[Slow Ben]

Abyss, on 21 November 2011 - 03:08 PM, said:

GRIMM... the Billy Goat man ep was predictable, again, and i'm losing interest.

This. The premise of the show is great, the execution is leaving something to be desired.

I'm gonna give it one more episode and if i'm still bored with it, i'm done.

[QuickTidal]

Abyss, on 21 November 2011 - 03:08 PM, said:

HAWAII 5-0... after three truly brain deadneningly dumb episodes, if Wo Fatt doesn't show up and kneecap half the cast in the next ep, i'm out. Masi Oka couldn't carry a lead in HEROES and he's doing a dreadful job of supporting role here. Grace Park with a sniper rifle only marginally salvaged the last ep.

I am actually impressed you are still watching this. I gave up on it 3 episodes into the first season. At a certain point Police Procedural: (Insert Setting/plot twist Here) becomes just stagnant.

I'd like to point out that io9 was very excited about Oren Peli's (the guy who did the first PARANORMAL ACTIVITY) TV show THE RIVER will be debuting in February and sounds like it's PERFECTLY suited for TV week-to-week hooks and long series arc. It's a found footage/documentary style about a famous nature show host (Bruce Greenwood!) who mysteriously disappeared into the Amazon rainforest. Whether he was looking for something, or something took him, or compelled him we don't know. His wife, and grown son are joined by others as they step into the Amazon in search of him or at least what happened to him.

A docu-mystery show that seems to be following a guy who, like the famed lost Royal Geographic Amazon explorer Percy Fawcett Major, get's mysteriously lost in the amazon and people go looking for him? Fuck me man, but count me in for that show!!


The notion was that the folks who watched the pilot said that they thought the whole show had passed and then looked at the clock and only 15 minutes had gone by was how jam packed with good stuff the story was.

This is even higher on my list than J.J. Abrams new Hurley-starring show ALCATRAZ is (which has now lost a show runner (creative differences) who was quickly replaced, and said replacement is apparently having every episode have re-shoots and re-scripts....thus all is apparently not well in the Abrams-TV-Show camp)

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 21 November 2011 - 05:14 PM

[Abyss]

QuickTidal, on 21 November 2011 - 05:13 PM, said:

Abyss, on 21 November 2011 - 03:08 PM, said:

HAWAII 5-0... after three truly brain deadneningly dumb episodes, if Wo Fatt doesn't show up and kneecap half the cast in the next ep, i'm out. Masi Oka couldn't carry a lead in HEROES and he's doing a dreadful job of supporting role here. Grace Park with a sniper rifle only marginally salvaged the last ep.

I am actually impressed you are still watching this. I gave up on it 3 episodes into the first season. At a certain point Police Procedural: (Insert Setting/plot twist Here) becomes just stagnant.

It's popcorn tv that I can cheerfully switch off bad eps halfway thru with no burning curiousity about what happened. The patern was usually one good ep, one bad, but lately it's just been bad stupid-bad worse-bad. FFS they had the always watchable Greg Grunberg guest and turned the one scene he had with (former HEROES castmate) Oka into this awkward, silly, we're-trying-to-be-clever-but-don't-know'what-we're-doing failfeste.

Quote

I'd like to point out that io9 was very excited about Oren Peli's (the guy who did the first PARANORMAL ACTIVITY) TV show THE RIVER ...

I've read the hype, i want to believe, but historically, every tv show in the history of tv that involved anything in the Amazon has failed... Amazon, Off the Map, whatever. People hacking their way through a jungle just doesn't seem to have much legs in tv land. Still going to check it out.

Quote

This is even higher on my list than J.J. Abrams new Hurley-starring show ALCATRAZ is (which has now lost a show runner (creative differences) who was quickly replaced, and said replacement is apparently having every episode have re-shoots and re-scripts....thus all is apparently not well in the Abrams-TV-Show camp)

Just googled that. Ouch!
Very unfortunate because the cast at least seemed solid and while the base concept sounded like a 4400/PRISON BREAK mash-up, i figured Abrams could pull it off.

[worry]

PBS has just finished airing a four-part series called America in Primetime that was pretty excellent. It explored four TV archetypes (Independent Woman, Man of the House, The Misfit, and The Crusader). I only happened to catch the last two, but they were awesome. Lots of great commentary from actors, writers, show creators, etc. on what made them tick, and how that translated into some revolutionary TV shows and characters. It's pretty low on spoilers, from what I saw, though it did (for the sake of the discussion at hand) reveal some key moments on The Wire in The Crusader episode.

All four episodes are watchable here: http://www.pbs.org/a...etime/episodes/ though I dunno if that'll work for non-US residents since it's PBS.


