The Idiot Box 101

Heroes: When Good Shows Go Bad

Tue, 07 Oct 2008 19:16:18 GMT

Heroes: Are You Kidding Me, Tim Kring?

Remember Heroes, circa season one? Tight writing, good acting, awesome stories—the whole package. And then season two happened. Hiro got stuck in feudal Japan (dumb plot), Clair dated a flying boy who couldn't act and had a weird-ass vendetta against her father (dumber plot), and Peter accidentally left his girlfriend in a dystopian future, then forgot about her (dumbest plot ever).

So, season three?

Oh. My. Gosh. You would think that given the ratings and critical disaster that season two was, creator Tim Kring would learn, and make season three more like season one. But no. Season three has taken everything that was bad and stupid about season two and made more of it. Woohoo?

This is going to take a while to get through, and I might start bawling in the middle of it, so bear with me:

Remember Sylar? The serial killer who may or may not eat people's brains? Well, in the first few episodes of season three we've learned a few new things about him: one, he doesn't eat people's brains (he thinks that's icky), and two, he's Mama Petrelli's third son. Now, the first one I have a problem with because that was part of the appeal/scariness of Sylar. He EATS BRAINS. Don't take that away from me, Heroes. Oh wait, you did. And then there's the whole Petrelli thing. I hate that. I hate it because it retcons the slightly sweet and totally heartbreaking backstory from season one. You know, the one where he was the son of a watchmaker and always wanted to be special but there was absolutely nothing special about him for all those years? Remember that plotline?

Screw you, Tim Kring!

Mohinder has also gone through some changes. He got superpowers by distilling the something with the something and let's face it, I totally stopped paying attention as soon as he took his shirt off. All I know is that now he can walk up walls and beat people up, but his skin is coming off and he's super aggressive. I also know that he had sex with Maya, who sadly did survive into the third season (I always liked Alejandro better), and I really would have thought that Mohinder would have better sense than to go where Sylar had already been, but, um, oh well?

Here's the run down for everyone else:

Nathan got religion. There's a new Niki, named Tracey. She and Nathan have already had sex. Claire has revenge issues. Matt's on a spirit quest in Africa. I don't even care what happens to Hiro and Ando anymore. Mrs. Petrelli has slept with everyone ever. There are two Peters, and one of them is dead. Sylar has a kid in the future.

Really, Heroes writers? Really? Get it together!

The worst part of all of this is that I actually really like some of these actors (and I used to like the characters too). I think that Milo Ventimiglia (Peter) has done an admirable job trying to keep the show alive and basically keeping the archplot moving forward for three seasons, so, good job Milo. Zachary Quinto continues to imbue Sylar with a childish innocence and curiosity that makes the whole serial killer thing totally cooler.

But then there are people like Hayden Panettiere (Claire), whose acting seems to have devolved over the years. I mean, I guess I can sort of see it. She could play an angst ridden teenager, but someone actually on the verge of growing up and becoming a not-so nice adult? Harsh, dude. Also, though I have the utmost respect for season one Sendhil Ramamurthy (Mohinder), at this point, um, no. He's just phoning it in, not that I blame him. If I were him I'd do the same and wait for a good script to come along again.

And has anyone else noticed that this whole super-religious kick that Nathan is on is completely out of character?

Overall, just stop. Heroes, it's time. It's okay to admit defeat. You tried.

Heroes airs on Mondays at 9 PM on NBC (check your local listings).

Have a wacky prediction for what will happen this upcoming week? Post it here! Internet points to whoever gets closest to what happens in the actual episode!

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Bones: Not Actually a Cop Drama

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 20:26:42 GMT

Bones: Romantic Comedy with a Dash of Murder

I know I said that Criminal Minds is the best cop show on television (and it is), but there’s still room in my withered heart for a few others. Chief among these? Bones.

I actually couldn’t watch Bones for the first few seasons of its run (and yes, I do fully intend to go back and rectify that egregious wrong on my part just as soon as I have the time, thank you very much), because I was suffering from an acute case of “David Boreanaz is Angel not Booth” syndrome. Once I got over that (just say “hair gel” to yourself ten times fast), I wandered over to the Bones camp, and discovered something neat:

It’s not a cop show.

Yeah. I mean, there are crimes and stuff, and that’s all well and good, but Bones? Bones is a screwball comedy with a dash of murder. It’s a bunch of interconnected relationships playing out before your very eyes, and, oh yes, right, there are dead people. It’s awesome. Emily Deschanel, who plays Dr. Temperance Brennan with a childish intensity and curiosity, meshes well with David Boreanaz’s portrayal of Agent Booth’s boorish sensibilities and surprising sensitivity. They're glorious to watch, and damn fun to speculate about.

I will grant that the plot at times tries for true drama, and that those are the times when it falls flat on its pretty face. I’m still pissed about that whole Zach Addy is a serial killer’s apprentice thing (really, writers? really?). Plus, the writers saw fit to break up Angela and Hodgens, which was just mean. But the rest of the time, when the show sticks to its witty roots and enjoys the romantic tension, I’m totally there.

And romantic it is indeed! This season premier featured Brennan and Booth on a semi-romantic trip to London, and all of the episodes since then have further developed the possibility of a relationship between the two. I am, however, a bit worried that Bones is going the way of Moonlighting. A show built on romantic tension cannot last forever: resolve it and the show is over.

For now, though, Bones is still fun. If you’re wiling to ignore the occasional writing misstep (and if you’re going to be a television junkie, then you kind of have to be), then you’ll be in for a good ride.

Bones airs on Wednesdays at 8 PM on FOX (check your local listings).

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Criminal Minds Deserves to Stand Out from the Crowd

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 03:31:11 GMT

Why Criminal Minds is Actually the Best Cop Show in Town (But No One's Watching)

I love Criminal Minds. Let's just get that out there. This is completely biased, without a spec of journalistic integrity (as if I had that to begin with).

I do, however, have a legitimate beef with all the other procedural shows on television. They're stealing the spotlight! With so many cop dramas and interesting versions of the whodunnit, how can you know which ones are actually good?

That's what I'm here for.

Criminal Minds isn't just good, it's transcendent. It manages to effectively balance the crimes with the characters, allowing you to become connected to these flawed, interesting, dimensional characters, but also to focus on the case at hand. It's not a show where you can guess who did it before they do, it's more like watching Sherlocke Holmes in action. They examine every possible angle of the case, and I, for one, have learned more about psychology from three seasons of this than I did from two semesters in school. The entire point of the show is that that characters are behavioral analysts for the FBI. They can see all the little quirks of human interaction and deduce what that means for their case. It's fascinating to watch.

The best parts, though, are the interactions between the characters. Nothing is wasted. There are no moments that don't fit into the overall arch of the episodes, no loose ends that leave you wondering. Everything has a point. The episodes are like finely done needlepoint. Every stitch is in its place.

And of course, I can't go through this without mentioning my favorite character, the one who I think manages the best job of portraying a continuous character transformation without ever stealing the spotlight away from the main plotline: Dr. Spencer Reid, as played by Matthew Gray Gubler. I did a bit about him in my Emmy rant, how he should have won an Emmy. I firmly believe that. In the past two season he has convincingly shown his character, a sheltered child prodigy with a schizophrenic mother and a whole host of other issues, lose his faith in the world and the goodness of human nature. It seems weird to say that about a character on a crime drama, but it's true. We've watched Reid lose his innocence, quietly, like an explosion with the sound turned off.

The problem is that no one really watches Criminal Minds. Sure it has an audience, a decent one at that, but they're the same people that watch every single other crime procedural on television. It has no identity of its own, and it deserves one, because frankly, they've got some of the best storytelling on television.

So watch it? Please? For me?

Criminal Minds is on Wednesdays at 9 PM on CBS (check your local listings).

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Supernatural

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 03:02:38 GMT

Supernatural

Admitting that you like Supernatural is sort of like saying that you think the stupid kid in the corner is actually Einstein reincarnated, sure, but I really do enjoy this show. I will admit that the premise frequently descends into cheesy fan-service, and that their use of myths is spotty at best and mildly offensive at worst, but there's something appealing about this low-budget show that boasts only two regular actors, one regular guest star, and every monster ever.

Of course, I could just be blinded by the pretty.

I'm not going to lie, the actors of Supernatural are very easy on the eyes. Ridonkulously easy, even. Jensen Ackles, who plays Dean Winchester, the older of the two brothers, is my personal favorite. Sometimes I can't decide if I like him because I have a secret fetish for angry men with emotional issues (Dean Winchester, not Jensen Ackles), or if his pretty face and googoo eyes hypnotized me. His younger brother Sam, played by Jared Padalecki of Gilmore Girls infamy, is also pretty fine too, and they're much more prone to giving Sam fan-service, mostly via shirtless scenes. I approve.

There is more to the show than pretty semi-naked men, though. I think. Yes, yes there is. When one pays attention to the plot, it's an interesting combination of monster of the week and overarching descent into evil, a combo that worked very well on Buffy, and works reasonably well here. While I will admit that Eric Kripke isn't quite as good at keeping the thread of the overarching plotline alive through the season as Joss Whedon was, he is quite good at building suspense, and his greatest triumph can definitely be seen as the relationship between the brothers themselves.

Dean, scarred by the memory of their mother's death when he was four, clings to his family, mostly Sam, in the hopes that if he can just be good enough, strong enough, protective enough, he won't lose everything again. This self-denying, destructive behavior is entrancing to watch, and has come up time and again, most recently culminating in the fact that when Sam died, Dean, unable to cope, sold his own soul to bring him back to life. Sam, on the other hand, remembers nothing of their childhood before their mother died, and resents their father for the way they were raised. He irrationally believes that if he can just get Dean to understand what a normal life is, he'll want it, and stay safe. That hasn't really worked out so well for them so far.

We're in season four now, so needless to say, a lot of shit has gone down. Most recently, that shit included Dean going to hell to pay off his soul-debt. He died, apparently for four months. Sam tried to raise him, but failed repeatedly. We only find this out, of course, after Dean crawls out of his grave.

So now Dean is back, and we've discovered that it wasn't a demon that pulled him out of hell, it was an honest to goodness angel, who claims that God has a plan for him. Dean, being the devout atheist he is, is reasonably skeptical about this, but over the past few episodes (I won't spoil it, but I will say it involves time travel), he's come to the conclusion that something's up there, and it's got a hold on him.

And apparently it's the apocalypse.

So, sit down, buckle up and enjoy, because I have a feeling that before this season is over we're going to see some pretty awesome stuff: brother versus brother, heaven versus hell, more monsters, Dean shirtless, need I go on?
Supernatural airs on Thursdays at 9 PM on the CW (check your local listings).

