In the US: Mondays, 9/8c, The CW In the UK: ITV2 again
When Gossip Girlfirst popped up on our screens, it had a certain something. Okay, it was aimed at teenage girls and was about ridiculously rich people having ridiculously privileged educations and behaving like spoilt brats. But it was sweet, it had its heart in its right, there were some decent male and adult characters, the dialogue was witty, and it was actually quite clever.
Over the next two seasons, it became the must-watch show for teenage girls and indeed older women, keen to find a Sex and the City replacement, as well as a few men. However, as it went on, things became a little sillier. Although the producers promised they weren’t going to make the same mistakes they made with The OC, it all started to go wrong. Ridiculous plots and sub-plots started to crop up (Jenny’s stab at a fashion business, for example); everyone started to play ‘musical boyfriends’, yo-yoing between them all without any real rhyme or reason; and soon the cast had forgotten it was a drama and began mugging it for all it was worth.
So have the producers taken advantage of the summer break to take stock, regroup and come up with some storylines that don’t want to hit your head against a wall at the stupidity of them all?
I’ll give you three guesses. You’ll only need one.
Look up into the sky. Is there a round, silvery shape there? No, of course not. As we all know, the Moon left the Earth’s orbit back in 1999 following a cataclysmic nuclear explosion caused by waste from Moonbase Alpha going into chain reaction.
That, at least, was the scenario painted in Space: 1999, even if it – obviously – never came to pass. Made by Gerry Anderson, originally to be the second season of his earlier live action show UFO, Space: 1999 was a mix of many elements, some good, some bad. On the one hand, it did have some fantastic model work, cinematography and sets, the likes of which probably haven’t been bettered.
On the other hand, the acting was dreadful, and the plots… oh, the plots. They were concept sci-fi: great big ideas about philosophy, the universe, etc, but handled so badly, and usually with a plastic-looking monster, that it was impossible to regard them with any seriousness, particularly since the science part of the science-fiction was so ineptly handled.
The show was also hampered by having husband and wife team Martin Landau and Barbara Bain as the two leads. Okay, they’d been fine on Mission: Impossible but their marriage was now breaking down and they could barely stand the sight of each other. Therefore, zero chemistry between the leads.
After a first, not terribly successful series, a new producer was brought on board to help boost the ratings. Unfortunately, they brought on board Fred Freiberger, the US TV producer responsible for the changes made to season 3 of Star Trek that got it cancelled, and who went on to make the changes to The Six Million Dollar Man that got it cancelled. So despite the introduction of hot, shape-changing alien Maya, and an Italian lothario, guess what happened to the proposed season three.
During this time, Space: 1999 went through a couple of title sequences. For the first season, we got the funky disco theme coupled with the “This episode” (did you miss that? We said “This episode”, loser!) montage of highlights that Ronald D Moore copied for Battlestar Galactica. It also (weirdly enough) had Barbara Bain on a turntable.
Season two grabbed itself a whole new set of titles and a new theme. It wasn’t as cool, didn’t have Barbara Bain on a turntable, and it had a stupid “Red alert” on it. But it was more action packed and it did explain the plot.
These, however, were not the weirdest title sequences for Space: 1999. In overseas markets, there were completely different sets of titles that pioneered whole new areas of weird. The Japanese set was perhaps the least weird, since all they did was add a really odd new electronic/lounge theme to the first season titles.
No, for absolute weirdness, you had to go to Italy and watch Spazio: 1999‘s second season titles.
Another day, another Heroes trailer, it seems. Today, though, we have two behind-the-scenes videos, one that’s been included on the Heroes: Season 3 Blu-Ray disc, the other just sort of bandying around the web. The first is quite interesting, have some good interviews and tell us stuff we didn’t know before; the second is just showing how certain scenes were shot.
Remember: Heroes – Redemption starts next Monday on NBC at eight. God knows when it’s going to be showing in Britain.
In the UK: Sundays, BBC4, 10pm. Available on the iPlayer
Imagine if Katie Price’s next book turned out to be Hamlet. It would be incredible, wouldn’t it? Unbelievable, in fact.
But we’re talking that level of surprise that French TV could come up with Engrenages (aka Spiral).
For the most part, French TV is dubbed American imports, films, game shows and sitcoms that make ITV’s best efforts look like Curb Your Enthusiasm. Yet, a few years ago, bewilderingly Canal+, France’s answer to HBO, came up with Spiral, a French cop show almost as good as The Wire – and every bit as gritty, socially conscious, well written, well acted and authentic, albeit with some very pretty French people indeed.
The first season was a no-holds barred look at the French justice system, and was unafraid to show judges as corrupt, cops as racist, brutal and criminal, and lawyers as amoral and willing to screw over anyone for their own advancement.
Now, a year after it aired in France, BBC4 has finally gotten around to showing the second season. Could it possibly be as good as the first season?
Miracles do happen. It is.
Here’s a trailer for season two – it’s in French mind and contains a few spoilers for the next episode.
