A new blog for a new year...

Greetings all! I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! Mine was just what I needed, a nice quiet relaxing day.

Anyhoo, I came to a conclusion this morning that I wanted to share with you, dear readers. Over the last few months I have often found myself pondering topics for my blog posting and realizing that the show or topic I wanted to discuss didn't really fit into my "sci-fi" format that I've set up for myself. So, I've decided that, in honor of the fresh start we're all getting with the coming new year, I'm going to give myself a fresh start. I'm going to broaden the horizons of this blog a bit.

I won't be doing anything too terribly fancy, but instead of just limiting myself to science fiction television shows, I will now use this space to talk about all television shows I watch, regardless of genre, as well as the movies I see and the books I read. I really am a multi-media nerd. I'll still be the SciFiTVFanGirl though, because I am still a fangirl at heart.

I just wanted to give you fair warning. Television-wise, some of the shows you can expect to start hearing about include (but are certainly not limited to) How I Met Your Mother, The Big Bang Theory, Bones, Boston Legal, Psych, Monk, and The Closer.

Going back to science fiction television for a moment though, I was pleasantly surprised last night that BBC America did air a new episode of Life on Mars. I found this one particularly enjoyable. Sam spends much of the episode trying to convince DCI Hunt of the virtues of a newfangled policing technique known as "surveillance," which Hunt dismisses for not sounding very "manly." But this plot point led to a scene that had me laughing loud enough so that my husband, in the office down the hall, had to come find out what was so funny. Apparently I get loud when I'm amused. In this scene, the detectives are placing a transmitter in a car dealership owned by their suspect so they can bug his business. They've gone at night and are placing the transmitter in ceiling when a car drives by and its lights sweep across the room. One of the officers shouts out "The law!" and to a man they all jump down and start hiding behind cars. Meanwhile, a very bemused Sam is left shaking his head and pointing out, "You idiots, we are the law!" Good stuff. My only real quarrel with the episode is that it eventually ended up involving a key party. Why is it that everything set in the seventies at some point has to bring up a key party? Did these things really happen that often? Does the very concept freak the bejeezus out of anyone else? I mean, seriously...ew. Although, I have to admit, a large part of the concept was to make the main character Sam (who is from good ol' 2006) as uncomfortable as possible while also making him realize the danger he was placing himself and his partner Annie in. If uncomfortable and creepy is what they were going for, they definitely hit their mark.

Anyhoo, that's about all I've got. I've now dithered on the computer for far too long tonight and need to go get some things wrapped up before bed. I wish you all a wonderful week, hopefully a quiet one!

Happy New Year to everyone!

TTFN,
C

Recent acquisition: The Flight of the Navigator (oh yeah...)

Gone baby gone...

Sigh...well, I was thinking today I'd write about how awesome Life on Mars is (and it truly is), but then I got distracted by SyFy Portal's breaking story that USA has announced the cancellation of The 4400. Those of you who are familiar with this blog know that I am a big fan of the show and that as of the season four finale I was left pondering all of the possibilities to come and eagerly awaiting more. Alas, it looks like I won't be getting any. Grr...this seriously depletes my level of Kavan Smith sightings. I can only hope he'll mange to pick up a gig on Eureka or that maybe this means that for Atlantis season five he'll be all over the place...

Seriously though, last spring when the networks started to reveal their new lineups for the current season, we were all agog with the overwhelming increase in genre shows--several of which still have yet to start their seasons, being held off as mid-season replacements by their networks (Fox, I'm looking at you and the Sarah Connor Chronicles). But now it seems as if they're dropping like flies. Did all of the sci-fi shows wander into a bowling alley and line themselves up on the lane for some determined bowler to knock down in a well-played strike? Let's take a look at the shows on their way out...

1. Journeyman: Okay, this one hasn't been officially canceled, but NBC has already announced the full season pickups of Chuck and Life, and no word has been mentioned about Journeyman getting the nod. They've produced all of the ordered episodes and the (I believe) last one airs tonight. Which just totally sucks because anyone who was watching Monday knows how good this show just got.

2. Bionic Woman: Hmm...this may be more wishful thinking than anything else. NBC hasn't picked up a full season, the ratings are terrible, and they hadn't even finished filming all of the ordered episodes when the strike shut down production...yet NBC is saying that as soon as things are back in motion finishing up this order is top on their list. They really want this show to work...they advertise the heck out of it and have thrown all kinds of talent at it. The problem is that it just doesn't. I am only still watching this out of grim determination to see it through to the end, but if they order any more episodes I may just give up. I so want this to be awesome and it is just lame. But if NBC starts paying attention to the ratings at all, or if the hiatus from the strike has any effect on this show, it will be gone the way of the dodos soon enough I'll wager.

3. Lost: I don't even watch this show but everyone is talking about it...the final number of episodes left has been determined. The producers are going to space it out and get the story told, but then it's over. At least they have the balls to do it right. Tell your story and take a bow. I applaud them.

4. Battlestar Galactica: This is another one that's announced its final number of episodes left. As disappointed as I am by Bionic Woman--which was given to us by much of the same talent as BSG--I still have absolute faith that they will come through with this last season. My only fear is that they'll do that pesky think Sci Fi is threatening to do and only air half of the last season when it premiers in March 2008 and then hiatus until sometime in 2009 to finish it off. Boo! This is very story and suspense driven drama and you have a loyal fan base. Don't piss them off by abusing their loyalty. Just air the season all at once like normal decent people, then reap the benefits when the DVDs come out and you rake in the cash from re-releasing the entire series collectors edition or whatnot.

5. Life on Mars: I am fully aware that the second season currently airing on BBC America is the final season. I have accepted this, and given the plot, I am actually okay with it and eager to see the end game. But still...that's one less happy hour of escape each week.

So yeah...dropping like flies. That's okay though I guess. I'd rather see a show go out early and be remembered well than to cringe each time it comes up because it's just been limping painfully along for the last several years. Besides, Moonlight is looking good to be renewed, and Eureka is definitely coming back. And most of these shows aren't gone yet...so catch them while you can folks.

That is all.

Probably no post next week as it will be Christmas...but who knows, maybe I'll be in a computery mood.

But peace to all. I hope the holidays are treating you well. 2008 is almost here...let's hope it's a little more gentle than 2007, eh?

I'm out,
C

Recent Acquisitions: Stardust (Neil Gaiman is the most awesome person ever)

Hmm...

Howdy folks. It somehow escaped my notice yesterday that it was Tuesday and as such I totally forgot to post. No time now as I'm headed out the door for work, but I will aim to have one up tonight.

Have a great day!

Full Circle

Happy Tuesday dear readers. I don't know about the weather where you are but here it is nasty and dark and rainy and cool, but not quite cold enough to be winter, but not quite warm enough to mitigate the nastiness. In other words, it's the kind of weather that it is hell to drive home in (especially since it gets dark so early now) and that makes you just want to curl up inside with a good book or a movie. If my hubby ever makes it home, we're planning to pop in the new Harry Potter movie (Order of the Phoenix) that just arrived today, so I won't keep you for too long.

You know what's a weird sensation? I have found that watching early episodes of a show that you fell into the middle of can be a bit disconcerting. Don't get me wrong--if I love the show I want to see all of it, but once you start watching a series, you form your own theories and opinions about what's going on that no one is actually saying or what is happening off screen. You have preconceived notions about why someone would or wouldn't do a particular thing or assumptions about why people relate to each other they way they do (and we all know what they say about assumptions, people). To some extent, you do this for every show you watch anyway, but if you start watching from the beginning, at least you're on even footing. You only know what everyone else knows. There's no earth-shaking back story that has already been revealed. But when you're backtracking from a certain point, seeing those earlier episodes can really throw you from time to time.

I know I've mentioned before that I totally watched the new incarnation of Doctor Who out of order--starting with the Christmas special leading into season three and then (while still watching season three) catching myself back up with season one, then picking up season two after three had finished its run on Skiffy. This is actually a rare gem where just popping in won't ruin the earlier shows for you. The Doctor doesn't progress in the normal linear fashion, so while each season and the series as a whole has an overall plot progression from point a to point b you're still pretty safe most of the time. Although watching season one, having seen season three, and having missed season two, I really wasn't getting what had happened to Rose. I knew it involved something with Canary Wharf and an alternate dimension/universe/what have you, but clearly there were some big emotional moments I had missed out on. Also, it totally skewed the way I experienced season two (which, admittedly, was also affected by the fact that I had started Torchwood at the time and a lot of season two of the Doctor was setting up that particular institution). I kept waiting for the ending, trying to figure out the explanation for why Rose really ended up in that other place. I think now that I've seen all of it, I will definitely have to go back and rewatch season two at some point, just to do it some justice.

