Better Than Folly: they fight crime!

Showing posts with label they fight crime!. Show all posts

27 December 2023

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCVI (September & October 2023)

August is traditionally the "we don't know where else to open these movies" dumping ground of studios, and November is the "last chance to get in the big awards nomination window" timeslot, so September and October are generally pretty chill. (Except for horror movies, but I do not watch horror movies, so.) I found myself a good batch to watch, though!

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCV (August 2023)

That's right, it's BARBENHEIMER time. Here are my quick reactions to the…*counts*...twelve films I watched in August.

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCIII (May & June 2023)

I love summer movie season. I love living ten minutes away from a movie theatre. What a time to be alive!

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCI (April 2023)

We've reached the time of year--long days and mild weather--when I will go see pretty much any film that's not a horror movie. I am largely omnivorous.

Although I've got to confess: I did not diligently take notes on the miscellaneous films I watched this month, so it's mostly bullet-ish points to go along with the usual GIFs.

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LXXXVIII (January 2023)

The time has come, y'all! OSCAR WATCHING SEASON. I do like January as a movie-watching month--it's a good mix of genre stuff and awards bait stuff, and sometimes those two things even overlap.

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LXXXVI (July/August 2022)

While I didn't watch all that many movies these past couple of months, the ones I did watch were pretty excellent. Action galore! #RepresentationMatters!

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LXXXV (April/May/June 2022)

After my Oscars binge, I vowed to take a break from prestige films and go all in on my most beloved genre, science fictiony action. It's been a good three months, let me tell you.

Could You Repeat That? CXCV: Quarantined Globetrotter Edition

Rosaline Palmer Takes the Cake, Alexis Hall
Oh God. Oh help. He was doing kindness at her. Rosaline couldn't cope with people doing kindness at her. It made her feel like she'd shoplifted a lipstick. Except the lipstick was made of time and emotional energy.

Give Unto Others, Donna Leon
'I've always thought the people who want to help save the world are probably the worst people to be in charge of a charity.'

The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, Lauren Willig
"Look, if it makes you feel better, I promise to do a very bad job hiding your body."

Boyfriend Material, Alexis Hall
This was why relationships sucked: they made you need shit you'd been perfectly happy not needing. And then they took them away.

Sea of Tranquility, Emily St John Mandel
There's a low-level, specific pain in having to accept that putting up with you requires a certain generosity of spirit in your loved ones.

The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever, Julia Quinn
Good God, the butler had punched him in the jaw. Stunned, Turner stroked his tender flesh. "Are you mad?"
"Not at all, my lord. I take great pride in my work."

Upright Women Wanted, Sarah Gailey
She knew that they weren't an oasis--no cool shade or sweet water was waiting for her there. But they weren't a mirage, either, and that hope felt like just enough to fit in her fists.

A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking, T Kingfisher
I wondered if having a baker save the city would have any political repercussions.

Across the Green Grass Fields, Seanan McGuire
"Civilized people don't know how to listen," said Gristle.
"All their magic goes into the places they believe it belongs."

Calculated Risks, Seanan McGuire
"It's nice how you remember dissecting cuckoos without remembering me," I said mildly. "It makes me feel very special and not at all like you're going to slit my throat as soon as I fall asleep."

05 December 2021

TV Tellings X: 22nd Century Sherlock Edition

Amelia, there are SO MANY versions of Sherlock out there in the world, but this one seemed the most hilarious.

I continue on with my deep dive into 90s kid cartoons because Y'ALL. Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century, circa 1990, is on Tubi. (It is also findable on YouTube, if you wish.) I do actually remember watching this show when I was a kid--I distinctly remember the name Moriarty coming up a few times. But, honestly, I was kind of surprised to find out it actually existed and wasn't some nostalgic fever dream.

Whoever came up with this concept is a mad genius. Also, this theme song is going to be stuck in my head for WEEKS.

TV Tellings V: Justified Season 1

I actually did a fandom post on Justified a while back, which was pretty fun.

For this watch-through, I was tempted to go straight to the second season, as I didn't want to deal with Boyd Crowder as White Supremacist, but then I thought that would be kind of disingenuous. So here we go with the first season of Justified, which I have only watched once before.

