Hello, everyone. Thank you very much for reading CinemaSlants these few years. I have moved my writing over to a new blog: The Screen Addict. You can find it here: http://thescreenaddict.com/.
I hope you follow me to my new location! You can find an explanation for the move on that site now or on the CinemaSlants Facebook page.
This is, of
course, the broadest and dumbest question that has ever been written, and I am
sorry to have started off with it. But while watching the belated, Netflix-only
fourth season of Arrested Development,
it was a question that came to my mind time and time again. There is no
mathematical formula that makes something work as a piece of art or
entertainment; you can’t just throw talented people in a room and expect
everything to work out. I mean, Robert De Niro and Al Pacino co-starred in a
police movie just a few years ago, and it was terrible. For something to really click, all the magical pieces
have to come together at just the right time, and once those pieces are
disbanded it usually cannot be captured again.
Since
it premiered four weeks ago, the new Aaron Sorkin series The Newsroom has
inspired quite the Internet discussion. The reviews have been widely negative,
but it’s still a fascinating, compulsively watchable show that gets so much
wrong yet has a ton of potential. While I’m not necessarily a fan of all the
hate-watching/live-tweeting this show sees on a weekly basis—if you can’t stand
it, just stop watching it—but it’s also very much deserving of the vitriol that
gets sent its way with each new episode. It’s a mess, and sometimes an
offensively bad one at that. Like any writer, Sorkin has good habits and bad
habits. With The Newsroom, it seems like he’s stuffed all of his bad habits
into one place.
As a new fall television season begins, I have decided to watch as many of the new shows (and returning old shows) as possible. I will post my brief opinions on all these series as they premiere, with an emphasis on any shows I think may be good/mildly interesting. I will not watch all of these beyond this first episode—I won’t watch most of them, in fact—but writing these posts will give me incentive to watch as much television as possible. Because why not? This third and final post looks at the pilots for A Gifted Man, How to Be a Gentleman, Pan Am, Person of Interest, Prime Suspect, Suburgatory and Terra Nova. Also: the second season premiere of Boardwalk Empire, and I watch my first episode of the cult hit in the making Happy Endings.
As a new fall television season begins, I have decided to watch as many of the new shows (and returning old shows) as possible. I will post my brief opinions on all these series as they premiere, with an emphasis on any shows I think may be good/mildly interesting. I will not watch all of these beyond this first episode—I won’t watch most of them, in fact—but writing these posts will give me incentive to watch as much television as possible. Because why not? This second post will mostly focus on returning shows, with the only new show being Whitney. The third post—out later this week—will focus on several new shows. And then this experiment will be done.
As a new fall television season begins, I have decided to watch as many of the new shows (and returning old shows) as possible. I will post my brief opinions on all these shows as they premiere, with an emphasis on any series I think may be good/mildly interesting. I will not watch all of these beyond this first episode—I won’t watch most of them, in fact—but writing these will give me incentive to watch as much television as possible. Because why not? In this first post, I touch on the pilots for 2 Broke Girls, Free Agents, Homeland, New Girl, The Playboy Club and Up All Night, along with season premieres of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Two and a Half Men.
When season one of The Wire came to an end, I’m sure many fans were wondering where the show could possibly go after the season finale, which seemed to wrap things up pretty nicely. There was no “The Chinese have kidnapped Jack Bauer!” cliffhanger and no real extraneous threads that would suggest a great longevity. Yes, the ending of season one was hardly a happy, fulfilling one in the normal sense—though quite fulfilling in the artistic sense—but it’s hard to keep a show going when you put a good chunk of your characters behind bars or working crap jobs. As a solution, David Simon and his collaborators decided to approach the new season as they would each subsequent season: bring back all the old characters, but throw in about 20 new ones as well. Where the first season was essentially an extraordinarily-done cop drama, each season would introduce the audience to a new aspect of the constantly-deteriorating Baltimore, and how the drug trade affects every nook and cranny of the city.
For the record, I don’t spoil anything. So don’t be scared.
