminded of the tragedy by the psychic, which is the scenario I would prefer to imagine. Jane has been portrayed as a man angry at the abuse of skills such as his, and I'd like to think the show is willing to portray him as a tortured man but not one turning his back on his beliefs (and his knowledge of fraudulent psychic nonsense) just for some solace. It's lazy writing to have him debating this so early in the day, and smacks of focus group meddling. I hope Bruno Heller knows this and won't take the show down that road, and so in the interest of giving him a chance I'm just going to assume Jane is merely grieving and not taking her words at face value. Nevertheless, I'll be keeping an eye out for any further bullshit flare-ups.

Best Road Trip:

FNL has faced cancellation since early in its first season, and especially now, with the show on a roll, the prospect of losing it is a miserable one. Last season, ending on an episode that provided zero closure and only accidental cliffhangers, looked for a while to be the last episode ever until the DirecTV deal came through. That third season might also be the last (we'll have to wait and see what happens when FNL returns to NBC), but at least we're getting a little closure before then at the start of the season we saw Smash achieve his dream, and with this episode the same thing happened to Jason Street.


Using actual New York location shooting with a bit more grace than the clumsy attention-seeking of Ugly Betty, Street and Riggins bumble around the city in search of clothes and employment like a couple of yokels, except lovable, funny, and relatable. In the process, we see Street's confidence finally hit a speedbump, as he is rebuffed by the sports agent who had inadvertently given Street false hope, and yet more signs of Riggins' newfound maturity, as his advice and support saves the day.


As is usual with me, the end of the episode caused floods of tears, as Street gets his Happily-Ever-After with Erin, and Riggins watches from their cab. It was only then that it struck me: no more banter between these two friends. As grateful as I am that we got to see Street's arc finish (and finish with a happy ending to boot), it's a shame we get to lose that.


The chemistry between Scott Porter and Taylor Kitsch has been one of the most appealing things about FNL since the pilot. It shall be missed.

Most Pleasing Guest Star:

My childhood adoration of Steve Martin has taken numerous knocks since he became the go-to guy for weak wacky dad roles or unnecessary and ill-thought-out remakes of superior works, but luckily his appearance on 30 Rock as the crazed white-collar criminal Gavin Polone was a shot in the arm for my admiration.


Though he strayed into Wild-and-Crazy-Guyisms in the final stretch, for the most part he was reserved and quirky, much like in his film-stealing uncredited turn in Baby Mama. I'd hold out hope that this is a sign of a forthcoming renaissance, but I shouldn't hold my breath.

Worst Fashion Sense:

I could have spent a long time dealing with the psychic fallout from this horrendous jacket (cagoule?) worn by Greg in CSI...


...but we're actually both traumatised by the clothes foisted upon the female leads of The Mentalist. Amanda Righetti has been given some really badly fitting t-shirts, especially in the most recent episodes.


She's got a rocking bod, so it takes some skill to make her look bad. Still, in early episodes she did okay. Robin Tunney, on the other hand, has been lumbered with awful low-slung pants and nasty, tucked-in shirts. This picture...


...doesn't even begin to display the horror. If you watch the show (and you should, as it has gone from strength to strength, despite the quibbles voiced above), check out her dreadful ensembles. I'm shallow enough to want some CSI-style flash in their outfits. Tim Kang and Owain Yeoman also suffer with their bland suits, with only Jane looking swish with his vests. Maybe that's the point. Still, though.

Most Distracting Furniture:

It was the confrontation absolutely nobody was waiting for. After two years of not thinking about it at all, Nathan Petrelli finally comes face to face with the father he thought was dead. It was one of the great TV moments, up there with the end of M.A.S.H., or that bit in Only Fools and Horses with the chandelier. And through it all I was transfixed by Pops Petrelli's table.


It's just a sheet of circular glass resting on three metal beams. Simple. Yet I spent the whole scene either staring at it or worrying about the damn thing. Is the glass resting on the pointy corners of the beams? Isn't that dangerous? If you nudge the table will those corners scratch the glass? Or are the corners flattened? In which case that wouldn't happen, but the purity of the design would be disrupted. This fascination with furniture is proof that there is obviously something wrong with me, if I'm going to be distracted from all of the dramatic tension and devastating emotion on display by something so innocuous.

Most Blistering Performance:

Recently I pointed out how amazing Walton Goggins had been in The Shield, and his streak of acting brilliance continues all the way to the outrageously exciting finale, but in the penultimate episode, Possible Kill Screen, his genius was utterly eclipsed by one of the most astonishing acting moments I have ever seen.

Shield spoilers! Do not read if you have not yet watched this amazing show!

Michael Chiklis has been consistently great from episode one, even though I had a tough time buying this little man as a hardass despite all of the posturing and violence. In the penultimate episode, believing he has no choice but to sign a deal with ICE behind Ronnie Gardocki's back in order to save his wife from an arrest that didn't actually happen, Vic is asked to confess his wrongdoings in order to complete the deal, allowing him to start his new deal as a federal agent. After signing the document he pauses for a startlingly long time, something even the best TV shows don't have time for, and in that time, he seems to age ten years. The weight of everything he has done is so overwhelming that the strain of it made him look like a different person. How he did this I don't know. I don't have a picture of that, so take a look at this, and imagine the complete polar opposite of it.