Logline
Raylan Givens of the US Marshals office is a bit too trigger-happy for his superiors. After a pretty public shootout in Miami, he gets transferred to Kentucky--specifically, close to his hometown. Does he get drawn back into the life he used to have, except on the right side of the law instead of the wrong one? Yup. Nobody knows what to make of him.

TV Tellings II: Lucifer Season 5

Lucifer season 5! This is my second watch--and the sixth season is here now! Huzzah!

Logline
He's the misunderstood King of Hell. She's a former actress turned police detective. Together, they fight crime!

Fandoms I Have Loved, Part 4: Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

At the beginning of the pandemic shut-in, I signed up for a bunch of those 30-day trials from streaming channels. One of them was Acorn, and I figured I’d try watching the #MissFisher show I vaguely remembered some friends raving about. And then I watched it every day for about four months.

Logliney Stuff:
It’s the Roaring Twenties and the Honorable Miss Phryne Fisher, monied adventurer and avowed single lady, takes up work as a private detective in her hometown of Melbourne. Along with the clever and motley crew of her household, she flirtily solves crimes alongside Detective Inspector Jack Robinson.

Fandoms I Have Loved, Part 3: Criminal Minds

I was going to do #TheCrown next, but since it has a season or two left to go, I figured an analysis right now would be premature. So #CriminalMinds it is!

Logliney Stuff:
The Behavioral Analysis Unit of the FBI uses psychological theory to identify and outmaneuver murderers, most often focusing on serial and spree killers. While half of the team swaps in and out fairly frequently, fifteen seasons means the core cast has some serious narrative heft when sweeps time comes around.

What’s Up With That:
Sometimes you just need pretty people to play uber-competent puzzle-solvers who also are dead shots and good at roundhouse kicks. Also, if you need to run to the bathroom, it’s totally fine if you don’t hit pause, because you probably won’t miss anything you can’t guess beforehand.

Fandoms I Have Loved, Part 2: Justified

This one’s a bit of an outlier, since I only watched and fell in love with #Justified in the past year. But it’s a pretty recent rewatch, so I figured I’d get this written while the memories are pretty fresh.

Movie Moments IX: November

Twenty-two for November!

War for the Planet of the Apes, 03 November 2017, Blu-ray via RedBox
"I save myself."
"Is there anything left of you to save?"

These movies are stupendously good, y’all. I do wonder, though, how folks in the Deaf community experience the movie. Most of the dialogue is in sign language, but the CGI scenes are dark enough that I suspect it would be difficult to follow. Plus, what little I’ve seen indicates that some words are legible, but the overall use doesn't quite correlate to ASL. Hm!

I'm still impressed with how expressive Caesar-as-CGI is. There's an intensity of soul that I find more affecting than in most non-CGI lead actors. Kudos to Serkis and the team of wizards.

Thor: Ragnarok (3D), 04 November 2017, AMC Classic Central City 10
I wish there were more women, and apparently Asgard only contains, like, 350 people. I literally groaned aloud when Strange appeared, and I'm sad Thor’s old team was dispatched without ceremony.

All that aside: THIS MOVIE IS SO FUN. So, so, so fun. Also, Loki is a genuinely awful antihero who's been woobified way too much, but Tom Hiddleston's saunter, man. I am weak. Like, they could have had an additional 20 minutes of Loki and the Last Valkyrie power striding on the bifrost, if I had my way.

Monuments Men, 04 November 2017, DVD via university library
A movie about Cate Blanchett’s character would have been awesome. Like, a psychological thriller of Matt Damon, art curator, trying to get possible-quisling, possible-Resistance agent Cate Blanchett to reveal Nazi art smuggling routes? I want THAT movie.

The Imitation Game, 04 November 2017, DVD via public library
Someone call me when Benedict Cumberbatch finally plays against type.