Television procedurals often paint a wildly inaccurate picture of what police investigations are really like. Rare is the murder case that can be solved in 42-odd minutes of screen time. In reality, investigations are far more grueling. This is one of the many ideas that the first season of The Wire explores. Instead of the usual case-of-the-week format made popular on most network/basic cable police dramas, the entire first season of The Wire focuses on a single case. While that description may make the series seem limited in scope, the exact opposite is true: by slowly watching the same investigation over the course of the season, we feel wholly entrenched in the ever-expanding environment. The Wire is not paced slowly just because it can be; there’s a method to the madness. The show is like an extended pan-out shot, as it slowly reveals just how huge its universe is.
When watching sporting events, I tend to watch the action play out and go to the bathroom during the commercial breaks. The Super Bowl, however, poses a unique challenge. Not only is a football game on that you want to watch, but the commercials are also required viewing. The next day, as you stand around the proverbial water cooler, people will not only be gabbing about the football game. No, sir, they will be talking about that hilarious beer commercial with that dude who did that thing while that attractive woman stood there disapprovingly. As such, I have decided to go through the ads and choose the most remarkable or remarkably bad for you to view and judge along with me. BEGIN!
Ever since the A.O. Scott/Michael Phillips hosted At the Movies ended back in August, there has been a hole in the film criticism universe. I’m not saying that all was lost, for if you really wanted to know what a critic thought of a movie you could (God forbid) read their reviews, but a show like At the Movies provided an epicenter that all, even the illiterate, could revolve around. Back in the day, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert owned the criticism world because of their show’s success, but earlier this year this cultural institution that they created was forced to fade away. However, give Roger Ebert credit: he did not take this lying down, and just a handful of months later, he has brought a new incarnation of At the Movies back to the airwaves.
This is the fourth post of Operation AMC, my ongoing project to watch every episode of the AMC series Breaking Bad and Mad Men, often called two of the best shows on television. This post covers the third season of Breaking Bad.
On paper, Boardwalk Empire sounds like a series which I could not judge fairly. A period drama about corruption in the Atlantic City government during the Prohibition Era? Starring Steve Buscemi, Michael Pitt, Kelly Macdonald, Michael Stuhlbarg and Michael Shannon? The first episode directed by Martin Scorsese? This, ladies and gentlemen, would be the result of Leonardo DiCaprio’s team from Inception entering my subconscious and discovering my ideal television show.
This is the third post of Operation AMC, my ongoing project to watch every episode of the AMC series Breaking Bad and Mad Men, often called two of the best shows on television. This post covers the second season of Breaking Bad.
This is the second post of Operation AMC, my ongoing project to watch every episode of the AMC series Breaking Bad and Mad Men, often called two of the best shows on television. This post covers the first season of Mad Men.
Since comedian Conan O'Brien was ousted from NBC following the gross miscalculation that people would watch Jay Leno while they weren't tired to the point of lunacy, his return to television has been anticipated as if he is a form of talk show host messiah. With Monday night came the second coming, in the form of Conan, his new talk show on TBS.
The acclaimed AMC series Breaking Bad is about the ultimate family man: a man who does everything he does just so his family may have a better life. He is on the way out, and he knows he’s about to leave his family with nothing. As such he sets out to get as much money for his family, and he doesn’t care if it involves starting a meth business or strangling a man in the basement.
It seemed like a sure thing in fall 2008. Television übermensch J.J. Abrams was producing/creating a new sci-fi television show for Fox, entitled Fringe. Comparisons flew around likening it to The X-Files, a great mixture of police procedural and sci-fi mystery. The pilot premiered to great numbers, and as such the first season enjoyed great success. Then the second season came, and as it went on the ratings dipped dramatically, going from the norm of 10 million viewers a week to a mere 5-6. The third season is now in full swing, and this is as good as the show has ever been. Sadly, the numbers don’t reflect that, and we very well may be looking at the final year of Fringe.
