Michael Piller clearly hasn’t been slackin’ during the hiatus, because season 3 starts with a bang. More mystery, more intrigue and a tiny bit of drama. It’s all there, pushing the story forward. While there is a big chance it will fall back to being episodic again, but there’s still a lot of new terrain to cover and it seems the producers have this thing really under control now. So, I have a feeling it’s gonna be a great season.
Well, all season finales aired, and I slowly picked them off one by one. So here they are, sorted from best to worst:
Smallville:
This season went along fine, with some consistent backstories backing the main episode stories. With just enough drama and intrigue throughout this season, every new episode was a waiting game. This finale was a finale with a real bang, making it the only series you’ll be dying to see the new season for. This third season would rate a 8+.
24:
While the hours are episodically divided, every hour has some pretty hefty stuff going on. Of course, this also leads to diverse hits and misses. Overal though, it’s as exciting as the previous seasons, enough to make you sweat and sit uneasy in your chair. Not everything gets explained though, and most reasons behind the actions has to be guessed. All in all, I’m ready for a fourth day. Day 3 would receive an 8.
C.S.I:
All seperate episodes, with no personal stories to speak of. Those bring the best drama, but somehow the producers like to keep it in the middle of the ground, easy to syndicate, clean and to the point. Still the stories are still interesting, and the acting is still on par. Even though I know season 5 will be pretty much the same, I’d still watch it. This season rates a 7½.
Navy NCIS:
The overall lightheartedness prevented this series from ever going to the more serious direction, but the season finale comes really close. Trying to introduce a little something on a personal level towards the end, it explodes in the finale. And it works great. Too bad I can see the second season rolling out just as this first one, too frivolous, and also, almost predictable. Still, Mark Harmon has a lot too offer, so let’s wait and see if season 2 will really develop or not.7.
Enterprise:
Starting off in a predicable pattern, the main story arch gets full focus towards the end. Still, it wasn’t exciting enough, up to a point, where accidentally deleted episodes didn’t really matter anymore. Seeing the next episode while having only seen half of the previous wasn’t earth shattering enough to make me care. An *yawn* deserving finale did the rest. Why wasn’t this series canceled, I wonder.4½.
With the 2-parter season finale aired, the average Nielsen ratings in, Fox hasn’t greenlighted a second season yet. While it might be cancelled by the number crunchers, as an objective viewer, I keep track of the quality of the show. The first half of the season let us believe a highly predictable script generator might have been at work. But just as I was about to give up the show, several good elements were added. Not only did it lead to better dialogue, the story structure and character interaction was more dynamic as well. With even more jaw dropping revelations during the last few episodes, you finally had the idea the writers were finally getting their act together, and you’d hope a summer break would give them enough inspiration to make a blooming second season. Let’s hope this season doesn’t rewind, and skip safely to a new one.
After 8 season, the Trey Parker/Matt Stone duo still manages to be quite entertaining. Subjects on current matter are taken, and put under their controversial vision. It doesn’t really matter if you agree with them or not, it’s nice to laugh your ass off and be able to think about it more deeply at the same time. Some episodes still have the message buried under the jokes, and some are just fun for the hell of it. With no decrease in quality after such a long time, it’s a sure bet we’ll be able to enjoy South Park for years to come.
Having Stephen King’s stamp on something must mean something, you might think. For this TV series, where he does a rewrite of Lars von Trier’s original (both doin’ executive producer duties), he does know how to write weird.
As a TV series, I can already say it’s a misser. With nothing episodic to be seen (which doesn’t matter too much, serially written series are mostly the best), it’s also too damn slow. Also, with serialisation comes the opportunity for complicated stories, with enough time and depth for character development. However, here you wait for complicated stories, but you keep waiting and waiting. As for the characters, they’re nothing short of caricatures, probably as a device for comic relief. The problem with that is that after the character has been munched that way, they can’t be used for drama or anything else. Not believable at least. Without that, the scariness is gone too.
The only thing that’s consistent (besides the dropping ratings, week by week), is that’s everything is weird. So what ? All in all, in medical terms: definitely a goner.
With the February sweepstakes over, I can honestly say, that there were no highlights, unlike the last November sweepstakes. Let’s recap:
Traffic: The miniseries – Aired in January, and on cable, technically, it has nothing to do with the sweepstakes. But it’s the only memorable series. Being a 6 hour miniseries, it doesn’t really start kicking in during the second hour. The story then still seems a bit boring, but the way of storytelling, and how it combines the seperate storylines keeps it interesting. From the producer of 24, you can see some similarities, and that’s not a bad thing. In the end, you feel it’s a full story with enough depth and content worth every penny of the cable subscription.
