TV reviews

A complete archive of The Medium is Not Enough’s reviews of TV programmes since 2005

US TV

Mini-review: Golden Boy 1×1 (CBS)

5 March 2013 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

Golden Boy

In the US: Tuesdays, 10/9c, CBS

Not really worth a full-on review, since it’s so perfectly generic, I could recycle practically any other review I’ve ever written of a CBS cop drama and it would say more or less the same thing.

The basic idea is that the Robert Kennedy-alike Walter William Clark Jr (Theo James, who could see dead people in Sky Living’s horror show Bedlam) will become the youngest police commissioner in New York City history seven years from now, and when he’s interviewed about how he got to the top so quickly, we see in flashback the events that transpired along the way.

And it’s incredibly, incredibly generic. We have the slobby black partner a couple of years from retirement (Chi McBridge) and the ambitious backstabbing detective who’s intent on sabotaging Clark Jr’s obviously inevitable career trajectory (Kevin Alejandro from Southland). We have a token female detective who’s somewhere on the moral spectrum between those two. We have a wayward sister for our hero to look after.

All of which might be excusable if there were decent plots. But for a Golden Boy, he ain’t half stupid. There is literally no obvious insight that he can’t make, no obvious act of backstabbing that he won’t miss. The show should more probably be called Earnest Boy, because this isn’t a political animal like Robert Kennedy in the making (which someone who rose that quickly up the career ladder would really need to be).

So although, as with all CBS dramas, it is competently made, has a decent degree of verisimilitude and looks great, ignore it.

What did you watch this week? Including Cult, Zero Hour, Mr and Mrs Murder, The Blue Rose, Arrow and Being Human (US)

2 March 2013 Rob Buckley 7 Comments

It’s “What did you watch this week?”, my chance to tell you what I movies and TV I’ve watched this week that I haven’t already reviewed and your chance to recommend things to everyone else (and me) in case I’ve missed them.

First, the usual recommendations:

  • The Americans (FX/ITV).
  • Archer (FX, 5USA)
  • Arrow (The CW/Sky 1)
  • Banshee (Cinemax/Sky Atlantic)
  • Being Human (US) (SyFy)
  • The Daily Show (Comedy Central)
  • The Doctor Blake Mysteries (ABC1/ITV)
  • Cougar Town (TBS/Sky Living)
  • Elementary (CBS/Sky Living)
  • Go On (NBC)
  • House of Cards (Netflix)
  • Modern Family (ABC/Sky 1)
  • Mr Selfridge (ITV/PBS)
  • Shameless (US) (Showtime/More4)
  • Southland (TNT/Channel 4)
  • Spartacus (Starz/Sky 1)
  • Engrenages/Spiral (BBC4/Netflix)
  • Top Gear (BBC2/BBC America)
  • Vegas (CBS/Sky Atlantic).

These are all going to be on in either the UK or the US, perhaps even both, but I can’t be sure which. If I got the channels wrong, let me know and I’ll fix them

Still in the queue: plenty. As well as two episodes of The Doctor Blake Mysteries, Archer and Community, last night’s Banshee and Spartacus, and all the remaining episodes of House of Cards, two new shows launched this week in the US and the UK – CBS’s Golden Boy and ITV’s Lightfields – that I haven’t had time to watch. I think that means a little bit of rationalisation of my viewing is needed so I’m pruning out the following regulars and shows that were on trial:

  • The Blue Rose: Still hasn’t hit its stride after four episodes, which is just way too long a time to be on trial. Let me know if it finds its mojo.
  • Cult: A pretty tiresome second episode. The show might be easier to watch if the show-within-a-show weren’t so dreadful, but the show’s own storyline is so fundamentally silly, that I’ve yet to find much to make me want to watch any more. There was an interesting twist at one point, where the hero begins to question the motives of the heroine, but that didn’t go very far. Intriguingly, the episode was written by Steven Rea, who is, of course, the show’s creator in-series. I wonder if it’s hard to write a show in which you’re a character. Or is someone using a pseudonym?
  • Go On: Nice cast, doing relatively good work with a heart, but never side-splitting.
  • Mr and Mrs Murder: An Australian show about married crime scene cleaners who also solve crimes. From the outset, clearly not taking itself seriously, but the characters don’t quite work, they’re more irritating than funny, and I don’t really see those two together.
  • Zero Hour: Robbed off the most ridiculous qualities of the first episode, the second episode was merely stupid and insipid. Switched off after only a few minutes.