Gasland, 06 November 2017, streamed via Amazon
For one of my writing classes I’m using Fracture: Essays, Poems, and Stories on Fracking in America as our reader, so we watched this in three parts. It’s actually excellent text if you want to talk about research, because Josh Fox, the filmmaker, details pretty clearly how he went about doing investigation. There are a number of sequences of him just trying to get corporation representatives to sit down in the same room with him and a camera. (In one really fun scene, one executive rapidly backs out of the conference room as they see the camera and realize what the meeting is actually about.) And a lot of it is Fox being rejected, over and over, via voicemail, in contrast to the interviews he conducts with the folks who are being directly affected by fracking. (Even if you don’t know anything else about the film, you’ve probably seen the snippet of him lighting someone’s tap water on fire, which was the main feature of the documentary trailers.) As a narrative device, this works great: we, as an audience, are learning about fracking at the same time he is (or so it seems). The one major issue I have--and it’s possibly a silly one--is the mumblecore monotone Fox uses to narrate. It’s like he really, really wanted to sound like Werner Herzog, but couldn’t quite infuse his voice with the same conviction that Herzog manages. It’s...off-putting.

The Queen, 11 November 2017, DVD via public library
I remember seeing the news about Princess Diana's death and crying, really crying in my bedroom. My mom found me and gave me a hug, murmuring about how it was very sad, and how Diana had tried to do good in the world. (I'm actually crying now, thinking about it, which is odd.) I was too young to be cognizant of the context, so I can barely contrast the movie with the events proper. I am fascinated by the juxtaposition of personal turmoil and state-appropriate grief.

Jupiter Ascending, 11 November 2017, DVD via Netflix
The Wachowskis don't do anything half-measure do they? This movie is lush and imaginative, and Channing Tatum is somehow talking in an entirely different cadence, and I'm not surprised folks were completely weirded out by this movie, because what is happening in this movie? What is going on? (Still more satisfying than the Divergent trilogy. Actually, Mila Kunis would be perfect for a YA sci-fi romp. Someone make that happen immediately.) What glorious and incoherent nonsense.

THESE COSTUMES, THOUGH.

The Big Short, 12 November 2017, DVD via university library
This is the most expensive educational film made to show college sophomore economics classes ever made.

The Incredible Hulk, 13 November 2017, streaming via HBO Now
Weirdly, I had never watched this before (nor the Bana version), even though I am pretty sure I own it on DVD. I appreciate that the movie just dives right in without running us through yet another origin story. And it could just be I’ve accustomed myself to Ruffalo’s interpretation, but Norton's Banner is a bit too squirrelly for my tastes. This is sort of dissatisfying as all the individual MCU movies are, in that the titular hero is just fighting an evil version of themselves. Ah, well. I will imagine Betty, Jane, and Pepper get together for wine night once a month, because OF COURSE THEY DO. (Do I have to write this? I’ll write it if I must.)

Justice League (3D), 18 November 2017, Cinemark Colonel Glenn 18
I mean, it didn't suck? Though, as much as I appreciate Gal Gadot’s ass, I didn't really see a need for so many shots of it. Anyway, can confirm I did, in fact, cry through all the Amazon battle scenes.

American Hustle, 18 November 2017, DVD via university library
The real winner of this movie is whoever had the lightbulb moment about everyone's hair, because that's really all the audience can really focus on for the first half of the movie. By about two-thirds through the movie, I started to suspect the movie wouldn't end with JLaw's and Amy Adams's characters making out, and I was QUITE MIFFED. And then THEY DID.

I LEGIT THOUGHT THEY WERE JUST GOING TO TEASE US HERE.

Murder on the Orient Express, 19 November 2017, AMC Classic Central City 10
I am leery about any movie involving Johnny Depp nowadays, but Leslie Odom Jr is in this, too, so. In any case, it's a gorgeous movie with some fascinating camerawork (the overhead shots, zow), and I actually had never read this particular book, so the denouement was pretty fun.

This Means War, 21 November 2017, DVD via public library
What I’m learning from this movie is I’d really be interested in watching a Reese Witherspoon action movie. Also, Tom Hardy doing comedy is pretty disconcerting, while Chris Pine seems right at home. ALSO also, the movie clearly and immediately establishes Hardy/Pine is the REAL OTP. But nice try at making massive violations of a woman's privacy a romantic comedy, I guess? (It is entertaining, but I chalk that up to the undeniable charisma of the actors.)

