TV Round-Up: Flash Gordon

August 20, 2007 at 2:41 pm | In flash gordon, tv shows | Leave a Comment

Pride
…is what I wished they’d shown in this episode.

Instead, we got a muddled mess of an episode that alternated between dull and mind-numbingly dull. It’s not looking hopeful that this one is going to stay in my TV watching rotation too much longer.

I think the big issue the show is facing is that it’s struggling to find an identity. Does it want to have the same kind of self-deprecating humor that worked so well on Buffy, Angel and Firefly or does it want to play up the camp factor like Xena or Hercules or does it want to be a serious re-imagining of a campy idea from the past like Battlestar Galactica? Or is it trying to be all three at once and failing miserably on every account? I think the answer is more along the lines of the fourth choice.

You can see this show struggling with its identity in every scene. The thing with having the self-deprecating thing is the comments have to be a)funny and b)kind of insightful. And they’re not doing that here. Flash would do well to look at Buffy’s first season, when there were a lot of jokes and taking the mustard out of the old cliches of the genre, but it was all done to help us understand who the characters are and to set-up storylines and character arcs for the future. Here is feels like we’re getting a few random jokes thrown in because, golly, that sure worked well on Buffy and everyone seems to like that.

Part of where the show also suffers is that the two plotlines couldn’t be any more disjointed. After having every character on the show given a cursory introduction last week, the series wants and expects us to care about the characters and situations this week. And I can’t muster up any feelings for than, other than the female cast members are all visually pleasing to look at. Last week, Ming sent a female bounty hunter to take out Flash and the story ended with her trapped in our world. This week, she’s running around, creating havoc and doing…well, I’m not sure. Is she so devoted to Ming that she will still try and get the Imex back from Flash or bring him back to Mongo? Sure doesn’t seem that way since she moves into his house and doesn’t take a chance to go back to Mongo when she has it. Is she trying to escape her old life on Mongo? If so, then why not high-tail it out of town and away from where all the portals can open? And then in the end, why does she seemingly choose to join Flash’s merry band of people? Will she help him find his dad? Or is she just there to be the wacky, female-Worf wannabe of the show?

It’s all terribly, terribly confusing.

Meanwhile, over on Mongo, we’re trying to establish that Ming is evil. But we’re doing it in the least interesting way possible. I imagine when John Ralston got the role of Ming, he thought it might be…well, fun. In that way that Baltar on the original Battlestar Galactica was fun. But instead, we’ve got Ming the glorioius b*****d on this show. So, we capture a guy smuggling pure ice and he has to be executed. The only pure water on Mongo can be purchased from Ming. I am assuming this is how he hangs onto power. But then Aura asks him to save the guy because, hey, he was helping save his daughter. So, Ming helps the daughter but still kills dad. I suppose we’re supposed to feel outraged or go–man, that Ming is one bad dude in this scene. All I could go was–gee, Ming is a really, really boring villain. The thing with a good villian is he has to be absolutely convinced that he’s the hero of the show and I don’t get that feeling from Ming. To go back to the new BSG, if you went up and talked to Baltar, he’d tell you that everything he’s done is for a good reason and even though we may be horrified at it, we can sort of see the guy’s point. Not so much here with Ming. Instead it seems he wants to show off just how “evil” he can really be…or make sure Aura never asks a favor of him again.

And then there’s the whole–sending a bounty-hunter to get the bounty-hunter back. I still don’t quite get why Baraya is so important they have to bring her back.

So, unlike last week, when I was disappointed but had hope, this week I come away disappointed and wondering if I should even bother with the next episode. It may improve and they may be working out some kinks in these early episodes. Or these may be an indicator of things to come. I just can’t be sure and I’m not sure the show has done enough to make me really concerned if I see it or miss it.

