Monsters of Television

“The wolf is of the north. She deserves better than a butcher.”

Now that the hype has settled down a bit (and I admit that I was a victim of hype-backlash, despite my careful avoidance of sustained looks at the show beyond 140 characters), I think we can start working through the episode without the crushing weight of expectations bearing down on us. At least I hope so.

“The Kingsroad” is better than the pilot episode, but still has some problems to work through, though you’ll be happy to know that my problems are less with characters (though those still float about) and the narrative world than it is with just really horrible uses of elliptical editing that make the episode an unnecessary puzzle to piece together.

But the most important lesson I took from the episode? Don’t mess with the Stark children. Their direwolves will mess you up.

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What, exactly, is there to be excited about here?

Was it the violence? Was it the naked women with Peter Dinklage? Was it the naked woman with the king of the heavily racialized Others (who are to be used by a lily-white man to regain his throne in a political power play)? Was it the costumes and make-up? Was it the frost zombies? Was it the direwolf pups?

Okay. The direwolf pups are kind of adorable.

But beyond them, and I found myself asking, “Why should I watch episode 2 of this airless, lifeless story about, at its core, putting aside the fantasy genre, rich white men?” Read more »

“Anti-awesometic.”

So this was an interesting episode in that it is pretty funny but still feels like a bit of a rehash of past episodes (particularly “Okay Awesome” (mentioned in passing) and “The Pineapple Incident”), which is something I’ve tagged the show for before. I’m trying to figure out if the series is doing the rehashing of past seasons purposefully, carrying through with its idea of “new is awesome” this season, or if the show is just getting wheezy as it ages.

Part of me worries that I’m rationalizing my continued commitment to the show (and am now set up for two more seasons! Two! At least!). In that sense, I’m pretty hopeless, aren’t I? I’ve talked about this before, how I, as a viewer, am trapped in an idea of what the show should be, unwilling to let it grow past its previous seasons (and I talk a little bit about those reasons in a forthcoming podcast). Does this limit my enjoyment of the show, or is the show just genuinely not working any longer? Last week, I think, was clearly a case of the latter, but is there an instance where the former is happening?

I can’t say for sure, so let’s talk about this episode a bit while I try and work it out. Read more »

“For a rabbit, you’re not very cute.“

Access to television shows from all over the world is becoming easier-ish, legally speaking anyway. Sure, you can torrent or stream a show from another country as soon as someone has been kind enough to translate the dialog, if such an activity is necessary. If you don’t torrent or stream, you’re left waiting for months or longer to see a show from elsewhere in the world, if it’s licensed at all.

Attempting to stop the illegal downloading and streaming of their content, anime production committees and their networks have been licensing shows for next-day streaming, same-day streaming, and sometimes even simulcast streaming on sites like Hulu (content viewable U.S. only) or Crunchyroll (content viewable worldwide; also streams Asian live-action dramas, an increasingly popular commodity) complete with subtitles, and, of course, advertisements.

With this in mind, and since I enjoy anime, I thought I would check in on some of the spring season offerings. Coverage of these shows may be sporadic, but we’ll see how long I stay dedicated to this idea. First up: Tiger & Bunny which is streaming on Hulu and Anime News Network.  Read more »

“I am not a fan. I am not a groupie. I am an academic.“

I haven’t been writing much about Community lately, largely due to time constraints on my end. It’s been a little bit frustrating, but it is what it is. So I return, hopefully, for the rest of the season to keep writing about a show that I really really enjoy, even if it doesn’t always really work. Like tonight.

There’s nothing particularly wrong with “Competitive Wine Tasting” but the episode is kind of a mishmash of ideas and plots, each of which really needed room to breathe beyond their few scenes each. As a result, you can see potential for each plot kind of peek out, but since they’re just piled on top of each other, the potential is never realized, and we’re left with that, really, would’ve felt more at home in the early going of season 1 (before “Introduction to Statistics” or “Comparative Religion”).

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“Leela.”