Capote, 22 November 2017, DVD via public library
This is such a quiet movie, but it's difficult to look away from it. Most striking are the brief scenes of Capote holding court at parties, all jagged stories and sparkling wit. And we never see the beginnings or ends of tales, making those moments unsettling, in contrast with Capote as interviewer, as observer, as writer, as friend. (Early-ish in the movie, one of the murderers calls the other “mendacious,” but the word only resonates once we get a clearer glimpse of Capote's skillful and somewhat horrifying ability to manipulate.) And Keener as Harper Lee is wonderful--I would love to see a flipped version of this movie, focused on her experience in this handful of years.

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, 23 November 2017, Blu-ray via RedBox
I wasn't sure what to expect, but the opening montage set to Bowie and the act of ceremonial greetings over centuries is really lovely. And then a longish CGI sequence of an alien civilization under sudden attack, which was entrancing. And then directly to a shot of Cara Delevingne’s bikini-clad ass and our two protagonists “bantering” about their “sexual tension” that ends with Laureline telling Valerian her heart would be won by a dude who would, I kid you not, “erase his playlist for me.”

I just. I can't. And to be entirely fair, the world-building is spectacular. They just could have introduced their leads (who read more as precocious teenagers than the uber-competent agents they're supposed to be, and it is entirely because of their hair-styling) in a hundred different ways that would have been interesting and not gross.

Also, there's an interlude with Rihanna doing burlesque, and then reciting Verlaine's poetry, and I have no idea how to parse it. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT THIS MOVIE IS BUT IT IS SO PRETTY. (So, pretty much every Luc Besson movie, it turns out.)

Talk to Me, 23 November 2017, DVD via public library
I wasn't sure what this movie was about, but I can't really argue with this cast.

I MEAN, SERIOUSLY.

I actually felt like it could have used a longer runtime--we see Petey’s success escalate almost exponentially, but the conflict between him and Dewey, and him and Vernell, needed development. The fight after the Tonight Show should’ve landed more sharply than the blunt actuality. What we get, though, is great--plus Taraji P Henson's playing proto-Cookie as Vernell.

Get On Up: The James Brown Story, 24 November 2017, DVD via public library
What with Black Panther coming up, I figured it would behoove me to get familiar with Chadwick Boseman. And he's pretty amazing here, along with Viola Davis, Nelsan Ellis (RIP), and Octavia Spencer. And I really loved the way scenes ricocheted from era to era. The breaking of the fourth wall was uncomfortable but interesting from a narrative standpoint--to what extent is the film itself influenced by our titular character, and to what extent is the movie constructed by him in the role of an unreliable narrator? (That scene of the boys fighting each other blindfolded for the amusement of rich people, set to that jaunty band, is possibly the most horrifying thing I’ve watched all year.) Side note: since I watched Talk to Me the day previous, with Petey Green opening a concert after the assassination of MLK Jr, it was kind of neat to see the James Brown side of the concert.

Step, 25 November 2017, DVD via RedBox
This is so lovely. It follows the arc of a Baltimore high school step team as they go on competition, but it focuses on three young women applying to college, and their struggle as they try to raise their GPA, or find enough funding, or get into a school where they can still help their families. The most heartbreaking scene was one young woman worrying, close to the end of the month, about whether they had enough food to sustain her six-year-old nephew. (Oof.) Largely, though, this is affirming, plus showcases some pretty damn excellent step routines.

Focus, 26 November 2017, DVD via Netflix
Can you imagine seeing Will Smith and Margot Robbie in this movie and then being excited to see Suicide Squad? That isn't to say they have chemistry, actually, but just borderline reality that if either one of these two came at you with intent, you'd run with it.

In any case, if you like Will Smith or heist movies, you’ll probably enjoy this.

La Vie en Rose, 26 November 2017, DVD via public library
I honestly know nothing about Edith Piaf, but the movie adhered to the rags-to-riches musician formula, and Marion Cotillard was wonderful, as everyone knew already. I will say, though, that the non-linear storytelling got old after a while, even though I do think it could have been an effective device, as I've previously noted in my Get On Up review. But by the time we reached the end of the Marcel sequence--which, to be fair, was a superb scene--I found myself wondering when this would end already.

SO PRETTY, THOUGH.