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Emmy Recap and Rant

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 21:19:16 GMT

The Emmys: Recap and Rant

I watched the Emmys last night, naturally. It would be silly for someone of my obsessive interest in television not to take interest in its most important award ceremony. As usual, my favorite shows and actors were either passed over or ignored completely, and the ceremony ran over time. Still, there were some absolutely golden moments that I feel the need to share with you now:

-Heidi Klum. The whole time. The show itself was actually hosted by the five reality show hosts nominated for that category. Klum was just one of them (Project Runway), accompanied by Jeff Probst-Survivor (who actually got the Emmy), Howie Mandel-Deal or No Deal, Ryan Seacrest-American Idol, and Tom Bergeron (Dancing with the Stars). While Howie Mandel managed to waste ten minutes at the beginning of the show and set the entire shebang off to a late start, Klum was dignified throughout it all. She started in a svelte tuxedo, had that ripped off by William Shatner, revealing a sparkling minidress, and proceeded to go through the entire show with an impressive show of poise and humor. She was dropped on the floor, mocked, and had to stand through a joke reality show competition for the actual Emmy presentation, with a smile on her gorgeous face. She was marvelous.

-Josh Groban's theme song medley. I'm not sure who came up with the idea of doing a medley of the notable television theme songs from the past sixty years, and then having Josh Groban singing it, but whoever it is should be crowned king of all awesome. It was amazing. The sheer revelation that Groban can actually do the voices for South Park is a revelation that makes me like the guy way more than I did for just appearing in Jimmy Kimmel's “Fucking Ben Affleck” video. And that video made me like him a lot to begin with. Seriously, look this shit up on youtube.com. It is epic.

-Ricky Gervais yells at Steve Carell for five minutes. Last year, Ricky Gervais won an Emmy, but he wasn't there to collect it, so the presenters (Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert) gave it to Steve Carell instead. This lead to one of the best moments of the show, where Ricky Gervais stood on stage and reminded everyone that he won an Emmy last year, and he wasn't even there, and that he wanted it back from Steve Carell. The best bit was definitely when Steve Carell pulled the Emmy out from underneath his chair and handed it over. Well done, gentlemen, well done.

-An ode to Laugh-In. Okay, so the ode wasn't done very well, and was mostly lost on the audience (who probably didn't grow up watching the precursor to Saturday Night Live), but it was a nice touch to see them pay an ode to Laugh-In and the humor they created. It was also really sweet to see Jon Stewart, who received the Emmy that they presented (for writing in a variety, comedy or musical show) thank the comedians of Laugh-In profusely for creating the business that gave him a job.

And here are the problems I had with the Emmys. Now, I could go and just list off all of the moments that were long, dull, and unnecessary, but instead I will give you a list of ten shows/actors that should have gotten Emmys this year, and didn't.

1.Life. I don't know how this show wasn't gotten nominated, but it should have been. Far from being a cop procedural, it's an intimate portrait of a man struggling to reconcile his belief in zen and the balance of the universe with his overwhelming desire to get revenge on the people that framed him for murder. Really, a masterful show.

2.Matthew Gray Gubler. In case you weren't following Dr. Spencer Reid's story arc on Criminal Minds, here's the deal: in the past season and half, Reid has been tortured, become a drug addict, lost his mentor, gotten clean, had to face his inner demons, nearly gone back to drugs, and started going to NA. While with any other actor such a wild ride could become melodramatic and risk overshadowing the main plots of the episodes, Gubler has managed to keep Reid a character slowly dying on the sidelines, an impressive feat, and one that definitely deserves an Emmy.

3.Pushing Daisies. Come ON! It was nominated in nearly every category it could be except “Outstanding Comedy Show”, and I would like to know why. Sure, it probably wouldn't have won, and it should have, but I still maintain that at least a nomination would have been better than the snub. It's a refreshingly sweet show that lets you wonder about the world again and believe in the little magical things. Shouldn't we be celebrating that?

4.Neil Patrick Harris. For the past three years, NPH has been nominated for “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series” for his work in How I Met Your Mother. As Barney, the narcissistic friend, NPH is amazing. He manages to turn a bit part and an uncomfortable role into a full fledged character with an actual story. He even lets you root for Barney a little bit. Just a little, because he's still kind of evil, but you want him to win sometimes, and that takes skill.

5.Michael C. Hall. He plays a sociopathic serial killer going through an emotional breakdown. What's not to love? I sometimes get the impression that the Emmy voters might be a bit squeamish. Sure, Michael C. Hall's character, Dexter, is covered in blood about every twenty minutes or so, but he's still a compelling vision of a person stripped of all emotions and motivations. He gives us a startling picture of the beast within.

6.Lee Pace. He's adorable and pitch-perfect as Ned the Piemaker in Pushing Daisies, and sadly did not win. Pace gives Ned an unusual warmth, which is a good thing, as his sternly dressed, emotionally stunted character could easily come off as a dull boy. Instead, Ned just seems the type of shy, intelligent boy that has whole worlds within his head. You know, the kind of boy I always had a crush on.

7.Kristen Chenoweth. As Pushing Daisies' neurotic waitress Olive Snooker, Chenoweth makes a character that could easily have become a stereotype of every controlling woman chasing a man into a sweet woman who just wants to be loved by someone, and has a bad tendency to clutch onto the first man she sees, like Ned.

8.Leighton Meester. Okay, so I know I'm going to lose all of my smart person cred by saying that anyone from Gossip Girl deserves an Emmy, but if anyone does (and I think they do), it's Meester. She turned Blair from the girl everyone loves to hate into a truly flawed and fractured young woman who just wanted someone to tell her that everything was going to be all right. In fact, by the end of the season, you didn't mind that Blair was a manipulative bitch. As she herself said to a rival, “Maybe you forgot, but I'm the crazy bitch around here.”

9.Ed Westwick. In the same vein, the boy who brought Chuck to life on Gossip Girl also deserves some serious props. Chuck started out as a shallow horndog, and we watched him develop true feelings for Blair, but without changing his innate personality or actually becoming a better person. In true Chuck style, he just shifted a little, and focused his priorities. Westwick's true triumph was in making us believe that a creep like this could exist, and that he was worthy of love in the first place.

10.Jensen Ackles. Okay, so I wasn't going to mention Supernatural on this, because most people consider it even worse than Gossip Girl (and I really wanted to put another chick on the list), but Ackles really needs some recognition for his work in season three of Supernatural. He played Dean with a reckless abandon and a deep frustration that showed his frustration with his own fate. I love a good death scene, and this was one that lasted all season.

So, these are the people who I think deserved Emmys. Or at least Emmy nominations. Seriously, Academy of the Arts and Sciences, stop just watching dull critical shows. Get some new blood in there, and WATCH SOME FREAKING GENRE TELEVISION!
-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

A Quick Guide to Finding Shows Online (Legally)

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:46:17 GMT

A Quick Guide to TV Online

If you're like me, then there are way too many shows for you to physically watch them during their actual timeslots. So what do you do when you've got four shows all starting at 8 pm on Monday, and you've only got one you?

I guess the first step is to figure out which one you're actually going to watch. Once you've done that, you decide if you really, really want to keep up with the other ones, or if you can wait for the DVD. If you're still like me, and want to know what happens every week, then this is what you do. You go online.

Now, I'm not suggesting that people start downloading all their shows or anything—that's copyright infringement, and that's bad. I am saying, though, that there are lots of legal ways to watch your favorite shows online.

1.Check the network's website. A lot of networks these days are hosting full episodes online for anyone who missed them. This is perfectly legal, and takes up no hard drive space. You stream the episodes right on your computer. Granted, these usually come with ads, but it's worth it.
2.Check a meta-site, like sidereel.com or alluc.org. Sites like these archive links to online streaming content. They will be able to tell you if the network has archived the show somewhere off of their main site.
3.Check iTunes and Amazon. Both of these sites sell episodes of most major television shows for a reasonable price. You download the purchased episode onto your computer and watch it there.

As far as legal ways to find things online go, these are the best. From these basic areas, you can branch out and find even the most obscure shows, streaming into your computer at a time convenient to you!

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:31:27 GMT

Doctor Horrible's Sing Along Blog

Maybe you're not a fan of Joss Whedon. Maybe you really didn't hear about the surprise smash hit of the summer. Maybe you just think that the idea of an internet musical about supervillains sounds silly.

Whatever the reason that you didn't watch Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, you should, because it's genuinely one of the most innovative, surprising and creative works done in the last five years. And I'm not just saying that because Neil Patrick Harris bursts into song. Dr. Horrible came into being during the Writer's Strike last year, when Joss Whedon (the dude who did Buffy and Firefly) got the idea to actually do a project for the internet. After all, internet rights and the shift towards television housed on the internet were a large motivating factor behind the strike.

He created Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, a quirky hour-long musical about a supervillain, Dr. Horrible (Neil Patrick Harris), who runs a video blog about his evil deeds and desperately wants to be accepted into the Evil League of Evil. It's not your average Broadway fare, but it's cute. Dr. Horrible is a painfully shy nerd who stalks the pretty girl from his laundromat, Penny (Felicia Day), and is continually being beat-up by his nemesis, Captain Hammer (Nathan Fillion). There's more to the story than that, but I wouldn't want to spoil you. Suffice it to say that Whedon manages to take Dr. Horrible and make him a truly sympathetic character. You actually want him to rule the world.

Joss Whedon is admittedly one of those people who can just make a phone call and cast a show, so it should come as no shock that two of the main actors, Felicia Day and Nathan Fillion, are alums of his previous shows. There are also cameos by some of the other crew members from his projects, and some prominent scenes feature his brother, Jed Whedon, who helped write the music. The great coup of the show, though, is the performance of Neil Patrick Harris. The Doogie Houser and How I Met Your Mother actor had not worked with Joss Whedon before, so Whedon was stunned when his cold call was met with a resounding “Yes!”

“I didn't even get the sentence out before he said yes. And then I sort of got defensive (Whedon lapses into fanboy-speak): ‘No no no, it's really going to be good,' and Neil's like, ‘I said yes.' And I said, ‘No no no, I mean, but I mean the point is, is mean I mean' … I couldn't handle it." Joss Whedon, in an interview with TVGuide.com.

Ultimately, Neil Patrick Harris was perfect for the role, throwing away his usual super-confident persona for that of Billy, Dr. Horrible's true identity, a fumbling nerd who only wants to connect with Penny. Watching Billy's transformation throughout the show is one of the best parts.

And then there are the songs. Perhaps supervillains do not strike you as a good subject for striking arias, but whatever the case, Dr. Horrible's got them. Shot in only a week, you have to be impressed that a low budget and a tight schedule created such a masterpiece of humor.

News has come that the show will be released on DVD, so that those who lent their services to its creation can get paid, and the DVD will even feature Commentary: The Musical! Rumors abound about a sequel in the works, and the whole thing is exciting and new.

So what's the big deal? At its heart, Dr. Horrible is a show about self discovery, but its impact has much more to do on the way people are viewing internet content. As a show that was only hosted on the internet, and will be until it's DVD release, Joss Whedon has given us a model of what internet content can be and the surprising popularity it can have (in the first hours that Dr. Horrible was available online, there were so many visitors to the site that the server crashed).

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog can be seen on www.drhorrible.com or downloaded on iTunes.

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

House MD returns!

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 23:06:56 GMT

House MD

If you're like me, then you had no idea how the writers of House would resolve last year's bromance ending catastrophe. If you aren't like me, and have no idea what I'm talking about, here's a quick refresher course.

