August 19, 2008 · 7:40 pm

Forgive My Ambivalence: ‘90210’ and Network Screeners

During the summer months, it’s hard to get excited about television. Now, I don’t mean to say that I’m not enjoying the summer runs of shows like The Middleman, Burn Notice, Mad Men or Generation Kill – it’s the opposite actually, as I’ve enjoyed them immensely. The issue, however, is that this great medium we call television is just less interesting up until about this late August period.

And so, Cultural Learnings has been all about the reviews and not so much with grand statements evaluating the state of television as a whole; and while my more established colleagues (Read: actual TV critics) usually receive screeners that help them handicap the year ahead, my lack of such screeners means that I rely on their coverage in order to design my own. This year, of course, this is proving difficult: some shows are barely finishing their pilots, and the result is a lack of coverage of what Fall will truly have to offer.

I’ve dealt with this screener question before, arguing last year that the networks should do more to get pilots out to people other than TV critics in an effort to rustle up support and build a fan base that can support the show through tough times. So, the recent news that The CW is not sending out screener DVDs of its ‘90210’ reboot should be something that has me up in arms, ready to pounce on their ignorance of the power of these screeners to get people interested about their show.

But, at least for now, I can’t really say that I care either way – and that kind of ambivalence is, for the networks, probably their best case scenario heading into this pilot season.

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August 18, 2008 · 8:31 pm

Series Premiere: Skins – “Tony” and “Cassie”

“Tony” and “Cassie”

Season One, Episodes 1 & 2

It’s not abnormal for British series to be imported to the states these days: in fact, Showtime’s recently wrapped Secret Diary of a Call Girl was one example, having aired its entire first season in Britain before it started airing in North America. This presents the problem that the series is readily accessible to those who want to find it when it starts airing on a weekly basis here, and thus plenty of people who know how things turn out.

With Skins, two seasons are done before the series has stated airing, but BBC America intends on airing them back to back leading into this fall. I decided to give the show a shot since I figured there is always a place in my television rotation for a show about teenagers doing teenage things. I’m extremely excited that we’re only a week away from the return of ABC Family’s Greek, and this promised to be an edgier alternative.

And it certainly is edgy, putting Gossip Girl to shame in its frank depiction of this particular age segment. More importantly, though, it does something that neither Greek nor Gossip Girl has accomplished, viewing these characters through a lens that is actually unique and focused on character as opposed to sheer exploitation or, in Greek’s case, slightly sugar-coated ensemble plotting. The first two episodes of Skins’ first season feel almost entirely different because they are: they’re stories about two very different people, about two very different types of life which exist in this world.

So while the show is certainly not perfect, there is a definite sense that there is something to be offered here, and that this diverse group of young students exists not to offer a picture of diversity but rather to guarantee an actual diversity in narrative perspectives in the episodes to come.

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August 18, 2008 · 8:05 pm

Generation Kill – “Stay Frosty”

“Stay Frosty”

August 17th, 2008

We’ve hit the penultimate segment of HBO’s miniseries, but when “Stay Frosty” begins there is a definite sense that it might as well already be over: our central company is no longer part of the main conflict, and a majority of the group has more or less checked out in one way or another. Whether it’s an actual manifestation of post-traumatic stress syndrome (For Walt) or just a growing disenchantment with the whole process, this is a group of young men who are done even before they get the shits. And at that point, they aren’t going to get anything done at all.

It’s impossible not to find one’s self reminded of The Wire: in each of its seasons, a growing sense of finality always coincides with a bittersweet reminder that the struggle never ends. Just as the Baltimore drug trade won’t end through the efforts of one crime unit, this war did not end after what seemed like some type of victory at this moment. But, as Nate says, they need to stay prepared, or “Frosty” – the war isn’t over yet, not by a long shot, and no bout of the shits will change that. This inevitability is a Simon/Burns staple, and it is played well here (although perhaps in a bit more of a heavy-handed fashion than on their previous series).

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August 17, 2008 · 11:37 pm

Mad Men – “Three Sundays”

“Three Sundays”

August 17th, 2008

When Father Gil (Guest star Colin Hanks) stops by to the Olsen household for a dinner party, he is asked to say grace. He gives a short little moment of reflection on the meal in front of them, and Peggy’s Mother commends him on the fine words and asks if he’s going to say grace now. He quickly breaks into the traditional verse.

