TV reviews

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

Third-episode verdict: Vanished

5 September 2006 Rob Buckley 6 Comments

I’m so glad I invented this third-episode verdict thing. More often than I care to count, it’s proved its worth.

Take Vanished. Episode one? Silly. Episode two? Dull but not quite as silly.

Episode three? Ho, ho, ho. So magnificently stupid, it’s now passed through the other side of stupid and entered brilliant. Actually the first half was dire, but then the second half was just great. You know it’s silly. You know you’ve just passed Pluto on the way out of reality to somewhere far stranger, but you want to know more!

I won’t spoil it for UK viewers, since the episodes are going to air in October on Five US, but suffice it to say, if you’re familiar with Mozart’s ‘The Magic Flute’, you’ll know precisely who the bad guys are (I reckon). Fan-bloody-tastic. I was wondering when someone was going to use them.

Plus, our friendly visitor from Inner Toob has confirmed recently what I’d been hearing, too: we should hang around until episode 10 at least, because that’s when we’re all in for a big surprise. If what I think happens actually happens, Josh Berman and the rest of the production crew will deserve a great big tip of the hat for their ballsiness. Plus I was beginning to wonder why they’d chosen Gale Harold as the lead…

UPDATE: Vanished has recently had the seal of approval from Fox, which has commissioned another three episodes. Well, scripts for episodes anyway.

US TV

Preview: Smith

4 September 2006 Rob Buckley 5 Comments

Ray Liotta and Jonny Lee Miller

In the US: CBS, Tuesdays, 10pm ET/PT. Starts September 19th.

In the UK: Acquired by ITV for ITV4 for 2007; Hallmark has second-run rights

Heat: The Series. Sounds like a great idea, doesn’t it? Well, maybe not, but in the right hands it could be. Are the hands of John Wells, the man who largely messed up The West Wing post-Sorkin, the hands that could take Michael Mann’s classic and turn it into quality television drama?

Surprisingly, almost.

Continue reading “Preview: Smith”

US TV

Review: Bones 2.1

4 September 2006 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Bones

In the US: Second season, Wednesdays, Fox, 8/7c

In the UK: Not airing at the moment. Sky One and Five (probably) for the second season. Nothing official yet.

Characters re-cast: 0

Major characters gotten rid of: 0-1

Major new characters: 1

Format change percentage: 10%

I didn’t take to the first episode of Bones. It all seemed just a little bit too silly compared with CSI (which is saying something). I’ve watched a few episodes of the first season since, and it’s still pretty ropey.

So I went into this with low expectations. Was I justified? Pretty much. I won’t say it was awful, but it’s still not a fantastic piece of television.

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Stargate SG-1: The one good thing about the 200th episode

4 September 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Okay, it was on a fortnight ago, but I thought I’d bring it up now, anyway. Stargate SG-1 recently celebrated its 200th episode. The plot was pretty much a retread of its 100th episode, but instead of a fake TV show based on the Stargate programme, the show brought back Willie Garson (Stanford from Sex and the City) to mess around with ideas for a fake Stargate movie instead.

Writing it down like that actually makes it sound like it had more plot than it had, since it was really just an excuse for the show’s producers to take the piss out of Stargate, other sci-fi shows and movies. It had all been done before and much better by that 100th episode I mentioned earlier, as well as (of all things) the Hercules: The Legendary Journeys episode Yes, Virginia, There is a Hercules, in which the cast played very unflattering versions of the show’s own production team (with Bruce Campbell playing an hilarious version of Rob Tapert, his real-life lifelong friend).

So I won’t dwell on it too long, except to mention that Richard Dean Anderson (MacGyver himself) made a welcome return appearance as Jack O’Neill, although most of the time as a puppet.

And there was also this rather good parody of Farscape, a series that starred Ben Browder and Claudia Black, who are both now stars of Stargate SG-1. Anything that mocks Farscape (or as we know it in our house, “The Silly Show”) has to be good as far as I’m concerned.

Just as a little background, Vala (Claudia Black) is busy suggesting ideas for films that she claims are based on her life, but are actually things she’s seen on the tele.

More good reviews for season four of The Wire

1 September 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

I’m going to keep going on about it, you know. You can’t stop me. Season four of The Wire, which begins a week on Sunday on HBO in the US – and comes to FX in the UK later this year – is getting some pretty great reviews from all the critics who have watched it.
Here’s another one, which includes juicy quotes such as:

The shows are so powerful – so well-written, acted, filmed and edited – that the experience of watching them has left me a complete wreck.

I am so blown away by this show that I will go out on a limb here to declare that these 13 episodes just might comprise the single finest piece of work ever produced for American TV.

And

…following the story of these four boys for 13 Sundays this fall will be one of the most rewarding experiences you’ve ever had watching TV.

I’m looking forward to it, anyway. Ways to play catch-up for UK and US viewers are listed on my last fawning entry on the subject.