Category: TV Action (Page 63 of 145)

24 7.6: Sweet dreams and flying machines land in pieces on the ground

January 27, 2009 /

Come on out, you tinfoil-wearing conspiracy theorists. After playing coy for the first six seasons, “24” has finally delivered an episode that does what the show had previously been reluctant to do: hit us where we live. Where we all live.

But first thing’s first: Save Freckles! (Insert Ferris Bueller water tower joke here.) Her predicament was actually more dire than I made it out to be, and she had stopped breathing by the time 4B and Chloe arrived. The scene created a clip show of sorts in my head, a History of Cinema Resuscitations. I thought of Ed Harris pounding the bejeezus out of Mary Elizabeth Mastrontonio in “The Abyss,” which is still one of the most powerful scenes I think I’ve ever seen. Then Chloe pulls out the syringe filled with adrenalin, and I thought: what on earth did we do before “Pulp Fiction”? That movie really did rewrite the rules, didn’t it?

My next thought, by the way, was of Nicolas Cage injecting himself in the heart with the VX gas antidote in “The Rock.” Anyone else have that same thought?

Emerson is taken out after foolishly putting a gun to Jack’s head, which did not surprise me one bit. Jack and Tony were asking way too many questions, and it was only a matter of time before Emerson decided to call them on it. Tony’s now in charge, but he also knows, after the botched attempt on his life, that Col. Dubaku has no further use for him. Prime Minister Matobo/Bassett is now in play with a wire (Chloe, once again, gets the line of the week with “No, I’m a stay-at-home-mom” as she’s putting the chip on one of his teeth), but something tells me that Jack and Tony need to worry more about Freckles than they do the Prime Minister. You just know that she’s going to spill the beans to someone before the next hour is over, and blow their cover.

“Seriously, did you read my file? If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead. Now shut up and marry me.”

As for the other B-story, I was stunned when SS Agent Gedge actually succeeded with half of his plan to kill Samantha and the First Man, and man, was his murder of Samantha brutal. I hate seeing pretty girls die, but to be fair, she was a dead girl walking from the very beginning. At the same time, I watched Gedge throwing the rope over the rafters and thought, “Isn’t this crime scene going to look just a tad suspicious?” Seriously, you just know that the forensics people on any of the “CSI” staffs would see right through that ruse and suspect foul play. But hey, Gedge was young; maybe he hadn’t done enough killing yet to have a feel for the subtle.

And now, the main story: President Taylor knew an attack was imminent, and refused to stand down to a butcher, even though doing so meant risking the lives of innocent Americans. This is about as unwinnable a position as one person can be in. If she capitulates to General Candyman, then she’s admitting that terrorism works as a form of diplomacy, and opens the door for anyone to take a shot at squeezing us for this or that. If she holds her ground, and lives are lost – and they were, in the form of two colliding planes, and possibly a power plant somewhere in Ohio (I’ve never heard of the city, and I live in Ohio) – then she’s the President that had the chance to stop it but chose not to.

Sound familiar? The President that had a horrific attack happen on their watch, with the world speculating how much they knew before it happened? Uh huh, they just went there.

Granted, the circumstances are much more black-and-white here – Bush wasn’t dealing with rampant corruption, or the dreaded CIP device – but I never thought “24” would get this close to real life, ever. I have to think that an episode like this is going to get the 9/11 conspiracy chatter going again. I’m not sure there is a point to getting it started again, but I don’t expect that to stop people from wondering what Bush “knew.” Mind you, I was not W’s biggest fan, but here’s the thing: whatever it is that Bush knows, you can bet that it’s something you don’t ever want to know. Just sayin’.

I either wasn’t paying enough attention, or there wasn’t a single “Damn it” this week. Can anyone confirm this?

Jack finally killed someone, yay! The streak is over. And from the looks of the preview for next week, he makes up for lost time. Ehhhhhxcellent….