The thing is, I can understand the mass exodus that occurred during the second season. It was moved to a time slot which plays opposite The Office, CSI and Grey’s Anatomy. People banished Fringe to their DVRs and Hulu visits, and as the season went on it seemed as if the overarching storyline was being put on the backburner in favor of case-of-the-week episodes which were far less interesting and didn’t even provide the illusion of forward momentum. It was not until the end of the second season, coming to a head at the great “White Tulip”, that the show figured out how to provide us with weekly cases whilst still feeling like it was going somewhere. They have carried this mentality over to the early episodes this third season, mostly caused by a great twist which came in the second season finale. I’m going to try and tread lightly and not spoil anything, but it’s going to be tough.
The show follows FBI agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) and her journeys into the world of fringe science, concerned with ideas that most scientists would scoff at. Walter Bishop (John Noble), however, has devoted his life to the study of fringe science, and his research has caused all sorts of havoc that has led to various events/phenomenon in the modern day. To get to the bottom of it all, Dunham needs him to investigate these happenings. The problem: he’s absolutely insane and can only get out of his mental institution if he’s taken care of by his estranged son Peter (Joshua Jackson). Together, they investigate various fringe events that may or may not be related to “the pattern”, a series of strange events that seem to be leading to one ultimate goal.
The history of the show has been a handful of great episodes surrounded by filler, something that has made the show alternately thrilling and frustrating. The middle third of the first two seasons has proven to be mostly disposable, and until the show fixes that it’s doomed to lose viewers. The good news is that the latter part of the second season was almost universally great, and thus far the third season has picked up where it left off. I am optimistic, and whether the show only lasts until the end of this season of another 5 years (very very unlikely) I’m excited to see where the plot goes.
Not long ago I re-watched the pilot, and I must say it held up incredibly well. Most pilots end up being disposable table-setting, but here it remains one of the best episodes the show has done. Not only does it introduce the characters and premise, but tells a story which would provide a backdrop for every (important) episode the show would air.
The best actor on television to be ignored at Emmy-time is, quite possibly, John Noble, who in episode after episode gives us a man who is filled with a special mix of regret, insanity, naiveté and love for his son. Within minutes he can go from hilarious to heartbreaking, and if you just watch him for one episode you’ll know exactly what I mean. In my opinion, it’s some of the best work on television right now, and the fact that he hasn’t even been nominated depresses me.
One of the things I’ve been afraid of is a Peter-Olivia romantic relationship, and for a while it seemed the show would be rightly ignoring that plot device. However, of late they have been steering in that direction, but the way the show has done it has been impressive. I won’t go into details, but because of a key twist at the end of the second season the romantic developments have held a bit more… weight.
The twists have not always come fast and furious, but when they have they’ve packed a punch. That’s why, if you’ve never seen the show, you don’t need to watch every episode to catch up. Below I will provide a list of highlights, and I encourage you to please watch Fringe. It’s a pretty great show that has provided some of my favorite television moments of the past few years. Through journeys into time travel, shape-shifting and alternate dimensions, Fringe is a unique show, and no matter how much longer it lasts, I only hope it ends on its own terms.
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Noel Murray, the great Fringe reviewer for The A.V. Club, listed these 20 episodes as a catch-up guide for anyone new to the show. I have put my personal favorites in bold, to lighten the load. (For some inexplicable reason he did not include the pilot. Watch that, please.)
Season One
“The Arrival”
“In Which We Meet Mr. Jones”
“The Equation”
“Safe”
“Bound”
“Ability” “Bad Dreams”
“The Road Not Taken”
“There’s More Than One of Everything”
Season Two
“A New Day In the Old Town”
“Momentum Deferred”
“August”
“Snakehead”
“Grey Matters”
“Jacksonville”
“Peter”
“Olivia. In the Lab. With the Revolver.”
“White Tulip” (Heck Yes)
“The Man From the Other Side”
“Over There”
Thus far, everything in the third season has been essential. Fringe airs Thursdays at 9pm EST on Fox.