Roger’s daughter, meanwhile, is engaged. Her mother wants a wedding, a big gala where all of their friends can come and enjoy, but she isn’t on the same page: the young Ms. Sterling does want to feel like she needs to prove her love to anyone in some grand ceremony after only two months of engagement. Eventually, it seems settled: like it or not, a big wedding is simply unavoidable.

We shouldn’t be surprised by any of this: as my brother (who just finished the first season) noted, the 60s is a decade of change and Mad Men is a show about people of an older era. While this is not yet the time when there is an active war between these two generations, the battlegrounds are being drawn: as Don himself says, “We have a lot of bricks, but we don’t know what the building looks like.”

But, slowly but surely, the bricks are falling into place; and over these “Three Sundays,” a lot happens to lay a foundation.

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August 14, 2008 · 2:06 pm

Project Runway Season Five – “Episode Five”

“Lipstick Jungle”

August 14th, 2008

After last week was spent pimping out NBC’s Olympics coverage, which has clearly benefitted from the attention (I’m equating its success with Project Runway, as unlikely as that is), so now NBC Universal is turning their attention into my universe: the surprise Sophomore pickup of NBC’s Lipstick Jungle, Brooke Shields’ drama series that is searching for an audience it never quite found.

The result is our first episode to separate our groups into pairs, and one of the most prevalent examples of the producers clearly influencing the celebrity client to select some designers who clearly don’t understand the aesthetic that is required. Kelli and Blayne end up in the Bottom Two for taste more than their execution (Although that was also poor), and chances are that if she had selected a few more appropriate designers we would have seen a far better challenge; but, I’m not convinced that’s what the show is really after.

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August 12, 2008 · 11:43 pm

Weeds – “Little Boats”

“Little Boats”

August 11th, 2008

There have been many episodes of Weeds more eventful than Monday night’s ninth episode of the show’s fourth season; in a show that in later seasons has really delved into the more sensational elements of Nancy Botwin’s career choice, episodes have featured action and comedy that tends to feel like something out of a movie versus something out of, well, “reality,” as trite as that may seem.

So it is with pleasure that I say that “Little Boats” may be my favourite episode of the season so far primarily because it owes all of its drama to character, to a very human reaction from the show’s central character as it pertains to her family as opposed to her employers. This is the side of Weeds that we have, perhaps, lost in recent years: this was a show about a family first and foremost in the beginning, and this is one of the strongest examples of that in the past few seasons.

Faced with the behaviour of the people of both her own children and her extended family, and disconnected from Esteban, Nancy turns into someone who isn’t defined by drug trafficking or anything else – she’s just another Mother struggling to care for those she loves. And the result is definitely one of the season’s strongest episodes.

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August 12, 2008 · 11:44 am

Screw the Stigmas: Why The Middleman is Worth Saving

Why The Middleman is Worth Saving

In the world of television, it’s not a question of judging a book by its cover; rather, it’s about judging a show by its network.

For How I Met Your Mother, the “CBS is for lame people” stigma amongst some younger viewers keeps them from giving the show a decent shot, and in the process a show that should have been a big success from the beginning took three seasons and stuntcasting to guarantee itself a fourth. The show should have been 30 Rock before there was 30 Rock, and yet still quite a few people who would love this show are staying away.

And this summer, another example has popped up which is even more apparent. When The Middleman debuted back in June, I called it “a science fiction comedy with plenty to enjoy.” Since that point, I’ve grown to love the show, even those elements that I wasn’t so keen on in the pilot. The show has gone to great strides to build great characters and craft strong stories which serve their purpose, all with an added dose of pop culture humour to add to the show’s general charm.

But, a lot of people haven’t seen that. When someone posted about the show’s debut on a popular message board, these are amongst the first responses:

“You piqued my interest until I heard ABC Family.”

“No wonder I couldn’t find the show anywhere last night. ABC Family huh? Probably pass.”