Doctor Blake is still on trial, since although it’s very good, I’m not a big fan of mystery shows per se.

Now, some thoughts on some of the regulars:

  • Arrow (The CW/Sky 1): Geoff Johns is back on writing duties. Shudders. He’s certainly a big fan of stories with father issues, isn’t he? And of terrible dialogue? We also got a canary reference and Alex Kingston turned up with an American accent as Laurel’s mum. John Barrowman had a good stab at acting this week, someone else knows Arrow’s secret identity, Kelly Hu and another Arrow villain made a (somewhat ludicrous) return and we all got to laugh at Arrow’s ‘perfect’ Chinese accent.
  • Banshee (Cinemax/Sky Atlantic): A rather nice chase scene in the style of Reservoir Dogs and Point Break, a sex scene that was actually romantic rather than mechanical, and a nice touch with the Amish villain feeling nostalgic for the good old days.
  • Being Human (US) (SyFy): Josh’s family turned up at last. However, everyone’s brains left. Why exactly would anyone believe that Aidan would deliberately drink blood that was poisonous to him? It’s essentially a false conflict set up to create a dramatic choice, which is a bit tedious. I want to see where the Sally storyline is going, but why didn’t anyone suspect something like this would happen once her soul was on the line?
  • Cougar Town (TBS/Sky Living): Loving the flashbacks. And they handled the Travis romance reasonably well, too.
  • Elementary (CBS/Sky Living): Another episode that was less mystery, more ‘Why would someone do this?’ Not very interesting.
  • Go On (NBC): Bradley Whitford turned up and was good; Piper Perabo was as good as always; the Mary Poppins storyline was good. But I didn’t laugh. Hence it being dropped from my regular viewing.
  • Modern Family (ABC/Sky1): Elizabeth Banks was back, although it wasn’t until right at the end that she got to really strut her stuff.
  • Shameless (US) (Showtime/More4): A chance to look inside foster homes and how much like prisons they are. And Fiona got angry. This should be fun.
  • Southland (TNT/Channel 4): Cooper has a new partner, who’s great. Major Dad turned out to be Cooper’s old training officer as well, which was great, too. The shoot out was great. Why isn’t anyone watching this?
  • Spartacus (Starz/Sky 1): Some good things – decimation (yes, that really did happen) and Caesar among the rebels, making you feel sorry for the Romans for a change. Hope last night’s episode was as good.
  • Vegas (CBS/Sky Atlantic): Paul Ben Victor (The Wire, The Invisible Man) showed up but didn’t get to do much in an episode that was again dull procedural wrapped in the far more interesting series arc. And Mia finds out – where will it all end up? However, it winds up, please let’s not have so many procedurals along the way.

“What did you watch this week?” is your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV and films that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched. Since we live in the fabulous world of Internet catch-up services like the iPlayer and Hulu, why not tell your fellow readers what you’ve seen so they can see the good stuff they might have missed?

French TV

Review: Engrenages (Spiral) 4×5-4×6 (France: Canal+; UK: BBC Four)

25 February 2013 Rob Buckley 7 Comments

In France: Last autumn
In the UK: Saturday 23 February, 9pm, BBC Four

Well, we’re halfway throughout season 4 already. How distressing is that? Bloody BBC, burning through these things as if there’s an unlimited supply. This is France’s answer to The Wire, we’re talking about, and there’s not a lot on TV to rival it.

A more even affair this, following last week’s mix of not-so-cracking and cracking, with shocks aplenty. And for those who think I’m kidding about that comparison with The Wire, this week, on top of the usual less-than-complimentary look at French society, we had a police officer’s gun stolen and him going all out to get it back, a bunch of high-up police officers more concerned with the stats than getting to the root cause of crime, and a mysterious Greek with criminal connections turned up.

One unshocking thing we learnt this week, too: Ms Rullsenberg should be writing these reviews…

Continue reading “Review: Engrenages (Spiral) 4×5-4×6 (France: Canal+; UK: BBC Four)”

US TV

Review: Cult 1×1 (The CW)

25 February 2013 Rob Buckley 8 Comments

The CW's Cult cast

In the US: Tuesdays, 9pm ET/8pm CT, The CW
In the UK: Mysteriously acquired by an unnamed network

Cults are really big right now on TV. The Following is on Fox and now we have Cult on The CW. Intriguingly, both shows were thought up years ago, The Following as the script for Scream 3 and Cult as a show for the now-defunct predecessor to The CW, The WB.