Another show I have done this with is Stargate SG-1. I had seen the original Stargate movie (and Richard Dean Anderson is so much cooler than Kurt Russell, people) ages ago and dug it, but not having had Showtime in high school or college I didn't even know about the show until after it had moved over to Sci Fi Channel and the previews never really seemed to catch my attention. What did happen was that they decided to make a spin off series involving Atlantis. I am an Atlantis whore. I love anything about the mythology and mystery of that place. I even own not just the Disney movie, but its straight to video sequel. So of course I had to watch a new series called Stargate Atlantis. The creators did a decent job of setting it up so if you didn't watch SG-1 you could still follow Atlantis. Plus, in the first season they were pretty much completely cut off from Earth anyway, so they were just doing their own thing.

By halfway through season two though, I was hooked, and I wanted more Stargate, so I thought I'd give SG-1 a try. Okay, at this point, we are halfway through season 9 of SG-1. The first episode I ever saw of that was Ripple Effect. I'm not going to go into the plot because it is insanely complex. If you're a fan you know which ep I'm talking about, and if you're not, well, you aren't interested anyway. But, while I had no idea why so much was significant in that episode, I thought it was a really awesome concept, and I was from that point on hooked. I was so hooked that over the following summer I purchased the first eight seasons of SG-1 on DVD and proceeded to pretty much do nothing but watch Stargate when I wasn't at work.

Now, joining in season nine, our main characters are:

-General Landry (in charge of the SCG)
-Lieutenant Colonel Mitchell (head of SG-1)
-Lieutenant Colonel Carter (SG-1, scientist)
-Dr. Daniel Jackson (SG-1, scientist)
-Teal'c (SG-1, alien)
-Dr. Lam (SGC head of medicine)

Only three of these characters are anywhere to be seen in season one. SG-1 has a completely different team dynamic. Daniel has a wife. The main enemy as of season nine is a group of evil ascended beings called the Ori. For the first eight seasons our heroes struggled against the Goa'uld--alien parasites that like to take over people and pretend to be gods. Going back to the earlier seasons, especially from such a late starting point, is like watching an entirely different game. Plus, many of the secondary characters on Atlantis had previously had one-off or recurring roles as other people on SG-1, which is always a little bizarre. It's kind of like how Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones on Doctor Who season three) played a character who worked for Torchwood (and was killed by the Doctor) at the very end of season two (though they kind of explained that away in the first episode of season three a little, saying Martha had a cousin at Canary Wharf--whatever).

Anyhoo, it definitely made watching SG-1 from the beginning an interesting experience. Although, on the plus side, while I absolutely adore the character of Jack O'Neill, the last two seasons of SG-1 weren't ruined for me by his absence. I adore Mitchell. Plus, this got me to watch Farscape, because his on-screen interaction with Vala just always makes me laugh, and I was curious to see the two in the two actors' first endeavor together.

You may wonder why I bring this up. Well, to some lesser extent, I am doing this again with a newer show, one that I've mentioned before. I'm re-watching season one of Jericho. I completely missed this series during its original run but after hearing about its triumph over cancellation this summer, I decided to give it a shot when CBS re-aired it this summer. The only problem is, they showed the pilot then jumped ahead to the middle of the season. We got a little recap episode in the middle but that doesn't give you everything you need to know.

As of this weekend I have now seen all of the episodes I missed from the front of the season. Now I am really geared up to see the back half again, because some things I had thought I knew I'm now not so sure about. I thought Jake and Hawkins knew a lot more about each other by this point than they actually do--which makes their level of cooperation with each other even more amazing to me. I also thought Jake and Heather were more of a couple than it appears they actually are by this point. Those are two examples, but they have completely changed some motivations that I thought I understood for events that are to follow.

All I can say is thank goodness for the proliferation of television series released to DVD. I think without it I would still be wandering around completely in the dark about some of my favorite fictional people and events.

Well, I am off in search of dinner. I wish you all a warm, dry, happy evening. Have a great week!

Later,
-C

Recent Acquisition: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

...and I'm back in the game!

Did you miss me? Probably not, I know. I’m sure you all have fascinating lives that in no way revolve around this blog…but it’s nice to dream. Anyhoo, diving back in, I have a few topics for today’s post.

~*~

Last night brought us the mid-season finale of Heroes, and possibly the season finale if the writers’ strike keeps on. I found it pretty enjoyable. It definitely had me invested enough to be yelling at the people on the television as if they could hear me and would bother taking my advice in any event. I think for me the highlights revolved around the scene where Nathan and Matt arrived at the paper company to take down Kensei/Adam and Peter. First there was the opening shot of that scene, where all you see is the “paper” company but you start to hear Matt telling someone to slow down in an increasingly frenzied voice. Turns out Nathan flew the two of them there from New York once they realized where they needed to be to stop the release of the virus. Seeing Matt hop off of Nathan’s back with that slightly shaken look and hearing their quick agreement to “never talk about this again ever” had me almost fall out of my chair laughing. And then to top it all off, Hiro runs out of the building and upon seeing Nathan greets him with an exuberant “Flying man!” that only Hiro could pull off. I love that even in the midst of trying to avenge his father’s death and save the world from the Company’s virus, Hiro can be so enthusiastic to see his fellow gifted friend. Of course, Matt’s reaction to Hiro is just as priceless. I hadn’t realized those two characters had not yet crossed paths in the current timeline. Good stuff. As was to be expected they stopped one of the bad guys and averted the crisis at hand, so all’s well that ends well…until they gave us a preview of the next story arc. Sylar’s back folks. And now he’s really pissed because someone tried to take his powers. It will be very interesting to see how the new episodes play out whenever we finally do get them.

~*~

Next up is the awesomeness that is last Friday’s episode of Stargate Atlantis. “Miller’s Crossing” is our next to last episode before the winter hiatus (and thankfully all of season four has been filmed already and, being a Canadian production, SGA isn’t really subject to the writer’s strike, so Skiffy won’t be hoarding the back half of the season from us this time around). But back to the episode. Jeannie is back! Ronon on Earth! A frakkin’ WRAITH on Earth! This episode was all kinds of crazy. I keep watching the start of Atlantis episodes thinking, aw man, this is just a rehash of that SG-1 episode from season two, but then they go a whole different direction with it. So we find out in this episode that since the gate bridge has been up and running Rodney and Jeannie have been emailing back and forth and little sis has been helping out McKay when he gets stuck with some problems back on Atlantis. The bit where Radek is trying to convince Rodney to just email Jeannie already is beautiful. We also get to see some of Rodney’s much harried staff, and it’s nice to see they have a little bit of a backbone when it comes to the wrath of McKay these days.

So someone on Earth who is privy to the SGC’s research decides to kidnap Jeannie to get Rodney to come looking for her and get the wonder duo together to save his dying daughter. Now, she was sick and that is tragic, but then the doofus goes and gives her nanite therapy which is just making things worse. (If you’re not sure what a nanite is, think tiny little smaller than microscopic robots injected into someone with the purpose of repairing any “structural” damage, these also happen to be the building blocks for our multigalactic enemy, the Replicators.) After realizing what a horrible mistake he’s made the concerned but clearly unrealistic father resorts to kidnapping to get the McKay geniuses to fix her. This of course does not end well at all. But we get the beautiful onscreen chemistry of real life brother and sister David and Kate Hewlett and I’ll take almost any plot you want to give me if it means I get those two interacting on my television. I actually thought it was a pretty decent episode. The scene where Rodney tries to convince John to let him feed himself (Rodney) to the Wraith to save Jeannie (did I mention she also got zapped with nanites?) was pretty powerful. McKay isn’t exactly the selfless sort, but I love that they’ve actually let his character grow enough that he’s realized how important his sister (as well as his adopted family on Atlantis) really is to him. Though this episode definitely had its darker moments as well…seriously, you knew that kidnapper dad was the only candidate to feed to the Wraith, but John convincing him to sacrifice himself so Rodney didn’t have to…man… My only bone was that they had Ronon and John running around in suit jackets for half the episode. Why? Seriously, why? I mean, yeah, they needed to make Ronon as uncomfortable in Earth clothes as possible, but I’m pretty sure he would have been uncomfortable in whatever, and there was no need for John to be exuding uncomfortable awkwardness, now was there? But whatever. If that’s the worst thing in an episode then I would say the show is doing pretty good. Plus we got the added bonus of hearing Rodney frequently referred to as Meredith (which is actually his first name as we learned in season three) again. That just never gets old. I am glad that the writers didn’t just throw that in as a one off thing. If they ever let that just die off I am starting my own fan campaign to bring it back.

