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Okay, let’s try this again given my last 20 minutes work just deleted itself thanks to buggy software…
It’s “What have you been watching this week?”, your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched this week.
It’s been two weeks since the last one, which was entirely deliberate and because of the Christmas schedules and not because I was working or anything. Oh yes. Over that time, there’s actually been not much at all, so I’ve caught up with just about everything. So after the jump Ancient Worlds, The Apprentice, Being Erica, Burn Notice, Community, Dexter, Dirk Gently, Hellcats, Life Unexpected, Misfits, Peep Show, Running Wilde, The Trip and a big chunk of BBC4’s ‘The Glory of Greece’ season – Delphi: The Bellybutton of the World and Gods and Monsters: Homer’s Odyssey.
Continue reading “What have you been watching this week (w/e December 24)?”
Prequels are seemingly all the rage right now. The Hobbit‘s about to be filmed, Spartacus: Gods of the Arena is on Starz and Caprica has been and gone. And, of course, prequels have a long history on TV, in books, in theatre and the cinema: Star Wars infamously acquired itself three prequels and even a movie such as Romy & Michele’s High School Reunion (starring Lisa Kudrow and Mira Sorvino, two of my favourite actresses) managed to get itself a prequel (starring Katherine Heigl and Alex Breckenridge, two more of my favourite actresses*):
But – cue today’s question:
Is there a point to prequels?
While it can be fun to see how things came to pass and how characters came to be the way they are, you largely know how everything turns out. You know who survives, who ends up bad, who ends up good, etc. There are no real surprises. And usually, prequels are pretty awful.
So are prequels largely just writers’ background material stretched out into an actual story or do they have worth? And are there, in fact, any good prequels that you can think of?
As always, leave a comment with your answer or a link to your answer on your own blog
* Although I should point out that while KH and AB do do quite excellent impressions of Lisa Kudrow and Mira Sorvino respectively, they’re actually supposed to respectively be playing Mira Sorvino and Lisa Kudrow’s parts. Huh. Now there’s a scriptwriter and a director who weren’t paying attention.
In the US: Tuesdays, 9.30c/8.30c, Fox
Poor Alex Breckenridge. She never has much luck with Israeli imported TV formats, does she? One of the best things about both Dirt and Life Unexpected, she was also the best thing about The Ex-List, one of the first TV show formats to be imported by the US from Israel (the other being In Treatment). The Ex-List lasted all of four episodes before getting canned, but alas, poor Alex, she was in the pilot for Fox’s new rom com, Traffic Light, back when it was called Mixed Signals, and then she got recast. Not even an episode this time.
Still, if it’s any consolation to her now she’s on True Blood, this one looks like it’s going to last about four episodes too, especially since it’s currently in the practically-dead Running Wilde‘s time slot.
Based on the popular Israeli sitcom, Ramzor (which is apparently very funny if you can speak Hebrew), Traffic Light – which had a better title back when it was Mixed Signals – feels like an odd mix of a lot of the other rom-com sitcoms out there right now, particularly Rules of Engagement, Perfect Couples and Better With You. It sees three guys, one heavily married, one considering moving in with his girlfriend and one perpetually single, trying to navigate their friendships and their relationships, all while slightly disapproving, slightly dull women look at them as they mess up and embarrass themselves.
You know who else doesn’t have much luck with TV series these days? Kris Marshall – yes, him off the BT ads and My Family. He’s in this, too.
Cue two almost identical trailers, one with Alex, one without, all with Kris. By the way, these contain all but three of the jokes in the first episode, so you can save some time by watching them.
In the US: Mondays, 8.30/7.30c, CBS
CBS is the most popular of all US networks, but it does have an odd tendency. Whenever it has a successful show, it likes to create a backup in case things go wrong with it. So CSI spawned CSI: Miami and CSI: New York; NCIS got NCIS: LA; Criminal Minds is about to get Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior; and so on.
Sometimes, rather than create a simple spin-off, though, CBS likes to create a show similar to the original. So it is with Mad Love, a sneaky backup in case How I Met Your Mother gets corrupted. The basic premise is pretty much the same: two guys, two girls, two interesting, two not, and there are romantic complications. Here, Jason Biggs (American Pie), a very ordinary lawyer, meets Sarah Chalke (Scrubs), a very ordinary… actually, I missed what she did, but whatever it is, it’s probably very ordinary. Whatever – it’s love at first sight, there’s fireworks and everything.
Each has a much more interesting best friend: Tyler Labine (Reaper), an eccentric lawyer, and Judy Greer (Archer), a nanny who helps brain-dead trophy wives rear their kids. For them, it’s hate at first sight, but you just know that’s going to change.
And as is the trouble with carbon copies, it’s just not as good as the originals. In fact, against a backdrop of the likes of Traffic Light, Perfect Couples and Better With You, it’s a very pale copy that can barely raise a single laugh. Talking of Traffic Light, do you want to have a guess who was in the pilot but got recast again?
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