On another note, since I don't see a mention of it here and maybe some folks didn't hear about it, Netflix is bringing back Arrested Development for another season, exclusively through their service.

[amphibian]

PBS kills it. I live in an area where there's three PBS channels and just about every evening there's something legitimately fascinating on.

Mainstream TV basically stole PBS's moneymakers - Dancing With The Stars is an upbudget version of the ballroom dance, Pawn Stars is a redneck Antique Roadshow, the biopic reality shows are trashier upbudget versions of the old PBS ones - and PBS now has taken over the role Animal Planet, Discovery Channel and the History Channel used to play in mainstream tv culture.

I don't actively plan to watch PBS, but damn, it always sucks me in if I'm not careful.

[HoosierDaddy]

I have spent many a random hour watching Antiques Roadshow.

Cash in the Attic on BBC is a fantastically weird little show of the same variety, but with actual auctions involved.

[Abyss]

io9 accurately explains most of what's wrong with Terra Nova ...

[McLovin]

So I got to the PERSON OF INTEREST episode that ends with Reese saying "Help me make a good decision."

Ballsy way to end that ep.

Of course, the next ep with the kidnapping rolls in the stupid, so it kinda takes away from the previous ep.

[Abyss]

Abyss, on 22 November 2011 - 05:48 PM, said:

io9 accurately explains most of what's wrong with Terra Nova ...

...forced myself to try and catch up on my three ep backlog last night. Couldn't do it. I'm out. Sadly.

McLovin, on 23 November 2011 - 02:25 PM, said:

So I got to the PERSON OF INTEREST episode that ends with Reese saying "Help me make a good decision."

Ballsy way to end that ep.

Of course, the next ep with the kidnapping rolls in the stupid, so it kinda takes away from the previous ep.

Agreed on both points.
The next ep after the kidnapping one is better tho'.
This show can be wildly inconsistent but when it's good it's very good so i'm sticking with it.

[McLovin]

Caught up with PERSON OF INTEREST, so started the GRIMM backlog.

Very uneven, cast is not great, and they quite obviously have no police consultant on staff (because even my kids could do better police work) but it did manage to surprise me in a couple places, so I'll give it a few more eps.

Not sure about carrying two fairly-tale shows at the same time though. And I really like ONCE UPON A TIME, so GRIMM's really gonna have to hook me.

[amphibian]

Tonight's episode of Once Upon a Time was awful. D-level bad.

The showrunners still haven't worked out how to get the kid's impulse to get everyone to remember their fairy tale origins into the show in an organic way. It's turned just about every character outside of Rumplestiltskin into a one-note bore. Hopefully, the show improves from this low point during next week's Prince Charming episode.

[tiam]

HoosierDaddy, on 22 November 2011 - 04:03 AM, said:

I have spent many a random hour watching Antiques Roadshow.

Cash in the Attic on BBC is a fantastically weird little show of the same variety, but with actual auctions involved.

Cash in the Attic is so weirdly bad but I have seen so many episodes.

Still need to get Sons of Anarchy off my brother. Whether it will be any good is open though both my parents and brother likes it so worth a watch as the series is free.

[amphibian]

The woman "rating" episodes of Grimm and Once Upon A Time over at Tor has turned into a non-critical fangirl.

She's got zero real criticisms for the show other than nobody being non-white. Well.. I can sort of see her point, but Lana Parilla is very obviously non-white and the fairy godmothers have all been black.

[QuickTidal]

amphibian, on 29 November 2011 - 04:51 AM, said:

The woman "rating" episodes of Grimm and Once Upon A Time over at Tor has turned into a non-critical fangirl.

She's got zero real criticisms for the show other than nobody being non-white. Well.. I can sort of see her point, but Lana Parilla is very obviously non-white and the fairy godmothers have all been black.

Yeah, it's kind of annoying when the person who is meant to be doing honest, balanced reviews of both shows (and comparing them) basically descends into fandom alone...and I noticed that when I was reading it as well Amph.

But then to be quite honest I'm not surprised, TOR does not have the greatest track record with picking decent, non-biased columnists (term used loosely, blogger is probably more accurate) who know what they are doing, what with Mrs. Uber-militant-feminist Teresa Jusino doing a lot of the DOCTOR WHO reviews for TOR and basically using it as a soapbox from which to spout nasty one-sided rhetoric about the evils of men.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 29 November 2011 - 01:54 PM

[amphibian]

QuickTidal, on 29 November 2011 - 01:53 PM, said:

Yeah, it's kind of annoying when the person who is meant to be doing honest, balanced reviews of both shows (and comparing them) basically descends into fandom alone...and I noticed that when I was reading it as well Amph.

