Monday, June 28, 2010

Downfall is truly a downfall

It's been a while since a show has made me this sad for humanity. Last week, I somehow caught an episode of the new game show Downfall. It truly is an American show. Basically they throw stuff off the top of a building while a contestant tries to answer questions as quickly as possible. What they are throwing off the building are the prizes they could win so it's not little things. It's dining room tables, golf clubs, stereos, and even cars. Sometimes if you press the panic button, you can have a friend thrown off the building (not intentionally and of course the person is tethered for safety). Now according to the website, they use replicas of these prizes which makes it a little bit better but not much.

The whole concept is really ... arrogant. The whole idea of throwing larges items off a building for no good reason. Especially considering the whole economic recession that we all just went through. Even Japanese game shows, as bizarre as they are, are more about embarrassing the contestants than wanton destruction. Just seems all so unnecessary and screaming of American capitalism. I know it's hard to come up with good game shows but this is just taking it too far.

I really hope it doesn't take off.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Undying Love for Bryan Fuller

If there is one person I wish were Canadian it would be Bryan Fuller. He is my TV hero. If I could, I would write novels like Douglas Coupland but I would write TV like Bryan Fuller.

If you don't know Mr. Fuller, you really should get to know him. He created (or co-created) Wonderfalls, Dead Like Me and Pushing Daisies. All are rather fantasy type shows with a lot of humour. Inanimate objects talk to a person, there's a group of grim reapers who release your soul from your body before you die and a piemaker is able to bring things back to life temporarily. It may sound weird but you've got some get premises for shows right there.

In a way though, Fuller is like a Canadian. Despite how fabulous all his shows are, and especially how critically acclaimed Pushing Daisies was, none of them lasted for more than two seasons (poor Wonderfalls actually only aired for 4 episodes before it was cut). I can't really explain it. I mean, I know that they were kind of oddball and out there but they are all among my favourite shows. Stylistically Pushing Daisies was the most different but still had the dark undertones to it but the humour remained the same throughout them all.

Fuller is just underappreciated. And I cannot express how happy I am that Heroes is over and he's back to developing a new series: Sellevision, based on a novel by Augusten Burroughs. And I know I will be sitting here patiently, waiting for it to air.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Newsroom

I recently acquired the second season of the Newsroom on DVD. Having never seen the show before and not really knowing too much about it, I was excited. And I did quite enjoy it.

It has kind of the awkwardness of Extras which is something I always love. The more awkwardness a show presents, the more I like it. But it's a cynical type look at the inner workings of a news broadcast. More specifically, the people who decide what is going to be on the news. George, the executive producer, is the perfect anti-hero who you love to hate. I just like how seamlessly they go from talking about really important things to random things in their lives. It's perfect. There's no change in tone or voice or anything.

It is a little slow and I can see how it didn't last long since it's not the type of show that would bring in a huge audience. But it is a really interesting show. I just hope I can get my grubby little hands on the rest of the series soon.

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Shows I will probably never watch again

Back before I started the challenge, I thought it would be nice to take a break from shows that I ended up watching all the time like Friends or The Simpsons. I figured I would return to them, happy to see them again and it would be like it was new again.

Which is not what happened. In fact, I have only tried to watch Friends, The Simpsons and Family Guy each once. In doing so, I realized that I've seen them all so many times that even one year is not enough time to take a break from them. I just sighed and moved on to something else. I was actually kind of sad because I used to genuinely enjoy these shows but now I just feel indifferent to them. Given the choice, I'd rather not watch them.

It made me wonder why we tend to just watch shows over and over again when there are so many different shows out there that we could be watching. And with so many shows that I still want to see, I don't see the point in watching something I've already seen 10 times anymore. There is so much great Canadian TV out there that I could be watching.

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Splice

On Sunday afternoon we decided to go see a movie so we saw Splice. Now this isn't exactly a good Sunday afternoon movie since it left us all feeling rather uncomfortable.

From the director of Cube, I was expecting a scary sci-fi movie. My siblings seemed to think it would be sad. I was counting more on frightening just based on the clips I had seen of it. I can't really go into detail without giving it away but Splice went to a lot of places that I had not prepared myself for. It went a lot further than I thought it was going to (which isn't surprising since it was a Canada-France co-production. I should have been more prepared than I was). I was so sure that one scene was a dream since what was happening was so horrific but no, it was actually happening. And things just went further and further from there.

Now, the best part of the movie was watching the audiences' reaction. There was one specific incidence where every person in the audience reacted and started shifting around in their chairs. Everyone was just that uncomfortable (still even more happened after that). It was just interesting to watch everyone try to understand and deal with what was happening in the movie. Rarely have I seen the whole theatre react that way (it was even more extreme than the theatre-wide weeping during i am sam).

I don't want to discourage anyone from seeing it. It was a really interesting film and is definitely worth seeing but it does get a bit ... troublesome at times but isn't that what movies should do sometimes? It's definitely a movie that sticks with you.