The two shows both have good pedigrees. The Following comes from long-time writer Kevin Williamson (Dawson’s Creek and The Vampire Diaries) but Cult comes from the even older pen of Rockne S O’Bannon, who started out on The (New) Twilight Zone, before going on to create Farscape, Alien Nation and seaQuest DSV.

So perhaps it’s appropriate that Cult is a trickier, more knowing beast than The Following. The Following, of course, has all kinds of degrees of Scream-esque meta, but Cult takes things a step further. It begins seemingly as a somewhat stupid, tacky The CW show in which a young blonde cop, Kelly Collins, (Alona Tal) and an older, fatter, blacker cop have to investigate the cult run by Billy Grimm (Robert Knepper) to which Collins used to belong.

But just as they find somewhat buried in a wall and he utters the somewhat ludicrous and unfathomable “‘Well hey. These things just snap right off,” we discover we’ve been watching a TV show within a TV show. Collins is really actress Marti Gerritsen and Knepper is actor Roger Reeves and they star in The CW’s Cult.

With me so far? Good. Anyway, so far, so Pulaski/30 Rock. But rather than being a spoof or send up of the making of a TV show, Cult is a far darker creation that focuses on the nature of cult television and its fans. This Cult has fans and it’s created web sites and all kinds of other clues for them to seek out to discover more about the show. Except perhaps it’s not all fiction. Because when one fan seems to work it all out, he disappears. When his journalist brother Jeff Dean Sefton (Matthew Davis) comes looking for him, he starts to discover the same messages in the show that his brother did, and with the help of a researcher on the show, Skye Yarrow (Jessica Lucas), they begin to investigate Cult, to see if they can find out what’s really going on and what’s happened to his brother.

Here’s a trailer that gives away all the good bits from the first episode.

Continue reading “Review: Cult 1×1 (The CW)”

What did you watch this week? Including The Spa, The Americans, Banshee, Go On, House of Cards, Mr Selfridge and Shameless

22 February 2013 Rob Buckley 6 Comments

It’s “What did you watch this week?”, my chance to tell you what I movies and TV I’ve watched this week that I haven’t already reviewed and your chance to recommend things to everyone else (and me) in case I’ve missed them.

First, the usual recommendations:

  • The Americans (FX/ITV).
  • Archer (FX, 5USA)
  • Arrow (The CW/Sky 1)
  • Banshee (Cinemax/Sky Atlantic)
  • Being Human (US) (SyFy)
  • The Daily Show (Comedy Central)
  • The Doctor Blake Mysteries (ABC1/ITV)
  • Cougar Town (TBS/Sky Living)
  • Elementary (CBS/Sky Living)
  • Go On (NBC)
  • House of Cards (Netflix)
  • Modern Family (ABC/Sky 1)
  • Mr Selfridge (ITV/PBS)
  • Shameless (US) (Showtime/More4)
  • Southland (TNT/Channel 4)
  • Spartacus (Starz/Sky 1)
  • Engrenages/Spiral (BBC4/Netflix)
  • Suits (USA/Dave)
  • Top Gear (BBC2/BBC America)
  • Vegas (CBS/Sky Atlantic).

These are all going to be on in either the UK or the US, perhaps even both, but I can’t be sure which. If I got the channels wrong, let me know and I’ll fix them

Still in the queue: plenty to go in the House of Cards queue and there’s this week’s episodes of The Doctor Blake Mysteries, Vegas, Elementary, Archer, Zero Hour and Community to watch, although I think Community‘s days as a watched programme are numbered in this house. On top of those I have new US show Cult to watch – basically The Following but on The CW and with the guy who played T-Bone on Prison Break – which I’ll try to sneak a look at over the weekend, as well as new Australian show, Mr and Mrs Murder, which sees a husband and wife team cleaning up murder scenes (literally) and then doing some detective work of their own. I’ve also got Channel 4’s one-off spy drama Complicit to give a try, but Guy says it’s a bit rubbish so I might skip it.

