| 27 January 2012
Highlights
Fox’s Alcatraz was one of the more anticipated midseason shows, and for my money, it was well worth the wait. A smooth mix of prison drama, police procedural, X Files-ish sci-fi mystery and character driven office-politics drama, Alcatraz blends its many elements expertly into a show with a foreboding atmosphere, intelligent plots, sharply drawn characters and a long-story mystery that piques your curiosity.
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The premise of the show is that back in the ‘60s, when Alctraz was closed for good, 300+ hardened criminal vanished into thin air. Now they’re coming back one by one. San Francisco cop Rebecca Madsen (Sarah Jones) stumbles upon the Alcatraz connection to one of the men and enlists the aid of academician and comic book writer Diego Soto (Jorge Garcia), who has an encyclopedic knowledge of Alcatraz’ history, including all of the inmates imprisoned there. When they get too close to uncovering more of the story, they’re intercepted by tight-lipped federal agent and former Alcatraz officer Emerson Hauser (Sam Neill). He tells them just enough of the story to get them to join his team. Madsen and Soto pair up to work the street angle of the cases as each new criminal returns from. . .the past? oblivion?. . .while Hauser plays machiavellian puppet master behind the scenes.
Alctraz’ Odd Pairing: Jones with Garcia
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Sam Neill is terrific. If you can remember that speech he gave in Jurassic Park to scare the kid who made fun of the velociraptor, that’s the Sam Neill you get here: laid back and slightly menacing, leaving you not sure if he’s a good guy with bad motives or a bad guy with good ones. But the real eye-openers here are Jones and Garcia, who have terrific chemistry as an odd couple cop partnership. Moreover, Alcatraz skillfully plays against type. Madsen is a tough, loner female detective, but instead of pairing her with another tough female detective or a male detective who can’t handle her femaleness or toughness, they put her with a regular citizen, Soto, who automatically defers to her expertise when it comes to tracking down criminals. Soto is a bona fide geek, but for once his value to the crime-fighting team has nothing to do with some uncanny ability to manipulate computers. Instead he’s just a guy who happens to be the foremost expert in what would otherwise have been a somewhat useless historical oddity. Garcia’s character is our chance to see how a more or less regular person would deal with being put in the middle of a mysterious, dangerous conspiracy.
Alcatraz has a ton of backstory yet to reveal, and slips in just enough hints to let us know that the long story, whatever it is, is going to be a doozy. For the first episodes, however, Alcatraz has smartly refined the relationships between its characters through its police procedural elements. Part of each episode is also told in prison-flashback, and the change in Alcatraz itself from a dead rock to a living, breathing, somewhat creepy prison works both atmospherically and as a plot device.
Eventually, Alcatraz will have to make more of a leap forward in the sci-fi mystery so the audience doesn’t get annoyed or hopelessly confused, but so far, the show seems to have a great sense of just how much to advance the story at any given time. I’m looking forward to seeing where they take it.
Lost Girl, Syfy’s Canadian import, has a real sense of fun lurking behind it, and I can only assume that as I get further into the series, it will become more prevalent. Lost Girl is the story of Bo (Anna Silk), a wanderer who lives on the street, periodically feeding on the life energy of unsuspecting victims. A few drawbacks to this are that Bo doesn’t know why she does this and doesn’t know how to disengage before her meal drops dead. As a result, she tends to leave a trail of corpses in her wake. This attracts the attention of a supernatural underworld community called the Fae. The Fae are broken into two factions, dark and light, and comprise all assortment of supernatural beings, including Bo, who’s a succubus, in case you were wondering.
The Fae want Bo to pick a side, but she’s been on her own her whole life, so she chooses instead to stay neutral and carve out her fortune with human friend and fellow wanderer Kenzi (the eye-opening Ksenia Solo). The two form a detective agency, but have to be ever vigilant not to upset the applecart, lest The Fae revoke their permission for Bo to remain a free agent.
Anna Silk & Ksenia Solo
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Silk and Solo make a good team. Silk works her tough-gal bravado while Solo creates a truly unique character: a wise-cracking emo-pixie Robin to Silk’s Batman. The chemistry between the two fuels the show - and makes the otherwordly strangeness of The Fae and the depressing street-life setting palatable.
Lost Girl works well as a doesn’t-take-itself-too-seriously girl power comic book. More on point: it’s been nearly 10 years since Buffy The Vampire Slayer last aired, and this is the first show in a long time to make a play to be its worthy successor.
When It comes to Parks & Recreation, NBC’s Office-style sitcom about municipal government workers in a small town, I’ll admit I’m late to the party. For a couple of years this show has been making “Best Of” lists, but I didn’t really connect to it until this season. I think it’s because I so love the storyline involving perennial underdog Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) finally seizing hold of her love life and career and going out and kicking butt (and sort of screwing up along the way, but that’s the fun of it).
Of course, that’s only part of the equation. The story has just seem to come into much better focus ever since the maniacally happy and funny Rob Lowe joined the cast, and watching these many interweaving parts work their magic is a delight. My personal favorites are “slightly off” couple April & Andy (Aubrey Plaza & Chris Pratt), and the obliviously happy bubble they live in.
