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EVA

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I guess I'll start us off by talking up THE BRIDGE on FX. I enjoyed it. Not as much as THE AMERICANS pilot, but I'll stick around to see where it's going. In fact, I think I'm a lot more interested in how they're already selling season 2 in interviews (THE WIRE: EL PASO) than the murder mystery this season is built around.

Elsewhere, AMC is running a RECTIFY marathon this Sunday. I think that might be a better use of one's Sunday night than suffering through another hour of THE NEWSROOM.

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For those unaware, AMC has been running marathons of Breaking Bad late Friday nights, starting from the begining.  They are mid-season two now, but if you are thinking of jumping in and don't have Netflix, it is at a point you can still catch up relatively easily.  Five episodes airing late tonight. 

 

 

I guess I'll start us off by talking up THE BRIDGE on FX. I enjoyed it. Not as much as THE AMERICANS pilot, but I'll stick around to see where it's going.

 

Agreed.  I loved how weird & out of touch that chick was.  When she was telling that dude his wife died and her only "bedside manner" was offering him water (in his house) was the best. 

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I like how they didn't slap you in the face with what her "condition" is by not naming it.  You only really need  to know how it manifests itself in relation to her job.  She doesn't have the ability for empathy and had to be reminded to make eye contact and also to not change her shirt in the squad room.

 

Is anybody else enjoying this season of The Killing?  I think it's the best so far.  They are throwing out a lot less red herring suspects/clues.

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I like how they didn't slap you in the face with what her "condition" is by not naming it.  You only really need  to know how it manifests itself in relation to her job.  She doesn't have the ability for empathy and had to be reminded to make eye contact and also to not change her shirt in the squad room.

 

Is anybody else enjoying this season of The Killing?  I think it's the best so far.  They are throwing out a lot less red herring suspects/clues.

Question about The Killing. Do I need to have seen the first 2 seasons to watch the 3rd? Does it give anything away from the Rosie Larson story?

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No, it is an entirely new case and doesn't mention the Rosie Larson case, as far as I remember.  But, there are elements of Holder and Linden's characters that are referenced to the first 2 seasons.  It's not necessary that you have seen the other seasons, because you can probably pick up what they are talking about from the context, but it helps.

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I was bored with Board being down and ended watching the first half of Chicago Fire's first season. Now I'm looking forward to watching the rest of it. It ain't the greatest but it is very watchable. Chistopher Eigenberg as Hermann is by far my favorite character. Its kinda like the family friendly version of Rescue Me

 

James

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While the board was down, I noticed that Comcast was offering season 1 of the Newsroom via On Demand.  I was a little hesitant to invest much time in it.,  I've heard very little good about it, but I generally like Sorkin, love the first few seasons of West Wing, and agree with Sorkin's politics, so I figured it was worth a look.

 

I was wrong.  I know there are much worse tv shows out there, but I can't recall a high profile, big-name creator show that I've liked less.  Wow.  There are glimpses of greatness in the dialogue (always a Sorkin strength) and the points he makes, but, as a scripted drama, it fell flat for me.  I think the big weakness is that none of the characters come off as real, organic people.  I feel like even the two leads were ciphers.  Sorkin spent so much time grinding political axes and coming up with clever dialogue that the drama between the characters never develops.

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So I acquired all ten seasons of Smallville almost a year ago and sparingly watched an episode here and there. The first few episodes I very much got a Buffy with looser story telling vibe. In the fact that it was just monster of the week type stuff. Buffy had the master arc stuff and I guess Clark has the Lex story arc. It bothers me that EVERY villian in Smallville throughout the first season is connected to the meteors. Its a gimmick that wears very thin over 20 episodes. 

 

Overall the first season should have been half as long as it was with a lot of the monster of the weeks cut out. The end of the season starts to get pretty good and I'll give it another season to get some semblance of a story or goals or something more than random people turn evil when the meteors give them super powers. They seem to be onto something with Lex maybe knowing there is at the very least something special about Clark. I just don't want to watch five monster of the week episodes to get one story heavy episode. The show was on the air for ten years and I know its the CW but I would think that business would have to pick up a lot in order for even the CW to justify a decade on the air. 

 

In other news I'm excited about the third season of Franklin and Bash its a fun show that from what I understand has nearly gotten cancelled due to low ratings for two years in a row now. 

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Smallville suddenly got really good in season 3, iirc, and then started working it's way back down.  I gave up in season 6, but I've heard that the last two or three seasons were an improvement.

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I tried to take an interest in Smallville, but the only episodes I liked were the introduction of Impulse and the Justice Society episodes. From what I understand, the Society ep is one of the highest rated of the series yet they seem to be adamant that costumes don't draw, which imo is a disappointment.

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Anyone else watch Defiance on SyFy?  I wasn't interested when it debuted, but I started watching the early episodes via On Demand.  Just watched the last two eps this weekend.  Curious to know what people think.  I wasn't hooked on it, but the pieces are there to make a very good show.  Hopefully, S2 has some sharper writing.  They did a decent job making a fairly large cast interesting and unique, but character development seemed to come in fits and starts.  They'd start to go somewhere with a character, then the plotline would end abruptly or the character wouldn't get much screen time for a few weeks. 

 

The father-daughter relationship between Nolan and Irisa is probably the best developed element on the show, but the "Irisa has a destiny" thing doesn't interest me much.  It could, if they go somewhere unique with it, but it feels like something we've seen many times before.

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I stuck through Defiance for the first 3 episodes, I liked the idea, just not the execution.  I especially liked the females, it just seemed really slow from a story telling point of view.  I will probably go back to it later on, but its people like me that will probably get it cancelled.

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Watching Dawson's Creek on Netflix. The show fell off a cliff in season 3 when Kevin Willamsan left. From my memories of watching on TBS, it recovers a bit. Checking later, it aired at the same time as Buffy Season 4. This was a bad time for the WB first string. 

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The misses and I are slowly making our way through Friday Night Lights. Just finished Season 3. It's high, high, high on my list as my favorite show of all-time. No show has ever rendered such emotion from me on a consistent basis -- I have probably cried at some point during every episode. The Wire certainly impacted my life quite a bit (especially Season 4) but I also like watching television to escape from the fact that we live in a world that is really crappy for a lot of people.I love that FNL isn't afraid to have happy endings. On top of it, all of their happy endings have been completely earned and feel genuine. Smash's smile when he gets the scholarship, Tyra's acceptance letter are all completely perfect. They're characters I root for and get to see have personal victories.The show also has so many great epic moments. Tyra's college essay while they have the cuts to other people's scenes is absolutely amazing television. So are all the great Coach talks. But the best scenes are in the little moments -- Grandma Saracen and Julie holding hands before Matt's last game, Coach twirling around some little kid at a pick-up game outside Smash's apartment, the Riggins boys rasslin' after the truck breaks down, etc.I really didn't mind the Season 2 silliness either that everyone hates. I mean, it's a dumb sub-plot obviously shoehorned in by some network exec the producers had to cave in on to stay on the air. But Tyra and Landry -- ESPECIALLY Landry -- acted the hell out of crappy material.

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