Bridge of Spies, 26 November 2017, DVD via public library
This is a pretty terrifying cautionary tale that is so far going unheeded.

War of the Worlds, 30 November 2017, DVD via public library
This might not have been the intent, but I would absolutely watch a movie about the mostly-amicable dissolution of the marriage of Tom Cruise’s and Miranda Otto’s characters. Seriously, this movie is hella good. Terrifying, but.

21 May 2015

TV I'm Watching: iZombie

Or, welcome to back Neptune, AKA Seattle.

So, I've just started watching iZombie, which you can watch on Hulu (though the full run isn't available). I knew, even back when talk of it started circulating, that I would give it a shot, because Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero were the showrunners. As in, the folks responsible for the spectacular Veronica Mars. So I had it on my queue and sort of knew I would get to it eventually, and then I read that David Anders was in it.

David Anders is on this show. Oh hey, here's a picture of me and David Anders, when we randomly ran into him outside a club in West Hollywood eight or so years ago:

...wait, what were we talking about again? OH. iZombie, yes. So I read that he was on the show, and I immediately brought the show up on Hulu and discovered the first episode was expired, so I bought it on Amazon Prime. I've just watched the fifth episode, "Flight of the Living Dead," and y'all. Y'ALL. This show is great. It was sort of all over the place for a few episodes--very Veronica Mars in tone, wry and morbidly funny, but not quite sure what it wanted to do. It is based on a comic book, though from what I understand, "inspired by" might be a better term.

The Concept: Liv Moore (GET IT), a young doctor, with everything in life going perfectly, goes to a party and gets turned into a zombie. She wakes up on the beach, undead. As she adapts, she quits her job as a surgeon and starts up as a medical examiner. She breaks up with her fiance, and also starts solving crime. Turns out, whenever she eats somebody's brains (with generous amounts of hot sauce, because zombie taste buds aren't delicate), she gets flashes of their memories, and also temporary infusions of a few of their personality quirks. She then convinces a homicide detective she's a psychic, because obviously that's what happens when zombies decide to fight crime.

SPOILERS for up to the fifth aired episode, FYI.

I still have five episodes to watch, so I'm working from a limited standpoint. That said, here are four things that I dig about the show:

I mentioned David Anders is in this right? And he's having a marvelous time. Think, say, Sark as an entrepreneurial zombie instead of a spy. His name is Blaine, and he is remarkably pale and bleached blond. Think of him as charming and devious, an effortless liar, who manipulates everybody around him so that they answer to him, and only him. Think of him as a zombie that hires a chef to make brain-eating an elegant pursuit. This might, perhaps, be Anders's ur-role. It is what he is meant to be.
The delightful gentleman on the left is Ravi, Liv's boss/partner in the medical examiner's office. He grokked onto her zombie nature before she told him--one of the very earliest scenes was him catching her eating brains and not being surprised. Instead, he's delightfully scientific about it--he runs all sorts of tests to see how the whole undead thing works, but not in a mad scientist way. He's genuinely excited and curious, and also is pretty much Liv's best friend and only non-zombie confidante. They are great. Also, he's the new roommate of Liv's ex, Major, but I have yet to see that side plot come to any interesting fruition. But, yes. Ravi! He's awesome.
Detective Clive Babineaux, beleaguered homicide detective. While his whole, "yes, I totally believe in your psychic powers, suspiciously pale woman" deserves some side-eye, Clive's already got way more depth than we usually see in TV detectives. For one, there's a clear sense that he's good at his job, but awful at politics. He was deep undercover in Vice for a long time, which leads others to treat him with suspicion. He's rightly frustrated when Liv pops in, wide-eyed, and pokes and pokes him until he investigates one of her "visions." And he's got a good heart. The fifth episode has Major come in (for the second time, but the first time without Liv around) and ask for Clive's help following up on a missing teenager. It's the best, and possibly ONLY, character depth we've seen in Major so far. And following up is a scene where Clive walks into a skate park, gets clocked as five-0, and corners a kid with his prickly stare. Which leads to the kid nodding him over to a board plastered with missing persons flyers. It's excellent work--the conversations have a believable cadence, and the non-verbal cues lend the interactions a lot of depth. I'm looking forward to seeing more of this--a show where the non-Liv characters have lives beyond Liv will be a good one.