~*~

The first season of Torchwood wrapped up on BBC America this weekend. Sigh. But don’t lose hope! Someone at BBC America, who I now love forever, made the decision to go ahead and start airing season two in America only a few weeks after season two starts over in the UK. That means I only have to wait a month and a half for new episodes, huzzah! Now if only we could get Skiffy to do the same thing with Doctor Who…

I had previously stated that I thought the first season of Torchwood fell chronologically after the third season of the Doctor, but I’m going to have to recant that. As the season progressed, and as I got season three of Doctor Who on DVD and was able to re-watch that, I realized they are actually concurrent, with Torchwood ending just before Captain Jack meets up with the Doctor for their run in with the Master for the last few episodes of the parent series.

What I find most fascinating about these two shows is how different Captain Jack is when he’s around the Doctor as opposed to when he’s running the show in Cardiff. I have to think that part of that is just a desire on the part of the creators to keep the two shows as separate as they can be while occupying the same universe. But I also am starting to think, as we get further along the road of unraveling the truth behind Jack, that the only person he really trusts enough to turn over his responsibilities and burdens to is the Doctor. I think that’s kind of a spiffy bit of character development. It is especially significant given how much of the last few episodes of Torchwood’s first season centered around his staff realizing just how little they actually know about him.

I am super excited about season two of Torchwood. We’re going to have some appearances of Martha Jones (which will be interesting to see how she fits in with the Torchwood version of Jack) as well as a guest stint by James Marsters of Buffy fame. Sweet! Bless those wonderful people who decided to start running season two next month!

~*~

Has anyone else been watching Tin Man? It’s a miniseries on Sci Fi Channel that is a re-imagining of the Wizard of Oz. It kind of gives it a more modern spin without losing any of the magic of the original story. It also seems to be pulling in some elements from other books in the series, which I find pretty cool. So far I have only seen the first of three installments, but I really enjoyed it and am looking forward to curling up with my DVR and the next two episodes. We get Richard Dreyfuss as the great and terrible “Mystic Man” (translation = the wizard), which is pretty fun to see. I am not terribly certain how I feel about there being hookers in Emerald City though (called the Central City in this version). I would definitely say that the Outer Zone (or, the O.Z. = Oz) is probably not child safe. I do really dig how they’ve taken the characters of the Scarecrow, Lion, and Tin Man and fit them into a world that is closer to ours but just with magic. The Scarecrow used to be the queen’s advisor but when the evils sorceress rose to power, she had his brain removed. The Lion is a seer, and must hide from the sorceress because she tends to hook seers up to this machine and suck all of the foretelling out of them. Then we get the Tin Man, which is slang in the O.Z. for law enforcement. It’s really fascinating stuff. Plus, I love Zooey Deschanel. She is just awesome. Alan Cummings is even being less squidgy than I normally find him. I am sure Skiffy will be re-airing these soon, so if you missed out or are just looking for some fun escapism television, I highly recommend this one. It does make me want to go back and re-read all of the books though…

~*~

Let’s see…other than that I wanted to mention a few shows that I am looking forward to once we get past the initial holiday rerun phase on television. BBC America is starting back up with the second season of Life on Mars next Tuesday. I am very excited about that. This is one of those sci-fi shows that anyone can get into because it fits the broader definition of the genre that most people who steer clear of sci-fi on general principle don’t realize is actually sci-fi. The basic premise is you’ve got a cop, Sam, from 2006 that is chasing a serial killer that just took his partner/ex-girlfriend. En route he gets hit by a car and when he wakes up he’s in 1973. For some reason though, the 1973 police force thinks he is a transfer from another city, so he finds himself trying to be a cop in 1973 with the expectations and mentality of someone from 2006. All the while he’s trying to figure out if he’s in a coma back in his own time and dreaming this whole thing or if he’s actually been sent “back.” It’s just a really really cool show. I think season two is the last of it—because the Brits do seem to have grasped the concept that a series can exist with a specific arc that may only last a season or two, and it’s okay if the show ends once the story is told—so I am very much looking forward to the resolution of how/if Sam gets back and what the consequences of his time in the past turn out to be in the future. I have heard some disturbing rumors that there is an American adaptation of this in the works. I am not too sure how I feel about this news…but if they can take it the route The Office went as opposed to how Coupling was done maybe it will turn out alright. I just worry that if it does get done well, they might give in to that tendency to stretch out the story for years and years to give into our American greed, and this is definitely a story that I think needs to have a tight story arc from beginning to end. Oh well, we’ll just have to see I guess.

In the new year we will be getting the (short) second season of Jericho. I am excited about that, especially since I’ve started watching season one on DVD recently. I am still absolutely baffled that they tried to cancel this show. This is definitely one of those stories that can last for years because there are so many consequences to what has happened and so many possible ways for things to play out. I hope season two fares well so that we can maybe earn a third season and more. If you missed the first season and are looking for something to watch while we ride out the reruns and reality shows of the holiday season and strike, go pick this up (rent it or buy it or borrow it). We’ve still got a few months before they air season two, and I promise, just the pilot is gripping enough that you’ll be hooked once you start watching season one.

We’ll also soon be getting to see the new Terminator series, the Sarah Connor Chronicles. I am a total Terminator nerd, so I am definitely waiting on tenterhooks to see this one. It follows Sarah and her son John in the wake of the second movie (apparently completely disregarding movie three, which wasn’t great but wasn’t really that bad either) as Sarah trains her son to become the man who will be able to lead humanity against the machines. Also, we get Summer Glau (River of Firefly fame, or Tess from the 4400, if you prefer) as a Terminator. I think she’s serving to protect John and Sarah, but I don’t know if that’s what her initial purpose is. Ooh, this should be fun.

~*~

Well, that’s about it from me. I hope this missive finds everyone well and happy and warm as winter descends upon us. Take care and have a splendiferous week!

TTFN,

C

Recent acquisitions: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (yay!), Battlestar Galactica: Razor (extended DVD edition, sweet!)

Sorry folks...

No new post today...I'm not feeling very well and I really don't have anything to say.

There probably won't be a post next week either, since I have a medical thing going on next Tuesday that I am sure will leave me with no desire to be writing afterwards.

So...I hope all is well and hopefully I'll be back in full form in two weeks.

In the meantime, I hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving.

-C

Blah...

So I doubt this will be a long post tonight. I'm not terribly in the blogging mood (been fighting some health issues this week, again), and my smegging internet connection has been acting up every time I've logged into my lap top today. Heh. Can you tell I've been reading Red Dwarf?

Anyhoo. I wanted to be writing today about getting to see the forthcoming Battlestar Galactica telemovie Razor in a theater last night. Every once in a while Sci Fi Channel does something cool and not evil and one of those things was to arrange free screenings in several big cities across the U.S. a few weeks before actually premiering it on television. One of those cities happened to be the metroplex in which I find myself so as soon as I could I went and registered me and the hubby to go. Of course, enter the aforementioned health issues and I really really wasn't up to going, since we would have had to be out pretty late and have much car time, which isn't really my friend at the moment. So...I guess I'll just have to wait and see like the rest of humanity.

Is anyone else out there thinking April is way too far away for us to wait for new Battlestar episodes? Seriously...they're just going to tease us in November with a two hour special and then nothing until April. Plus...they haven't even released season three on DVD yet. There is something seriously wrong with the season four lead-in telemovie getting released on DVD and season three's release date not even having been announced yet. Grr.

Okay, rant over.

So, instead of Battlestar awesomeness, and in attempt to avoid Battlestar bitterness, I shall instead speak of Torchwood.

This week's episode was really nifty. Titled "Out of Time" it featured, wait for it...no aliens whatsoever. The crux of this episode was three people from the 1950's taking a short half hour flight from one part of the U.K. to another who just happened to fly right through a rift in time and end up in 2007. The episode featured no frenzied attempts to send the people back to their own time because, wait for it again...there was no way to send them back. Each of these individuals was faced with finding themselves fifty plus years in the future, all of their family dead or dying, and learning not only how to move on but how to do so in a world nothing like the one they had left. Each victim of the time rift was more or less adopted by a member of the Torchwood gang (which sadly left poor Tosh and Ianto with no screen time whatsoever), and the episode follows these people coming to terms with what has happened to them and deciding how to get on with their lives (or not). By doing this, the writers also managed to give the audience a profound insight into each of the three Torchwood members who interacted with our friends from the past. This was an excellent way to reveal these characters to us and make them all the more real, and very much fallible in their own ways.