The moment was electrifying, even more so when he finally unburdens himself of the list of crimes to an increasingly horrified Laurie Holden, who slowly realises that her support of Mackey has doomed her career. Vic's deadened laugh as he recounts some of the more despicable acts of the past three years is chilling, but even worse is his arrogance at the end, knowing that he has saved his own ass, with his only remorse saved for Ronnie.

Chiklis deserves honours and awards for his work here, but he wasn't the only actor to shine even brighter than usual. Midway through the confession Claudette and Dutch arrive to catch Vic, only to find he is now immune to prosecution. CCH Pounder's performance in that moment, snapping with the strain of seeing the man she detests getting away with not only the crimes she thought he was responsible for but also much much more, was another award-worthy moment, and not the first either.

This is the depressing fact about The Shield, that outside its fanbase, it's largely ignored in favour of more prestigious work. The recent disgraceful Golden Globes, which snubbed Lost and The Wire, also coughed up nothing for The Shield, and while there's an argument that ballots were cast a while back, the show has been around for long enough that it deserved a sentimental nod just for old time's sake. Though, of course, a gratuitous nomination just for making it to the finale would be almost as galling as no nominations at all, it still stings that Chiklis, Goggins and Pounder end up with nothing. At least they have the gratitude of a legion of fans who have been lucky enough to see these fine actors at the height of their powers.

Most Pointless Torture:

While waiting for the TV season to kick off again, we started watching the sixth season of 24, which we had yet to watch even though it aired a couple of years ago. During that there has been less of the torture, though saying that we're not even halfway through, so who knows how that changes. Nevertheless, nothing they can do in that show will top the endless crazy zapping of Sylar (who, at that point, was momentarily good) by Elle.


Seriously, she goes nuts.



Really nuts. It's to do with him killing her dad, Evil Ned Ryerson.


Stephen Tobolowsky was a dick in this show, and she never seemed to like him, so why his murder brings about this response is, as with many things on Heroes, illogical.


Even Mel Gibson doesn't get tortured for this long in his movies, and he has a Christ complex.


Well done, Elle, you blew some skin off his face. You can probably knock it off now.


No? Still going? Okay. Do you need to recharge or something? Drink some Powerade?


That wifebeater he's wearing is awfully resilient. After all, in this opening shot, she destroys his jacket in a homage to Watchmen.


Occasionally, for variety, he gets blown backwards.


So yes, she is very angry.


So angry I bet she never gets over it and forgives him! That would be crazy.


Oh, for fuck's sake.

Most "Holy Shit!"-Inducing Improvement:

We really never saw this this coming.

Yes, Fringe had been, before the pre-holiday episode, a sporadically entertaining sci-fi show packed with silly implausibilities, boring secondary characters, poorly cast leads, and even more loose plot threads than Lost had at this point in its first season. Other than John Noble's brilliant performance as Dr. Walter Bishop, we found it mildly diverting but frustratingly underwhelming, especially when compared to the electrifying mind games of Lost.


And then Safe happened. Suddenly every character was written better, every plot thread echoed the others, and most of those annoying questions posed earlier in the season came together brilliantly. It also featured the best cold open so far, as shady FBI traitor Agent Loeb (surely a comment on the hapless writer/producer) used the phasing doohickey from a few weeks ago to steal a lockbox containing a mysterious machine.


The sequence had pace, intrigue, grisly death and cool sci-fi trappings, and even better, we didn't have to wait to find out what the machine was, and who it belonged to. By the end of the episode we knew it was part of a teleporter that had been designed by Walter many years previously, something that even he didn't know.


Not only did it sate our curiosity about the elements introduced this week, we got to see Mr. Jones in action, killing his lawyer (played by an underused James Frain), and then being snatched from his captivity in Germany by mad science to reappear in America, at Little Hill (another question from previous weeks thus resolved). The teleportation effect, disrupting the ground and shaking the prison, was especially well conceived.


While the craziness raged, Walter's memory hiccups continued, as Olivia began to mistake John Scott's memories for her own. That the show had finally figured out how to make two plots intertwine in this way inspired hope that the writers were becoming more confident now that the format and characters have been set down. It's not the best writing on TV, but it was the best writing on Fringe so far, and I take heart, hoping that this represents the moment the show kicks into gear.

So, for now, that ends that. I'm sure that I'll still talk about TV in the future, in some format, and not just because some of our favourite shows are returning. Yes, Battlestar Galactica, Big Love, and Flight of the Conchords are back, and coming very very soon, my favourite show, Lost, returns following a triumphant season. In the words of my good friend and dastardly despot Brian Michael Bendoom...

Why It Can Be Okay To Be A Hater

Since writing about Mike Leigh's Happy-Go-Lucky, it has been released in America to a tidal wave of positive notices, with even less dissent than there was in the UK. While I would like to think some of that might be attributable to Anglophilia from some critics who consider the UK to be automatically culturally superior (a fallacious assumption if ever there was one), people I know and whose opinion I respect have chimed in with fulsome and uncompromised praise as well. Once more I feel like the curmudgeon who hates fun, even though I still maintain the movie is a wretched, hollow mess hiding behind a smug veneer of respectability.

However, this suspicion that I am out-of-step with the happier end of the cultural spectrum haunts me even more now that I've seen Mamma Mia!, the most successful Hollywood musical of all time. The DVD release has been the cause of much celebration by the UK press, who giddily recount tales of singalong screenings packed full of delirious fans who adore it, flaws and all. Though some outright hate it, I've heard many people say they thought it was dreadful, but couldn't hate it because it is so genial and determinedly jolly that picking on it seemed unfair.