But then to be quite honest I'm not surprised, TOR does not have the greatest track record with picking decent, non-biased columnists (term used loosely, blogger is probably more accurate) who know what they are doing, what with Mrs. Uber-militant-feminist Teresa Jusino doing a lot of the DOCTOR WHO reviews for TOR and basically using it as a soapbox from which to spout nasty one-sided rhetoric about the evils of men.

Teresa Jusino is the same writer covering Once Upon A Time.

Wow, her Dr. Who reviews are that kooky? I can believe it. She comes off as a person who if she's for something, she's for it all the way and blinds herself to most flaws - which is basically being a fangirl.

[Abyss]

Tor and various other genre sites will frequently resort to anyone who is willing to do the job, vs holding out for someone who will do the job best.
Of course, given that many if not most of these columnist/bloggers are unpaid or barely paid, that's to be expected.

[QuickTidal]

amphibian, on 29 November 2011 - 03:03 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 29 November 2011 - 01:53 PM, said:

Yeah, it's kind of annoying when the person who is meant to be doing honest, balanced reviews of both shows (and comparing them) basically descends into fandom alone...and I noticed that when I was reading it as well Amph.

But then to be quite honest I'm not surprised, TOR does not have the greatest track record with picking decent, non-biased columnists (term used loosely, blogger is probably more accurate) who know what they are doing, what with Mrs. Uber-militant-feminist Teresa Jusino doing a lot of the DOCTOR WHO reviews for TOR and basically using it as a soapbox from which to spout nasty one-sided rhetoric about the evils of men.

Teresa Jusino is the same writer covering Once Upon A Time.

Wow, her Dr. Who reviews are that kooky? I can believe it. She comes off as a person who if she's for something, she's for it all the way and blinds herself to most flaws - which is basically being a fangirl.

Haha, I never even noticed who was ding the ONCE UPON a TIME ones. I'm not at all surprised.

This review: http://www.tor.com/b...y-and-her-skirt

In which she moans about Moffat's writing in a line where Rory is gawking at his wife in a skirt and screws up something in the TARDIS because of not paying attention and the Doctor says to Amy to put on pants because otherwise Rory will continue to do so and put their lives in danger. She shouts feminism about how the Doctor could have just as easily told Rory to pay attention...

...luckily most people in the comments of the post took her to task for making such a ludicrous statement, simply saying that telling Rory to pay attention would not stop him looking up his wife's skirt if the situation happened again...he's a dude, he's going to look...and that Amy putting on pants would solve the situation. I'm not saying it's right, I'm simply saying that it's realistic and guys are guys. She literally spends a paragraph or two in the comments POORLY attempting to defend her position and basically saying that "guys will be guys" is not an excuse, and that we should change that aspect of humanity...riiiight...because changing soemthing men have always exhibited is that easy to do. Then her argument goes right off the rails when she is asked about Jack Harkness objectifying women and men in the same fashion on older episodes and she claims that since we expect it of a flamboyant gay guy, that it is quite alright and that never bothered her. So basically she makes a stupid comment in her post (makes the post ABOUT that comment, instead of properly reviewing the mini-sodes), and then proceeds to not only poorly back it up in the comments, but eventually pushes her own argument right off into men-bashing territory.

Anyways, reading her DW posts pissed me off because they always rode the line between her decidedly vigorous feminism, and her fangirl-ish nature where she just gushed for a few paragraphs and didn't properly review anything at all.

How TOR asks her to write anything is effing beyond me.

EDIT: Yeah Abyss, that's probably why indeed, and I guess I should expect it more.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 29 November 2011 - 03:30 PM

[amphibian]

Probably a mixture of her being the easiest option in terms of availability and interest in the subject matter.

Best way to beat her is to keep putting up good stuff on Iceberg Ink. Reach out to Tor, see if you can cross-post or something like that.

Editing to address Abyss: Yes, you're right about that. However, it's entirely possible to go from putting up posts for no money to actually getting paid (not a ton, but okay money). My internet radio show co-host and I are each on the staff for two major MMA websites and my co-host actually pays his rent through that.

This post has been edited by amphibian: 29 November 2011 - 03:40 PM

[Abyss]

There are absolutely excellent interwub columnists out there including many who do it for free.
It's when we see the example in question that it's reminder that some sites go for quantity over quality.

And there's a bit of a Howard Stern thing going... even the bad ones draw attention.

[QuickTidal]

amphibian, on 29 November 2011 - 03:36 PM, said:

Best way to beat her is to keep putting up good stuff on Iceberg Ink. Reach out to Tor, see if you can cross-post or something like that.

Indeed, which is actually part of the reason I am currently reviewing Series 1 of DW, I hope that if I review all the older eps of DW then I have ground to stand on when I go to TOR and ask for space to post there about it as it airs. We shall see.