House MD is about Dr. Gregory House (Hugh Laurie), a miserable, sarcastic, but brilliant cripple. He works in the exciting field of Diagnostics, and cuts down anyone who dares to exist near him. He's not a very nice guy, but then, that's most of his appeal. His best friend is Dr. James Wilson (Robert Sean Leonard), who's a wishy-washy, nice, guilt-ridden multiple divorcée. He has a team of three brilliant doctors who follow him around and complain about how mean he is, and the head of the hospital, Lisa Cuddy (Lisa Edelstein), puts up with his bizarre tendencies because it means she gets to have a world-renowned doctor on her staff.

All this is nice, but last season the writers decided that everything wasn't going badly enough, so they had all of House's previous team quit or get fired, and made him get a new team. This introduced us to Amber, aka Cutthroat Bitch (Anne Dudek), a potential employee who House decided not to hire. She comes back later in the season as Wilson's girlfriend, and House and Amber fight over who gets Wilson's time.

And then she dies.

In the season finale of House this past May, Amber was killed in a bus crash, and it is revealed that she was only on the bus because of House, thus creating a seemingly irreparable gap between House and Wilson. This season begins with that gap still unrepared. As of this writing, it would seem that the bromance is actually over.

Wilson can't forgive and forget that House is a manipulative bastard that contributed to the circumstances that killed the one woman he thought he might not cheat on. House can't seem to tell Wilson how he feels, and the whole thing is super depressing and frustrating. I get the urge to do what Cuddy did and just lock the two of them in a room together until they sort it out (naturally, that didn't work when she tried it).

But I do have to say that this season of House MD has certainly started with a bang. Not as much of a bang as the season where House got shot, but I have high hopes that this one will shape up well. Just as long as the boys get back together soon!

House MD airs on Tuesdays at 8 pm on FOX (channel 33).

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Fringe

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 22:39:42 GMT

Fringe

Fringe is the new hot young thing on network television, which is surprising for two main reasons. One, it's a science fiction show. Granted, it isn't as hardcore science fiction as something like Farscape (seriously, canceled way too early), but Fringe is still a true science fiction show. It's about weird science and the people who investigate it. It's pretty cool. The second reason Fringe is raising eyebrows is that it's on FOX. That's right, it's on the show killer network.

Here's a recap for those of you who don't know what I mean when I call FOX a show killer. Most people of a college age like shows like Family Guy and Futurama. A smart network would realize that and keep showing them. FOX? FOX canceled both of them far before their time. It was very lucky that they were resuscitated due to fan protests. I'd be remiss, too, if I didn't mention Firefly, Joss Whedon's (the guy who made Buffy) space cowboy future sci-fi epic. Yes, it was a weird show. Yes, there were flying cannibals and the characters sometimes spoke in untranslated Mandarin Chinese, but the fact remains that it was a very intelligent look at society 500 years in the future, and FOX canceled it after eight episodes.

What does this have to do with Fringe? Simple. Fringe is a sci-fi show on a network that prefers to pander to the greatest possible audience. Everyone is a little worried. In its favor, though, is the fact that Fringe was created by JJ Abrams, the same man who made Lost, and also the man in charge of the upcoming Star Trek film. JJ Abrams should be enough to keep Fringe on the air for a while, but then it's up to the show itself to determine it's own lifespan.

From what I've seen so far, that shouldn't be much of a problem. Fringe follows Agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) as she investigates “fringe science”, that is, areas of science where the science is developing more quickly than the human ability to understand it. She's helped by an insane old professor, Dr. Walter Bishop (John Noble), and his son/caretaker Peter (Joshua Jackson, yes, that Joshua Jackson). It's a good mix, and the show manages to keep away from ripping off The X-Files too terribly much. Mostly the similarities are superficial, and Fringe has a good way of laughing at itself when the science gets too weird.

All in all, Fringe is a very well-made show, and it's easy to see why it is the triumph of the fall TV schedule, especially at a time when most shows are just entering their umpteenth season, and the only other new shows are sitcoms. Still, Fringe is well worth the time.

Fringe airs Tuesdays at 9 pm on FOX (channel 33).

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:48:44 GMT

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

I'm not going to condescend to explain what the Terminator movies were about just in case some of you missed them. Nor am I going to bother explaining how that relates to the show. Why? Because I don't have to. Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles already does that in the first two minutes of the show.

Now, chances are that if you were ever going to watch this show, you would have already started. Let's face it, it's just another incarnation of a tired franchise that really should have stopped with Terminator: Judgment Day. That was the end of the good stuff. There are, however, redeeming qualities to this hour long piece of apocalyptic bubblegum. Sure, it holds your hand through the plot far more than it needs to (Have they seen Lost? That's a show that could use handholding.), but it's a prime case of cheesy sci-fi on primetime television, and I just can't hate it.

I do have some good things to say about it's second season so far:

In the first season, John Connor (Thomas Dekker, mostly of Heroes fame) was this super-whiny emo kid who could never figure out why his life was so screwed up. I really wanted to know how this kid was going to become the savior of the human race, but I wasn't sure he'd make it there, because I might kill him first. In season two, kudos to Dekker, John has grown up a bit, made some tough decisions, and finally, finally cut his hair. I really hate emo bangs and his were just groady.

Then there's Cameron, the resident “good” terminator, played by Summer Glau, who seriously needs to consider working outside of sci-fi. I mean, I love sci-fi, but she has a tendency to get typecast as “that athletic and weird chick with superhuman fighting abilities and an inability to connect with the world.” I'd like to see her on Gossip Girl or something. At any rate, she's still kickass as a petite terminator trying to save John's life, and the second season has her showing signs of either gaining true sentience or of starting to malfunction. So, either way, we can look forward to more Cameron asskickings and some serious angst.

The rest of the plot is largely the problem with the show, though. I mean, yes, it's actually fascinating to watch John Connor try to go to high school with the normal, oblivious teenagers. This past episode had him actually talking to a girl (gasp!) and taking her home to see their new house. When we factor in his best friend's crush on his “sister”, Cameron, the high school subplot is by far the most interesting and the most fertile ground for questions about machines and normal life and the way people should live. If there were some deep social thought going on in this show, it would be there.

Sadly, the high school subplot is not the most important. Sarah Connor, played by the incongruously beautiful Lena Headey, takes up a bit too much of the show with her worrying over her son's welfare, the future of mankind, and whether or not she has cancer. I like a show with exploding robots, but I'd prefer a bit less drama about it, thanks. She also frequently uses herself as a sex object to get information out of men. Now, I think she's pretty, and I have no doubt that men think so too, but I sometimes wonder how many times that can keep working. I refuse to believe that men are that stupid. Call me naïve.

John's uncle, Derek Reese (Brian Austin Green), Special Agent Ellison (Richard T. Jones) and Charley Dixon (Dean Winters) all float through the show as varying types of resistance fighters and surrogate father figures for John, but, honestly, none of them have much of an effect. Granted, Derek Reese is there for a great deal of the show, but he seems to have been largely muzzled by the writers, which is a shame. He was always good for an inflammatory comment.

Altogether, I would have to advise you to only watch this show if you are going to commit to it. This is not a show you can just pick up and put down. You might miss Judgment Day or something.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles airs at 8 pm on Mondays on FOX.

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Gossip Girl, recap!

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 15:29:37 GMT

sorry for the super long absence! here's some Gossip Girl to soften you up!

Gossip Girl

Okay, I'll admit it, I'm addicted to Gossip Girl. It feels shameful to tell people, like saying that you secretly hide in your room and watch Passions and Oprah and cry when everybody gets a car.

But I really, really like Gossip Girl. I mean it. Sure, it's juvenile and smutty and totally trashy, but it's about beautiful people doing ugly things, and what's not to love there? So here's the deal with season two, just in case you, like me, want to give this seriously underrated guilty pleasure a chance:

Last season, there was a whole lot of drama over the return of Serena (played by the effervescent Blake Lively) from her boardingschool. She had lots of petty feuds with her pretty friends, while her bff Blair (Leighton Meister, also lovely) had to deal with her disinterested boyfriend Nate (Chace Crawford) and his too interested best friend Chuck (Ed Westwick). And then there's Serena's new boyfriend, Dan (Penn Badgely) who's all middle class and shocking, his social climbing little sister Jenny (Taylor Momsen), and Serena's suicidal, gay, younger brother Eric (Connor Paolo). Oh! And there's Dan's best friend Vanessa (Jessica Szohr), and Michelle Trachtenberg guest stars as the spawn of satan herself, Serena's old friend Georgina. I think I got everyone.

So, yes. It's a bit of a mouthful. There are plotlines everywhere, even with the parents. A particularly notable one points out that Dan's father and Serena's mother used to date. This is a fact that squicks out not just the characters, but the audience too. So if you think that Gossip Girl is too confusing to get into, think again. Sure the plots are up there with Greek myths on complexity and infidelity, but at it's core, this is a show about being miserable and seventeen, and I think we've all been there. It's nice to sit back and watch someone else deal with it for once.

In season two, which has already aired three episodes, so far Blair has dated an English Lord, Serena and Dan got back together, then broke up again, and little Jenny seems to have finally put her conniving past behind her.

I'm not going to lie to you—there's almost nothing redeeming about this show. It's pretty people doing bad things, and as far as I'm concerned, that's fantastic! So, tune in if you feel like checking out some awesome catfights, hookups and drama. And this is the best kind: the kind you don't have to avoid eye contact with on the street.

Gossip Girl airs at 8 pm on Mondays on the CW.

-Rachel Frazier, Idiot Box 101

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season One

Sat, 08 Dec 2007 02:51:30 GMT

yeah, about the not updating last week...my bad.

on a better note, fresh soup for you! have a season review of buffy the vampire slayer, season one, a season of cheese and tight skirts. those were the days. the days before sarah michelle gellar became anorexic and lost her boobs. which was sad.

Season Review:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season One

Once upon a time there was a show. An awesome show. An awesome, kickass show. But it didn't start out like that, all awesome and kickass. No, when the show began, it needed ratings. And thus it had skimpy skirts (see above), cheesy villains, and bad special effects. The show knew that it could be great, so it persevered and was renewed for another season with a higher budget. First though, it was young, it was Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season One, and it was cheesetastic.

It was twelve episodes of pure bubblegum, but there's something wonderful wonderful about season one. Buffy comes to town, Giles gets a slayer, Xander and Willow find out about the monsters, Angel falls in love, Cordelia is bitchy, and the bad guys get beat up. The first season may fly by the seat of its pants, but all of the pieces of the next six season are already there. I mean, you've already got the Buffy and Angel tragic love story set up, even if it is still more camp than cataclysm. Giles establishes himself right off the bat as so British you could cry into your tea, but there's always that hint of something extra, and every once in a while it comes sneaking out. Without season one, Xander's xenophobic hatred of vampires is inexplicable, but with the knowledge of his best friend Jesse, turned in the first episode, and staked in the second at Xander's own hand, it makes perfect sense. Vampires killed his childhood. Season one also gives us the first ticklings of Willow's magic, as well as letting us see the strength that she will grow into. And by the end of it all, even Cordelia has developed as a character, changing into someone aware of the supernatural and darn tooting against it!