I had a similar response at first, but it slowly turned sour, which convinced me to blog about it. That post is coming up, but while writing it I kept changing tack, eventually realising that my thoughts about it were rooted in my unspoken beliefs about criticism. This realisation came as I saw with some sadness that, as both Mamma Mia! and Happy-Go-Lucky have accidentally or intentionally generated a impregnable forcefield against criticism by dint of being celebrations of joyousness, writing negatively about them is tantamount to hating life, or proof, as Melanie Reid puts it in this column, that I “have missed the joke”. Maybe she’s right, as the only jokes I could see on display in Mamma Mia! involved bawdy comments about promiscuity and male genitalia, and they didn’t make me laugh. I must hate life!

This gets to the core of any film criticism (or, in my case, amateurish blogging about superhero flicks), that for any movie or book or album or comic or game, there is liable to be someone out there who thinks it's a joy-inducing slice of heaven, so what purpose does a dissenting voice matter? There are even those of us who think Speed Racer is a misunderstood classic, but as only twelve people seemed to like it, it's not quite the same thing. Mamma Mia! is the fastest selling DVD of all time, a record that is unlikely to be broken when The Dark Knight comes out, even though that movie made $440m more in theatres. Mamma Mia! isn't just loved by a few. Its fanbase seems to be monolithic. It makes millions of people deliriously happy. What's the point of bringing up the faults of this movie when millions of people either ignore those faults or think they they are actually the things that make it more real or honest?


This is the "If you don't like it, don't watch it," defence, employed by fans to bitch out anyone who dares to point out the flaws in the object of their affection. Talkbacks across the internet are littered with this mewling protest, not in the hope of saving someone from wasting their time on something they don't like or "get", but because they want the negative assessment eradicated. It's childish and conceited and hilariously thought to be the final word in these arguments, even though I'll watch whatever I fucking like and won't be told what to do by some weasel in a Save The Cheerleader t-shirt.


(To whoever created that image, thank you from the bottom of my heart.)

To clarify, I feel I have an insight into their mindset. Shamefully, I will admit to thinking Heather Havrilesky should just switch Lost off as it's obviously not the show she expects, and her constant frustration with it for not being a jolly romp every week is depressing to read, but that's in my crankiest moments. Obviously she should do what she wants to, or has to, what with her being a TV critic and all. That attempt at rationality on my part doesn't make reading her drubbings any less frustrating or upsetting, though. Why is my emotional response so visceral? Am I personally offended by it? Is it an unthinking and oblivious diss of my own opinion? Am I objectively wrong somehow, and Havrilesky has some insight into the show that I, a mere blogger and fanboy, am missing? Am I empathising so much with the creators of the show that I feel bad for them being insulted like this?


It's all very silly and solipsistic, and I try to subdue those feelings. While pretty much everything that happens on the internet is ephemeral and meaningless, I heartily believe raging ineffectually against a consensus opinion is necessary and almost worthwhile, and not just in an arrogant "Every Opinion Counts" way. It's the way of things that people are more likely to want to debate something that they enjoy above something they dislike, as most people will gladly not waste time on something they derive no pleasure from. As a result, fanbases grow and solidify, and any outsiders looking for information about a work of pop culture and/or art will come upon an uncritical consensus view that something has value. Sometimes it will, above and beyond the appeal it has to a fanbase, and sometimes it won't. However, as time passes these pop culture artifacts become considered classics, and their influence can be felt on other works that come later.

That's all well and good if they're original and personal and thought-provoking etc., but if they're poor but popular, it can be a problem. While I'm uninterested in anything that rips off Buffy or Angel, I'll happily give hours of my life to experiencing the work of people inspired by the Mutant Enemy team to stretch themselves to those heights of writing. It's likely to happen, as many writers on that show were insanely talented (Whedon, Espenson and Goddard particularly spring to mind), and to aspire to their level of excellence is commendable. The goalposts should be there, but if, over time, flat and lifeless writing is considered the height of achievement thanks to relentless praise from uncritical fans, those goalposts move, and we're stuck with Torchwood as the standard bearer. Yes, I’m aware that I’m describing a worst case scenario that is almost totally beyond belief, but the nightmares of a world in which that poo-wad of a show is revered have been keeping me up at night. I appreciate that there is a large element of over-reaction there. After all, no one would ever try to fuse the macho nonsense of Torchwood with the concept of Buffy.


Oh bollocks.

And no, I'm not one of these fusty old moaners who thinks that standards are in the toilet and TV and cinema are cultural toilets with nothing of merit on offer. If anything, things are better than ever, primarily because even those stereotypical suit-wearing, cigar-chomping movie moguls are realising that smarter movies can find an audience and even a profit (though I hate to admit it, you can credit the Weinsteins' ability to make Miramax such a success for that sea-change). What worries me is that, while blogging and talkbacks allow anyone's opinion to be voiced, a dissenting voice will be shouted down by the fans, who have more of a stake in supporting the object of their affection than the "hater" has in hating on it (the exception to this rule is Heroes, which seems to have a large audience, most of whom are having fun piling on).