This episode was beautiful to me in that it really reinforced that good science fiction isn't actually about "science," but about people. The point of science fiction (as with the point of most fiction in general) is to take a possible, impossible, probable, or improbable situation and put people just like you and me smack dab in the middle. Then we sit back and see how they roll. I enjoy science fiction because it allows the imagination to roam a little more, in my humble opinion. But the core of the story is always about the people and what they do when presented with aliens, or people from the past, or learning that their "perfect" Utopian society is anything but (I have a whole post planned on dystopia's once I get around to re-watching Jericho, just you wait).

So anyhoo, this is an episode of Torcwhood I would heartily recommend to even just the casual viewer because it's one that speaks to the heart of humans and how we meet change.

That's about it from me tonight. I want to express my best wishes to the WGA for their ongoing strike effort. I wish they didn't have to do it, but I totally get it. I can only hope, for their sake and ours, that a happy compromise for writers and studios alike can be found sooner rather than later--though I find that highly unlikely. I've never understood why fair compensation is something we, as people, are so unwilling to give. Perhaps I should start digging through my collection of science fiction to see if anyone has held a mirror up to that aspect of society yet...

As ever,
Ciao

-C

Recent Acquisition: Shrek the Third

Magic time...

Do you know what's a really cool series? The Dresden Files. It only lasted for one (short) season on Sci Fi but man was it awesome. I've been rewatching the series (only one and a half episode to go) over the weekend as an interlude between seasons two and three of Doctor Who.



I had forgotten how truly fun this show was. Based on the series of novels by author Jim Butcher, the show followed the adventures of Harry Dresden. Harry is a Wizard. He lives in Chicago and works as a "consultant" for the Chicago PD--helping out on the "unexplained" or "weird" cases that us mere mortals couldn't possibly comprehend.

Really it's just another supernatural detective series but Harry is an interesting character. He belongs to the Morningway bloodline--a powerful line of wizards who are primarily known to the High Council (the governing body of the wizarding world) for being "trouble." But his mother broke tradition and married a simple magician--with no magical talent. Harry seems to me to want to live in the "real" world but he, like his family before him, has a knack for finding trouble of the supernatural sort.

My favorite part of the whole show? Bob. Bob is the ghost of a sorcerer who centuries ago fell in love with a sorceress named Winifred. When she died he broke all of the rules and brought his lost love back from the dead. Of course, this is highly forbidden, so he was sentenced to spend the rest of eternity as a spirit trapped in his own skull. Bob's kind of the straight laced guru to Harry's laid back PI. It's a really entertaining combo to watch.

Throughout the series we get to see Harry face off against werewolves, vampires, an incubus, and even a dragon. There are also lots of perpetrators of black magic on the loose and somehow our hapless wizard always ends up right smack dab in the middle of things.

I haven't read the books (I have a self-imposed moratorium on buying any new books or starting any new series until I have finished my large reading pile) but I am planning to. I can only imagine they are as rich or richer than the series they inspired.

So, should you find yourself looking for a quick fix in the world of sci-fi/magic on television, I would highly recommend this one.

On another note, it looks like the WGA strike is now in full swing. I am curious to see how it affects the rest of the television season. I hope for the sake of all involved that the strike won't have to last too long. I do take heart in the fact that our friends the writers have been joined on the picket lines by actors, producers, and just average schmoes. They seem to be getting a lot of support--hopefully the studios will take that into account and decide to start looking for some way to at least try to meet the writers in the middle. Also, kudos to the folks at Whedonesque for delivering pizza to the picket lines. Jane Espenson and Joss Whedon have already expressed their gratitude and it just made me happy to hear about. Huzzah!

If you're looking for something to occupy your viewing time once those produced scripts start drying up, I have a recommendation for you. Check out the wonderful online series Sanctuary. They've got eight webisodes in the can already, and they are excellent. We're not talking mid-level, made in someone's basement, web series here--we're talking about a full on production. It stars Amanda Tapping and Robin Dunne as well as featuring several familiar faces from the world of Stargate. It's good stuff.



Well, that's all I've got for tonight.

Wishing you all happiness and peace,
C

Recent acquisitions: Doctor Who season three; Opus 'n Bill in A Wish for Wings that Work; Ratatouille

Odds 'n ends...

I don't really have any specific topic for today's blog, so I thought I'd just mention some of the things that happened this week in the world of sci-fi television that caught my attention.

~*~

One of my email lists put out the word yesterday that actor Jason Momoa, fabulous portrayer of Ronon Dex on my fave show Stargate Atlantis, has decided to cut off his signature dreads.


Now, personally, I don't really care what kind of hairstyle an actor or actress has. I mean, I've been known to comment, "wow that's a stupid haircut" from time to time, but really, none of my business. I'm just having a hard time imagining Ronon without the dreads. This guy is a total badass--that's his thing, and part of that is that he's got an aura of "wild" to him. The dreads add to that by giving him a very lion-esque appearance. Amusingly enough, he had to jump through some hoops to get the approval from the show's producers before he could get rid of the dreads. Apparently those evil geniuses finished season four with a bit of a cliffhanger (surprise surprise) and season five will pick up right where season four leaves off. So there's a major continuity issue if Ronon doesn't have dreads. The solution? After consulting with a "hair expert" the producers and Jason agreed that he will hang onto the dreads after they are removed so that they can be reattached when season five starts filming. I didn't see any specifics on when/if they will let the character of Ronon shed his mane though. Should be an interesting random detail to keep your eyes open for though.

~*~

Let's see...my buddy Christopher Jacot made another guest appearance this past week. Remember, this is the actor who plays the recurring role of Larry the sycophant on Eureka. I love to hate him. This time he showed up on Smallville. He was, of course, the bad guy. Seriously, if you're watching a show where there's some kind of crime or mystery to solve and Christopher Jacot is doing a guest spot, it's him. It's always him. Awesome. In this incarnation as bad guy he played the comic book obsessed PA to a starlet playing the girlfriend in the Warrior Angel movie. Good ol' Chris was miffed that the movie producers had decided to let the girlfriend live when in the original comic story line she died. So he of course decides it's his job to kill the actress on camera. This results in him finding out about Clark's powers and thus being carted off to Belle Reve insane asylum. Oddly enough though, I found myself rooting for him a little this week as he tried to off Lana so Clark could move on and accept his destiny to save the world. Seriously...dude had a point. I will admit I kind of dig how evil they are making Lana lately, I just wish they would actually make her evil and not all sweet and good whenever Clark is looking her way. It's just a rehash of the first few seasons with her in Lex's place. Sheesh.

~*~

Snippet number three tonight is about Journeyman. Is anyone else completely digging this series? I keep reading all of the critics' theories that it is just doomed and awful, but this one is really starting to grow on me. Even though it airs late enough that it makes me miss my bedtime to do so, I've started watching this one live. It also seems to me that NBC is still promoting the heck out of this show, so I am not sure why everyone keeps tolling the bells of early cancellation here. I don't think the network's ready to give up yet. I hope not. Sweeps are coming up so I guess we'll know more after November. My fingers are certainly crossed.

~*~

Now I think I shall shell out some love for Dr. Who. I was contemplating last night who I would want to be if I did dress up for Halloween and I think I pretty much decided I would want to be the Doctor (as portrayed by David Tennant, I adore him). Fear not though--even if I was even remotely tall or skinny, and thus able to pull off the sweet vintage pin-striped suit, I completely lack the motivation to go find such a suit or to wear it in public. So no one will have to endure me looking silly. At least not for that particular reason at any rate. And in case you were wondering he wears that kick-ass suit with high-top cons. Score.



Anyhoo, to get back on track, I have recently started watching season two of the series. I have watched this series so completely out of order it boggles the mind. I started with season three and then moved on to season one, then started watching the spin-off series Torchwood (which aired after season three) and am just now getting into season two. Yet somehow I have managed not to confuse myself too much with the continuity. I think that might be one of the most beautiful things about this series. You can watch it in almost any order--and even if you know something from seeing a later show that you probably shouldn't know when you watch an earlier episode, it doesn't actually spoil that earlier episode. Brilliant!