A funny and solid supporting cast is more than Poehler needs to be hilarious, and she has been all season. After leaving the safety of Saturday Night Live for sitcom television and living through several ratings-challenged season, plucky Poehler and her feisty little show are finally kicking some butt, just like her character.
Quick Takes
The Oscar nominations were submitted this week and, predictably, included a few regrettable omissions. Surely, Bridesmaids deserved at least a nomination for Best Picture and I was sad to see Joseph Gordon-Levitt ignored for Best Actor. I was especially dismayed that Nicholas Refn’s terrific direction in Drive was overlooked. That said, Bridesmaids did earn a nomination for screenplay, and I was pleased to see Hugo in the Best Picture category, Rooney Mara nominated for her performance in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and Moneyball earn an adapted screen play nomination.
Reality Check: ABC’s fascinating reality show What Would You Do, combined with the innovative Shark Tank on Friday nights, forms what is probably the most intelligent pairing in reality television. What Would You Do is wonderfully simple and straightforward. Using a hidden camera, the producers create a “moral dilemma.” They are nothing too exotic. They may have a boyfriend screaming at his girlfriend in public or someone picking up a wallet an old guy dropped and making off with it and seeing if regular people on the street intervene. The hidden cam sequences are rather invigorating, but the most satisfying moments of the show occur when they interview folks after the deception is over and get their reactions to what they saw and offer explanations for what they did. The show also sometimes “changes up” their own scenarios, replacing, a mother and daughter with a father and son, to see if people’s reactions change. Best of all: no celebrities or “reality TV stars” or gimmicks. Just real people facing real world situations that anyone might see tomorrow.
You’d think creating one of the most successful franchises of all time and getting to make movies for a living (which is sort of a dream job, no?) would provide all of the self-esteem one person would ever need, but apparently not for Star Wars creator George Lucas. Asked if he would make the last trilogy in the envisioned nine-picture series, Lucas replied, “Why would I make any more when everybody yells at you all the time and says what a terrible person you are?” That’s it, George. Take a shot at your fans. Take a shot at people who LOVED your frigging movies so much that they took it personally and went overboard when they felt the second set of three wasn’t as good as the first. Then claim you won’t make more as a punishment! You know who doesn’t get “yelled at” or “called a terrible person?” The guys who made Men In Black 2; Miss Congeliality 2: Armed and Fabulous; Braddock: Missing in Action 3; or Porky’s 3: Porky’s Revenge. You know why, George? Because even though people may have liked the original movies, they didn’t love them. They didn’t go see them 19 times. They didn’t make the guy who created them a multi-millionaire either. I understand that George Lucas got a lot of grief he probably didn’t deserve just because Jar Jar Binks was annoying, but considering all the adoration heaped upon the Star Wars franchise, I think he owes his fans an apology.
Educational TV: Things we learned from TV this week: 1) Fairytale castles have service entrances (Once Upon A Time); 2) After you see your doctor, he kicks back with a buddy and they both light cigars off a flaming $100 bill (House); 3) “Gonna tear the cape off her Batman” is an expression people use (Royal Pains).
On last week’s Real Time With Bill Maher, two of the guests were former Louisiana Republican Governor Buddy Roemer, a true populist, and Independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, a true progressive. These guys had a strong level of agreement about what the real problems facing this country were, and not too much agreement on the best way to fix them. But instead of a lot of stupid extremist talking points and borderline name-calling, they engaged in a fact-based debate so pointed and concise, it was more informative and news-worthy than anything I’ve seen on the actual news in at least a year.
Admit It: Even if you like cats, this story (about poison Chinese cat stew) is funny.
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Not sure why, but learning that Maurice Sendak, author of the beloved children’s classic Where The Wild Things Are, is a gravelly voiced cynical curmudgeon with a wicked sense of humor makes me laugh my ass off. So did Stephen Colbert’s two part interview with him this week, which was both enlightening and hilarious.
I’ve got another book plug for you: read Mindy Kaling’s fun collection of her life’s reflections Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me. It’s got just the right mix of show biz anecdotes, growing up different and single gal in the city musings. Plus, as Mindy herself points out, you can finish it in two sittings, max.
Looking Ahead:
Luck, HBO’s drama about horse racing which stars Dustin Hoffman and Nick Nolte, premieres on January 29.
Current TV continues to build its weeknight lineup by adding The War Room at 9:00 p.m., debuting on January 30. The show will be hosted by former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, a veteran of political talk shows like Meet the Press and Hardball and politically themed entertainment shows like Real Time With Bill Maher and The Daily Show.
It’s Michael Jackson week on Glee, on January 31. As I’ve long said, any episode of Glee will never be better than the music that’s featured in it, so this one should be terrific.
True Blood’s Joe Manganiello guests on White Collar on USA on January 31.
Ringer returns from hiatus to air new episodes on the CW, starting January 31.
Comedy Central’s sketch comedy Key & Peele, which will look to take a “Chappelle’s Show-like” look at race, politics and culture, debuts on January 31.
Fixer Zoe Morgan (Paige Turco) turns back up on Person of Interest on February 2.
TV’s a big place and I haven’t been to all of it yet. Got a favorite show you’d like me to comment on? Post a comment below, contact me on twitter @RobLazlo. or shoot me an email:
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