And then there's the sheer fun of it all. While season two has it's melodrama, and season three just has a damn good plot, season one is FUN. The stories are reasonably unrelated to each other, and take no prisoners in their ability to laugh at themselves. Nothing is sacred, not cheerleading, substitute teachers, online dating, or even gym class and field trips to the zoo. Season one let us believe in monsters, but they were always easily identified by their bad makeup and lumbering action, and Buffy always kicked their asses by the end of the show. She even fought a puppet, for crying out loud!

That having been said, there was also a lot to show that the show really was going somewhere. The last episode, "Prophecy Girl", confronted real issues of life and death, and introduced the idea of a master villain at the end. Plus there was the theme that pervaded the whole series, but the first three seasons most of all: "High school is hell." Well, in this show, high school IS hell, quite literally, and in the last episode hell springs forth (apparently hell has bad special effects), ironically in the center of the library.

Every season after this is probably ten times better, but nothing can really beat the sheer campiness of all the fun in the first season.

It's a good show. Just saying.

-Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

The Barbarian and the Modern Milquetoast

Mon, 26 Nov 2007 04:12:48 GMT

sorry that this is late (again!). hope everyone had a good thanksgiving. just as a warning, this is half-digested stuff from a class I'm taking--but the television references are good. I promise to try to have something new and exciting up for next week.

Heroes meets Nietzsche, Sylar meets Mohinder

The Problem of the Barbarian and the Modern Milquetoast

[All citations taken from Friedrich Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morality, Preface and First Treatise, Heckett Publishing Company.]

“This was unknown to Dr. Ree; but he had read Darwin:--and thus in his hypothesizing we have, in a manner that is at least entertaining, the Darwinian beast politely joining hands with the most modern, unassuming moral milquetoast who “no longer bites”—the latter with an expression of a certain good-natured and refined indolence on his face, into which is mixed even a grain of pessimism, of weariness: as if there weren’t really an reward for taking all these things—the problems of morality—so seriously.” (Nietzsche 6, emphasis mine).

The Problem

We have nothing to fear from men. Sure there are your everyday crazies, people with guns, suicide bombers, and sociopaths, but there is nothing to really fear in men. We don’t fear looking into the eyes of our neighbors. We are not afraid of what we might see. We do not fear men. We fear what they might do. This shift from fear of person to fear of actions is, Nietzsche claims, a result of the shift from the noble morality (the morality of the strong) to the priestly morality (the glorification of weakness).

The Heroes Universe

The Heroes universe is a variation of the X-Men formula. It is the story of a world in which ordinary people are suddenly evolving, and with this evolution comes a number of special powers. Some gain the power of flight, the power of clairvoyance, telepathy, telekinesis, or other impressive feats. In a world where people are randomly given these gifts, however, it’s only a matter of time before one of them falls into dangerous hands.

Such hands belong to Sylar, the psychotic pseudo-empathic serial killer. After too many years of being told he’s not special enough, Gabriel Grey snaps and becomes Sylar, a barbarous murderer only interested in gaining more and more powers. His opposite lies in Mohinder Suresh, the geneticist devoted to finding the people with special abilities. Mohinder’s secondary purpose is actually to find those with powers before Sylar does so that he can keep them safe. Still, Mohinder is not a man of action—he’s the type to cower behind his desk and theories. When Sylar and Mohinder clash, it’s a sight to behold, out of sheer dread that Mohinder won’t come out alive.

The Barbarian

The barbarian comes from the noble tradition of morality, according to Nietzsche’s genealogy of morals. Nietzsche claims the noble tradition to be that of the victor—good and morality belong to whoever can claim them and hold them (10). They feel themselves to be higher, rather than good, so they naturally view all others as lower, which becomes “bad” (13). They place their morality in being other. Sylar does by placing his self-importance and his view of the world upon the fact that he is genetically different. He must therefore be better, and since he is stronger, he must obliged to take what he wishes. Sylar is the new barbarian.

Sylar describes himself as the ultimate creation of the evolutionary imperative, and in that sense he is a new sort of barbarian, at least a new sort of barbarian for our viewing on television. All the ones before have been made somehow inhuman, so as to make them more palatable for audiences, whereas Sylar is a type of human. There is no excusing his barbarism with cries that “he is not like us!” He is the us we could be.

The barbarian respects his enemy. To the barbarian, his enemy is a worthy opponent, someone worth fighting, or else they are beneath him, and thus worthy of being snuffed out (21). Sylar follows this code, believing that, while he wants to exterminate his enemies, he also respects those that use their powers well. Sure, he wants to steal those powers, and he does, but he honors them. His rivalry with Peter, another empath of similar strength is a good example. He respects Peter as his rival. All the others are just peons, and he is completely justified in taking gifts away from the undeserving. His morality is tied up with his strength.

Sylar is the “blond beast” that Nietzsche keeps preaching is at the base of all the noble races (22). Given that Gabriel, Sylar’s original form, is an outgrowth of the priestly class, which was an outgrowth of the noble class. His transformation into Sylar is at once both a progression into the next stage of human morality and a throwback to the old days of the blond beast.

The strong must be strong. The very idea of asking the bird of prey (Nietzsche’s example) not to hunt seems silly. Yet, the weak ask the strong to be weak, claiming it to be “good” (25). Mohinder does this to Sylar, when he tries to get the barbarian to be more Gabriel. Sylar does try, but finds that he cannot deny his true nature. He is incapable of going back to being a milquetoast, a Gabriel, and must live with being Sylar, for whatever good or ill that will bring him.

Sylar is the answer to Nietzsche’s prayer. “But from time to time grant me—assuming that there are heavenly patronesses beyond good and evil—a glimpse, happy, powerful, triumphant, in which there is still something to fear! (24).” Sylar is someone to fear. Granted, there are lots of people that we could be afraid of, and Nietzsche certainly knows this. What he is here referring to is someone who we instinctively know is a predator, a person whom we, as animals, can recognize, and feel ourselves as prey.

The Milquetoast

Mohinder is the perfect milquetoast. Beaten down by imperialism and a classical British education, Mohinder is meek and pleasant to all he encounters. He’s polite to a fault, obnoxiously bland, and seems to find nothing of interest even in the extraordinary circumstances that surround him. He dreams of normalcy and going home. He is our perfect modern man. He is the us we are.

The priest claims that the good is in being lowly (16-17). Mohinder never states such an ethos, but he practically exudes a twisted pride in his normalcy. He’s not special, although his older sister apparently was, and he makes pains to assure everyone of this fact. He is such a product of the priestly tradition that he looks down on Sylar for his displays of strength, believing them to be some sort of sick cry for help. He begs Gabriel to come back, or for Sylar to turn himself in to the police, not understanding that this is against Sylar’s nature. Mohinder’s entire outlook on life is focused on this idea that being lesser is being better.

The priestly type is better at surviving, though. He does make Sylar waver for a bit. Sylar tries to revert to Gabriel, as previously stated. With little whimpers, the priests took the nobles by inches and eventually there was nothing left but temples and a yard of weeds. The priest slowly poisoned the world and killed the “other” (18).

What Mohinder and the priests know is how to hate one’s enemy, truly hate them (22). Mohinder hates Sylar for killing the elder Suresh, Mohinder’s father. Sylar does not hate Mohinder, but Mohinder does hate him. Mohinder’s hate could be considered just by our society, so steeped is it in the mores of the priests. We see nothing wrong with the hatred of the predator. Yet, it is only the priests who hate—it is only the lowly who take pride in being lowly who can hate most completely.

“We are tired of man…” (24), says Nietzsche, and in a way, Mohinder is tired of man too. He is in a profound way, tired of himself, and his own milquetoast-ness. By the end of his time with Sylar, Mohinder is more dangerous, more frightening, and considerably less passive than when he started. One gets the impression, that for all his bluster and pride in his ordinary state, Mohinder would give a kidney to be special. When he ties Sylar to a chair and jabs a needle in his neck, one just gets the feeling that he’s found his way to be special too. Mohinder has taken his first, and certainly not last, step to becoming a barbarian.

Conclusion

When it comes right down to it, the difference between the priests and the nobles, the milquetoasts and the barbarians, the Sylars and the Mohinders, is that of power. Power shows itself in funny ways, not least of which is in happiness, or how we show it. The barbarian is unabashedly happy. He is free of all restraint and allows himself to be happy when he feels happy. The milquetoast buries his happiness until he deems it an appropriate time to show his happiness, at which point he gives off a squelched sort of grimace of happiness, rather than the real thing (20). So it is with Sylar and Mohinder. Sylar is open enough to go get himself an ice cream when he is on the clock, as it were, while Mohinder denies himself everything in the quest for answers.

“And is that not our doom? What causes our aversion to “man”?—for we suffer from man, there is no doubt.—Not fear; rather that we have nothing left to fear in man;” (23-24). Fundamentally, we fear having nothing left to fear, because if we are safe, utterly safe, even from ourselves, then there is no point for us to remain in society. We need a predator herding us together to stay in these neat little clumps of civilization. We fear Sylar, yet we fear not having him more.

-Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

MAS*H Love

Sun, 18 Nov 2007 06:02:52 GMT

[sorry that this is kinda late...]

M*A*S*H

The Idiot Box 101—M*A*S*H Love

Let’s talk about a little show called M*A*S*H. It wasn’t on the air long (only eleven seasons), wasn’t very popular (it’s series finale is still the most watched episode of television—77% of all viewers), and had almost no continuity (okay, that one is totally true). In all seriousness, it was groundbreaking in all the right ways. Based on the movie of the same name, M*A*S*H was a show about war, insanity and how people are people even in extraordinary circumstances.

On top of all of that it was also a show that evolved. While it began as a sitcom, filled with real stories from real veterans about the absurdity of war and the ways that one must become insane to survive it, as the show went on it became more about the way people behave everywhere.

I mean, first, there’s Hawkeye, that rapscallion who leads the charge. He’s a surgeon, one of the best, but he hates the army, the government and pretty much everything about this war. Yet, in spite of all of his hatred for the establishment, for “the man” as it were, Hawkeye still has great compassion for the soldiers under his knife. Sure he thinks this is a ridiculous war. Sure he hates that he was drafted. That doesn’t mean that he isn’t going to do his darndest to make sure that those boys get better and that the Koreans he treats get equal treatment too.

Of course, it’s not like Hawkeye is all social conscience and surgeoning. He’s also the consummate prankster, carrying on years of prank wars with various characters, specifically Margaret “Hot Lips” Houlihan and Frank Burns. Hawkeye is the king of the “laugh to keep from crying” philosophy, and the show fully expresses that. He’s the ringleader of the circus of people going insane to keep themselves sane.

There are other characters to note here too, of course. There’s Corporal Klinger, best known for trying to get kicked out of the army. Of course, it’s not so much impressive that he’s trying to get kicked out, it’s more how he does it. He’s trying for a Section Eight, the insanity clause, by constantly dressing like a woman. It doesn’t work, but it’s funny as all hell to watch him try. The there’s “Radar” O’Reilly, so known for his disturbing ability to know when the choppers are coming with more wounded soldiers. Plus, he always knows what someone is about to tell him. He’s kinda creepy like that. And he sleeps with a teddy bear.