I'm only a few episodes in (the Christmas special and the first two, to be exact) but so far here are some of the highlights for me:

-While running around in pajamas (or as he refers to them, jim jams) and a bath robe, the Doctor makes a wonderful passing reference to Arthur Dent and what a nice guy he was.

-While defending the human race he starts quoting "The Circle of Life" from the Lion King, then realizes halfway through that he's quoting the Lion King.

-Anthony Stewart Head, best known to us Yanks as Giles from Buffy, has a guest spot on the next episode I get to watch. Huzzah! It was his guest spot on MI-5 that got me hooked on that show. I completely forget that he's kind of a big thing across the pond so I get all warm and fuzzy every time I am reminded. Also, it makes me super jazzed for the Buffy spin-off special (possibly series) that BBC is working on based around Giles. Yay Ripper!

-The episode I watched today involved Rose and the Doctor in 1879 (they were trying to get to 1979, oops) running into Queen Victoria just as she's getting caught in a trap by a werewolf/alien thing. There's this lovely scene where they're all running from the werewolf and it totally made a bit from Eddie Izzard pop into my head. You all know what I'm talking about...that's one well protected queen...

~*~

Anyhoo, so that's all I've got for you tonight. It's not much more than random musings, but it's what has been going on in my head in between all of the blanket making. I hope you all have a wonderful Halloween!

~*~

"God attack the queen, send big dogs after her, that bite her bum..."

Hey, at least I don't have "Viva Las Vegas" stuck in my head any more.

Ciao,
C

Recent acquisitions: Scrubs season six, My So Called Life the complete series (with an essay by Joss Whedon included, score!), and Twin Peaks the complete series (definitive Gold Box edition)

Time for another happy dance!

Howdy boys and girls! Just a quick post to share the wonderful news alert I got from my spoiler group this morning. Sci Fi channel has announced that Stargate Atlantis has been renewed for season five, with a 20 episode order. HUZZAH!


Funnily enough...they're not sure whether or not Flash Gordon will be picked up for a second season. Methinks that show is going the way of Painkiller Jane. Oh darn...


Anyhoo, that was a happy wake up call for me this morning, so I definitely wanted to share.


Happy Wednesday to all!


C

Go ahead, jump into that deep end...

There’s something to be said for character development outside of the story. What I mean is that, as a writer of any kind of story, you really need to almost overdevelop your characters when you create them. I think that a lot of writers in television or movies stop thinking about their characters as soon as those characters are no longer on the screen. I’ve seen a lot of shows get called out for “weak” writing and the complaints are usually centered on plots that make no sense or characters that just aren’t believable. I truly believe, however, that all of this can be traced directly back to lack of character development outside of the story or off the screen.

The viewer doesn’t necessarily need to see little Timmy’s fifth grade recital to understand that as the moment he realized he was destined to be a star. The writer, on the other hand, certainly needs to realize that it was this exact event that acted as the catalyst for the path Timmy finds himself on when we, the audience, join up with Timmy. If the writer doesn’t possess this piece of information then he really doesn’t understand Timmy and can’t believably write that character.

Let me go to an example outside the realm of television (but still within the world of scifi/fantasy). J. K. Rowling, author of the world-famous Harry Potter books, gave us seven books filled with oodles of rich characters, no matter how big or small the part each character had to play. When she was first setting out to share Harry’s story with the world she made a back story for every first year student that entered Hogwarts with Harry. She can tell you the name, birthday, and favorite color of a character that we may only have seen walking down the hall as our heroic trio discussed some matter of import. In book five, we are treated to some of Sirius Black’s back story and learn the names of a few of his relatives as he and Harry discuss the Black family tree. It was a nice little informative scene, but Rowling didn’t stop at just coming up with those few relatives Harry and Sirius discuss in the book. She came up with the complete family tree—complete with back story on most if not all of the family. When the fifth film was being produced and the props department needed more names to fill out the tree so that the scene could be translated to the screen, Rowling was able to send them over the complete chart without delay. She knows what happened to everyone in this world long before we met them and long after we had to say goodbye. As she recently told an audience at Carnegie Hall—she even knows that not only does Neville Longbottom become the headmaster of Hogwarts, but he also marries Hannah Abbott (of Hufflepuff) and lives at the Leaky Cauldron (which his wife runs) while he’s not at school.

Then there's that other thing she told the fans at Carnegie Hall on Friday. Yeah, you knew I was going to bring it up. Turns out our beloved Dumbledore is gay. Good for him. On the way to work yesterday and at lunch I heard several news stories regarding Jo's big "announcement." Oh did that frustrate me--not that Dumbledore's orientation is considered newsworthy or is controversial--those books have been nothing but controversial despite how well they have been received. Here's the thing--she didn't announce this fact. She was at a Q&A session, someone asked her if Dumbledore had ever really been in love, and she honestly answered the question. There was a particular wizard in Dumbledore's past that anyone who has read book seven knows about--and this wizard was D's one true love. I'm pretty sure Jo could have gone the rest of her life without telling anyone that Dumbledore is gay, but I also don't think she's the kind of person who has ever been inclined to be anything but honest with her fans. Someone asked so she answered.

To bring this back on track, the reason I mention the whole situation is that this has been an essential part of Dumbledore's character since day one. We the readers may not have known, but Jo couldn't have written him half as well if she hadn't. To even better prove my point--this part of Dumbledore had nothing whatsoever to do with the story of Harry Potter, so she never felt the need to include the information in any of the books. It's part of who he is, but not part of the story.

This is what I am talking about when I say that writers should overdevelop their characters. I think this is even more crucial in the world of television than in some other forums because for the most part television is ongoing. Character development is pretty much built in, unless you have the misfortune to be canceled before your time or unless you are writing a really crappy show. But what makes these characters able to grow and more believable to the audience is a writer that treats them as if they go on living their lives when you turn your television off.

I would lay down money that if asked what Clem the Demon's favorite movie is, Joss Whedon could answer without batting an eyelash. Ask any Whedonite why they love Buffy, Angel, or Firefly, and I would also bet that at least 3 out of 5 people would tell you it's because of the characters. We loved these people so much, wanted so deeply to find out what happened to them after their series' ended, that we got a movie out of Firefly and Buffy and Angel are now both officially continuing on in comic book form. If he hadn't known his characters so well to be able to write such enthralling stories for them, we would have none of that today, nor would we probably want it. Buffy the Vampire Slayer would have gone quietly into obscurity and the world would have been a much duller place.

One of my favorite television writers, Jane Espenson (who has written for such shows as Dinosaurs, Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Star Trek: DS9, Battlestar Galactica, and the Gilmore Girls), has a really awesome blog for aspiring television writers. I like to read it purely for the writing insight and the many Whedonverse or Galactica references. Some of her recent advice follows along the lines of what I've been saying today. She recommends giving characters something to do on screen and notes that whatever activity you choose for your characters not only will serve a technical purpose, it will also give the characters depth. I whole-heartedly agree with this. Imagine you're a writer and you need to create one of these scenes--how much easier would the scene be to write if you already knew enough about your characters to know if they play Scrabble or would prefer Uno? How much more rich will the scene be if you don't have to stress about those kinds of details because you already know the game they're playing and know them well enough to say who'll play fair, who'll cheat, and who is just playing because they're bored?

So that's my advice to the writers of the television world (because clearly they all read this blog). If your show isn't performing as well as you'd like, take some time to get to know your characters off screen, then take a good look at what they've been doing on screen. I bet the two don't match well.

Anyhoo, that's pretty much my blog for today. In closing, I'd like to send happy thoughts the way of two Stargate Atlantis actors. Rachel Luttrell and David Hewlett both recently became parents (separately of course--two separate babies and all). Congrats! I guess if SGA gets a fifth season it will have to be a much more baby friendly set, huh?

Laters,
C

Recent acquisitions: none--believe it or not I didn't buy any DVDs this week. Wow, scary huh?

Merry Little Thoughts...

First things first. I owe all of you an apology. My entry last week was completely lacking. It did, however, teach me a very important lesson: Unless I’ve been struck with a sudden inspiration (which does happen from time to time) I cannot just write something on the fly. It won’t work, clearly. So going forward I won’t post unless I’ve given the entry at least a little bit of thought and planning before sitting down to write. I’m making a list of potential topics and I also think I may mix in reviews of the zillion shows I’ve got waiting for me on DVD as I watch those. So bear with me, gentle reader, I promise it will get better. Now, to get to it…

Science fiction in television…there are so many shows out now—new and returning—and obviously I’m not watching them all, but I thought I’d let you know which shows I am watching and give you my thoughts on the series in general and the season so far.

