Monthly Archives: December 2007

December 31, 2007 · 1:48 pm

10 Shows to (Hopefully) Watch in 2008: #10-8

Cultural Learnings’ 10 Shows to (Hopefully) Watch in 2008 is a list which reflects not the best series to possibly air in the calendar year, but rather those which shall prove most interesting to watch both in terms of the show itself and the buzz surrounding it. Some shows have made this list due to curiosity, hype, or a genuine interest in their creative future. Some of these shows may not air a single new episode of television until the fall, but it’s never too early to look ahead. On with the list!

Last year, I designated an episode of Heroes (“Company Man”) as the #1 episode of television during February Sweeps, and perhaps during the entire year. Ultimately, I’d probably give that distinction to an episode from another series, but the fact remains that Heroes did some great things in the past year that should make them something to watch in 2008. Unfortunately, almost all of that goodwill has been squandered.

As a result, Heroes barely makes this list due to a sheer curiosity as to how low Tim Kring and Co. can sink this ship. If the season one finale took the wind out of its sails, the show’s “Volume Two” was a shipwreck of epic proportions. Everything that went wrong did: new characters fell flat, beloved characters were stuck in awful storylines, and there was no “Company Man” to save a sinking ship.

Before the last few episodes of Season Two, I was at least optimistic that Tim Kring’s apology would at least ensure that the series would right itself heading into Volume Three. However, what Kring sold us as an altered course was still in a fundamentally wrong direction, and an awful fall finale was enough for Heroes to become entertaining not due to its quality but due to its continue descent into mediocrity. If I’m watching in 2008, it will only be out of a morbid curiosity…and that’s kind of sad.

Heroes will not go back into production until the Writers’ Strike is resolved. Chances are it will complete its 22-episode second season with a string of 11 episodes to air in the fall of 2008.

YouTube: Heroes Volume Three Preview

I feel obligated to place one of the season’s midseason debuts on the list, but don’t view this as a token selection – Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles is perhaps one of the most interesting drama series to hit the airwaves this year. This attempt at spinning off the Terminator franchise seems a terrible idea on paper, but its execution is solid: the pilot presents a level of action and drama that at the very least appears to offer a smarter and more cohesive alternative to NBC’s fading sci-fi series.

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December 30, 2007 · 10:00 pm

The Amazing Race – Season 12, Episode 8

“Honestly, They Have Witch Powers or Something!”

December 30th, 2007

While I took last week off in order to spend some time Christmasing with the family, I did watch as Kynt and Vyxsin were saved by the first non-elimination round in Florence, Italy. Their meltdown was an unfortunate one, struggling to overcome both personal tensions and unfortunate race problems. Their last place finished put them at a severe disadvantage in this leg, as they have to overcome a mandatory Speed Bump where they must complete a task no other team needs to complete.

Now, as you’d expect, bunching means that they will be on the same playing field as their competitors to start off. This means they need to find a way to finagle their way with airport haggling and some strong performance in roadblocks and detours. It means that they need to run a flawless leg, and using performance tactics they might be able to knock a few teams off in the process. And, well…they did a pretty damn good job at it. But, was it enough?

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December 29, 2007 · 8:10 pm

Ringing in the New Year in Front of the TV – The Start of 2008 at Cultural Learnings

While it may not sound productive to my thesis advisor or to those who remain concerned about my academic future, there’s nothing like television to bring productivity back to the forefront after the lethargic post-Christmas period. In what is normally a fairly quiet time for television, as series go on extended hiatuses until mid-January in order to extend their seasons into May, this year is obviously quite different: there might not even be a May for a majority of series, and the television landscape remains a battleground as opposed to a form of entertainment. The result is a rather busy first week of the new year, which will be reflected here at Cultural Learnings

For this blog, as opposed to some others, the New Year signals a time to look forward as opposed to backwards. With 2008 on the horizon, and shaping up to be a sparse yet volatile year for television, I want to take a look at what we might be looking forward to in the new year. As a result, I’ve prepared a list of The 10 Shows to (Hopefully) Watch in 2008. This is not a list of the shows to actually physically sit and enjoy, but rather those which pique my curiosity for good or bad reasons. These are the shows which are in need of improvement, those making their triumphant return, or those which face an uncertain future and some unique opportunities in the new year. Look for numbers 10-8 in this countdown to debut on Monday, with the remainder of list emerging throughout the week.

The week is not devoid of new television programming, however. Sunday brings the latest episode of The Amazing Race, while Wednesday brings both a new episode of Gossip Girl and the premiere of the new lineup for Law & Order. This is followed by Celebrity Apprentice (Which is being blogged about purely for the sake of entertainment, as opposed to true interest) on Thursday, and then the first of a rather large number of new Friday Night Lights episodes to air in 2008 on Friday.

As a result, after a rather large period of Cultural Learnings being a bit outside of the curve so to speak, it looks like this week will provide plenty of fodder moving forward. Check back for the 10 shows to watch, and for reviews/commentary, throughout the week, and look for more news about future developments on New Year’s Day.

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December 23, 2007 · 12:25 am

Happy Holidays from Cultural Learnings!