Not to mention the previously mentioned Hot Lips Houlihan. She starts the show as an uptight “army clown” who lives by the rules and lives to see Hawkeye go down. By the end of the show, she has been transformed into a part of the gang—just another inmate in the asylum. Frank Burns, on the other hand, never manages the transition. He remains a childish representation of all that is wrong with the army, America and people, until he leaves the show in season seven. He is funny, though.

The show manages an impressive transition from sitcom to dramedy, from a show whose main concern is silly gags to one that takes its characters very seriously and develops them extensively. It becomes a show with heart.

That’s why by the ceasefire that ends season eleven, you almost don’t want the members of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital to go home. You want them to keep on, to keep showing us how people are.

-Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

The Daddy Issues of House MD

Sat, 10 Nov 2007 04:34:38 GMT

[for the record, this article does not take into consideration any of the new characters from season 4 of House, since I don't really think that they have much character development yet. and I really like Chase.]
The Idiot Box 101- “Daddy Issues”

House MD: The show should be called “Daddy Issues”, because about halfway through the first season that’s what it becomes. The only characters who don’t have massive complexes (that we know of) are Lisa Cuddy, who appears to have no issues, and Alison Cameron, who has death issues and caring issues and nosiness issues, but a lack of parental ones. One might as well get a subscription to this show instead of watching it. That’s not to say the show isn’t brilliant, that Hugh Laurie as the pathologically miserable Dr. House isn’t a revelation to watch, and that seeing the bizarre illnesses get increasingly weirder isn’t a guilty pleasure. There are just a lot of Daddy Issues in this show.

It’s not wrong for a show to explore the emotional side of men. Quite frankly, it gives me a happy that the writers are putting this much effort into writing great plots for the characters, but COME ON! All I’m really asking for is a little bit of creativity, instead of giving every male character the same problem, just with different shading. House’s father was abusive. Chase’s father left them when he was 15, leaving Chase to care for his alcoholic mother. Foreman and his father disagree about religion and his mother’s Alzheimer’s. Wilson’s father constantly dumps JewGuilt upon him. Daddy. Issues.

I’m going to focus now on House and Chase, because, honestly, they’re more interesting. The writers must agree too, because Foreman only gets a few episodes here and there, and Wilson’s storylines are either ancillary to House’s or about his philandering tendencies. Thank god for small favors and new plotlines.

Gregory House might as well have a stamp on his forehead that says “Daddy Issues”, with his juvenile behavior and constant jibes at any and all authority figures (see: Cuddy, Vogler, Tritter, God…). He certainly has reason to have issues, as revealed in “One Day, One Room”. His father was career military and believed in martial law at home too. House probably wouldn’t have been a winsome personality even without Daddy Dearest, but it’s truly hard to say how much of his misanthropy, drug addiction and other charming personality traits can be traced back to childhood ice baths and beatings.

Robert Chase’s childhood was (probably) less violent, but ran pretty good competition on the angstometer. By the start of the show he’s a half orphan, his mother having drunk herself to a messy death twelve or so years ago. He blames her death on the father who left them: a brilliant doctor in his own right, Rowan Chase is undoubtedly an emotional cretin. Aside from trying to derail his son’s career, he neglects to tell Rob that he’s dying, then cuts him out of his will entirely. You can practically hear the cretin-ness form beyond the grave.

As if the writers of House weren’t emphasizing their own collective Oedipus complexes enough, there’s also the twisted father/son relationship between House and Chase themselves. House is Chase’s mentor, but he seems to abuse this duckling more than the others. Chase had been there the longest, was arguably the best diagnostician of the bunch, and he practically had to grovel for a scrap of kindness from House, and then House fired him. Yet, Chase is willing to betray House. He seem practically gleeful about it. Chase reacts with hugs and tears to the news that House might be dying, but when faced with the reality of a living House, he is not pleased. It really does remind me of a real family.

House, it seems, can never decide whether to be proud of Chase or angry with him. There is one particular episode in the third season, called “Finding Judas”, when House is so enraged that Chase found the correct answer to the case before he did that he literally punches him in the face. On the other end, however, is the episode in the second season when House defends Chase as he deals with the medical fallout of his actual father’s death. House is weirdly protective of Chase, telling an inaccurate version of events which makes Chase look better, all to help Chase avoid being sued.

So we know that they do care about each other. Sort of. But they also hate each other. Sort of. It’s delectably complicated, just like a real family, and all I can say is that this is a show that revels in its issues. Which I why I love it.

-Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Pushing Daisies

Thu, 01 Nov 2007 23:59:35 GMT

okay, today's is a bit mondo big, but I had bit too much fun writing about Pushing Daisies, and really, who can blame me? there's another picture behind the cut too.

The Idiot Box 101
Pushing Daisies

As a friend of mine said, “you know, for a show about death, Pushing Daisies is really freaking colorful.” It’s true. For that matter, it’s also weirdly adorable, rather chipper, and slightly unnerving in its attention to detail. It’s not just the color, or the look, or even the cuteness of the show, though, that makes it so eminently watchable. Pushing Daisies is a show about death that makes death into something fantastic, something wonderful, and most importantly, something that can be got around.

There is also a sense in which this is a show that reveres death, though. I mean, yeah, sure, the whole point of the show is that the main character, this really sweet guy named Ned who makes pies, can touch any dead thing and it comes back to life. As in all life, however, there is a catch. That catch is that if he ever touches that dead thing again, it goes back to being dead, and this time there is no coming back, and if he doesn’t touch it within a minute, something else in the vicinity dies. For example, when his mother died, he touched her to bring her back to life. All fine and dandy. Unfortunately, he didn’t know about the one-minute rule yet (he was nine), so one minute later, his childhood sweetheart’s father keeled over dead in the next yard. Even worse, that night, when his mother kissed him goodnight, she died, this time for real.

So, when I say that this is a show that understands death, I don’t mean that in the depressing, “I need to see death to feel alive,” sense. No. I mean that Pushing Daisies brings the magic and the mystery back to death. It gives us a mystical grey area to nose around in, a way to wonder at the world again. But just as the magic giveth, so it taketh away-eth. Here I call to attention the case of Chuck, or as she is better known to the papers, “Lonely Tourist Charlotte Charles”. Chuck was Ned’s childhood sweetheart, the one whose father he accidentally killed. She lived a sheltered life until she was twenty-six or so, went on a cruise, and got herself murdered over a pair of gold monkey statues in a suitcase. Ned is hired to solve her case, but when the minute is up, and all he has to do is kiss her to let her go back to her death, he can’t do it. Ned fails, and Chuck lives on, past her allotted minute.

It’s a love story that we’ve all heard, but with some twists added in. Oh, we all know those silly romance novels about a couple who if they are together, horrible things will happen, but this one? This one wins. If Ned and Chuck so much as brush fingertips once, she dies forever, and he goes into full time therapy. It’s a traditional romance, just with the stakes raised higher than any story outside of a traditional opera.

So who are our players in this epic tragedy?

First, there is Ned, the Piemaker. Now, shows these days like a main character with issues. We crave characters we can relate to in some way—usually because their lives are just as depressing as ours. So too with the Piemaker. If this were any other show, he would be a compressed ball of issues, dark and brooding, prone to explosions of angst that drag everyone down, but give the show a “sense of realism”. Bah. This is Pushing Daisies. Ned has problems, sure, (dead mother, accidental murder, can’t touch Chuck), and I’m sure that he would love to curl up into a little ball of neurosis sometimes, but he tends to deal with these problems in other, more productive and far less stereotypical ways, like baking pies obsessively, keeping up his little wall of personal space, amateur detecting, and being a total geek.

For the record, how do I know about that geek thing? Well, there’s this swordfight, see, and the one guy—the bad guy, if you must know—says something about being the best fencer in the state of Alabama. What does our hero, the Piemaker, say in reply? “I wanted to be a Jedi.” Yeah. It’s just that awesome. The real clincher, though, for me at least, is right after that bit of adorable geekdom. It’s when Chuck looks down and sees Ned, victorious in the swordfight. She doesn’t see a lonely little boy playing Jedi, or even a lonely young man playing detective. No, she sees her knight, the man who quite literally brought her back to life, and the narrator informs us sweetly that she always will.

If the Piemaker is really just some adorable lonely guy called Ned, who was Lonely Tourist Charlotte Charles, and who is this Chuck? For starters, they’re two completely different lives led by the same person. Sure, they share the same body (the same very pretty body), and it’s not like she’s got any extra personalities running around, but dying will change a girl, and Chuck is no exception.

Prior to her untimely death aboard a cruise ship, Charlotte Charles was a happy homebody, spending all of her time caring for her two neurotic aunts, Lillian and Vivian. She loved her life, but occasionally felt stifled, resulting in her decision to take the cruise that ultimately resulted in her untimely death. She was revived by Ned, kept alive by Ned, and whisked away into a new life as “Chuck”, a new life with only one rule: no contact with the old life. So we can see where she gets her conflict from, really: the desire to go home, and the knowledge that she never really can.

This puts her in a prickly relation to Ned. While she certainly does love him, he is essentially what is keeping her from going home. He may not have killed her, but his touch quite literally sparked the rest of her life, and that life necessarily involves replacing her home with her aunts with a home with Ned. That having been said, Chuck adores her new life with the Piemaker at the Piehole (yes, he named his restaurant that). She has a job (making pies), a boyfriend-ish type person (their relationship is hard to qualify), and a really cool hobby (solving murders with Emerson and Ned). Her life as Chuck is everything that she couldn’t have as Charlotte Charles. She seems happy, in her bright-colored dresses and matching hats, and she probably is. One just gets the feeling that she’d like it both ways if she could have it.

I’m not saying that the story of the Piemaker and the Lonely Tourist is some epic love story akin to Romeo and Juliet, one that is a complete classic that we must revere and tell our children about for generations. Nor am I saying that it’s quite that dramatic. Basically, Pushing Daisies is a really good television show with a wonderful love story at the center. Not everything works out perfectly, the characters still have problems, they get frustrated with each other, and they rebel against their circumstances, but the story of this show is one of an adorable man named Ned, a wonderful girl named Chuck, and the story of how she died and they fell in love.

Rachel Frazier, the Idiot Box 101

Mickey the Idiot

Fri, 26 Oct 2007 02:05:56 GMT

this is part one of a two part article--this covers all of season one of Doctor Who and Mickey Smith's contributions therein. yay! while I doubt that I will post the second part next week, since I have committed to a Pushing Daisies article. still--soon, I swear.

The Idiot Box 101

Mickey the Idiot: The Glory of Ordinary Men (Doctor Who)

You really don’t find guys much more ordinary than Mickey Smith. His very name screams of a humdrum existence always, eating chips and watching extraordinary things on the telly. He’s the ultimate schlub too: a car mechanic who reacts to the fact that his girlfriend’s job just got blown up by asking if she wants to go watch the footie match down at the pub. At least, Mickey starts that way.