TV Round-Up

August 11, 2007 at 10:47 pm | In flash gordon, rescue me, tv shows | Leave a Comment

Rescue Me: Solo
Thanks for the FX Rescue Me site, I knew before I watched the episode what the fate of baby Gavin would be. And while I’m not sure about the decision to give the baby to Sheila (seems like you’re trading one version of crazy for another here), I love the fall-out this decision had on the show. First, the fight with Janet, which we saw in the previews. But the most fascinating part of the show was watching Tommy’s ghosts give up on him and leave him. The entire first act of this one was some of the most dramatic and intense we’ve seen from Rescue Me all year.

Watching Tommy’s desperation to get into the bedroom to save his ghosts as well as his breakdown on the floor as they all screamed in agony was superb. Something else that fascinated me about this–Tommy convinces himself that he has to hit the bottle to knock himself out and drown out the screams of the ghosts in the fire. A superb performance by Dennis Leary here and I imagine this will be in the running for his Emmy submission next year.

Meanwhile, down at the firehouse, the guys are still acting like teenage boys. Here’s something I noticed–the only guy at the station acting with any sense of maturity is the new probie Sean. Seeing him show genuine concern for Tommy and offering to be a friend, while all the other guys acted like fools and gossiped about what harm had befallen Tommy was interesting.

And I’ve got to ask this–why was the new chief so hot for someone to take out his daughter? And is Tommy really the best choice? I mean, as a father, do you want your daughter who is in therapy seeing the guy who is a serial liar and in the midst of a divorce and a hormone imbalance on legs? Seems to me you’d want to steer your daughter way clear of this guy….

Things should get interesting from here. I can’t see Janet letting Sheila keep the baby. And if Tommy isn’t the father, what right does he have to hand the baby over to Sheila? Personally, I think there’s a huge crossover just waiting to happen here–Janet or Tommy could hire Patty Hewes from Damages to be his or her lawyers. How cool would that be?

Flash Gordon: Pilot
Flash Gordon’s first episode suffers a lot from “pilot-itis.” It throws everything and the kitchen sink into the episode. In the course of 90 minutes, we meet all the characters who will appear in the eventual opening credits and set up the entire situation and story arc. And it all feels so rushed that we never have any time to build any sense of connection or interest in the characters. Oh sure, all the players look pretty, but beyond that there’s not much else.

So, we find out that Flash’s dad vanished earlier in his life, left him behind some kind of secret databank that Ming wants and that there are portal from our world to Mongo. Oh and we also set up at least two or three love triangles. Ask yourself this-did Dale’s fiancee serve any other purpose in the story other than to be a potential love triangle? Couldn’t we have left him out until the next episode and had Dale say–oh I’m engaged. Then we meet him next week after we’ve had some time to want to root for Dale and Flash to be together and build some chemistry between these two.

And I also have to wonder at what point we’ll find out the portals can go to other worlds. Otherwise if it’s just a trip from Earth to Mongo and vice-versa, that is going to get old fast.

It also didn’t help that the script was a bit predictable. Gee, could they have telegraphed more that Princess Aura wasn’t exactly who she claimed. As if it weren’t obvious enough, we had Dale saying “Gee, she’s not all she appears Flash,” while Flash doesn’t listen. Until it’s too late and she comes to steal the IMEX (I kept thinking they were trying to find the IMAX theater in town to catch a movie….not good). And here’s another thing–so, Ming is the ruler of Mongo and he’s a bad guy. Why? Because he’s got the good water and all the other water on Mongo is bad. Yeah, not exactly the greatest motivation for a bad guy…..of course, as I said before, we get such a touch and go couple of scenes with Ming that it’s hard to really care that much either way. He’s a bad guy because the script says he is….and there’s not much more to it than that.

That said, I think this series has potential. Hopefully the next few episodes will settle down and start to develop these characters a bit. (Don’t even get me started on the female bounty hunter who comes to our world, gets trapped here and Flash allows her to drive off in a truck). I’ll watch during the summer but come fall with all the new genre choices on the horizon, this one may fall of my radar.

Blog at WordPress.com. | Theme: Pool by Borja Fernandez.
Entries and comments feeds.