(I will note--Liv's roommate and supposedly best friend Peyton has had almost zero development. Liv's parents were pretty one-note in the premiere, and Liv's brother in a previous episode was a creep who kept creeping in Peyton's bedroom. So it's not ALL great character work so far.)
The fifth episode also introduced Lowell, a gorgeous rock star who starts as a murder suspect. When he first sees Liv at the crime scene, he stares at her, almost shocked. In the next scene, he flirts with her to the extent that I thought, hey, maybe he's guilty. And in their third scene together--in one of the most spectacularly-constructed scenes I've ever watched--he offers to make Liv a drink while they chat about the case. Instead of doing vague drink-making-like gestures, the camera frames him so we can see exactly what he's doing: swiping lime wedges around the edge of two glasses, then twisting the rims with cayenne. Pouring the tequila and the tomato juice, and then quickly adding glugs of hot sauce. Carefully slicing two bright red jalapeno peppers to garnish the drink, and when he presents it to Liv, she notes, "This is hot." And that, friends, is how Lowell reveals he knows Liv is a zombie. Because hey, he is, too.

I have no idea where this love interest thing will go, but in a universe of TV shows that constantly have actors flailing around empty coffee cups, this scene will remain glorious in my memory.

So, yeah. iZombie. It's worth a watch, folks.

I realize I mostly talked about handsome gentlemen in this post, which is sort of missing a major thing: Liv. Liv is delightful. She sort of sad and messed up, as new zombies are wont to be, but she's also caring and intelligent and wry. It's hard for me to talk about her, because her voice is so very Veronica Mars, but I dig her. I'm hoping she'll get more to develop beside "I hate murderers" and "I am sad I am a zombie, mostly because I can't make out with my ex." Anyway, I'm off to the sixth episode now.

25 September 2014

Fall TV Preview: Thursdays

We're reaching the end of the week, now. Thank goodness season premieres stretch over a month and a half--if all this was happening tonight, I'd keel over with joy and/or exhaustion.

Real-Time Devotion

Reign (10/02), 9 PM on The CW

This. Show. Is bananas. It is a gorgeous mix of Dawson's Creek and The Borgias, with a smattering of Supernatural, all wrapped up in the Claire's version of Ren Faire attire. The plotting is based more on what feels right rather than historical accuracy, but they commit to it so thoroughly that I almost don't care.

Additionally, the best scenes are of Mary, Queen of Scots, and Catherine de Medici, Queen of France, having a steely Queen-off about how much more each is able to connive and sacrifice in the name of one's country. Also, one of Mary's handmaidens, Grier, is so far more committed to practicality than epic romance, and I love it. Also, NOSTRADAMUS.
Elementary (10/30), 10 PM on CBS
While I am a sucker for any version of Sherlock, because I like competency, I think this one is the best. Leaning heavily on Sherlock-as-addict, this show has blossomed by making him aware of how much he needs Joan's help, and Joan's friendship, in order to be a better human being. He's aware of how his flaws can detract from his humanness. And Joan is a being separate from Sherlock, even as she's aware of how she's learning from him. It's a wonderful, wonderful partnership, and slowly, the edges of that bleed out into the other characters.

Soon After Airing (thanks, internet)

Scandal (9/25), 9 PM on ABC
The last season got a little too gory and gonzo at times, but there were a lot of things I liked about the trials of Olivia Pope and company. First, that Olivia's father spoke truth to Awful, Awful Fitz. (While I would have liked it if he wasn't speaking on behalf of his daughter, his utter scorn of Fitz in "A Door Marked Exit" was so epic that I must include it below.) Second, the revelation that Melly is, in her desperation and heartache and hope. Third, the clothes. Always, the clothes.
NEW: How to Get Away With Murder (9/25), 10 PM on ABC
This runs along the same lines as Scandal, though it's not Shonda-run. I like Viola Davis, and this will be an intense, fun ride, as far as the previews hint.