Families love each other. Most do, anyway. You have to wade through a lot of crap most of the time, but at the end of the day they’re what you have, and they’re not going anywhere. ABC’s Modern Family takes us into the world of one such group, and week after week this show provides pure joy minus the usual cynicism. Yes, I loveArrested Development, but for the first time in a while we have a true family sitcom that depicts a big, happy family. Yes, I’m a guy who tends to love some of the most depressing stuff out there, but I'm not immune to happiness.
In suburban Los Angeles, we have the Dunphy clan, your basic stereotypical American family with a mother, a father and 2.5 children. Fearing the consequences, no doubt, the series decided to round up and go for three. The parents are Claire (Julie Bowen) and Phil (Ty Burrell), and their children are the high-school aged Haley (Sarah Hyland), the intelligent middle child Alex (Ariel Winter), and the young Luke (Nolan Gould). I’ll let them do the talking:
Claire’s father, Jay Pritchett (Ed O’Neill), has married a younger Columbian woman named Gloria (Sofia Vergara) after a divorce. Gloria’s son, Manny (Rico Rodriguez II) is adjusting to his new life with Jay. Vergara is an absolute revelation, she could have been a one-dimensional bimbo in a relationship that would never happen, but against all odds she and O’Neill appear to be truly happy. This is the kind of thing you just don’t see often.
You know what else you don’t see often? Gay couples on network television. Luckily Modern Family has created Cameron (Eric Stonestreet) and Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), who is Claire’s brother and Jay’s son. Again, this could be a coupling done in an exploitative manner, and the ads seemed to be advertising them in a way that said “See! We don’t hate gay people!”, but these are actual believable characters. In the pilot they adopted a Vietnamese infant who they named Lily, and they continue to raise her as their daughter.
One of my favorite films thus far this year has been The Kids Are All Right¸ which functioned very much in the same way, only in a slightly more adult tone. Who am I kidding? It was a much more adult tone. Either way, the basic message in both examples is that no matter how much crap people go through, at the end of the day your family is your family. Kids went to some darker places than Modern Family will ever go, but you get the point.
All ooey-gooey stuff aside, this show is freaking funny. Once in a while it goes a little over-the-top, but for the most part it stays rooted in the real world. Often the laughs are laughs of recognition, remembering moments from your own family history. Let me just say, though, that Ty Burrell is absolutely godlike in this show. Eric Stonestreet won the Emmy for supporting actor, and deservedly so, but part of me was rooting for Burrell. He does slapstick with the best of them, the entire time playing a man with intentions so good that he can become misguided. Without him, I’m convinced this show would not be anywhere near where it is.
However, the longer I think about it, I don’t think you could afford to lose a member of this cast. Each hits every note with just the right pitch, and I think saving their characters from becoming the stock types I was afraid of. Take, for example, Bowen, who at any point plays a scene with the just the right level of caring and neuroticism. There is never a moment where you worry that there are two characters who don’t truly love each other. The closest thing to genuine conflict comes in “Coal Digger”, an episode in which Claire’s possible true feelings about Gloria come out. However, (spoiler alert) it’s all worked out.
In fact, if I have a complaint about the show, is that there never really seems to be anything TRULY at risk. Honestly, though, that is a terrible complaint and I hate myself for it. Modern Family is not intended as a show where everything can fall apart. It’s a family sitcom, about real families. Sure, all the episodes can end with cheesy group hugs set to cheery music. Sometimes, with all the negativity and cynicism from people such as myself, sometimes we all need a little cheese. There’s a reason it won the Emmy for Best Comedy Series. It’s a weekly injection of pure, unadulterated joy. Who can resist that?
MY FAVORITE EPISODES (in order of airdate, yes there are a lot)
“Pilot”
“The Bicycle Thief”
“The Incident”
“Coal Digger”
“Not in My House”
“Moon Landing”
“My Funky Valentine”
“Truth Be Told”
“Benched”
“Airport 2010”
“Hawaii”
Two episodes have aired to begin this second season: “The Old Wagon” and “The Kiss”. The show airs every Wednesday night at 9pm EST.
