Since I’ve in NJ, I’ve had access to live cable for the first time. I try not to feel pressure to watch television as it airs, but with the current crop of shows, I’ve felt compelled. And since some of my favorite television shows have recently premiered, I figured I would get in from the beginning. Since there will be some mild spoilers, you might not want to read beyond the cut if you’re not up to date.
Note: This was written before the most recent episodes aired.
My thoughts on the Season Five Finale of Lost can be found here (at Tor.com).
It was a bit mindblowing, but I’m getting a few uncomfortable BSG vibes from the show now.
I feel like everyone I know has been to see Star Trek already. As usual, I am late to the party. I will rectify that tonight, however. In a way, though, I’m glad that some of the hype has been tempered by people having more critical opinions. I still haven’t seen too many people saying it wasn’t good, but I would rather go in expecting decent and not the best movie I’ve seen in recent times.
Tomorrow night is the Lost finale and it’s something I’m looking forward to more eagerly than I am Star Trek. I know Lost lost a lot of people a while back, but I have to say that it’s my favorite show on television. That title used to belong to Battlestar Galactica, but even in this past season, I found myself appreciating Lost more.
The Lost finale will also mark the end of cable television for me, for now at least. I’ve never been one to find that television was bad, or somehow lesser than other forms of media, but I do find that I spend too much time watching it lately. And I continue to stare at the books that line my bookshelves wondering when I’ll have the time to read them. So – no more television. Which isn’t to say that I won’t watch television shows – I will via downloads and DVD. I expect to watch more movies and actually take advantage of my Netflix subscription and the watch on demand service they offer. But I really want to read more and I figure this will help. I will also save some money in the deal.
Speaking of books, I finally finished Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun about a week ago and I’ve already started in on Urth of the New Sun, the sequel. I was originally going to wait, but I found that I couldn’t. I wanted a continuation of the story right away.
I’ll plan on writing a lengthier post on the books soon as I feel they deserve one. After this one, though, I intend to take a break and catch up on other reading.
More to come later…
Recently I have been feeling a kind of television fatigue. A lot of this rests on the shoulders of Battlestar Galactica, and the almost tiring march to the end, but I’ve been following more series than usual this year and doing my best to keep up with them all. The finales of BSG, Life, and Sarah Connor Chronicles bought me some reprieve, but there is, of course, Lost which I’m eagerly enjoying. Other series that I enjoyed at the beginning of the year – House, The Mentalist, even Bones – have failed to engage me much lately and while I’m enjoying Castle, there’s something a bit off with the show that I can’t quite put my finger on.
This television fatigue is why I was surprised to find myself watching ABC’s new cop show, The Unusuals. I chalk it up to being a sucker for shows about quirky people and a willingness to follow actors like Harold Perrineau (who I think got a little screwed on Lost) and Adam Goldberg. It also helps that I saw Amber Tamblyn in a few scenes and she surprised me with her portrayal of police officer Casey Schraeger.
The Unusuals is a bit formulaic in its setup. It focuses on the NYPD’s 2nd Precinct and the unusual cops who work there. Each person has his or her thing – Perrineau’s character, Leo Banks, is afraid of dying and always wears a bulletproof vest, Goldberg’s character, Detective Delahoy, has brain cancer but won’t get treatment or tell anyone, so he risks his life in the line of duty. There are other secrets, too, and a few characters with dark pasts.
While the individual episodes are interesting, usually dealing with an “A” storyline, and a more humorous and lighter “B” storyline, there’s also an overarcing “mystery” of sorts. The precinct’s Sergeant feels that things aren’t quite kosher in his department and he brought Detective Shraeger in to help clean it up. This plays up the usual tension of Shraeger having to ingratiate herself in the department while simultaneously investigating her fellow officers.
In addition to the quirkiness of its characters, The Unusuals succeeds for its portrayal of its police officers. These characters are corrupt, imperfect and damaged. They don’t always do the right thing, they’re not always stand-up people. But they are cops and they put their lives on the line, often for each other. Impressively, these imperfections only serve to make the characters seem more admirable and depicts a cost to a job that most people wouldn’t want anything to do with.
So The Unusuals is now on my DVR for as long as I still have cable. Though with ABC’s move to Hulu, I hope to be able to watch the rest of the episodes of this first season(only 10 have been ordered so far). Anyone else watch it?
My latest post is up at Tor.com looking at the influence of Sherlock Holmes on modern television shows. Check it out if you like.