24, TV, TV Action

Moonlight: The Complete Series

January 26, 2009 /

“Jericho” fans seemed bewildered when, after all the hype their show received upon its last-second reprieve from cancellation, its second season didn’t find a huge surge in viewership. They shouldn’t have been. There have been precious few occasions when series have been saved from oblivion and suddenly had the masses respond by saying, “Wow, you guys were right! This is awesome!” That’s just not how the mind of the average TV viewer works. They’re not thinking, “Say, if all these people like the show that much, there must be something to it.” Obsessive fans freak out the average TV viewers, and their actions generally only serve to convince Joe Average that this show, whatever it may be, can’t possibly live up to the hype that’s being heaped upon it, and since it can’t, then why bother tuning in?

But here’s a dirty little secret for you: the minds of critics have been known to work the exact same way.

“Moonlight” seemed like a perfectly viable concept when it was originally pitched by CBS. Certainly, “Angel” fans were immediately on edge when word got out about this new series about a vampire private detective…and so, for that matter, were the rabid “Forever Knight” aficionados… but, still, it was going to be produced by David Greenwalt, who had actually worked on “Angel,” so there was hope that the vampire mythos would at least be done right. But then things got a little dodgy on the creative end, with cast and creators being switched out left and right, including the aforementioned Mr. Greenwalt, and critics were left lingering in wait for a pilot episode that took forever to come to fruition. Once it did, we were grumpy and, frankly, we just couldn’t see what all the fuss was about…but, dear God, those Alex O’Loughlin fans sure as hell could. They attacked in droves, criticizing my opinion of the series while invariably finding a way to mention how incredibly hot O’Loughlin was in the role of Mick St. John (the aforementioned vampire), yet they rarely offered much in the way of reasons beyond his sex appeal for me to give the show a second chance.

So I didn’t…until now.

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Actors, Actresses, Celebrities, External Entertainment, External TV, Reviews, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV DVDs, TV Sci-Fi

Battlestar Galactica 4.14: A Disquiet That Follows My Soul

January 24, 2009 /

Politics has always played a major role in this series, but lately it has taken a back seat to the more spiritual storylines as the fleet sought out Earth. But as is often the case, when there’s a spiritual crisis, there are people who would seek to capitalize and attempt to seize power, and that’s just what Tom Zarek tried to do this week.

The disagreement revolved around an FTL upgrade that would require Cylons to board all of the ships in the fleet. The upgrade would (at least) triple the chances of the fleet finding a suitable planet to colonize, but the Cylons want full citizenship in return. Zarek and his supporters don’t want the any part of a permanent alliance with the Cylons.

Strictly speaking, this felt like a setup episode, and was a bit tedious at times. However, there were a couple of major plot points. First, we learned that Tyrol is not Nicholas’ father. I thought for a moment that the father would turn out to be another major (or minor) character, but it turned out to be some dude we’ve never seen before a very minor character, Hot Dog, so it was kind of a letdown. I wonder if this was the plan all along with Nicholas or if it was a last-minute decision by the creators to wrap up his storyline.

The other major revelation was Gaeta’s decision to align himself with Zarek. After Bill nimbly tricked Zarek into giving up the position of the fuel ship, I thought the politicking might be over for a while, but it looks as if Gaeta intends to lead some sort of an uprising. It’s kind of surprising, really – Felix has never been all that popular with the crew, but now he’s going to rally the troops? It just seems odd is all.

Meanwhile, it appears that Roslin has checked out. Given the show’s penchant for twists and turns, it has always been in the back of my mind that she was in fact not the “dying leader” that found a home for the fleet. It will be interesting to see how this storyline shakes out, because more and more it looks as if Bill is taking over control of the fleet’s direction.

Two more things about this episode…

– I loved Baltar’s line at the beginning of his speech: “Are you all just children? Well, obviously, you’re a child.”

– Something is going on with the nurse in the infirmary. When Tigh and Six were looking at the ultrasound and talking about the “future of the Cylon race,” the nurse was looking awfully suspicious. It’s possible that her reaction was meant to characterize the uncertainty of the fleet about its association with the enemy, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if she tries to do something to Six’s baby.

It wasn’t a bad episode; it was just kind of slow and lacking drama. Based on the scenes from next week, it looks like things will pick up very soon.

Battlestar Galactica, External Entertainment, External TV, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

“Lie to Me” beats “Lost” premiere

January 23, 2009 /

I’m stunned.