I'll Get Around to It

Bones (9/25), 8 PM on FOX
It's kind of astonishing, but not, that this show is still running after so many years. As with all quirky procedurals, I love it for the character depth so many years allow. I like the squints. I like that they generate drama not from will-they-won't-they, but from genuine conflicts between loving and long-term committed partners. And I love it because David Boreanaz, against all reason, is growing more attractive as he ages.
NEW: Gracepoint (10/02), 9 PM on FOX
Honestly, this isn't really the kind of show that draws me in, what with the MOODY TONE and the small town with DISTURBING SECRETS. But I like David Tennant, and I get the impression this is a short-season sort of deal. So I might check it out--at least for a couple of episodes.
NEW: A to Z (10/02), 9:30 PM on NBC
The pilot for this, too, has been up on Hulu. It's...way too twee, a lot of the time, but I like all the actors involved. I'm a bit gunshy after the spectacular flameout of How I Met Your Mother, but who knows? This could be okay.

Bookmarking for Future Downtime

Grey's Anatomy (9/25), 8 PM on ABC
I stopped watching this...in the third season? Maybe? When Seattle Grace merged with that other hospital, but before that episode where they killed off half the characters. I've heard, however, that Grey's has taken a turn towards awesome again, so I'll have to catch up at some point.
The Vampire Diaries (10/02), 8 PM on The CW
I honestly don't remember why I stopped watching TVD. I really liked all the actors, and I was consistently impressed with how quickly and decisively the plot would move from episode to episode. I ran out of free time, I guess, and didn't love the show so much that I had to keep up. I'm watching the spin-off, though, so I may return to TVD again in the future.

And that's Thursday! It'll keep me busy.

27 November 2013

Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Sal's Pizza

LADIEZ IS PIMPS TOO
I still need to finish my TV-every-night blogging, but I just needed to share fifteen seconds of amazingness from last week's Brooklyn Nine-Nine:

A Breakdown of the Amazingness

Terry Crews is a brilliant, brilliant man and I would watch this show for his scenes alone.
Andre Braugher, as the captain to Crews's sergeant, plays off that moment perfectly. His character is typically deadpan, and in contrast with the oft-times too-sincere lunacy of Crews's character, it's kind of perfect.

(Note: I wanted to say "the straight man," but as Braugher's character is very specifically a gay man who is finally in charge of his own precinct after years of steady, unquestionable work, I thought that would either be too on-the-nose as an ironic pun, or too oblivious-sounding.)
These are three men of color, all in one scene together, and well, let me just direct you to Sonia Saraiya's article: Fox is changing the landscape for black men on TV. The fact that they're two black men working together adds some subtext and depth to their interactions, but it's never an explicit conversation.

Similarly, in another of the episode's storylines, the two detectives played by Stephanie Beatriz and Melissa Fumero, could very well have been about how two Hispanic women might have struggled in their particular line of work, but instead is very rooted in the characters as we know them. The demographics add layers, but aren't the story. I love it.
BABIES CAN'T BRUSH THEIR TEETH.

This show is taking some time to settle in--it's still crazy-uneven sometimes, and Samberg is the least interesting part of it, despite being the star--but it does make me laugh sometimes.

05 November 2013

Fall TV 2013: Tuesday Nights

The saga continues. And Tuesdays are heavy. Not urgent, but entertainment-laden. I kind of wish networks would try some counter-programming, though.

Vague spoilers for the most recent episodes of New Girl, but otherwise I think this post is pretty safe.

Fall TV 2013: Monday Nights

The TV blogging continues. (I swear I am doing actual work in addition to this.) Spoilers up to the current seasons of How I Met Your Mother, Sleepy Hollow, Castle, and Bones. Also, the briefest of discussion on Almost Human and Mom.

Mondays
Keeping Current

How I Met Your Mother (ninth season, 9/23)
I've been watching this show since the second season (ah, "Slap Bet," you are the best ever), and I will continue to watch it until it is done. Thankfully, since the last couple of seasons have had only occasional high points, this is the last season. The producers, Carter & Bays, have unfortunately refused to have focus character Ted (Josh Radnor) actually meet the mother until the last episode and, oh man, how it has contorted this show past all plausibility sometimes.