Hey everyone,

Hope all is well this holiday season! I have to apologize for not being able to bring you end of year retrospectives and the like, but my real life has taken a turn for the hectic. The result was a whirlwind of essays, exams, theses, and just about everything else under the sun. I am going to try to get back into a posting rhythm in the New Year, but we’ll see how that goes.

However, where I have dropped the ball others have mercifully picked it up and ran with it. Here’s a couple of links to keep you occupied during this festive time of year, and may they and the rest of the month bring you good tidings.

South Dakota Dark, where I’ve been covering Dirty Sexy Money, has been going full force with an epic countdown of the 100 Greatest Television Shows of all time. I am envious of Todd for being capable of crafting this list, as I am both too young and was too-television deprived in my youth to possibly cover the same range of material. I know that a lot of my future DVD purchases may end up coming from this list, so be sure to check it out.

SDD’s Top 100 Shows of All-Time

If TV isn’t your current mood, what about Music? McNutt Against the Music, run by my elder brother, has put together a fantastic series of lists of the year’s best and worst in music.

McNutt Against the Music’s Best of Music 2007

And because it’s the holidays, time to spend a little bit of time with a certain frog (or lizard, if you prefer):

YouTube – Muppet Family Christmas

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December 17, 2007 · 1:34 am

Season Finale: Dexter – “The British Invasion”

“The British Invasion”

December 16th, 2007

I don’t quite have time for a complete analysis of Dexter’s 2nd season finale, but I was going to be making this argument anyways and felt that it would be best served here. In short, Dexter’s 2nd season was a strongly-conceived second season which features more fantastic acting from Michael C. Hall and a continued commitment to suspenseful television. Unfortunately, I was not wholly pleased with how the potential foreshadowed early in the season was lost.

This is not to say that “The British Invasion” was bad, but rather that it did nothing to resolve the problems with one key storylines, or make me feel like another decision was necessary to the development of the season. While it may have been visceral, Dexter’s second Season Finale ultimately lacked the complexity and depth of its first.

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December 16, 2007 · 1:53 pm

The Women of ‘Mad Men’: An Essay

[So, admittedly, I had wanted to write about Dexter today, but I am simply not going to have time. In short, finale is good, but I have some serious issues with the season as a whole that keep my from joining the hype train. However, I can offer you the following: it’s my Lit. Theory essay about ‘Mad Men’, one of my favourite series of the year, and recently nominated for two Golden Globes. I wanted to throw in a couple of YouTube videos here and there to spice it up but there’s no time; so, it’s just 2800 words of me intellectually rambling! Enjoy!]

From a twenty-first century perspective, the 1960s present a strange and foreign environment in which social interaction was defined by an entirely different set of rules. Man Men, a television drama from Matthew Weiner, takes place in the world of advertising during an era where smoking is natural and where segregation defines African-Americans as ‘the help’. While these social issues are used to locate the show within this specific time, largely remaining unchallenged within the show’s narrative, the presentation of women within Mad Men is a more deconstructive element. The series presents two women, in particular, who find themselves intertwined with this fast-moving world dominated by male figures: Peggy, a young secretary turned copy writer who struggles with her weight, and Betty, the wife of the Head of Creative who is defined by her domestic role. The series may be focused on an industry and a time period where the role of women was marginalized, but it represents an opportunity for the show’s writers to emphasize how this marginalization impacts these two women in particular.

Specifically, the daily activities of the Sterling Cooper agency are particularly worrisome: the discourse of advertising speaks to all audiences but is written and created almost exclusively by male writers. This environment provides a fertile ground for an investigation of the role language plays in reaffirming or challenging the patriarchal order. Peggy’s attempts to break into this industry may provide the most extensive representation of feminist literary theory within the series, but Mad Men also emphasizes the level to which phallocentric discourses bleed into the life of a young wife struggling to come to terms with her own identity. Mad Men is not a feminist television series, as its dedication to realism keeps either of these characters from emerging in defiance of all their unfair treatment. However, that attention to realism allows the series to demonstrate the level to which patriarchal discourse was dominant in life and language during this period, historicizing this period of feminine experience.

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December 13, 2007 · 10:24 am

Because They Won’t Complain About Themselves – The 2008 Golden Globe Nominations

I won’t lie – there are many things that are capable of interrupting my academic productivity and resulting in a lengthy blog post. As of late, this list has been shrinking with the loss of original programming, and with some of that original programming just becoming uninteresting (Heroes, I am looking in your direction). However, there’s nothing like Award Shows to get my blood boiling, and my fingers typing – you can read Cultural Learnings’ other Award Shows coverage here, of which there is an extensive amount.

Cultural Learnings post-dates last year’s Globes (Which means our 1-year anniversary is coming up, so stay tuned!), which means that this is my first time to REALLY complain about the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. For the sake of this blog, I’m going to stick with the Television nominees from an analysis-standpoint, but I’ll probably end up offering predictions on both the film and television side of things come January (Ironically, when I will have even less time). Of course, this is all dependent on the WGA offering the Golden Globes a strike Waiver.