Chuck (NBC, Mondays)
This is a new one. The basic premise follows Chuck, who was kicked out of Stanford and now works at the Buy More (i.e., Best Buy), as he receives a life-changing email from his former college roommate (and the individual responsible for getting him kicked out of Stanford) Bryce. The aforementioned email contained the database that receives all intel gathered by both the CIA and NSA and coded into the form of images. So, suddenly our friend Chuck finds himself knowing all kinds of things he shouldn’t (and doesn’t really want to) know. This newfound knowledge is triggered by seeing one of the images that was cataloged in the database that now resides in his brain.

Okay, this one is a wacky fun-time show. Chuck clearly has enough problems working at the Buy More with his best friend (I’m not really familiar with the actor playing Morgan but I swear the guy is channeling Seth Green and that is okay by me) and living with his sister and her boyfriend “Captain Awesome.” Everyone has expectations of Chuck, and he doesn’t really know what he wants to do with his life at this point—so he really doesn’t want to hear what anyone else thinks he should be doing. None of this changes when he becomes the crux of the CIA/NSA information sharing initiative. What does change is that now he’s got agents of the CIA (hot chick who is posing as his girlfriend to the outside world) and NSA (Adam Baldwin posing as a new employee at the Buy More) babysitting him and utilizing his hidden knowledge to complete “missions” to keep the free world safe and all that jazz.

I know it’s getting some mixed ratings, but I am really enjoying this show so far. I cannot give Adam Baldwin enough praise for how he is playing his character. He is probably, hands down, my favorite thing about the show. He can be scary and funny all at the same time. If you’re not familiar with Firefly or a Stargate aficionado, you probably best know Adam Baldwin as the guy who shot the can off the spaceship in the movie Independence Day. And no, before you ask, he’s not one of “those” Baldwins. Trust me; he’s got more cool in his pinky toe than all of them put together. That being said, I would never want to run into his current character at my local Best Buy. I think I’d just go home and order my DVD online…oh wait, that’s what I do anyway. Well, there you go.

So if you like a little action, adventure, and comedy with your sci-fi, I definitely recommend this one. I am very curious to see how this series proceeds.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 4 SQUEE!s (out of five)

Heroes (NBC, Mondays)
(**Spoiler Alert if you haven’t seen this week’s episode yet.**)
This one is a returning favorite. Tim Kring’s comic book for the small screen is entering its sophomore year to a lot of flack from the critics, and to be perfectly honest, I don’t get it. Let’s admit up front that I am a) easily amused, b) for the most part perfectly capable of temporary suspension of disbelief for entertainment purposes, and c) not a professional television critic. I tend to be a little bit more forgiving of some things that might make critics want to play a round of headdesk. At the same time though, I feel this makes me your average television viewer (although I still can’t stand so-called reality television, so maybe not that average). That means I’m the audience these shows are directed at, and I say that so far, Heroes’ second season is coming along swimmingly.

I will concede that they are getting kind of crowded with the multiple story lines and express my disappointment we didn’t get to visit Hiro in ancient Japan with last night’s installment. But that being said, I am glad that they are introducing new characters and given the overall title of this season, which is “Generations” in case you weren’t aware, I don’t think anything we’ve seen so far was completely unnecessary. I haven’t been terribly impressed with Maya and Alejandro, the twins of doom, so far. Frankly, I’m not entirely sure what purpose Maya’s power serves to the overall arc and unless she learns to control it and soon it’s just going to be more of the same. However, now that they’ve teamed up with Sylar and he’s figured out they have powers, that whole story line has become more interesting. I can see one of two outcomes here. Either Sylar will kill them and steal their powers, giving him the ability to have the eyes of death as well as temper the power, which will just be scary, or Maya and Alejandro will somehow manage to escape from Sylar, powers intact, which suggests that they will have gained some further measure of control over them. If they can do that they will have earned my respect. You don’t mess with Sylar without being a badass or without some serious help. This actually brings to mind a third potential outcome—they could meet up with another hero that helps them escape Sylar. I’m cool with that too, because it means more threads being tied together.

I don’t pretend to be an expert in comic books, but I have read my share. If you’re looking at serial comic books, Heroes, to me, fits the pattern. Kring has a plan here, and if we’re patient we should see a really stellar payoff by the season’s end. The whole point is to give you just enough in each episode to move the story a little further along and bring you back next week. It’s working for me. I don’t have to like all of the characters or be completely into all of the separate story lines—I know that it’s only a matter of time before they switch to someone else and I also know that when it all comes together it’s going to be one hell of a bang.

As an added bonus for all the nerds out there, this show gives constant love to the world of Star Trek. I’m not even a fan and I’m amused. First there was good old George Takei as Hiro’s father. He’s gone now, alas, but this season they’ve brought in Uhura (Nichelle Nichols) as Micah’s grandmother. Given the theme of generations, I can’t wait to see what her power is. I find Micah so much more interesting now that his mom is out of the picture. I’m sorry; I just don’t think schizophrenia is a super power. Plus, we’ve got Zachary Quinto (Sylar) lined up to play Spock in the new Star Trek movie next year. This is just good stuff.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 5 SQUEE!s

Journeyman (NBC, Mondays)
Here’s another new one for you. I was a little indifferent about this show at first, but it’s starting to pull me in. Here’s what NBC’s website has to say about this show:

“’Journeyman’ is a romantic mystery-drama about Dan Vasser (Kevin McKidd, "Rome"), a San Francisco newspaper reporter and family man who inexplicably begins to travel through time and change people's lives.”

In the pre-season build up I often heard this compared to an old favorite of mine, Quantum Leap. I will admit there is no other reason why I even gave this show a chance. Really the only big similarity between the two shows is that Dan is sent back to “fix” something about history. He’s not lost in time the way Sam Beckett was, Dan only leaps back for small periods at a time before returning to his present life. I like this, because it gives us all kinds of issues he has to deal with when he does get back, because while he’s not always gone for the same amount of time that he spends in the past with each visit, he’s still gone for big chunks of time and he has absolutely no control over when he travels. Unfortunately, so far this season, the show runners haven’t really taken this set-up to its full potential. Mostly his wife has just been pissed that he’s missed something important, or his boss has been pissed that he missed a deadline, etc. Apparently, however, Dan has had a history of gambling problems. His disappearances initially cause his loved ones to think he might be gambling again, or perhaps experimenting with drugs. Eventually Dan manages to convince his boss he’s clean and to get his wife to believe him when he explains what he’s actually been doing. So now he has an ally in the present.

Of course, the whole “romantic” part of that show description then comes into play. Dan’s not the only traveler we meet on the show. It turns out his old fiancé, Livia, is also a traveler. In fact, she once ended up traveling while on a plane that crashed and has been presumed dead by Dan for the last nine years. Surprise! I haven’t seen last night’s episode yet, but last week left Katie (Dan’s wife) having just discovered that Livia is still alive and also traveling like her husband. I sense renewed trouble in paradise. I hope they get this triangle resolved quickly, or at least relegated to a minor, and much less irritating, plot point. It has the potential to be a nice running piece of the show but it equally has the potential to reach the Clark-Lana proportions of irritation being forced on us by Smallville’s show runners. Ergh.

Another nice touch is that when Dan travels, he goes back as himself, at his current age. Which means if he’s traveling in his home city of San Francisco (which is usually the case), he needs to be careful to a) not run into his younger self (which would be much easier if he would stop going to his old apartment, seriously), and b) not run into anyone he knows who might wonder why good ol’ Dan has suddenly aged twenty or thirty years. It keeps things interesting. As I mentioned already, he only goes back for short periods of time, a day, a few hours, etc. Whatever is sending him back will keep sending him back to either the same day or different periods in the life of the individual he has been sent to “help.” For example, in one episode he helped deliver a baby girl on an airplane, only to end up helping her confront her absentee father once she was in her twenties. There’s a lot of potential here. If the show runners can find the right balance between Dan’s personal life and his “missions” I think that this could be an outstanding show.

I must also give kudos for the soundtrack. So far, every time Dan has gone back, I have been highly impressed with how well the chosen background music has set the scene for the new time in which our hero finds himself.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 3 SQUEE!s

Bionic Woman (NBC, Wednesdays)
Now we get to yet another new series this season. Of course, it’s not completely new. Bionic Woman is, of course, an update of the classic series. It comes to us from the minds that took Battlestar Galactica from cheesy but entertaining fluff to a dark, intense, and gripping look at humanity as a whole. I had high hopes. Between the BSG creative might working on this show, and the on-screen talent they’ve “borrowed” for cameos and recurring roles I had my fingers crossed that I would once more be blown away. So far, not so much.