Outsourced is a disgrace of a television show. I have seen one episode, and it was one of the most laborious, unpleasant half hours of my life. It’s a lazy sitcom made by people that had little interest in making quality television, but instead in forcing a single, insulting joke down the throats of America. This is not a review. This is a plea. Do not, under any circumstances, watch Outsourced. To borrow a phrase from Roger Ebert, if you do, “I will never let you read one of my reviews again.”
Essentially, Outsourced is a show that attempts to generate comedy from the fact that India is, in fact, a country that exists. Ignore the fact that its main character, played as blandly as possible by Ben Rappaport, never even hints at entering a second dimension. The opening scene finds him walking into his office in Kansas City to find his novelty item company has been outsourced to India, and he’s the lucky sonofagun who gets to go and run the Indian call center. It probably took you 10 seconds to read that sentence. It takes about the same time for the series to plant you into the middle of an India that never has, and never will exist.
About here is where we meet the theme song, which (as I tweeted) sounds like a cat being dragged through a Bollywood nightmare. Such is the case with the entirety of the musical score.
Thus begins the parade of endless Indian stereotypes that never even begin to resemble humor. Among the characters he meets are Rajiiv, Asha, Gupta, Madhuri and (wait for it) Manmeet! Oh, Outsourced, you cut like a knife!
Managing all of these characters is our hero (and Jim Halpert clone) Todd. Does he have a family? Friends? What impact did the movie to India have on his life? Outsourced doesn’t care. All it wants to do is put a white man in India and watch alleged hilarity ensue while mocking Indian culture for being so behind us in SO many ways. Todd, however, is saved when he finds another white man to hang out with! Huzzah! This friendly face is played by Diedrich Bader. Also, there’s a hot Australian lady for Todd to be attracted to.
Last year NBC was able to make Thursday nights the funniest night on TV, giving us weekly doses of Community, Parks and Recreation, The Office and 30 Rock. Not one of those shows is bad. Needless to say, NBC felt the need to shake things up, push Parks and Rec to midseason and replace it with this piece of trash. NBC, this is why you are consistently in last place.
Creation of the show is credited to Ken Kwapis, who also directed the first episode. In the past he has directed several episodes of The Office, and he even did two episodes of the short-lived but great Freaks and Geeks. You’d think working on those shows would teach him to be able to make something, you know, funny. Outsourced is not funny. It sucks the ability to laugh out of you, wondering if you may ever be able to experience joy again. Normally I write “TV Timeout” pieces for shows I love, but this is different. I am begging all of you to let this show die a quick, unheralded death, and we can await the return of Parks and Recreation in the fall. By all means, tune in to NBC on Thursday nights. Watch Community. Watch 30 Rock. Watch The Office. But please, in the name of all that is holy, when it turns to 9:30 eastern time, find a better way to spend your time. Watch QVC if you have to. If this did not convince you, just remember that the pilot ends on a poop joke, with the basic message that Indian food is disgusting.
The Social Network comes out next Friday. I know this is not directly related, but I state it as an antidote. That is one of the best movies of the year. This is not the best anything.
FX’s It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is the best show on television to hold no meaning besides the events on the screen. I’m not particularly sure the world would be a much different place without it, certainly no worse, but television doesn’t get much funnier than this. Most great sitcoms hold some transcendent power. Community illustrates the idea of your life not quite going where you planned. Seinfeld was not a show about nothing but about perceived nothings within our everyday society. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia exists entirely in its own universe, and all I can say is that these characters are incredibly entertaining to watch, but I hope I never meet any of them.
The premise of Always Sunny is essentially this: the viewer spends a half hour observing some of the worst people on Earth. They are mean-spirited, stupid, manipulative, and often just plain evil, but at the end of the day the various shenanigans they get into are hilarious. Each episode is shot and cut together so quick and dirty you’d think there was a gun to their heads, but the result is gloriously anarchic. Everyone involved with Sunny knows one thing: what is funny, and I cannot think of an episode that didn’t make me laugh. It never makes me think, but it always succeeds in the humor department.