Of course, that is not to say I’m patting trolls on the back for standing up to the consensus with random reflexive insults that are posted merely to be contrary or obnoxious. There is a middle-ground, and debate can be conducted on the internet with civility and courtesy. I’ve managed it in the bearpit that is the AICN talkback, and if it can be done there, it can be done anywhere. It’s easy. Just follow the simple rule, “Don’t be an asshole”, and, weirdly, people respond positively. It’s shocking but true. I'm also aware that yes, there are often sites that go beyond the pale in chasing after an object of hate (I just stumbled across this baffling site obsessing about Kevin Smith), and while I return to the same few things I think represent the ass-end of pop culture, I do try to praise the stuff that makes it all worthwhile.

Before I forget, when I mentioned to Canyon that I was going to write this post, she made a good point, that often pop culture artifacts that receive a uniform critical drubbing or blanket praise do so because those with an opposite opinion feel cowed by the wave of consensus, and it's only after a dissenting voice speaks up that some people feel bold enough to voice their doubts. I'm not sure how often this happens, but Canyon mentioned the Titanic backlash, and The Dark Knight certainly went from high praise to fevered criticism pretty quickly. One anti-Torchwood post I wrote received comments about how relieved people were that the show wasn't just accepted as a quality production by everyone, as several media outlets were acting as if it was must-see TV, when in fact it was an ongoing car crash. It can be a real Mugatu/Crazy Pills experience when you're a lone rebel (oh God, get me!), so if even my carping, which is read by something like twelve people on a regular basis, is aimed at something everyone likes and gives others the courage to say how they feel, then I feel much better about being a mean-spirited jerk making fun of Eve Myles' berserk facial expressions.

Okay, that’s enough navel-gazing and justificating and preening and stating of the obvious. Consider this my huge caveat whenever I get all mean and start to complain about something that has a loyal fanbase. Though it might not seem like it, I'm criticising something beloved out of a sense of duty to mankind, and I also temper that with love. There should be garlands strewn at my feet or something.

ETA: Oddly enough, Noel Murray's penultimate Popless post at the AV Club has seen him pondering what is the point of criticism, and this paragraph chimed:

Throughout the year, I've been wondering: What is the responsibility of a critic? Is it to respond openly and enthusiastically to whatever an artist is trying to do? Or is it to nitpick it in the name of maintaining some authority? For most of my career, I've leaned toward the former, but I'm starting to see the value in the latter. Everything looks flawed to me these days—even the music, movies, TV shows and books that I love. When I review Mad Men or Lost for The TV Club, I often take pains to note the flaws even as I'm raving about what those shows do right, but whenever I do that, I wonder if I'm unnecessarily bumming out fans who came to The TV Club merely to celebrate the good. If I'd reviewed The Shield finale—one of the best TV endings of all time—would I have been persnickety enough to point out that some of the dialogue was strained and the ending rushed? If so, would that have served a purpose? I'm honestly not sure.

Of course, I think he has a duty to pick faults with the finale of The Shield which, while dwarfing everything else on TV all year, had its problems, though minor. His concern that the fans would be upset is off the mark. Fans with thin skins should know better than to expect blanket praise from a site written by such thoughtful people, and everyone else would appreciate the back-and-forth in the comments section. Also, if people are to trust your opinion, you have an obligation to be honest with yourself, especially if you're contributing to a larger dialogue. The man needs to be fearless, as do we all. Be sure to read the articles he links to in the first paragraph. The Pop Matters post is especially bracing, especially this:

Most reviewers are similarly in it for the self-definition, seeking to prove to themselves that their tastes are unique or trying to secure tangible proof of their influence on the world. The parasitic positive review is as much a will to power as the nihilistic negative one.

It's funny makes me feel kinda queasy because it's true.

That Week In TV Year II (Week 10)

The things that delayed the completion of this post include:

The nineteenth century stylings of London Underground

Doing overtime even though all I wanted to do was stay home and play Civilisation Revolution

The UNBELIEVABLE series finale of The Shield

David Mamet's incredible Redbelt

Repeated listens to Deerhunter's Microcastle and Bonnie "Prince" Billy's Lie Down In The Light

Seeing The Dark Knight on IMAX one more time before it disappears

Plumbing emergencies

A hellish visit to the soul-chasm that is Westfield in White City (though it was for a good cause, so that makes up for it)

Compiling a list of mundane events that are of no interest to anyone, even The Blog Gods who watch over bloggers and follow our every word with rapt attention. Sorry, Blog Gods.

Enough of this list-compiling shit. Let's get this fucker rolling!

Week 10 (10 - 16 Nov):

The Shield 3:11 - Petty Cash
America's Next Top Model 11:12 - Good Times & Windmills
Friday Night Lights 3:07 - Keeping Up Appearances
CSI 9:06 - Say Uncle
The Office 5:07 - Business Trip
House 5:07 - The Itch
The Mentalist 1:06 - Red Handed
Heroes 3:08 - Villains
Fringe 1:07 - In Which We Meet Mr. Jones
30 Rock 3:03 - The One With the Cast of Night Court

Highlight of the Week:

Debate rages about whether The Office has become too broad, deviating so far from the template created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant that is no longer relevant as a comment on the drudgery of office working and how it can bring out the worst in people. Having Michael drive his car into water, or making Dwight clamber over the top of a house to check how sturdy it is, or any number of oddities, has turned some fans off for being too wacky.