But as with all good television characters, Mickey Smith progresses through the course of the show, transforming from a scared little boy hiding behind Rose’s legs to the man who saved the world. It would be tempting to say that Mickey becomes a hero on Doctor Who, that meeting the Doctor transforms his life, and that he becomes extraordinary. It doesn’t, and he’s not. Mickey Smith remains ordinary all the way through, and that is what makes him so very glorious.

We meet Mickey in the very first episode, “Rose”. He’s Rose’s boyfriend, her very normal, very human boyfriend, and other than that, I’m not sure we’re supposed to think much of him. He’s clearly supposed to embody the ties that hold Rose to Earth, with his clinginess and general inability to act on his own. He acts silly, is sweet to her, but still a bit insensitive to the whole “job blown up by aliens” thing, and then gets captured and acts like a helpless, scared two-year old. While it may not be the most rousing endorsement for humanity, Mickey is our example of exactly the way most people really would react in those circumstances. We are not really supposed to be surprised when Rose dashes off into the unknown with the Doctor, leaving Mickey quivering in fright in an alley.

He turns back up in “Aliens in London” and “World War Three”, the first two episodes that bring Rose back home. It turns out that the Doctor accidentally returned her twelve months after they left rather than the twelve hours he promised, meaning that Jackie, Rose’s mum, has thought Rose missing for a whole year. She, naturally, blamed the last person she knew to be with Rose: the longsuffering Mickey. Sure, Mickey knew exactly where Rose was, or maybe not where she was, but at least who she was with, but there was no way he could tell her mother that, and even less way that he could make her believe him. So Rose comes home to find that Mickey is the main suspect in her murder.

We don’t see much of this from Mickey’s point of view, since, as I keep pointing out, he’s not the main character, and we’re not supposed to bother with him. But you can see his eyes light up when he realizes that Rose is back. You can see how frustrated he is that she’s been off having adventures and he’s been stuck back home pretending he didn’t know. He forgives Rose for running off (how could he not?), and he acts as if he is content to let her live her life with the Doctor and remain on the fringes of that. This is of course until Rose and the Doctor end up trapped by aliens in 10 Downing Street and he has to save the world.

I won’t spoil the details any more than I really have to, but the Doctor has Mickey use the one skill applicable, and hack into the British Naval security system. Mickey saves the world, beats up a few aliens, and gets called an idiot quite a few times by the Doctor in the process. The point, however, is that the person who seems most surprised by Mickey’s ability to actually influence the world one way or the other is Mickey himself. He is shocked to find that he saved the world, flabbergasted that he even kept it from getting dinged up a bit. That is the reaction of an ordinary man who has just realized that the world is bigger than it seems. The Doctor asks Mickey if he wants to join them on the TARDIS but he says no, he’s not brave enough, which when you come right down to it, is a smart answer. It’s better to know your limits than to spend the next five episodes throwing hissy fits.

Then, of course, just when we’re starting to get to the really great Mickey parts, he disappears for a long time, until episode eleven, “Boomtown”, where the gang, now including Captain Jack Harkness, meets up with Mickey in Cardiff. It’s supposed to just be a pit stop to refuel the TARDIS and let Rose pick up a few things she left at home, but hell just has to break loose, and Mickey is caught in the middle of it. When they aren’t fighting aliens or racing around the Millennium Center, though, Mickey looks lost. Rose, Jack and the Doctor are an almost impenetrable bubble of laughter and stories, and somehow tales of getting plastered down at the pub and putting the wrong song on the jukebox just don’t seem as funny.

Mickey’s been cheating on Rose with some girl named Trisha, but really, who can blame him? He’s barely seen Rose in months, she’s off swanning about the universe, and he’s an ordinary bloke, who wants to do ordinary things…right? Well, he is an ordinary bloke, but I would argue that he, by this point, does not want to do ordinary things. In fact, that makes him even more normal. The desire to be special is a mainstay of humanity. It is what makes us US. Mickey, by wanting to not be ordinary, is ordinary, and that’s just brilliant.

Rose leaves after “Boomtown”, but Mickey’s only out of sight for one episode until “The Parting of the Ways”, when The Doctor sends Rose home. He’s in a battle, he’s sure he’s about to die, so he sends her back to Mickey and her mum because he knows that they are the last people on Earth who would ever want her to rejoin him. For the most part, the Doctor’s right about that. Jackie and Mickey react to Rose’s homecoming by taking her out for fried chicken and chips, which is arguably not the best meal for someone working herself into hysteria. Still, it’s the only thing that they can think of to do. It’s only when they find that Rose won’t give up on the Doctor, really, REALLY won’t give up on him, that they give in and help her as best they can. And, wonder of wonders, it’s Mickey who caves first.

Actually, it shouldn’t be that much of a surprise. Mickey is the one who’s had the most contact with the Doctor in his element. Mickey is the one who loves Rose romantically. Mickey is the one who is less known for being mindcrunchingly stubborn. Mickey is also loyal, and it seems that this is the point where Mickey takes his first step towards believing in the Doctor. He helps Rose because he wants to believe that the Doctor really is everything she says he is. Mickey doesn’t get any superpowers or flashes of insight. He merely decides that he is going to trust Rose, hitches up his little deathtrap of a car, and presses the pedal to the floor. The rest is up to the special people.

to be continued...

-Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

An Ode to Vain TV

Sat, 20 Oct 2007 02:46:27 GMT

I'm trying out a new format now for the site: instead of doing a season a week, I'll pretty much just write about a television phenomenon that makes me happy.

so here's this week:

An Ode to Vain TV

In case you've been living in a horrid little cave the past few years, a horrid little cave without cable, there's this thing called reality television. Now, by and large, I am not a fan, but there is something compelling about some of these shows, something special that suggests that they strive to be more than just schlock, something--

Oh who am I kidding? They're just plain fun!

Here are the latest contenders for the Vain TV Award:

A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila (VH1)

I admit it. I have sat through an entire episode of this show, and I enjoyed it. The whole point of the show is that Tila Tequila, an exceptionally hot bisexual chick who's giving 16 guys and 16 girls a "shot at love."

Tell me you don't love that double entendre.

Here is what I give it actual props for: head on addressing bisexuality and homosexuality as everyday dating issues, and not promising marriage and eternal committment but rather a chance at all that. It mostly promises sex and a jolly good time.

Here is what I actually watch the show for: seriously? It's a bunch of lesbians and straight men competing for a bisexual woman. It's kinda hysterical.

America's Next Top Model (CW)

This show is practically the reigning queen of Vain TV. Tyra Banks? Twiggy? Janice Dickinson? Scores of impressionable wanna-be models clawing each others' eyes out for a chance to even get into the room with a fashion photographer? Glorious.

To be fair, this show has convinced me that modeling is difficult and that it takes a lot of talent and hard work to succeed. But it's also taught me that models really are catty and shallow and it makes me happy to watch. There are catfights, runway disasters, bulimia jokes, "oh no she didn't"s, catfights, drag queen spectaculars (Miss J. Alexander comes to mind), bad photos, good photos, more catfights, and healthy, honest feminine competition (which means more catfights).

NEXT (MTV)

This show is not a guilty pleasure. It's a guilty treasure. It's about pretty people hooking up with each other. There's one person who wants a date, guy or girl, and there's a bus full of five possible dates. The dates go in, and they get money for however long they last before the date-r yells "NEXT!" If the date-r chooses them, they get to pick whether to take the money or a second date. It's awesome.

I mean, it's still awful and degrading and vain, but it's really REALLY fun to watch these pretty people deflate each others' egos. The date-rs always have tricks to weed through the dates, and the dates have ways of trying to be as awesome as possible. It's all posturing and hyperbole, and it's darn fun to see!

The Grand Prize Winner in Vain TV: America's Most Smartest Model (VH1)

Who could hate a show like this? This is a show of unbridled vanity and stupidity. The gag? Ben Stein and his cohost, Mary Alice Not-nearly-as-cool-as-Ben-Stein, have gathered a group of models, male and female, who all think that they are smart. Yeah. It's never a good sign when the show itself is grammatically incorrect, and the models have to test their "smartingness".

They're not great models. They're slightly retarded. Some of them are rather unattractive. They're arrogant. Theyr'e bitchy (even the guys). It's made of awesome. Perhaps the best part of this show, however, is the fact that the show itself mocks the models. It is a show that is well aware of its own stupidity and the stupidity of its topic.

Ben Stein has no love for these models. In fact, he has scorn. They set themselves up for this. I'm sorry, but I have no pity for them. This show revels in its mockery, and I invite you to revel with me.

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Fall TV Premiers 2007, Part Three

Sat, 13 Oct 2007 01:32:21 GMT

last one, I swear!

The Idiot Box 101, Fall TV Premiers 2007, Part Three

THE LATECOMERS:

1.    Cavemen, Tuesday 8:00, ABC

Remember those Cavemen ads for Geico? They were witty and clever and highly entertaining. They were also about a minute long. This show is twenty-nine minutes too long. Sure, it’s funny, and cute, and the concept really is pretty cool (cavemen live among us, everyone knows about it, and they face a lot of racial discrimination), but aside from stereotypical gags about not dating outside of your species, scaring away annoying neighbors by grunting and threatening them with sticks, etc, this show really doesn’t have much to offer after the first five minutes. That’s when the novelty wears off and it’s just kind of annoying.

2.    Carpoolers, Tuesday 8:30, ABC

Let’s just get this out of the way first: yes, I know that the characters on this show have seriously retarded names (Marmaduke, Laird, Dougie—seriously, Marmaduke?). Still, it’s a cute show. It isn’t hysterically funny, but it’s sweet. The guys, who all carpool to work every morning and evening, are sweet and funny dudes just trying to navigate their work and family lives. Nothing revolutionary or spectacular, but lots of chuckles and giggles.

3.    Pushing Daisies, Wednesday 8:00, ABC

Love. Love love love love love. I adore-heart-hug-LOVE this show. I realize that I should try to be slightly more objective, but I don’t want to be. I really love this show. The concept is spectacular (guy touches dead people and they come back to life, he touches them again, they go back to being dead), the acting is really good (Ned is adorable, Chuck brings a sweet pathos to being dead-alive, and Olive is deliciously stalkerish as she pursues Ned), and the absurdly precise voice over just adds the perfect touch. That, and it’s a show about death that has super-bright colors everywhere. It’s just made of awesome.

4.    Supernatural, Thursday 9:00, CW

Sometimes you can think that your siblings are kind of dumb. So, imagine how Sam Winchester feels. His brother, Dean, has just made a deal with a demon, selling his own soul to bring Sammy back from the dead. If the brothers try to break the deal in any way, Sam goes back to being dead. Sam’s not very happy. On top of all of that, the boys may have inadvertently started the apocalypse. Oops? The season promises to be full of hedonism (Dean already lived for the moment—and now he only has a year left to live), mysterious, but sexy, femme fatales, and lots of violence. I like this show a lot. I see no bad here.