Lie to Me pulled in 12.4 million viewers and a 4.9 rating/12 share among the 18-49 demo, but lost a substantial amount of viewers over the course of its 60 minutes. I guess people were waiting for Tim Roth to sing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Lost’s two-hour premiere averaged 11.4 million viewers but grabbed a 5/12 in the 18-49 demo–just barely topping Lie to Me.

Lost’s premiere was down 25 percent from last season in the prized demo, but had more competition in the form of whatever-is-on-behind-American Idol. Surprisingly, the one-hour clip-show of Lost fared fairly well against Idol, raking in 8.4 million and a 3.3/9. Lost’s numbers are expected to go up dramatically thanks to those people in your office who are running around with their hands clasped over their ears screaming, “Don’t tell me! Don’t tell me!” because they’re going to watch it tonight on their DVRs.

This is a classic battle between a procedural show and one with a serialized format. It sounds like “Lie to Me” lost a good portion of its viewers throughout the hour, so it will be interesting to see how the show does next week. Many people watch the premiere of a new show (especially one with as much pub as “Lie to Me” received from Fox) and decide then if they’re going to return the following week. Sounds like more than a few people decided midstream that it wasn’t for them.

External Entertainment, External TV, Lost, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

Bullz-Eye’s TCA 2009 Winter Press Tour Recap

January 23, 2009 /

Wait, didn’t I just go to one of these press tours…?

Actually, that was back in July, when the networks were busy pimping their new fall schedules; this time, they were presenting us with an idea of what we can expect to see on our favorite broadcast and cable channels from now until they premiere their next fall schedule.

Going out to L.A. in January was a new thing for me, though. It was my first winter tour since becoming a member of the Television Critics Association in 2007 – last year’s was canceled due to the writers’ strike – and, if the rumblings throughout the ballrooms at the Universal Hilton were any indication, it may well prove to be my last January tour. I’m hopeful that this presumption turns out to be inaccurate, but given the current economic climate and an increasing tendency for newspapers and publications to only send their TV critics out for one tour per year, there’s every reason to suspect that the networks will join suit and only be willing to pamper those critics once per year.

Sorry, did I say “pamper”? Of course, I meant, “Treat with the utmost respect.”

It feels a bit odd to be doing a wrap-up of my experiences at the tour before I’ve even had a chance to write up all of the panels I attended while I was out there, but, hey, when you get a good spot on the calendar, you make it work however you can. So still keep your eyes open for my ongoing pieces on the various shows you can expect to find on the broadcast networks during the next few months, but in the meantime, here’s a look at some of the best and worst bits from the January ’09 tour as a whole.

Most enjoyable panel by a cable network: “Rescue Me,” FX.

I’ve been a big Denis Leary fan every since No Cure for Cancer, so I knew the guy was inevitably going to go off on a profanity-filled rant before the end of the panel. What I didn’t expect, however, was that Peter Tolan – who co-created the show with Leary – would start the proceedings by telling Leary to watch his mouth, adding, “If you were going to say ‘cunt,’ don’t.”

From there, the two of them seemingly battled each other in an attempt to offer up the most memorable line. Leary complained about his salary. (“I had a crazy idea of getting paid, like, $250,000 an episode. They put limits on that, let me tell you. That’s Kiefer Sutherland money right there.”) Then Tolan claimed that he was at fault for the show’s fourth-season slump, blaming it on a drug problem and that “I was heavy into a kazillion hookers that year.” Then Leary bitched about how Michael J. Fox was going to guest on “Rescue Me” and get the Emmy that Leary himself has yet to earn. (“Five fucking episodes, he comes in. God damn, $700 million from ‘Spin City.’ He never asked me to do the show. He’s going to walk away with the fucking Emmy. That son of a bitch.”) Then Tolan started mocking Hugh Laurie’s American accent by talking about how he could do a British accent. (“Aye, pip, pip, mate, aye! ‘Allo, Mary Poppins!”) And…well, as you can see, there was really no contest: this may well have been the greatest panel ever.

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Actors, Actresses, Celebrities, External Entertainment, External TV, Lost, News, Reality TV, Rescue Me, TCA Blog 2009, TCA Press Tour, The Office, TV, TV Action, TV Comedies, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

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