And therein lies The Middleman’s problem: it’s not that ABC Family is a bad network, as Javier Grillo-Marxuach (Formerly an executive producer on Lost) has nothing but good things to say about the show’s treatment on the network side of the equation. Rather, they are a network with absolutely zero cache with the genre audience that the show is appealing towards. In fact, I’d say that they have negative interest: these people are not just unlikely to watch a show on ABC Family, but they are likely to actively avoid such a show thanks to its network affiliation. This means that any attempt to increase the show’s audience, which is miniscule if stable thanks to such issues, is going to take a whole lot of convincing to an audience that has never given the network a fair chance.

But that doesn’t mean that people aren’t trying, and it certainly doesn’t mean that anyone reading this who has yet to sample The Middleman shouldn’t immediately do so by searching through their on-screen guide, unblocking ABC Family, and opening your mind to a new kind of summer show – or, even better, buy it on iTunes, so you can bypass the stigma altogether.

Because this is a show that needs, and deserves, the viewers.

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August 12, 2008 · 11:00 am

Generation Kill – “A Burning Dog”

“A Burning Dog”

August 10th, 2008

As we begin our march into the final parts of Generation Kill, it is becoming clear that nothing is going to change. The crew of Bravo Company will not have competent leadership, the overall objectives of the military will continue to lack practicality or logic in terms of the situation on the ground, and the path of least resistance is not something that command is interested in, even if some of their soldiers might be.

More than any other segment, though, I felt that this one really kind of fell on the human side of things, people who are beginning to view this less as just military bureaucracy inaction and more as an actual personal failing. These are men who are dead tired, struggling to stay awake let alone alert, and in those moments the tasks set before them are more challenging. When so much of the war is out of their control, from the opening bombing of a small community which likely housed no “enemies” to the illogical attempt at passing a bridge compared to an easier route, there are two likely responses: either writing off your own actions as part of the broader mistakes, or a heightened sense of responsibility for what part you play in the grand scheme of things.

Written by Evan Wright, whose book is the basis for the series, this is the story of how people fall on that binary of sorts, and the continuing impact of the series’ broader themes on these individuals.
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August 12, 2008 · 10:25 am

Season Finale: The Mole – “The Mole is Revealed”

“The Mole is Revealed”

August 11th, 2008

While I was without internet for most of yesterday, a frustrating scenario that messed up a lot of things, I was perhaps most upset that I had to miss out on blogging my initial reaction to last night’s Mole finale. I’d call it a cross between entertained and saddened, enjoying the reveal while remaining quite sad that there will likely never be another one like it.

The Mole hit this summer with very little buzz and, for the most part, ratings failure. And yet, for fans of the series, it was right in line: no, Jon Kelley was no Anderson Cooper, and I do kind of miss the old music, but for the most part as a “game” The Mole was right where we wanted it to be. The personalities may have gotten a bit out of hand, but chalk that up to the newfound prevalence of the “Be a Jerk” strategy in reality television as a whole, something that didn’t exist to the same degree in earlier seasons.

And, right in line with those expectations, we have a finale that fits: we have the Mole we suspected, the winner we wanted, and the reunion that feels like these people loved playing the game and loved even more to watch it back on a television and see all of the ridiculous things they said about people. There’s plenty of close calls, plenty of foot-in-mouth behaviour, and little enough drama for this to feel like the celebration it should be.

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August 11, 2008 · 12:00 am

Mad Men – “The Benefactor”

“The Benefactor”

August 10th, 2008

After a busy day of moving, there’s nothing better than sitting down with one of the most satisfying dramas on television and just letting its quality suck you in. But, to be honest, it wasn’t grasping me at first: maybe it’s being tired, maybe it’s just that the show is finding a slower pace after a couple of really quick episodes, but there was something about “The Benefactor” that wasn’t clicking.

But then all of a sudden everything starts clicking – what seemed like a strangely slow subplot for Harry Crane turns into a sudden revelation of its broader impact on his life (And Peggy’s for that matter). It’s one of those examples where something initially so isolated has this ripple effect, showing in tiny small moments how one thing impacts everyone else.

And even though the episode is slow to start for Don and Betty Draper, they end the episode both with extremely twisted views of their current marital detente of sorts: as they both continue to struggle with embracing their new roles, it is clear that their expectations for happiness are quite different. When Betty cries in the car on their way back from dinner, they’re inexpicable tears of happiness, her bar set so low that being used to flirt with an unruly comedian is her new calling.

But, I guess this is normal: for her, Don is really just a Benefactor, although a slightly more benevolent one these days.

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