The main characters are the owners of an Irish bar in South Philadelphia that gets almost no business at any point, thus allowing the characters to go on various misadventures. There is Dennis Reynolds (Glenn Howerton), his sister Dee (Kaitlin Olson), and their friends Mac (Rob McElhenney) and Charlie (Charlie Day). In the second season the show introduces Frank Reynolds, played by Danny DeVito, who they believe for a time to be their father. Dennis is as narcissistic as they come, obsessed with his own looks, and he believes just about any situation can be solved by “popping his shirt off”. Charlie is certainly the least intelligent character, but he can leap into a hilariously angry outburst at the drop of a hat, and he showers about once a month or so. Mac fancies himself a strong, angry Irishmen but is actually quite childish and cowardly. Dee dreams of becoming an actor, but much like Arrested Development’s Tobias Fünke couldn’t get a gig of it danced in front of her. Franks used to be wealthy, but he wants to revert to his filthy, risky, younger days, so he moves in with Charlie.
There are almost no multi-episode arcs to be found throughout this show’s duration. Each episode exists in its own vacuum, and it isn’t necessary to view it from front to back by any means. The only major cast addition was that of DeVito in the second season premiere “Charlie Gets Crippled”. Nobody dies, has a baby or gets married, so feel free to sit back and watch with no strings attached. There is no Lost labyrinth to be navigated here, except perhaps the various mysteries that almost certainly exist in Charlie and Frank’s apartment.
The show has never strayed from risqué humor, but it never comes off as offensive because as Glenn Howerton has laid it all out in one sentence: “If it’s not funny, it’s offensive. If it’s funny, it’s not offensive.” Always Sunny may not push as many hot buttons as South Park, thus staying out of the headlines, but it’s never safe. The first episode to air was titled “The Gang Gets Racist”, and immediately we were looking these character’s shortcomings in the eyes. In these 22 minutes there are endless race jokes, and in the second half their bar begins to cater to gay men. You know exactly what kind of show you’re dealing with once that episode is over, and it’s your choice to take it or leave it.
It all began with a short film made by McElhenney, Howerton and Day. The plot entailed a man going over to his friend’s house to borrow some sugar. However, it turns out his friend has cancer. Nonetheless, he is intent on getting his sugar. This idea led to a deal with FX for a 7-episode first season, and thus It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia was born. McElhenney was credited as the creator and showrunner, and he, Day and Howerton would be the main writers of the show. Other writers would eventually come in, but these three to this day remain the main creative voice behind the show.
If I have a complaint about the show it’s that it is not aired nearly enough. We are about to go into the sixth season of the show and they have made only 58 episodes. The show comes every fall, cranks out 13 episodes, and then we have to wait for the next fall. On the plus side, there is less room for filler episodes and the quality of each episode shines through a little brighter. That’s why cable shows get such a good reputation: they don’t have to pump out episodes like the network shows do.
There is no other show on TV which provides such an endless supply of goofy, meaningless fun. Each actor knows their character inside and out, and they perform each scene to an utterly hilarious tee. Throughout the 58 episodes thus far, we are treated to football tryouts, musicals, the World Series, hallucinations involving Sinbad and Rob Thomas, the thoroughly repulsive McPoyle family, various references to political issues of the day and the set of an M. Night Shyamalan film about Serbian genocide. It's low-class, it's crude, and it's one of the funniest things on television.
My 5 Favorite Episodes (In order of airdate)
“Underage Drinking: A National Concern”
“Mac Bangs Dennis’ Mom”
“Sweet Dee’s Dating a Retarded Person”
“Mac is a Serial Killer”
“Mac and Charlie Die”
Last year they released a Christmas Special on DVD called “A Very Sunny Christmas”. I’m guessing it didn’t air because of the F-bombs in its second half, but I hardly consider it essential viewing. If it did air I’d consider it a rather sub-par episode.
Season 6 will begin September 16th on FX at (probably) 10pm EST.