5.    Moonlight, Friday 9:00, CBS

Okay, so you hear that there’s a show our about a vampire private detective who lives in Los Angeles. I’m pretty sure that everyone’s first thought was to flash to Angel, the reasonably good spinoff of Buffy that followed her vampire ex-boyfriend as he moved to Los Angeles and became a private detective. I’m just saying, déjà vu. As for the actual show, however, it’s pretty good. Mick is a very modern vampire, pretty up to date with the world, and he has a sweet film noir vibe. Beth, his pretty blonde love interest is played by the spectacular Sophia Myles, is a perfect blend of the classic damsel in danger, and a brilliant chick with enough guts to run into a scary building, shoot the bad guy, and save the hero. It may be a carbon copy of a show we’ve already seen, but I’ll watch it again. It was pretty good the first time too.

6.    Numb3rs, Friday 10:00, CBS

If you’ve ever seen Numb3rs before, then you know how this will go. The episodes are almost classically formulaic (bad guy does crime, FBI tries to solve crime, math genius uses math in a weird way to solve the case), but if you like it, then you’re good with it. They know what works, and they stick with that. There must be something in the air this season, though, because not only do the main characters, brothers Don (FBI agent) and Charlie (math prodigy), have girlfriends, even Charlie’s weird professor friend Larry has a girlfriend. I’m not saying this is a bad thing—there’s just something in the air. The math is still baffling, the crimes are still impressive, and the show’s still predictable, but in a good way—like those old Choose Your Own Adventure books.

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

[Doctor Who/Torchwood sightings: Caroline Chikezie guest stars on Supernatural in the premier (she was in several episodes of Torchwood). Also, Sophia Myles costars on Moonlight--she guest starred in season two of Doctor Who (she's also David Tennant's girlfriend).]

TV Premiers 2007, Part Two

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 20:01:09 GMT

TV Premiers 2007, Part Two

1.    How I Met Your Mother, Monday 8:00, CBS

Oh my gosh, how can I describe television’s funniest (best) sitcom? If you’ve never seen it, the show’s about Ted, a nice enough everyman, who’s desperately searching for The One. For the first two seasons Ted dated Robin, a Canadian expatriate, but now they’ve broken up, and Ted’s back on the prowl, with the aid of his “wingman” Barney, and the hesitant support of his married roommates, Marshall and Lily. It’s legendary. Watch it. Watch it. Watch it.

2.    Heroes, Monday 9:00, NBC

I’ve already whibbled to you all about the glorious joy that is Heroes, so I think I’ll just stick to commenting on how season two looks. There are a bunch of new characters (which is not a good thing for a show that already has thirteen main characters, give or take), but the old characters are still here, and the producers swear that they won’t let their world get too big. There’s a plague, a new bad guy, romance, and time-travel. I am more than ready to settle in and let them all save the world. Again.

3.    NCIS, Tuesday 8:00, CBS

I haven’t seen much of the previous seasons of NCIS, but this one sure starts with a literal bang, and the threat that a beloved character (Tony) has been blown up. There’s not nearly enough Abby (the goth lab tech who talks to her computers like people) in this episode, and frankly I could take it or leave it, but there’s something worth coming back for, when you get past the tendency towards overdramatic music and plots. Watch it for Abby and Tony, because they are where the magic is.

4.    House MD, Tuesday 9:00, FOX

By the end of last season, Dr. House had alienated or fired his entire staff his boss, and his one friend, Dr. Wilson, wasn’t feeling all that pleased with him. House has to hire three new fellows, evade his boss, solve cases, and there’s the slight issue of the ransom notes he keeps finding, threatening his precious electric guitar. It’s a brilliant start to a fourth season that promises to be absolutely hysterical.

5.    Mythbusters, Wednesday 9:00, Discovery

Okay, so Mythbusters isn’t really a premier, because it doesn’t really have seasons. It’s pretty much just on all the time. I still maintain, though, that it is so worth watching. They take simple accepted myths and try to see if they are true or false. It’s great fun, because the guys are really just geeks giving a good time. They blow things up, crash cars, slaughter dummies and do other crazy stuff. It’s well worth the effort.

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Fall TV Premiers 2007, part one

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 03:07:20 GMT

I've watched a lot of shows this week, and this is my conclusion about them all:

NEW SHOWS:

1. The Big Bang Theory, Monday 8:30, CBS

This is a show about two geeks and a pretty girl. It should be funny. I want it to be hysterical. It's not. Oh, it's got its moments, but it's also pretty insulting if you actually are a geek. You're supposed to look at these two guys and just revel in their social incompetence, but you can't help feeling bad for the mocking. This show is downright mean to its protagonists. I'm giving the show one more shot, but don't be surprised if this bang blows.

2. Journeyman, Monday 10:00, NBC

So, there's this guy. This guy, Dan, accidentally time travels. Whoops? No, seriously, Dan doesn't try to time travel, he just keeps falling through time at innapropriate intervals, much to the consternation of his wife and extended family. The show sort of schlubbed along for the first forty minutes, but then there was The Twist. It was a twist that made the show worth watching, made me go ooh, made me want to watch the show forever and ever. Seriously, watch this.

3. LA Ink, Tuesdays 10:00, TLC

I'm generally not a huge fan of reality tv, but this show is actually reality. There are no crocodiles, no contestants, and no bizarre elimination rules. Instead, there is a kickass tatoo parlour, and a really cool lady called Kat Von D. Sure, some of the people who come in for tatoos are weirdo hippies who need to get "buddha babies" tatooed on their legs, but there are also awesome tatoos, funny artists and just plain old cool people. This is my dead brain show. It's nice to not have to think, and to just enjoy.

4. Life, Wednesday 10:00, NBC

It's a good show, not a great show, but it could be a really great show. Granted, it's not there yet, but all we have to go on is the first episode. The main character, Charlie, spent twelve years in jail for a crime he didn't commit. He got beat up a lot. He also studied zen. Now he's out, a police detective who eats an abnormal amount of fruit. He can solve almost any crime, except the one that framed him. It was fun, and I liked it, but I wanted to see greatness, to see awesome. I am willing to watch and wait for the awesome.

5. Reaper, Tuesday 9:00, CW

Oh my gosh, made of hysterical. It was seriously like watching dogma, the action television show. The guys are clerks at a crappy Home Depot clone, there's a hot girl with low standards, and poor Sam, the main character, owes his soul to the devil. His parents made a deal before he was born, a deal with the devil. It's pretty awesome, because now he has to find souls that escape from hell, and send them back. FYI, the portal to hell, is apparently in the DMV. It makes a scary amount of sense. I would totally say to watch this show, if only it weren't at the same time as House MD. So, I think that everyone should tape it, and watch it during a lull in programming.

for now, cause there's more later, Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Prison Break, Season One

Fri, 21 Sep 2007 22:12:32 GMT

and we're back, with much less of the peruvian death flu (still got pangs, but they're a lot better). therefore: have some Prison Break, in honor of the start of season three this past week. note: next week, rather than a season review, I'm going to post little mini-reviews of the season premiers we've seen so far. just so you know!

Season Review:

The Idiot Box 101: Season Review
Prison Break, Season One

Prison Break (season one, at least) is a delicious parfait of a show—all those lovely layers! It’s the tale of two brothers, one wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death, and the other working desperately to save him. Michael is trying to free Lincoln before Lincoln gets the death sentence, and the only way that he can think of to do that is to get himself sent to prison, and break them both out. He’s just a bit dedicated.

The show works because you believe that Michael can do it. If he were any less convincing, if Wentworth Miller played Michael with any less sociopathic calm and panache, the show would just fall apart like so many popsicle stick houses. Instead, the show spirals off into brilliance, all based on that look in his eyes, the one that says, “Yes, I am that smart. No, you’re not going to try to stop me.”

Before he robbed a bank to get sent to prison, Michael was a structural engineer. He was actually one of the people who helped design the retrofit for the very prison he’s trying to break out of. There’s the tattoo that hides blueprints of the escape route, an impressive knowledge of physics and pressure points to aid the digging, and a lot of blackmailing the mob that go into this escape. Only a genius or a crazy person would think this is a good idea. Fortunately, Michael is both. He has low-latent inhibition (basically, he filters out NO information), and a ridiculous IQ. He’s sort of amazing.

Lincoln, Michael’s elder brother by about five years or so, wasn’t exactly a saint before he got framed for murder. Still, he wasn’t evil. He was just a guy going nowhere in life, the schlub of the two. Lincoln poured everything he had into raising Michael after their mother died, leaving no energy to take himself anywhere. He was content to sort of drift through the rest of his life, content that he’d done right by Michael, and done pretty right by his son, LJ. Being put into prison changed his mind a bit. By the time Michael gets there, Lincoln’s gone through all those nifty stages of grief and ended right back up at acceptance. He doesn’t want the freedom Michael’s offering at first, not least because Michael had to ruin his own life in the process. Lincoln comes around though, because he knows that Michael’s really serious about it.

Lincoln is the only person for whom Michael has entirely altruistic intentions. Everyone else in the escape group, every John Abruzzi and Fernando Sucre, brings something important to the table. Their very involvement is actually a testament to Michael’s planning skills, because with a few exceptions, every person in on the escape was planned for since the beginning. They all form a piece of the pretty little sculpture Michael is building.

The plan is a brilliant work of art, but things go wrong. Things always go wrong, and it wouldn’t be a drama if they didn’t. Thing’s don’t work on time, people get blackmailed, people won’t cooperate, they lose parts of the map, they run out of time, their route gets blocked off, the guards find out—stuff goes wrong. The best part of the show is actually watching Michael take in each latest failure and creating a nifty new way to get around it.

In the background of the show is the reason driving all of it: Lincoln’s execution. We know that he’s innocent, but we don’t know why someone is “trying to bury him.” That’s where the conspiracy subplot comes in. Honestly, this is the part of the show that I have mixed feelings about. While the conspiracy makes sense, the scale feels too large for a show so focused on one little plot. We have Michael and Lincoln in the Fox River State Penitentiary, but outside, we’ve got Secret Service guys chasing his ex-girlfriend, son, and any random people who have information that could get him exonerated. It’s good that we’re establishing Lincoln’s innocence so emphatically, but do we really need the nation-wide conspiracy?

When you get right to the base of the show, though, it’s about brotherly love. The ties between Michael and Lincoln anchor the plot. You want them to break out of prison, because you want Michael to succeed. You want the good(-ish) guys to win. In fact, by the end of the first season, you want them all to escape—sure, we’ve got pedophiles and mob bosses in the mix too, the characters are so brilliantly complex that you’re really rooting for them, morality be dammed. Prison Break pretty much owns at breaking out of prison, it’s everything else that’s iffy.

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Dead Like Me, Season One

Fri, 14 Sep 2007 22:01:29 GMT

I apologize for the inferior quality of this article. am sick. have peruvian death flu. will hopefully be better next week.

Season Review:

The Idiot Box 101: Season Review
Dead Like Me, Season One

Dead Like Me has one of the more unique concepts I’ve ever run across in a television show: the main character dies in the first episode, and everything that happens after that is her afterlife. Well, it’s less her afterlife and more her unlife. When Georgia Lass (the main character) is hit by a toilet seat falling from the sky, she is stunned to realize that she has not really lived. She doesn’t get to pass on, though. George doesn’t get an afterlife. Instead, she is recruited into the ranks of the Reapers, meant to harvest the souls of those about to die, specifically from freak accidents.

