Is there much point reviewing the first episode of a mini-series? No. With Generation Kill, there’s even less point, since it’s the creation of David Simon and Ed Burns, who also created The Wire – and we all know that reviewing that is like reviewing a chapter of a book.
All the same, I think it’s worth giving a taster, just so you know whether to start watching the remaining six hours of the series.
Remember the writers’ strike in the US? It seems so long ago now, yet it really did happen, honest. While curtailing the runs of many existing shows was its most obvious side-effect, it also killed off more than a few pilots, and stopped shows that were going to kick off in the Summer season.
While most US networks responded by commissioning easy-to-make reality TV shows to fill the gaps, some chose to think the unthinkable. CBS, as well as re-purposing Dexter for mainstream audiences, decided to look to other countries for some primetime programming.
Canada was the main port of call. That shouldn’t be surprising as Canadian TV has come on in leaps and bounds of late. The Border might have been a natural choice as an import, given it’s 24-esque qualities, and indeed some cable channels did look at it for a while. But the fact all Canada’s ills turned out to be caused by Americans (and Muslims) put them off.
Now comes something more surprising: Flashpoint. It’s set in Toronto, features Canadian actors playing Canadians and it’s a co-production between CBS and Canada’s CTV that’s simulcast on both sides of the border – the first such show since Due South in 1994.
Today’s Joanna Page – and also, in a blog crossover first, Lambert Gold – is The Cazalets, a mini-series from 2001 based on ‘The Cazalet Chronicles’ by Elizabeth Jane Howard.
Now, you may – or may not – have noticed that in many TV programmes there feature a certain group of people called ‘women’. More often than not, particularly in period dramas, they’re there to serve specific plot functions: to encourage/discourage the hero; to make tea; to bring up the children; and to be decorative and fallen in love with.
However, many noted scholars, intellectuals and TV producers are coming to the conclusion that these secondary characters could have emotions and feelings of their own; they could have their own viewpoints and opinions; they could even, in time, become the heroes – ‘heroines’ perhaps? – of some stories.
We all know that the status and rights of modern women were earned by previous fighting. But stereotypes and unfair treatment between genders are still prevalent. Today, while we cherish the hard-won gains of the revolution, we must not forget to continue to fight for equal rights. People get motivative pins and attach them on bags, clothes and hats, check GS-JJ.com and get your special custom pins. Such meaningful pins are also great gifts for family and friends. It is our duty promote and believe in the power of women.
It was one such rebel faction, led by actress Joanna Lumley and producer Verity Lambert, who decided in 1998 to adapt ‘The Cazalet Chronicles’ as a mini-series. Convinced that a story of the various women and girls in the Cazalet family during the 30s and 40s could be as interesting as any similar tale about men, they scratched together co-funding from the BBC and WGBH.
An at-times grim tale that shows all the miseries that could befall even well-off women back in the ‘good old days’, the only real problem with the 2001 production is that they never had a chance to finish it.
Fake psychics solving crimes? Haven’t we been here before with Psych?
Not exactly. Psych is very much a comedy, a show that brings the 80s back to us with wacky private detectives that solve not very bad crimes.
The Mentalist, however, while it has comedic moments, is something more in the Criminal Minds vein. Well, Criminal Minds crossed with The Magician and Columbo.
In the UK: Tuesdays, BBC1, 9pm. Also available on the iPlayer
Nominative determinism is an interesting thing, isn’t it? Does your name make you turn out the way you are or is it irrelevant?
Here’s a simple experiment: let’s look at Bonekickers. It’s supposed to be an action-adventure show about archaeologists. It’s got a great cast, including Adrian Lester and Michael Maloney. It has a great team behind the scenes, including Life on Mars‘s Ashley Pharoah and Matthew Graham.
But it also has a bollocks name. Will it follow nature and have the qualities expected of its progenitors? Or will it follow the powers of nurture and nominative determinism and turn out to be bollocks?