Two defences spring to mind, the first being, if it's funny (which it very nearly always is), who cares? The other is that is still able to reveal subtle truths within the context of a broader show that features Dwight hiding weapons around the office, or Creed hinting that he might be a murderer. This episode, set on a feeble business trip to Canada for some of the Scranton crew, featured an alcohol-fuelled Andy trying to get Oscar laid before phoning Angela to demand sex (which she is having with Dwight right at that moment), and Michael becoming convinced that the female concierge of their hotel was like a Geisha. Both plot threads were pleasantly farcical, but become part of a thematic trend when linked to Jim and Pam's relationship woes, or Ryan's attempt to woo back Kelly to restore what he sees as tarnished honour, inadvertently freeing Darryl. (Side-note: Craig Robinson has been great all season, and possibly the one thing that saved the previous episode, Employee Transfer, from becoming too uncomfortable to watch.)


The original show kept the office relationship thread restricted to just Tim and Dawn (with David's woes coming later in the series), as there was more than enough horror to document already. The US version, while still dealing with the horrible mundanity of office work, has definitely branched out to more outlandish plots (while keeping the characters internally consistent), but slowly a noose has tightened around many of the characters' necks.

What could be considered an over-reliance on soapy relationship drama still feeds into the central theme, that the drudgery of office work is a living hell from which there can be no escape, a miserable fate that, until this episode, was made funny by Michael's (and, in the original, David's) obliviousness to this fact. Of the main characters, the number of characters who appear to have a social life outside Dunder Mifflin is shrinking. Angela and Dwight and Andy are in a love/sex/emotional torture triangle, Pam is unable to complete her course and fulfil her dream, Ryan is playing some weird game with other people's feelings, and for a while now Phyllis has been married to Bob Vance of Vance Refrigeration, who works in the same building, and has his own bizarre and seemingly unbreakable connection to his job. The office has taken over their lives over time, and while I'd agree that it's debatable whether that theme in the show is intentional or merely a side-effect of the emphasis on relationship plot threads, it is there nevertheless.


Most poignantly of all, Michael, who has considered his job to be the second most important thing in his life, has just seen that job ruin the actual most important thing: finding a partner to have numerous kids with, an obsession he has had since childhood. If his delusional attitude to the realities of working life has kept him happy in the past, it probably won't for much longer. Given a shitty business trip as a sop to his upset over Holly's departure, and feeling lonelier than ever after a depressing tryst from which he expected more, Michael snaps and bitches out David Wallace.


For the character, and this show, it's a dramatic (and beautifully performed) moment that's on a par with Michael Corleone deciding to kill Sollozzo and Captain McCluskey. That's not hyperbole, my good friends. After all, I could have said it's on a par with him ordering the hit on the heads of the other four families and Mo Green while his nephew is baptised, but I didn't. I'm not that crazy.


While Michael (Scott, not Corleone) had a depressing epiphany (which may or may not play out in coming weeks), we also got to spend a lot of time with Andy, a prospect that made me miserable. I loved Ed Helms on The Daily Show, but when introduced to The Office, I was disappointed that I couldn't get a bead on who Andy was. Other than some odd belligerence and insecure Ivy League posturing, I didn't believe in the character, especially after he became deferential to Dwight. I understand that was a consequence of his anger management training, but at the time it seemed too drastic a change, and rendered the character kinda pointless. Surely there was a place in the show for someone with an anger problem. As long as it didn't flare up too badly, it could have been a new and interesting dynamic to have on the show. As it is, we're just waiting for Andy to have another nervous breakdown, and as his wedding to Angela is not going to be a harmonious affair, it sometimes seems like we're on a straight course to it. Maybe this expectation is why I've been bored with Andy, as I've been unable to see what else his character is there for.


Thankfully, this episode showed a new side to Andy, given his own plot instead of being a featured player in The Dwangela Show. His successful attempt to bond with Oscar over many strong drinks, and his endearing insistence on trying to hook Oscar up with a couple of heterosexual businessmen, went a long way to giving Andy a real personality at last. It also meant we got to see Ed Helms and Oscar Nunez playing drunk, which was surprisingly funny (playing drunk can go wrong so often). It was a total pleasure seeing them becoming friends, as well as getting more screentime for Nunez, who is often regrettably sidelined.


Most surprising of all, at least to me, is how the showrunners have managed to keep the Jim/Pam story going for so long without running out of ideas. It's especially gratifying for me as, in direct contrast to the original series, Tim/Dawn was my favourite thing about it, whereas here I often tune out as they flirt. No offence to Krasinski or Fischer, who do a great job, or to the writers, who have managed to make their characters fun and flirty, as well as slightly tragic (both of them are doomed to never live up too what they think their potential is, providing much bittersweetness to their romance). I just have more fun watching the other characters, and think their low-key comedy moments are less amusing than Creed's occasional utterances, or Dwight's epic delusion.


This week made me care about them. In a scene as well acted, written, and directed as anything in the entire run of the series, Pam phones Jim to tell him she has failed her course, and will have to stay in New York to retake her exams. Both actors do amazing work conveying the misery of that moment. As I've said, the US version of the show is still doing what the original did, i.e. showing how office work can kill the soul unless you're careful. It also shows that life can throw you terrible curveballs outside work, and this cruel event was a perfect example of that. Of course, that was, thankfully, not the final word (see below).

