Monsters of Television

“How I know is inconsequential. That I know is significant.”

Dear Zack Whedon,

Allow me to thank you for “Look to the Ant,” the most recent episode of Rubicon. While I’ve been enjoying the show from episode 1, I’ve felt a little like Will in conversations about it. I’m convinced that Rubicon is a very good show, but I’ve had trouble of really convincing people of that, in much in the same way that I’m sure Will feels he can’t convince anyone of the conspiracy he’s currently trying to solve.

While I’ve pointed to the past couple of episodes, particularly “Keep the Ends Out” and “Connect the Dots,” as signs of life in the series, as hints of why people who are in the fence should keep watching, I think I’ll start using “Look to the Ant” as the episode that tells people why Rubicon works. Read more »

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“It’s all I have. That, and my ideas.”

Sorry everyone, but with Nick moving to Los Angeles tomorrow (perhaps to see his cancer-stricken ex-wife or have a Fellini-inspired romp with a girl), it means I get to review this week’s Mad Men. Happily, I’ve been enjoying this current season far more than I did the seasons leading up to it. The season thus far has given me exactly what I wanted: more ad agency goodness and Don Draper coming apart at the seams. But no pears yet.

However, that hot streak was doomed to die at some point, and it drank itself to death with “Waldorf Stories.” If anything, it gave me too much of what I wanted from the show, as Don’s descent in being a useless jackass is ever closer to rock bottom, and I find myself almost feeling sorry for Don.

But not as sorry as I do feel for Peggy. Read more »

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“You do not get to lie to me anymore!“

Burn Notice comes to a summer close, with new episodes back in November, including the couple of extra episodes USA tacked into the show this season. But those are in November, so we have to wait a bit, I’m afraid. However, this break will give us (or at least me) time to decide about how I should be thinking about Burn Notice. As things stand right now, I find myself where I tend to myself at the halfway point of every season: not caring a lick about the show.

I suppose, at this point, I should probably get over myself and just accept the fact that Burn Notice isn’t going to alter its formula one iota. It save me from writing the same thing over and over again and probably enjoy the show more. But “Guilty as Charged” pretty much sent me over the edge on Thursday, and I have only just now recovered. Read more »

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“You missed a button.”

If you’ve been struggling with Rubicon then last week’s episode was probably a breath of fresh of air for you. The pacing picked up a little bit, and some of the characters surrounding Will were developed more. With “Connect the Dots,” it seems like the change in showrunners has taken a firm root within the show now, as the past two episodes are only vaguely like the first three in terms of aesthetics and pacing.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the changes that are in play with the show. Most, I suspect, will say they are for the better, but I feel a bit sad that it’s been two episodes now and I’ve barely had any of Will staring at a wall for 3 minutes straight. I miss it already. Read more »

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“Bet you never saw this coming.”

Oh, sure, he can figure who the father is.

Talking about the whole episode seems a little bit pointless, but since the entire episode (and of course the other episodes) were building to this. Indeed, as I told Ms. Monster of Television (girlfriend, not wife), deadlines are a key way to create suspense, and they do a terrific job in this episode. But they also constantly remind you that you’re so close yet so far to finding out who Moriarty is. And that can be infuriating.

Solving  the bombing cases was a pretty obvious ploy, a distraction (as Ms. Monster of Television figured out before I did), but the ploy makes for both an exciting and tiring episode, and with all that that entails. Countdowns and ticking clocks make for easy suspense (we’ve been using them for how long now?), and you pile it on with multiple micro-cases that allows us one last glimpse into how smart Sherlock is, the episode chugs along at a very pleasant pace (unlike “The Blind Banker”), but the deadlines and bombs and the cases make the episode feel a bit overstuffed (there’s clearly no pleasing me, is there?). Read more »

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“I hate us.”

“Keep the Ends Out” is probably the dullest episode of TV I’ve seen in a while. It’s a struggle to get through and it was a struggle to write anything about. “The Outsider” is perhaps aptly name since it pushes back whatever conspiracy Will is investigating to the backburner as he and Spangler visit D.C. to shore up API’s standing with powerbrokers there. If “Keep the Ends Out” made me wonder why I was watching, “The Outsider,” at the very least, reassured me that the show can be engaging and interesting.

That said, both episodes still work through notions of grief and guilt, ideas that I feel are central to the show far more than any 4-leaf clover based conspiracy. Read more »

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“You’re a star. It’s just obvious.”

Three words for you: demographics, demographics, demographics. But more on those three words in a moment.

If the entire competition essentially boils down to who has the best pilot, and it seems to have done that, I must wonder why the show just didn’t do a tournament style pilot structure, showing pilot after pilot to focus groups, with the last pilot standing being the winner. I know that past performance weighed into the decision, but I’m willing to bet that the response of the focus group gave weighed in even more. Read more »

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“I see unstable minds think alike.”

Burn Notice, why do you keep doing this to me? Better still, why do I keep thinking you’ll change? I know that you don’t bother devoting episodes to your seasonal arcs until the end of the season (and sometimes not even then), so why do I keep expecting you to do it before that? It’s frustrating, especially when the procedural element you elect to focus on is, well, dull and relatively stakes free.

A part of the problem is that, oddly, I bought into the USA promos, which basically showed every Simon scene (really, it did), and thought that Michael and Simon dueling for information would be the episode, not the cold open and the tag. I don’t know what caused this sudden bout of naïveté, but trust me when I tell you that I don’t have high hopes for seeing a lot of Robert Patrick next week.

…Okay, so I do, but it’s only because I love Robert Patrick. I mean, who doesn’t? Read more »

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“You are all my mortal enemies.”

A couple of a weeks ago, I skewered FNS for doing a supper club challenge because I don’t perceive Food Network as being a foodie channel. This week, they decide synergize their programming (this show is pretty good at it, I have to admit), with a Iron Chef America challenge. This makes sense for their penultimate episode, as well as a way to plug a new episode of ICA that follows it. However, where the super club challenge was a mistake as a branding issue, an ICA challenge is a weird challenge to throw at people who aren’t established and sure of themselves chefs.

It’s certainly a way to test someone’s mettle, but I feel like it’s a little unfair to the chefs, and it’s a poor way to decide who your final three are. Read more »

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“FROM ONE PAWN TO ANOTHER.”

“THEY HIDE IN PLAIN SIGHT.”

Rubicon thus far, is an interesting study in just how much genre and style matter. Its slow burning, methodological pace and meandering characters reminded me of Mad Men in a number of ways (no idea if this is an AMC thing since I haven’t seen an episode of Breaking Bad, but now have plenty of time to catch up on it). Mad Men’s high modernist-influenced slice of life approach infuriated me to no end because it wasn’t that nothing happened, but that so little happened that I cared about to characters I couldn’t care about, and it happened very slowly.

Rubicon, on the other hand….well…there’s nothing to spoil because nothing has happened, also kind of like Mad Men (consider that my comment on Matthew Weiner’s idiotic mentality toward spoilers). But I find myself engaged with these two episodes even though very little happens, and the characters are not exactly complicated or willing to say things out loud. From it’s set design to its sound mixing (which has been accused of looking cheap, but I say is very purposeful) to the drab costuming and opaque plot developments, Rubicon embraces the 1970s spy thriller film, and doesn’t look back (or at least I hope it doesn’t). Read more »

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