Way to take away all the hope, show.

I mean, yeah, we knew it was coming eventually (it had to!), so it’s not that much of a surprise but I have to tell I was pretty devastated at the end of the episode. I wasn’t crying or anything, but given how the season has been building on Alicia’s accomplishments at work, how she’s been able to make decisions for herself, slowly rebuild her marriage,  and on and on and then to have it taken away (Undermined? Tainted?) by the man with the talking lion phone (notice the lack of comedy Andrew had this week?), I was pretty depressed with the end of the episode.

And will continue to be depressed until May 3. Which is one the next new episode is.

Is it May 3 yet? Read more »

“I don’t think you know what Spain is.”

So that episode felt relatively pointless, and I’m not entirely sure where to begin with how many kinds of frustrating the episode was.

Maybe with the quickly (semi-)resolved Lily is frustrated plot that kind of nearly recycled the season 1 finale (different motivations, but same almost result)? Or Barney’s latent emotional issues? Or with the fact that Zoey is, as we all kind of suspected, a really annoying, overly challenging person, and that Ted is going to come to completely and utterly loathe this woman (except we already knew that from a previous episode).

On the upside, Robin broke up with Scooby.

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Well, it’s finally happening. I’m watching the first season of Breaking Bad.

I’ve never been particularly excited about the series, despite all the positive word of mouth and critical praise heaped upon it. I cannot explain the lack of excitement (I remember that when I heard the premise, I said, “Oh. So it’s Weeds. But with a guy. Who has a cancer. Hijinks ensue.”), but it was just never much of a priority for me, despite how really superb I think Byran Cranston is in anything.

But here I am, caving to peer pressure, like I was told never to do. I decided to split the difference in the normal way of covering a show for a DVD First Watch. I didn’t care for the season summary approach I took with Mad Men, but the Supernatural episode-by-episode approach was taking me forever to watch and then write about (I did finish season 1, by the way. Reaction: HOLY CRAP, GUYS. THAT’S INSANE. IS THE IMPALA OKAY?!).

Instead, I’m borrowing a page from Maureen Ryan’s playbook as she watched season 3 of Breaking Bad: After each episode she watched, she did a brief list of responses and thoughts about it and then went to the next one. Mine may be in paragraph form as opposed to a bulleted list, but the thought process will be the same: I’ll watch an episode, write some brief thoughts, and then go to the next one.

I should be able to get through all seven episodes today (update: I did not), so either check back here every hour or so for thoughts on the episode I just watched, or keep an eye on my Twitter feed for when I update this entry or have to take a break.

Here we go. Read more »

“If I had real eyes, I would cry right now.“

So that’s that, the final episode of Sym-Bionic Titan. While the episode description that circulated was about Lance and Illana (somehow) returning to Galaluna and facing off against Modula, the episode served to tie up the plot threads from the past two episodes as the show finished what would’ve been its first season, not its only season. I ended up not reviewing the previous two episodes due to time and health issues, but it’s probably best to address them both here in relation to the finale, since all three are really a set of episodes that should, ideally, be watched together.

Seen in that way, as one chain of episodes as opposed to three individual episodes, the final run of Titan is actually fairly strong, even if “A New Beginning” isn’t too much of a finale and isn’t very aptly named as the episode returned the series to its status quo.

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“I’m just trying to ascertain the extent of your humiliation.“

After last week’s just off episode, it was nice to see the show come back with something that clicked along better. I don’t know what it was about last week, the songwriting serial killer or the choppy transitions between scenes, but nothing really worked for me. And it wasn’t like the episode was trying something new (like a musical episode or something (though The Good Wife should TOTALLY do a musical episode)), but it just didn’t feel like an episode of The Good Wife.

“Wrongful Termination” did feel like an episode of The Good Wife, and a very good one. Not good enough to help me through my writer’s block, but enough that I’m willing to try and eke out a post on it. So this may be briefer and less in-depth than my usual thoughts. Apologies in advance.

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