Almost Highlight of the Week If Only It Hadn't Fallen Apart At The End:

Coming hot on the heels of the exceptional Leave Out All the Rest, this episode looked horribly like a CSI:Miami-esque cultural embarrassment, as a shooting in Vegas' Koreatown is covered up by the locals who are distrustful of the police force. I seem to recall an episode of some procedural show about Korean gangs and the Omerta-like silence of the Korean residents, but I can't remember which show it was in. Whatever it was, this vague recollection made me more than a little uncomfortable with the portrayal of Korean immigrants as skittish, incomprehensible, and ignorant. Seeing this episode open with the shooting made my heart sink.


Luckily the gang plot turned out to be akin to a red herring, with the murders caused by familial strife over a series of clinical trials performed by an unethical pharmaceutical company on a very young HIV-infected boy. Introducing this plot element defused some of the uncomfortable events that had occurred by that point, most notably one elder Korean woman's panicked near-shooting of Nick, thinking he was going to abduct the boy and perform more experiments on him.


Even better, it served as a metaphor for the dismissive attitude of mainstream (and corporate) America towards its working class immigrants, seeing them as dehumanised, manipulable resources and not as individuals, which was a bold narrative stroke that I did not expect, and echoed last season's episode about the consequences of costcutting at a water treatment plant. The other great thing about this plot is that Gil gets screentime wearing his scrupulous scientist hat and not his forensic investigator one (and by hat I don't mean this one).


Right now, with Eleventh Hour and Fringe dealing with bonkers pseudo-science, it's great to have a show present both good and bad science in this sober way. Well, I say sober, but that's probably too generous. If Big Pharma fudges the statistics on their clinical trials, it's probably more insidious and subtle than just ignoring a couple of days of results, but it's satisfying to see the show address the issue from the point of view of someone the audience trusts. Even better, it's also a great character moment for Gil, coming so soon after Sara's message from a scientific expedition. While she left the team due to the psyche-wrecking stress of working in such miserable conditions, Gil is slowly realising that there is more to life than sitting in a sexily-lit office and eschewing real research. His natural curiosity, that was once one of his more endearing qualities, has become a curse, and maybe now he realises that Sara has found a better way. It's likely this will be the thing that makes him leave the team.


As I've said before, I'm looking forward to the arrival of Morpheus as Dr Raymond Langston, because that voice is like the planet itself intoning profundities and, if that photo is anything to go by, he will look motherfucking sharp, as ever, but I will miss Gil's socially awkward alpha nerdery, and his belief in the power of science. Perhaps Langston will be like that too, though the early talk of him having a psyche similar to that of a killer not only smacks of gimmickry, but drags the show into Will Graham territory (ironic, as the early seasons of the show, with Gil more outgoing and lean, brought back memories of Michael Mann's Manhunter). I've got no problem with that per se, but I'll miss Gil's positive perspective on science, and besides, Cracker did forensic profiling definitively, so this can only suffer by comparison.


So why is it not the highlight of the week? Partially because The Office was so great, but also because the killer turned out to be the HIV positive child. While this was a great way to explain away the silence of the Korean community, which naturally wants to protect the child from the deadly consequences of defending himself and his uncle from his greedy and unscrupulous mother, it sadly joined the long line of episodes where the killer turns out to be the child. Though this stopped shy of the bad seed explanations used in the past, it's still an over-used tactic, so much so that we can now add "It was the kid that did it!" to "It was the guest star that did it!" as probable third act reveals. In individual cases there's no problem with this; this episode was generally terrific, and both Hannah West episodes were superb. It's just becoming formulaic, and is used too often as a way to illustrate the generally awful state of the world, and can smack of "Save the Children!" handwringing, which ticks me off.

Directorial Excellence of the Week(s):

Since the pilot episode, helmed by TV vet Clark Johnson, The Shield has always been strongly directed, with a roster of in-house talent making TV gold out of their low low budget and crazy shooting schedule. On top of such fine directors as the late Scott Brazil, D.J. Caruso, Dean White, Guy Ferland and even Michael Chiklis, the show has featured some classy guest directors, with Frank Darabont and David Mamet providing two excellent episodes.


This week's nerve-shredding installment of The Best Show On TV™ was helmed by Craig Brewer, aka the Southern Douglas Sirk. As a big fan of Hustle and Flow and Black Snake Moan, I was particularly thrilled, and this episode was a perfect fit for him, with quirky moments like Shane and Mara's inept hold-up, and Vic's drug deal, complete with panicky money transfer. It was terrific stuff, as always, and made me eager for his next movie.

Also pleasing was the chance for ace director of photography Rohn Schmidt to direct an episode two weeks earlier. His contribution to the show (and to Darabont's The Mist, which looked way more expensive than it actually was) is such that it was nice to see him get a chance to step up. It was a decision in keeping with the rest of the season, which has seen several characters come back, sometimes to wrap up loose ends. That the showrunners are eager to honour the road they have taken by giving us one last look at the rich tapestry of characters they have created to populate Farmington is one of the things I love most about this season. This is how you end a show.

Best Use of the Golden Hour of the Week:

The Office, as well filmed as it is, cannot be said to be a pretty show. The cast are mostly believably plain, though the rabid internet fans of John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer might disagree. The palette of the show, all greys (grays) and... well, greys (grays), is hardly easy on the eye either. It's all in the service of the bleak tone, and so please don't consider this a complaint, just a statement of fact. However, this week we got to see a little colour, used to great effect, as Pam returns to Scranton just as the sun is setting behind her. The result, all lens flares and backlighting, was beautiful.