The show follows George as she tries to acclimatize to being dead, living alone, taking souls, and having to work for a living. In other words, it’s a show about growing up. The conceit of the show is, frankly, brilliant, forcing us to confront our ideas about being and adult and being a person in a whole new perspective. The show, and George’s, cavalier approach to death reinforces this, maintaining that “every person has a time”.

George works very well as a symbol of the lost youth of America, as long as you’re willing to admit that the lost youth are kind of depressing. She’s cynical, sarcastic, and utterly unmotivated to make anything of her life. When she was alive, she was a college drop out, living at home and working at a temp agency. After her death, she’s a grim reaper, squatting in a dead guy’s apartment and still working for the temp agency. As it turns out, death doesn’t pay. Still, George is the model for all those who didn’t grow up right. She stares at the world from under her perpetually raised eyebrows as if it’s about to get up and bite her. Which, for a girl who got hit by a toilet seat, isn’t that unreasonable a view.

The other reapers are stereotypes for the types of people that you meet as you mature, the people who become your family outside of your family. Rube, George’s immediate reaper boss, is a sort of father figure, trying to guide George through the simultaneous confusing worlds of death and adulthood. Roxy is like your favorite bitchy aunt, a meter maid who takes nothing from anyone. Mason is the slacker big brother, a perpetual schlub who oozes nice-guy charm and sleeze like bad aftershave. And last are Betty and Daisy, the big sisters. Betty is the real big sis, the one who first befriends George and teaches her how to adjust to unlife—just to live it. After she leaves in episode five, we get Daisy, a pale replacement, but still funny in her own lovable ice queen way. Daisy is the girl you loved to hate in high school, and she’s the type of older sister who always locked you out of the bathroom.

George’s actual family reacts to her death in an almost extreme parody of empty-nest syndrome. Her mother boxes up some of her things and sells the rest at a yard sale, figuring that it is less painful if there are no reminders left of the chickie that has flown (or fallen) out of the nest. Her father barely reacts, admitting that his relationship with his eldest daughter effectively died years ago. And last there is Reggie, her eleven year old sister. Reggie reacts by collecting dead things, stealing toilet seats and hanging them on a tree, and creating a shrine to George. She’s a little on the crazy side, but in her own way, she is the only one in the family who actually expresses her grief at George’s absence.

Dead Like Me is a brilliant show about growing up, even if it’s not so brilliant when it comes to addressing the issues of death and loss. Still, for a show about the disconnection between adolescence and adulthood, it really hits every mark. George is lost in her own life, and it’s not until she dies, or “dies”, that she finds a purpose. Sure, her purpose is to take the souls of the living to ease their passage, but that’s better than nothing, right?

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Heroes, Season One

Fri, 07 Sep 2007 05:53:10 GMT

remember how I promised that I would do Heroes? have some Heroes. unfortunately, I have absolutely NO idea what next week will be, since I've had requests for Dead Like Me, Keen Eddie, and Dante's Cove in the past few days...I will get to all of them, the question is just in what order? I accept bribes.

Season Review:

The Idiot Box 101: Season Review
Heroes, Season One

I came to Heroes halfway through the first season, laid up in bed with the flu and a potent internet connection. I was hooked. I watched, engrossed, as the bad guy tricked the good guy, morally grey characters (which was pretty much all of them) switched sides, and the show grew towards a climax that promised to be monumental. Here was a show that took superheroes and stripped away all that was “super” about them. There is no spandex suit, no arch-enemy, no silly name, secret identity or mountain lair. All that remains are ordinary people with special powers, and the question of what they will do next.

Heroes is by nature an ensemble show—no main character or main plotline—so it can at times get the tiniest bit confusing as all hell. We are expected to keep track of 13 main characters (yes, I had to stop and count), all of which at some point have their own storyline that interweaves with the rest. Heroes is not a show for the faint of heart or the short of memory. That having been said, of course, I do have to point something out: Heroes is not Lost. Instead of just piling questions upon storylines and leaving the audience to sit in a puddle of their own confusion, Heroes actually answers questions, and within a reasonable timeframe, too. The plots tend to resolve within 5 to 10 episodes, leaving the audience happy and fulfilled, pitying the poor fool whose show is not so kind.

Despite the numerous plots and subplots, however, there are three that really stand out in season one as the most consistently awesome: The Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day; The Odd Couple; and Secret Agent Man.

The Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day: Peter Petrelli

It’s not really a day. Peter Petrelli’s bad day lasts for about six months (so far), and it just keeps getting worse. If Heroes did have a main character, it would be Peter, if only for his wounded puppy dog look and the way his story arc intersects with everyone else’s. His power is empathy, which means he can absorb anyone else’s power, can be either really useful (yay, Peter’s not dead!) or very, very bad (oh no, Peter’s going to turn into a nuclear bomb and blow up New York City!). Poor Peter just can’t catch a break. From the moment he jumps off a building in that first episode (I kid you not), the plot just takes off and carries him through a never-ending gamut of cheerleaders that need saving, abusive British mentors, psychotic arch-enemies, and an impressively dysfunctional family. We can hope that Peter’s very bad day might be over, but it seems that the more emo he is, the higher the ratings go, so expect more agony than ecstasy in season two.

The Odd Couple: Sylar and Mohinder

It’s like a match made in a reality show boardroom: stick a mild-mannered Indian geneticist (Mohinder) on a road-trip with the psychopathic watchmaker who murdered his father (Sylar), don’t him who the killer really is, and stir in some weird sexual tension. What’s not to love? It’s not the sheer schadenfreude of watching their personalities clash, however, that is so compelling about our odd couple. Rather, it’s the way we watch these two men slowly become friends in spite of themselves. You can practically taste the betrayal on both sides when the truth comes out. But the most powerful part of their story is when Sylar, even after the truth is revealed, still considers Mohinder the only person he can call when he needs help or just to talk.

Secret Agent Man: Claire and Mr. Bennet

Can you imagine finding out that the father you’ve adored for years is actually a secret agent man for some evil company that tortures people like you? On top of that, you somehow are indestructible, which would be pretty cool if not for the ick factor, and the fear that your dad might turn you in. Such is the life and teenage angst of Claire Bennet. Imagine working for a company for years and then discovering your loyalties suddenly torn between the job you’ve devoted yourself to and the daughter you love. You would find yourself morally grey too. Such is the life of Mr. Bennet, secret agent man. Claire loves her dad, but she just can’t figure out whether to trust him or not. It’s the dynamic of real family love, a genuine father-daughter relationship on the screen that really makes me squee.

I suppose, when it comes down to it, Heroes works because it eschews the silly idea that people are either good or bad. Rather, everyone is a different shade of grey, some are just a darker charcoal than others. It’s the real-life situations, though, that the characters get into—situations that Superman never has to deal with—that give the show a true depth. The show deals with rape (Claire), addiction (Isaac), a lovingly dysfunctional family (the Petrellis), bankruptcy (Niki), and betrayal (everyone), to name only a few issues. Superheroes don’t have problems like these (except when a writer reinvents them to appeal to a newer audience), but these heroes do, because, foremost, they are people.

[Heroes Season One is out on DVD. It returns to NBC for Season Two on September 24 at 9PM, at which point there shall be joy throughout the land.]

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101

Torchwood, Season One

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 03:55:03 GMT

here's Torchwood, coming straight off the first week of college. hope you dig in and enjoy as much as I did!

Season Review:

The Idiot Box 101: Season Review
Torchwood, Season One

Torchwood may be a Doctor Who spinoff, but that’s pretty much where the similarities end. Doctor Who is a family show where sex is only alluded to in innuendo and they can’t even admit that the Doctor is in love. Torchwood is more mature, if your definition of “mature” pretty much means more: more sex, more violence, and more swearing. It’s a teenage boy’s wet dream of a show, and it’s downright addictive too.

For starters, Captain Jack Harkness, that dastardly sexual beast from season one of Doctor Who, heads up the Torchwood team. Torchwood is a top-secret extra-governmental agency for policing alien activity in Cardiff, Wales. [Season one of Torchwood coincides with season three of Doctor Who, so the Doctor only left Jack a year ago, but Jack has lived over one-hundred years since then, trapped on the long road through Earth’s history. Just so you know.] He’s not the same Jack as before, with much more angst and slightly less camp than he had before his first death at the blasters of the Daleks. Turns out, being immortal and unkillable really takes it out of a guy. Still, he’s Jack, and that’s the important bit.

We see Torchwood through the eyes of Gwen Cooper, introduced in the first episode as a sort of likeable guy’s girl. She’s a constable in Cardiff, has a nice stable Welsh boyfriend, and practically exudes working-class Welsh charm. Somewhere between a caricature and a stereotype, however, Gwen fails at being the connecting piece she is intended as. Rather, it is the other characters (Tosh, Owen and Ianto), who truly connect with the audience. Gwen brings a much needed humanity to Torchwood, true, but it’s the eyes that see the alien as normal that really engage the audience.

Gwen’s generality and broadness of appeal are actually what make her difficult to relate to. The others each have something specific to recommend them. Tosh has a certain vulnerability peeking out of the corners of her face. She’s strong. You know she’s strong, but Tosh’s glimpses of insecurity lend a realism to the character. Similarly, Owen is pissed off. Not really at anything, but Owen is pissed off in a general sense—he’s angry with the world, underneath that good old lad exterior. And then there’s Ianto. Oh, Ianto. Ianto has his secrets, like the robot girlfriend he’s hiding in the basement, and his ability to let the scent of pain waft away from him makes us connect with Ianto. He’s sad, which we really can all connect with.

And then there’s the gay. Oh, the gay.

Being a BBC show, Torchwood has fewer strictures on it than most American shows. Hence the gay. Now, I may be a slasher at heart (and in other places), but I don’t have to slash this show. It slashes itself. First there’s Owen being gay in the first episode, then there’s Jack harassing Ianto. Jack is just one giant pile of gay, bi, omni, and just plain sexual. In episode four, Jack and Ianto kiss. In episode eight, they just wallow in sexual tension, until Ianto propositions Jack (there’s a stopwatch involved). Episode twelve is quite literally all gay. The plot of the episode is a gay love story. Whee! The season finale, at last has a nice, sweet kiss between Ianto and Jack…in front of everyone. It’s a pretty darn gay show.

And then there’s the cheese. Oh, the cheese.

Torchwood is fun, but it’s also really awful. It’s a paragon of cheese, a palace of crap, and a great temple to bad television. The Torchwood base is the most impractical base ever created by a group of geeks. It’s pretty much a Welsh batcave. I mean, they have a pterodactyl that nests in there. In fact, there is a blissful scene wherein a pterodactyl fights against a cyberwoman. And the cyberwoman has been doused in barbecue sauce. There’s something to be said for bad television, and Torchwood says it all. Seriously, it will melt your brain with the bad, but it will also make you scream with joy at the good, the awesome and the geekily fantastic.

Rachel Frazier, The Idiot Box 101