CSI (up to 416) – Continuing with seperate standalone stories, and second to none involving personal matters, it’s good at what it’s doing. But it could be so much better. While there have been better times with darker, more personal styled episodes with a touch of a longer story arch, one can only hope for a return.
Smallville (up to 316) – Weird to say this, but somehow the stories seem a bit far fetched and out of character, it’s still the B stories that count. Again, with short periods where both the A and B stories were rock solid, one can only hope they’ll be back soon.
Navy NCIS (up to 115) – Half a season done, it’s clear where this series will be heading. Another standalone type. And again, it could be so much better. With a more than a handfull of episodes already, and you still don’t know the characters at all. Trying to keep it lighthearted, with jokes and one liners flying around, there seems to be nothing that much at stake everytime. But still, it’s fun enough to keep watching.
24 (up to 314) – With a good start, the second quarter seemed a bit off. Somehow, it seemed like there wasn’t enough at stake, both overall and personal. Now well past its first half I can see a clear rebound, and I’m certain I’ll be glued to the chair till this day is over again.
Enterprise (up to 317) – With the last review saying I saw improvement, I can honestly say I almost forgot what the last two episodes were about. So it’s a safe bet those were probably another pair of recycled stories with a lot of cliches.
Tru Calling (up to 112) – While you can see the last few episodes are finally trying to be a bit different, the character development is still slow. Just a few more episodes, and I will know for certain if this series will make it or break it.
After another few “loose” episodes, the latest two are slightly improving again in writing. Especially the last episode had good dialogue and character interaction, though still very cliche. But better cliche than the crap from the already forgotten season two eh ?
There was a time when Joss Whedon was busy with screenplays for movies, and directing and producing and writing for two TV shows. Those days are over.
Firefly well deservedly got cancelled after a only few episodes. Buffy had to move from the WB to UPN in its last season. His Giles back home in the UK spinoff series never got off the ground. And on top of this, Thursday he got the message from the WB big heads. No more Angel after this current fifth season. That leaves him with enough time to make a nice concluding story line.
But yikes, he wants to turn Firefly into a feature length movie. Bad idea.
In the middle of this current run, they almost gave away the reason, explaining all the why’s and how’s of the mysterious things happening to Eliza Dushku’s character Tru Davies. However, it ended up backing away totally, and they moved on with some slightly changed character dynamics. Character development goes ahead, very slowly. That leaves Eliza to carry the show with stories that have a very clear and laid out script template. With already 9 stories following her hunches, with the first one always being wrong, you’d hope they (the writers/producers) would’ve figured out by now that we (the viewers) already figured it out. Time for a big change if they want to keep me from zapping to another download queue.
The WB is back for another 8 episode consecutive run, currently going head-to-head with Fox’s ratings magnet American Idol 2. The declining ratings aside, the new stories are showing another strong leap forward in writing. While the A-story of standard quality, the continuing B-stories keep it interesting. The Clark-Lana relationship evolves subtly with emotional direction and camera moves capturing the hidden glances and unspoken words, making the wait for next week’s episode even more harder.
Somehow, the sweeps do bring out the best of a show. All three episodes were stronger and more intense than usual. All three shows were almost tired, and showing story recycling, but for now, they’re saved.
With a pattern going on (one independent story followed by an episode to continue the arch), it’s still below mediocre. With only the last episode “Similitude” worth remembering and its slightly improved writing as a whole, it’s still a lacking season.
Eliza Dushku stars in this Early Edition/Seven Days/Haunted kinda mix, and it seems there’s some continuous development going in the series, which is a good thing. This mix however, bodes a dark cloudy warning of expecting the exact unexpected, which means, in the end, it’s predictable. The episodes are very clearly cut into the same pieces every time. Let’s see if they can change that within this new season, otherwise, the repetition, which every episode in itself is already, will wear thin.
This season opener is a blasting take-off, not too surprising, as the season ender left you glued to your seat for at least an hour. This episode is still in the same league as previous seasons, but with a hightened suspense level, with a lot of backstory to be revealed slowly, as flashbacks does not fit in this series. With the same creative team behind the scripts, it’s surely gonna be another heart-pounding 24 hours. It’s almost sad there are only 23 eps left this season.
Yupz, this is going to be a good season. A self contained story for every episode, while the arch runs in the background. The lingering atmosphere makes it a richer experience and the allows the character development to unfold slowly, while also sneakingly introducing known elements of the future. Definitely must-see.