I wouldn’t go so far to say this show is bad, but I still can’t say I really like it at this point. I’m not even remotely invested in any of the characters they’ve given us so far. Considering how much I love some of the actors we’ve got, this is not a great sign.

The effects are okay, and the action scenes are satisfying on the popcorn scale. Overall though, I’m just not feeling the plot. I have yet to even consider watching this show live, and it’s usually one of the last ones I clear out of my DVR buffer at the end of the week. Still, NBC is putting a lot of effort into this one, so I am holding out hope. I wouldn’t recommend it at this point, but I am hanging in there, at least till the mid-season break.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 2.5 SQUEE!s

Smallville (CW, Thursdays)
Oy vey. Talk about shows making someone want to headdesk. Smallville definitely is not a new entry into sci-fi on television. It’s now airing its seventh season. I keep hoping each season will be the last and they keep bring it back. I would say I don’t even know why I watch this show, except that wouldn’t be entirely true. For one thing, on average, about half of the story for each episode is pretty good. For another, I’m committed now. It’s in its seventh frakkin’ season for Pete’s sake! I want to see him don the cape and the tights and fly!!

For those of you who have been living under a rock for the last seven years, Smallville is a take on a possible origin story for Superman. It follows a young Clark Kent as he learns of his Kryptonian heritage and subsequent super powers. Throughout the series he has developed most of Superman’s trademark powers. As each ability surfaces he has to learn how to use it and still keep his true identity secret from all but the small and ever-rotating cabal of people who know about his real origin. In addition to watching the boy Clark Kent grow into the man who will become Superman, the show runners have added their own element to this iconic universe: meteor freaks.

Along with his spaceship, baby Kal-El’s arrival on earth brought a meteor shower. Those meteors were composed of green rocks that are pieces of Kal-El’s native world, Krypton. While we all know that Kryptonite is poison to Clark, it is also radioactive, and the inhabitants are constantly stumbling across it. Exposure to the “meteor rocks” tends to give us humans powers of our own. It also tends to make us crazy…and apparently to make us lust for Lana Lang. A large portion of the high school seasons dealt with Clark trying to protect the town (and Lana) from meteor-infected individuals while his best friend Chloe runs around town trying to expose them. Fun times.

Now that the show is getting on in years, I really can’t say it is aging terribly well. Clark can only stay in Smallville for so long. They’ve got Chloe working at the Daily Planet—alongside Jimmy Olsen (who is her boyfriend) and Lois Lane (who is her cousin). Lex Luthor has for the most part given up on his attempts to be anything other than the mega-villain he’s destined to become. Pappa Kent has passed on. Hell, this season we’ve even got Super Girl joining the party, and last season the JLA got its kick start. There’s only so much stalling the show runners can do before Clark has to put on the cape and finally become Superman. But man, are they trying to stretch it out.

My biggest quibble is that Clark is still chasing after Lana Lang. We all know they don’t end up together. They’ve completely broken each other’s hearts multiple times by this point. Lana married Lex Luthor for crying out loud—then staged her own death to frame him for her murder. This is not the woman Clark Kent needs to be trying to keep around. An interview with one of the show runners touched on this stating that Clark Kent will always love Lana, she’s his first love, so they can’t just abandon that story. To that I say, yes they can! I had a first love in high school. It happened, it was nice for a while, and it ended. We both moved on with our lives. This is the way the world works. This is even the way the comic book world works. Hell, even Angel and Buffy realized that while they would always love each other they weren’t meant to be and moved to different cities so they could get on with their respective lives. Keep her around as a friend, sure, that follows canon, but for all that is good in the universe, stop trying to pretend these two are PB&J. I can’t be the only person who is tired of that. It can completely ruin an otherwise excellent episode for me.

So, yeah, I’ll watch this one to the bitter end. But I really wish that the show runners would wise up. Go the BSG route and plan out your story arc, and then when you get to the end, end the series! People would far rather have a show that ended early that they can remember fondly than watch a beloved show grow stagnant and painfully drag on. I think even the band on the Titanic would understand…

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 3 SQUEE!s

Moonlight (CBS, Fridays)
I so wasn’t going to watch this show. It’s been a hot topic of discussion all spring and summer. The show centers on a vampire who works as a private investigator in L.A. But he’s not just any vampire—he’s got a conscience, and he doesn’t feed off of people, but gets his blood from the neighborhood blood bank. Does this sound familiar to you? Does it sound a bloody awful lot like the plot synopsis for Angel? Exactly. I loved Angel (liked it better than Buffy, as a matter of fact), and I felt that my personal quota of vampire detectives had been filled. Plus, this show seems to have a curse hanging over it. Only one actor that appeared in the original pilot is still in the cast (the main one, of course). David Greenwalt (who actually worked as a show runner on Angel) came on to replace a show runner and had to leave because of health problems before the season started. All of the Whedon fans are in an uproar over the similarities to Angel. So the show has had a lot of negative press. But as I started to hear more of the actual details of the show, and found out that Shannyn Sossamon had been cast as the main vampire’s sire (I have no idea why, but I for some reason will try anything once if I find out she’s in it), I decided to at least give it a cursory chance. My hopes weren’t terribly high as there wasn’t a whole lot of good in what I’d heard about the show.

Wow. I was so wrong. I am totally digging on this show. The Angel parallels are there alright—reporter Beth Turner is decidedly like Detective Kate—but Moonlight has taken how I always thought things should have gone with Kate on Angel and applied that, instead of the girl meets guy, girl works with guy to solve crimes, girl finds out guy is a vampire and swears to kill him. The two actresses look creepily like one another though, and that is hard to shake.

The show was a tad slow in getting off the ground but I think they’ve done a good job of developing the characters and introducing their unique spin on the vampire mythos. Two nice touches in particular are that instead of a stake through the heart being lethal—the sweet spot for a stake on this show is the spine, and it’s not lethal—it will leave the vamp paralyzed until the stake is removed. I also dig “the Cleaner” who we met last week. She’s a vampire that specialized in cleaning up after other vampires. That means disappearing the bodies so that the humans don’t find out and go all Van Helsing on the vampire population. I do get the impression (I can’t recall 100 %) that the vampires of this world have reflections, and that irks me, but you can’t have everything, I guess. Other than that my only real complaint is that there’s a bit of a Thorn Birds vibe going on here. Mick (our vampire) rescued Beth from Coraline (his sire) when she was a little girl and has been keeping an eye out on her since, playing her protector and eventually becoming her friend. What worries me is that they seem to be setting up a romance between the two. Ick. Then again, I guess there’s a serious shortage of morally upstanding lady vampires floating around out there for Mick to choose from. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see how it goes.

All in all, I am very pleased with what Moonlight has put out so far. There’s a lot of potential here. So to CBS I say, don’t screw it up!

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 4 SQUEE!s

Stargate Atlantis (Sci Fi, Fridays)
Clearly I love this show. It is my favorite show on television right now. Atlantis is now in its fourth (and hopefully not final) season. This is the first year it has been on its own without parent show Stargate SG-1 leading into it. So far, I think that Atlantis has reaped all of the benefits of being the primary focus of the franchise. This show follows the exploits of an expedition of modern day humans comprised of scientists from multiple nations, many members of the U.S. Air Force and Marines, and a few aliens thrown in. The expedition occupies the lost city of Atlantis which is currently located in the far away Pegasus galaxy. They travel to other planets and Earth primarily using the stargates, but there are also some pretty ships. To date their biggest enemy is an alien race known as the Wraith, closely followed by the Replicators. We’re supposed to get a new big bad this season though. This show is just fun. While the science isn’t always 100% sound, the show runners do try to be at least remotely grounded in reality and the technobabble itself (sometimes in Czech, even) is always entertaining. But for me the best thing about this show is the dynamic between the characters.

As far as this season, I’ve already recapped in a previous post what I am looking forward to seeing in future episodes, so I won’t go into too much detail here. I’ll just say that so far I’m nothing but pleased with what they’ve given us and am eagerly awaiting more.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 5 SQUEE!s

Torchwood (BBC America, Saturdays)
Last, but certainly not least, we come to my new British favorite. This is another show dealing with aliens but it addresses them from the point of view of a group of humans on Earth. They know we’re not alone, but they also know we’re not really ready to know that. So the institution has taken it upon itself to make sure that aliens stay secret and alien technology doesn’t fall into any human hands but its own. It’s a fun premise and the show has good writing and great characters.