It felt like a different show for a couple of minutes.

Personality Overhaul of the Week:

Remember when I said Marjorie was an annoying skittish bird of a woman whose fear of everything made it hard to connect with her? Well, seems she agreed, because this week, to paraphrase Dr. Evil in Goldmember, she went men'al on account of the booze.








And yet, following all of that madness, this is how her photoshoot ended.


Oh Marjorie, your crazy European mind is a source of constant mystery.

Improvement of the Week(s):

What is depressingly stupid, peppered with plot holes and narrative contrivances, woeful performances from a bunch of lucky amateurs, distrust of logic, a total lack of embarrassment when it comes to retconning continuity problems, and a perplexingly huge fanbase? Obviously, it's world's worst sci-fi show Torchwood. But what has all of the above minus sexual progressiveness and plus Robert Forster and Malcolm McDowell working hard(ish) to get that kidney-shaped swimming pool they always wanted?


Yes, it's the Metahuman Family Variety Hour, with laughs (see Suresh buy "something to take off the edge" from a drug-dealer with a plummy British accent), thrills (will a major character get killed and/or brought back to life this week, before being resurrected and/or killed again the week after?), and suspense (how much can the showrunners ruin the character of Sylar this week? Quick answer, quite a bit, if they're going to trap him on a bed that he can just walk out of even without powers. Look at his hands! They're not even tied down!).


The episode entitled Villains spent much of its running time showing how Sylar, who was introduced in the first season as an evil bastard, took a momentary retcon break in the middle of his bastardiness to sappily regret his first murder (David Berman from CSI!) while hanging out with Elle after a meet-cute involving attempted suicide. That this remorse makes a mockery of the entire first season is possibly the most infuriating thing that has happened in the whole show, made worse by the "reveal" that Sylar ended up being re-evilled by HRG, manipulating Elle into throwing some hipster douchebag into his line of sight, which triggers his hunger and makes him super-extra evil.


Poor Sylar! HRG was the real villain all along! At least, that's the big narrative conceit there, that the characters we thought were heroes and villains were all vicey-versa. King Kring and his Krazy Kronies in the writers room may have thought that this was a promising direction to take the third season, but all it's done is waste our time. Did any of the Peter-bad, Future Sylar-good stuff mean anything, especially now Peter has no powers? If Kring is so in love with this idea, wouldn't it have been cheaper and simpler for him to just play Dungeons and Dragons instead? If you want your characters to change alignments in that game you just reach for another character sheet and scribble in Chaotic Evil instead of Lawful Neutral.

There were other things happening this week. Having Meredith and Pyrokinetic Man turn out to be siblings was simultaneously annoying (is this just one big incestuous family by now?) and gratifying (for the first time in a long time it felt like the showrunners had planned something ahead of time instead of giving the impression the script was rattled out by someone who had never attended a script meeting to date). That didn't change the fact that even the momentary return of Eric Roberts didn't make that plot interesting.


Actually, now that I think about it, is Eric Roberts interesting? He's kinda funny, unintentionally, and I do love him for being in Worst Movie of All Time contender The Specialist, but I think the casting of someone well known in this show I once liked has blinded me to the fact that we're talking about someone who is Roy Scheider, except not cool (N.B. I wrote this before rewatching The Dark Knight a couple of nights ago, and he's really good in that, so I think he is now hovering around the edges of cool).

It's the same with Malcolm McDowell. It's impressive that he's in it, until you remember he's also been in Tank Girl and Fist of the North Star and any number of bad movies, and it's not like he was any good in them. Does he suck now? Was he only ever notable for being the anti-establishment poster boy in 60s British cinema? That dangerous young man is not who we see grappling with Patrick Stewart in Star Trek: Generations, or haunting Adrian Pasdar. Or is Heroes so bad now that it's infecting my memory of him as Alex the Korova-drinking asshole, or young H.G. Wells in Time After Time?


It's not just him. Canyon and I were discussing Veronica Mars earlier this week, after I updated her on the terrible silliness Kristin Bell has to endure in this (falling for Sylar, being very very angry in almost every scene, wearing some really unflattering clothes). I committed the terrible sin of saying I don't even remember whether she was any good on that show, and Canyon justifiably chided me. Turns out the suckage of this show is so complete that I cannot remember how charming and intelligent and tragic she was in Mars. All I think about now when I see her is, at best, the hilarious deleted scene from Forgetting Sarah Marshall where she gets abducted by a horse, or, at worst, every single second she was on screen in this episode.


Maybe that's the worst crime Heroes has committed, other than squandering a great premise, not to mention Tim Kring's insistence on insulting the fanbase. Dude, when Aaron Sorkin did it we forgave him because The West Wing was the shit. Your silly show hinted at impressive things for half a season, and has been a laughing stock ever since.

So why did I call this Improvement of the Week? Because it was much less ponderous than the usual nonsense we have to endure, ignoring Suresh, Parkman, Peter (for the most part), "Tracy", Claire, and The Ridiculous Mr. Sniff. Some of the retconning was fun (Linderman's attack of conscience), and it temporarily fooled me into thinking the writers were interested in gathering up loose ends. So, possibly the best episode of Heroes since the penultimate episode of season one. It was still the worst thing I watched all week, though.