I did get round to watching Sky Living’s The Spa, which stars Rebecca Front. It’s as dreadful as every other Sky 1 and Sky Living comedy, I’m afraid. In particular, we had a scene based on someone being told to tell someone they were ‘clinically obese’ and mishearing and saying they were ‘clinically a beast’.

Now, some thoughts on the regulars as well as some of the shows I’m still giving a try.

  • The Americans (FX/ITV): A rather excellent episode all round, set against the backdrop of the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan and suggests how it could have resulted in World War 3. There’s excellent usage of archive news footage and intriguing to see the Soviets transferring and imagining it could be an attempted coup by General Hague. ‘Operation Christopher’ also showed just what the KGB was capable of if necessary. There’s also a humorous suggestion that Christopher Hitchens (ish) was basically a Soviet sleeper agent, pretending to be a new-wave conservative to hide his true plans to spy on the US. Very much recommended.
  • Arrow (The CW/Sky 1): A living breathing advert for Windows 8 and way too teenage and soapy. Even James Callis couldn’t keep a straight face. It was redeemed by the use of the BSG alert klaxon during the museum robbery scene.
  • Banshee (Cinemax/Sky Atlantic): Is it my imagination or is the title sequence becoming more and more animated with each episode? I could have sworn the albino didn’t move until this episode. A decent flashback episode, this one focusing on Hood’s time in jail, that paid off well if you’d been watching since the beginning. Very, very brutal, mind.
  • Being Human (US) (SyFy): Somehow feels less involving than previous seasons. Mark Pellegrino turning up in flashback was good, as was his English accent, but Sam Witwer’s needed work.
  • The Blue Rose (TV3): Still hasn’t found its feet and neither comedic nor dramatic enough to be compelling. But I’ll give it a week or so more yet.
  • Elementary (CBS/Sky Living): Not seen all of it so far, but I’ll tell you one thing: Sherlock Holmes doesn’t know how to build a molecule with benzene rings in it properly.
  • Go On (NBC): Has reached the point where ideas are now being thrown out randomly, whether they work with particular characters or not. They finally gave the blind black guy something to do with some funny retcon – he’s a former cop and has mentioned it loads of time, but because everyone’s been so self-involved they’ve ignored him – and Piper Perabo does a funny New Jersey accent.
  • House of Cards (Netflix): I’m an episode or two further along now and enjoying its twisty turniness. Not convinced Kate Mara’s character would allow herself to have pictures taken in the nude, and the latest episode had the usual American belief that unions are little more than organised crime in disguise, even teachers’ unions, but lovely stuff. The show actually used the c-word as well, which was remarkable. And if you wondered what happened Joel Schumacher, turns out he’s directing House of Cards now. Definitely still recommended.
  • Modern Family (ABC/Sky1): Yes, that was Maxwell Caufield.
  • Mr Selfridge (ITV/PBS): The show’s starting to become a little self-mocking and Jeremy Piven is starting to spiral out of control, presumably thanks to the punishing schedule. The archness (and hair bra) of his aristocratic sponsor is also starting to grate, as are the accents of some of the cast: some of the Selfridge children’s US accents are wobbly and Amy Beth Childs, who was good with a Northern accent in Sirens, is clearly struggling with a squeaky cockney. Still, we did get John Sessions as Arthur Conan Doyle and a seance, and next week, we’re going to be getting Michael Brandon (Dempsey from Dempsey and Makepeace).
  • Shameless (US) (Showtime/More4): For once, you wanted to side with Steve against Fiona in their dramas. All of a bit of a jolly jape, though, all the mean girls at the swimming pool were good, but the ending was a refreshing change to the status quo. Looking forward to seeing what happens next week.
  • Southland (TNT/Channel 4): And so the bleakness goes on. Loving it. Best moment: Cooper’s fire-fight, although his continuing self-closeting and kindness to the Downs girl were close seconds.
  • Suits (USA/Dave): A great finale marred somewhat by some of the worst English stereotypes since The Patriot or possibly Three Men and a Little Lady. It does feel though that it’s not actually doing seasons any more but is just one long continuous show that occasionally takes breaks.

“What did you watch this week?” is your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV and films that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched. Since we live in the fabulous world of Internet catch-up services like the iPlayer and Hulu, why not tell your fellow readers what you’ve seen so they can see the good stuff they might have missed?