[Speaking of the WGA, their nominations were revealed last night: Mad Men, which you might see more of over the weekend, leads the way with three nominations in Drama, while The Office has four nominations on the comedy side of things. Pushing Daisies also grabbed two nominations, as did 30 Rock and Dexter.]

Anyways, onto the Globes!

Drama Series

  • Big Love
  • Damages
  • Grey’s Anatomy
  • House
  • Mad Men
  • The Tudors

Can I get a woot for Mad Men? It’s clear that the series will be getting some January Awards love, based on the WGA and Golden Globes love. I’m very pleased – the show is fantastic, and hopefully the Emmys remembers it as well. Otherwise, interesting that the other new series on the docket are relatively not new Big Love and the Tudors, along with Damages which…I liked enough, I guess. Missing is Lost and Heroes, which was the big new series last year.

Comedy Series

  • Californication
  • Entourage
  • Extras
  • 30 Rock
  • Pushing Daisies

Pushing Daisies and Californication are the new series, bumping The Office from the list. I don’t know how I feel about that, but I do know that Pushing Daisies and 30 Rock have an advantage in this category. 30 Rock is a rare show that despite being “new” last year, its star is rising – compare to Heroes, which has dropped off the radar entirely in its 2nd year. Ugly Betty, last year’s winner, is also no longer new, and thus no longer nominated.

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December 12, 2007 · 10:27 pm

Pushing Daisies – “Corpsicle”

“Corpsicle”

December 12th, 2007

While I am still smack dab in the middle of end-of-term essays and exams at this stage, I couldn’t help but take an hour out of my evening to watch tonight’s Fall Finale of Pushing Daisies. Considering its procedural structure, I think sometimes we as viewers take for granted the rather deft hand being taken by the series in terms of the characters it has created. “Corpsicle” was not written by Bryan Fuller, or directed by Barry Sonnefeld, but it was perhaps my favourite episode of the series yet.

It wasn’t because it was funny, or witty, but rather that there was a level of poignancy which felt earned: it was a moment where Chuck was forced to face a harsh reality, and at the same time come to terms with her own reality. There were two scenes in the episode which were note-perfect dramatic scenes that proved that Lee Pace, Anna Friel and Chi McBride are deserving of their potential Golden Globes nominations tomorrow morning. Plus, an intriguing secret at episode’s end should prove interesting heading into the next season…whenever that might be.

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December 9, 2007 · 10:24 pm

The Amazing Race – Season 12, Episode 6

“Cherry On Top of the Sundae That’s Already Melted”

December 9th, 2007

This will be briefer than in past weeks, but tonight’s episode of The Amazing Race was just so all over the place I feel the need to try to dissect some of it. You see, we are left with six teams at this point which are interesting because there is not a single alpha-male team in the bunch. Mind you, there were none to begin with, but it is specifically interesting in the context of an episode like this one. Some physical tasks which could have resulted in some fundamental shifts in the race ended up being largely irrelevant, and the whole thing was decided by some missteps with flights. But, anyways, some thoughts after the jump.

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December 9, 2007 · 1:07 pm

Let the Academic Hell Begin: Some Cultural Confessions

Yes, folks, it’s been quite some time now since I have been posting here at Cultural Learnings, and I apologize for that – yesterday was our lowest day in six months, so it’s clear that the lack of productivity is hurting big time. Since I still don’t really have time to put together anything all that impressive (I MAY be back for The Amazing Race tonight, since it’s the only thing on), I thought I’d let you know some of what I would have posted about.

  • Heroes’ finale I probably had time to discuss, but it was just so objectionable that I really didn’t feel like it. I’ve been mulling putting together another post on the series, which might have to wait for the Christmas break when it will be considerably less relevant. In short: finale bad, season bad, interest waning.
  • Having seen the final two episodes of Dexter, I can say that the season ends on a high note…but that doesn’t mean I’m still not frustrated by the show’s inability to put together a cohesive season. They’ve yet to get the middle section right, and to be honest the finale is even a little bit too much of a downer. It’s still one of the strongest shows on television right now, and is likely guaranteed a third season, but I really think that they need to re-evaluate some elements of their story arc structure. Mainly Lila. But, watch for yourself, it’s an exciting two hours of TV.
  • Speaking of Dexter, I’d love to delve into the writer’s strike a little more and try to imagine scenes from the show in neutered forms as CBS is considering repurposing the series (Edited for both time and content) for their strike-riddled schedule. I like this plan, to be honest: stick it after CSI on Thursdays, and I think it could do some good for the series. However, I need there to be a disclaimer that says “This show has been edited, so buy the DVD too you puritan!”
  • I don’t think I ever talked about House’s new team, even though that happened almost two weeks ago. It’s…good? I guess. I loved Anne Dudek in the role of Cutthroat Bitch, so it was disappointing to see her go in some senses, but I think that the team has a lot of potential. However, they REALLY needed to give Chase/Cameron something to do. I fear we’re dangerously close to “Chase and Cameron become the patients and one of them dies, driving the other one back onto House’s team” (Maybe for the Superbowl episode!), and I don’t particularly think we need that storyline.

I’ll be back over the next few days with my Mad Men essay as well as some ways you can pass your time while I am not providing as much distraction as I’d like to.

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