Visual of the Week:

This New Yorker piece (recently reprinted in the Daily Telegraph without acknowledging the originating magazine) paints Alec Baldwin as a tragic and miserable figure, wracked with self-doubt/loathing, overthinking everything, and seemingly suffering from anhedonia. But look at him!


If only he knew how much joy he brings us.

Voice-Off of the Week:

Fringe returned this week, luckily being just good enough to erase the memory of the previous dire installment. It wasn't all (tolerably) good, though. Ever since seeing Jared Harris in the execrable Resident Evil: Bollocks Overload (I can't remember the proper title; it was the second one), I've been more than a little creeped out by his voice, which is almost exactly the same as his dad's, except higher-pitched. It's like English Bob during puberty, and it really irks me. Such a petty thing to be annoyed about, and I appreciate I must seem like a jerk, but it bothers me so much that I have no idea whether he is a good actor or not, as I concentrate so much on the voice that I don't pay any attention to what he's saying.


This week's episode featured a Face/Off between Harris (as the predictably mysterious Mr. Jones) and Olivia, played by Anna Torv and her Amazing Voice of Amazingness. It was like matter and anti-matter colliding during the scene. Torv may still make some regrettable acting choices (her love scene with Billy Burke was tough to watch), but her voice is like angry chocolate. It makes up for a lot.

Oddly Subdued Direction of the Week(s):

I've railed against Greg Yaitanes many a time in the past, but to my surprise this week's episode of House was restrained, and all the better for it. Considering how annoying Deran Serafian's work on Joy was (see previous post), I'm wondering if the title cards were mixed up. Or their minds were swapped! That's much more likely.

Tonal Victory of the Week:

The Mentalist has got into a groove of above-average entertainment, despite the relative anonymity of the supporting cast, mostly because the showrunners seem to have found the right tone for the show. While it concerns murder and kidnap and other forms of criminal behaviour, the show is uncommonly genial, which is pretty much what creator Bruno Heller is aiming for.


This week's installment showed Patrick Jane, super-handsome Mentalist Supreme, winning lots of money at a casino (in the line of duty), and sharing it with his colleagues and a woman trying to buy a new liver for her mother. It was playful and silly, with the murder mystery plot going unmentioned for a weirdly long stretch of the show, and when it re-focused on the murder, we ended up getting a ton of face-time with Gregg Henry, one of the most watchable and likable actors around. As most procedurals tend to be dour, it's refreshing to have something that is willing to strike a chirpier tone, and a lot of that is down to Simon Baker's wonderfully charming lead performance. His devilish grin and joie de vivre is the key to this show's success, and the news, from that link above, that we are going to see how much of that is a cover-up for his inner anguish, means there is enough depth to the character that we're not about to get bored of that multi-layered gregariousness any time soon.

Disgusting and Confusing Imagery of the Week:

Dear God, Fringe made me want to boak for reals, with this week's burst of Mad Science involving a weird worm thing wrapped around someone's heart and pushing tendrils into the guy's veins, eventually coming up through his IV drip. Seriously, I have a vivid imagination, but this is totally sickening. Problem is, when the guy's chest is cracked open, we see the worm around his heart...


...and for a whole minute I thought a big-lipped fish was growing in his chest with its mouth around his heart, which would have been gross, upsetting, confusing, and batshit insane all at the same time. Canyon thought it looked like Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors, which is also regrettably true.

Frustration of the Week:

Watching America's Next Top Model and knowing McKey is going to win really got us down. Analeigh was, as ever, amazing during the challenge and her photoshoot and, outside the competition, protective of Marjorie and gracious and sweet throughout. It was bad enough seeing her sadness when Marjorie got kicked out, but knowing that she will lose to someone who can't even flirt convincingly...


...made watching this episode a chore, filled with much shouting at the TV. Again, this is why I don't watch reality TV. Its unreality makes it too real for me.

Funny Expressions of the Week:

What was up with Tina Fey this week?







And no, this is not just a flimsy excuse to post lots of pictures of Tina Fey, and I'm offended you would suggest that.

Fight of the Week:

Friday Night Lights was, as usual, amazing, with several disparate plot threads coming to natural and satisfying conclusions during the final football game, but even though I was in my usual FNL-induced joy-fugue, it was sad to see Street fighting yet again with his obnoxious friend Herc.


Their fractious relationship is one of the most fascinating on TV. Their bond withstands the terrible frustrations both feel toward each other, and this fight, one of many, was just as entertaining and touching as all the others. With Street's arc resolved in the next episode, I'm going to miss their bitchiness and semi-hostile supportiveness.

Intensity of the Week?:

Is this intensity?


If you were to assume so because that's what I say every week, having never met a joke I can't beat into the ground like a tent peg, then maybe it seems that way. In fact, in context, Lance "Incredulity" Reddick is actually staring in baffled horror at Walter Bishop, who, at that point, is recounting a non-anecdote about eating a fruit cocktail once upon a time. To the hardcore Fringe-watcher it might seem like this is an easter-egg of some kind, like the appearances of The Observer (seen here at a German airport)...


...but to Broyles, it's an excuse to give Peter a lecture. As we're hugely bored by Peter's reflexive annoying sarcasm and exposition (sarcexposition?), we're happy either way.

Can you believe we're still plodding through shows from week 11? We only just watched that week's Fringe and House (both very good), and even though Thanksgiving shrank week 12 (i.e. this week), we're behind on that too. I will get up to speed and talk about something else soon, I swear.