BUT. How I Met Your Mother began as a goofy hangout comedy, spiced up by the premise that everything we see is part of an epic tale a father is telling his two (mostly bored) teenagers sometime in the now-near future. It's remarkable for its time-shifting tricks, which include flashbacks, flashforwards, "we'll get to that later," a bit of Rashomon, imaginary scenarios, and once, sublimely, a matryoshkan feat of four embedded narratives in one episode. And it's lovely, but it almost doesn't even matter, because these are five people that really, truly care about each other as friends, even when they're cruddy to each other, and even when they make each other cry. They're in their early 30s, and negotiating what that means.

I grok that. I grok that enough that I actually buy each episode via Amazon Instant. I AM PAYING FOR THIS SHOW WITH CASH MONEY. Let's take a moment to consider that.

And, finally, while Neil Patrick Harris has stolen most of the spotlight as the oft-lamentable caricature Barney Stinson, this is cast is just MONSTROUS with talent. In addition to Radnor and Harris (who had worked in theatre together prior to the show), we've also got Alyson Hannigan, Cobie Smulders, and Jason Segel. The show often demands breakneck changes in mood, from goofy to heartbroken to rageful to madcap, and none of them has ever, ever missed a beat.
Sleepy Hollow (first season, 9/16)

TIME TRAVEL. NO BIG.
So I was skeptical of this show, and then all the reviews were good, and then fandom exploded. I queued up the four already-shown episodes on Hulu Plus and watched them alllll. And everybody was right.

This show is ridiculous. Like, what if the headless horseman was actually Death, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse? What if George Washington had a Bible rife with notations that would allow those in the know to avert an apocalypse? What if Ichabod Crane (Tom Mison) was almost-killed, put into suspended animation by his witchy wife, and then brought back to life in our times so he could avert the apocalypse with his reluctant partner Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie), a police detective who was bound for Quantico until her mentor was beheaded by the headless horseman?

No, seriously. That is what this show is about. It is silly, and it is gorgeously diverse, and I don't even know, y'all. But I am IN IT.
Castle (sixth season, 9/23)
Castle is, as always, goofy fun. Nathan Fillion is Nathan Fillion, and now that his character and Beckett (Stana Katic) are a romantic pairing, it's actually way MORE interesting. Instead of weird obstacles and will-they-won't-they, it's genuine conflicts about procedure and priorities and power. But, fun. Silly! The worst episodes of this show are the ones that get all ~~~dramatic~~~. Anyway, I usually try to watch this show every couple of weeks on Hulu Plus, but if there's plenty of other things to watch, no big.
Bones (ninth season, 9/16)
Seriously, we could find and replace the names from my Castle description, and it would be pretty much the same. I'm more interested in the characters on this show--there are more of them, first, and they've been around three seasons longer, second--and the procedural stuff is at least kind of interesting. I mean, instead of rote police or legal procedural, this show is all about GROSS SCIENCE. Like, it is their special delight to come up with new gross things to do every week, and I respect that.

Anyway, I hope things get a little less turgid this season, now that Bones and Booth are for real married now. I mean, they've had a baby together for a while, so who knows why a wedding is such a relief, but there you go. Then again, they've offed their major antagonist, so who knows what happens next? I sound way more ambivalent about this show than I actually am--I pay more attention to it than Castle, but I watch it less frequently. Hulu Plus! Its ways are magic.

Undecided
These are shows that I haven't yet watched, but kind of like in theory.

Almost Human (first season, 11/04)
Michael Ealy is a super-emotive, sentient robot! Karl Urban is a grumpy cop! Together, THEY FIGHT CRIME.
Mom (first season, 9/23)
So all the critical reviews have noted the show itself is uneven, but Anna Faris and Allison Janney are excellent. I love Allison Janney! I have no objections to Anna Faris! I have not felt motivated to watch the show, but I will probably watch an episode or two at some point.

That's all I've got for Monday! Not a heavy must-watch night, it turns out.

27 December 2023

26 December 2023

25 July 2023

01 May 2023

31 January 2023

30 August 2022

30 June 2022

15 June 2022

05 December 2021

20 October 2021

27 May 2021

15 January 2021

10 October 2020

27 September 2020

04 December 2017

21 May 2015

25 September 2014

27 November 2013

05 November 2013

04 November 2013