I think my personal favorite bit about the show is Captain Jack’s pet pterodactyl. That’s right, there’s a pterodactyl. It’s pretty awesome.

I also enjoy that (as far as I can tell) they avoid falling back on the Dr. Who aliens or even mention of the Doctor. This is a spin-off, yes, but it is very much its own show. I really look forward to watching Jack’s character grow now that he’s out of the shadow of the Doctor.

SciFiTVFanGirl rating: 5 SQUEE!s

~~~~~~~~

Alrighty folks, that’s it for this week. I hope you found it at least mildly interesting. Until next week, try to behave.

-C

Recent acquisitions: Transformers the movie

The Awesomeness that is Captain Jack...

Sorry Pirates of the Caribbean fans--as much as I love Jack Sparrow, I am actually referring to Captain Jack Harkness from Russell T. Davies' reimagined Dr. Who and original spin-off Torchwood.

The story goes like this:

In my avid consumption of Stargate Atlantis fan fiction (it's like crack, people) I came across multiple stories that were crossovers with Torchwood and featured my beloved captain. Now I am a fool for crossovers in my fan fiction, and even if I've never seen the show that's crossing over, I'll read the story if the premise sounds interesting enough. This is how I managed to get sucked into the awesomeness that is Farscape and Battlestar Galactica (well, only partly for BSG), and will probably lead to me getting completely sucked into Babylon 5 when I finally get around to checking out the series on DVD. So I read the SGA/Torchwood crossover stories and was completely intrigued by Captain Jack. So I thought to myself I would check out this show Torchwood and see if it had any potential.

Well, turns out, the show was in its first season over in Britain at the time--which meant not airing anywhere in the US. So okay, I could probably have found the episodes online somewhere, but I am too lazy to do that, and there are usually legal implications and all that. Plus I found some info on a news site that BBC America (one of the best cable channels ever) was planning to air the show the following season. Woohoo! So...just a little patience and I could find out what this was all about.

In the meantime, since Torchwood was a Dr. Who spin-off series, and since Jack Harkness was the character that they were carrying over to the new show, I figured it might be time to give Dr. Who a try.

I'll confess, I had never seen any of the previous incarnations of the show. All I really knew about Dr. Who was that at one point while Davies was working on getting the new version up and running Eddie Izzard was being considered for the role of the new Doctor (which, I have to agree with my husband, now that I have a point of reference, totally wouldn't have worked, as much as I love Izzard). I also knew that the fans of Dr. Who got really super persnickety when Stargate SG-1 got lauded (and put in the Guinness Book of World Records, I believe) for being the longest running sci-fi series. Who fans threw a fit about this, because the good Doctor has been around in one form or another since the sixties. Here's the thing--the show, much like the Doctor himself, comes and goes. The award for SG-1 was for longest consecutively running sci-fi tv show. It had at that point been on air for ten seasons straight. The Doctor's never done that. Okay, sorry, that's still a bit of a quibble for me. Where was I? Oh, right...okay...so I was a neophyte into the world of Dr. Who.

I decided to give it a whirl when the new(ish) third season aired on Sci Fi Channel back in July. I think it took maybe an episode and a half and I was hooked. So I went and ordered the first two seasons on DVD so I could get caught up. As of right now I have seen all of season 3 and all of season 1. Season 2 is next up on my DVD watching list.

As it happens, I finished up watching season one right around the weekend Torchwood finally aired on BBC America. So I did actually manage to see the introduction of Captain Jack on the parent series and get some back story on him before I saw the first episode of Torchwood. (Which by the way, is every bit as awesome as I thought it would be--despite the weirder than weird episode about a cyberwoman.)

So who is Captain Jack Harkness? Well, as portrayed wonderfully by John Barrowman, he is a former "time agent" from fiftieth century Earth. He is human but due to an encounter with a Tardis-enhanced Rose Tyler, he can no longer die. (For those as new to the Doctor as I once was, the Tardis is Dr. Who's time-traveling ship and Rose was his companion for the first two seasons.) After getting stuck on Earth in the far past, he must actually live through the next few centuries until he can find the Doctor again (after he has met the Doctor in his original timeline, of course) and get his time-traveling device repaired. One of the things he does with this time is to reinstate the institute of Torchwood, which is a group dedicated to tracking alien contact on Earth and protecting the human populace from aliens and alien technology. It's pretty nifty.

Anyhoo, I seem to have totally wandered off from what I had originally planned to post. My apologies. It's been one of those days where my brain just refuses to stay on track. Long story short, this is my favorite new character on television. I can't wait to see where his story goes. He popped back up at the end of Dr. Who season three (to set the scene for airing Torchwood, I'm sure, given how skewed the airing in the US is when compared to the original airing schedules). I very much enjoy that he can carry his own show but also integrate so smoothly with the characters on Dr. Who.

So, there you go. I'm pretty sure I have stopped making sense, so I'm not going to torment you any more. I will close with my answers to a survey that my mom posted on her blog last week. I've been meaning to put mine up and now I'm finally getting around to it.

1. What time is it?
9:35 p.m.
2. What's your family nickname?
I remember once I was Kitten and I think Cocoa at one point too
3. What are you most afraid of?
Hm…I don’t know how to answer this without getting terribly existential.
4. What is the most recent movie that you have seen in a theater?
3:10 to Yuma
5. Place of birth…
Champaign-Urbana, IL
6. Favorite food
tacos or Chinese food
7. What's your natural hair color?
brown
8. Ever been to Alaska
nope
9. Ever been skinny dipping
not so much
10. Love someone so much it made you cry
very much so
11. Been in a car accident
yes, when I drove that darn Saturn it was a magnet for accidents
12. Croutons or bacon bits
can’t I have both?
13. Favorite day of the week
Tuesday (new DVD day!)
14. Favorite restaurant
Chili’s or P.F. Chang’s—it’s a toss up
15. Favorite Flower
daffodil
16. Favorite sport to watch
hockey
17. Favorite drink
tea (hot)
18. Favorite ice cream
chocolate-chip cookie dough
19. Warner Brothers/Disney
I’m a Disney brat
20. Ever been on a ship?
I don’t think I’ve ever been in anything that qualifies as more than a boat
21. What color is your bedroom carpet?
beige
22. How many times did you fail your driver's test?
3—go on, mock me, I dare you (explains a lot, huh?)
23. Before this one, which blog did you look at last?
Jane Espenson’s (television screenwriter)
24. What do you do when you are bored
watch DVDS, read, crochet, torment the cat, call my friends…
25. Bedtime?
Usually between 9:30 and 10 on weeknights—Friday and Saturday all bets are usually off though
26. Who will post this on their blog?
I really couldn’t tell you
27. Who won’t?
Also, no idea
28. Who is the person that you are most curious to see their responses?
I’ll be curious just to see if anyone else picks this up
29. Favorite TV shows
Stargate Atlantis, Torchwood, Bones, it goes on and on really…
30. Last person you went to dinner with
my hubby, yay for date night!
31. Smokes or Drinks
I have been known to enjoy the occasional margarita
32. What is your favorite color
green
33. How many tattoos do you have
five
34. How many pets do you have
two cats and a husband
35. Which came first, the chicken or the egg
again with the existential—I still maintain that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows has an excellent answer to this question if you choose to look for it
36. What do you want to do before you die?
I would really like to a) complete a story and b) get it published
37. Have you ever been to Hawaii
honeymoon in Waikiki, it’s cliché, I know, but, also, awesome
38. Have you been to countries outside the U.S.
I spent a random few hours in Canada once (though I plan to go back for a con at some point) and spent a week in Cancun, Mexico
39. How many people read your blog?
I’m going to say maybe 2.5?
40. Time this survey ended
9:51 p.m.

That's all I've got. Have a good one kiddos!

TTFN,
C

(Almost forgot!)

Recent acquisitions: Degrassi High the complete series

I'm doing a happy dance...

It's not Tuesday and I don't even care. I just had to share the happiest news in the world. TVShowsOnDVD.com, which is an awesome website and useful tool for any DVD fanatic such as myself, announced this week that a release date has finally been set for the second season of Seaquest DSV. Score! January 1, 2008 can't come quickly enough for me.

Ahh, Darwin the talking dolphin, we miss you so. Rest in peace Jonathan Brandis, and Mr. Scheider, I salute you!

Ciao,

C