Friday, January 31, 2014

Supes & Scifi Represent!

Alex



Good god, I leave for a little while and come back only to find that aside from "American Horror Story," there's pretty much no love on this blog for all the freaks and geeks out there! We need some science fiction and some supernatural chaos up in this beast!




I will start by saying that this fall marked my grand re-entry into regular television viewing. I became too disheartened by all the cancellations to put myself through that again, so I took a hiatus. From television. Movies and web series seemed to be the safer bet, but alas, I was too tempted by all the awesome-looking new shows to stay away this year. I will say right now that man, I'm glad I got my feet wet again!



Let's start with Mondays, shall we?



First, I must give kudos to the show that brought me back to television:



Sleep Hollow!

When I saw the previews for this show my first thought was that it was going to be awful, but in that kind of way that would make if funny and therefore entertaining to watch. Omg, I was so wrong! It's entertaining, alright, but for entirely different reasons. There is humor, but it's clever humor brought on by Ichabod's quips about having to live in today's society (his experience with energy drinks and the internet were the best scenes ever!). More than that, there's lots of action, tons of fun historical references and facts mixed with fantastical and mythical elements, creepy critters done with real makeup instead of being overloaded with CG fakeness, lots of clues and puzzles and foreshadows dropped along the way that must be paid attention to, and, most surprising of all, this show has a tendency to scare the pants off of me when least expected! Now normally I don't do horror, but that element combined with everything else great about this show just sort of becomes the icing on the cake. They definitely deserved to be the first in the fall lineup that got flagged for a new season, and I can't wait to see it!

Second in line was a late bloomer in the fall season, but definitely worth the wait:



Almost Human

Robots and Karl Urban? How could you possibly go wrong with that? Yeah. You can't. With the pilot episode starting off leading us straight into gunfights and explosions, followed by some Karl Urban snark, a little android murder, the introduction of Dorian the "bleeding heart" bot, some people getting their faces melted off, and good times action had by all (except for maybe the characters that were dying), this show was destined to become a favorite of mine right out of the gate. Week after week it's failed to disappoint, giving me that good mix of action, comedy, angst, and violence that I do so adore, topped off with the kinds of futuristic effects that give my scifi nerd side the happy feels. It's also been much fun (and kind of touching, if my girlier side is allowed to throw in her two cents), to watch Kennex (Urban) shift from acting more like an android than the actual android to allowing himself to feel and act human again thanks to his robot partner. Dorian could not possibly be more adorable, yet badass at the same time, if he tried. We'll consider the box for "awesome robot show" to be checked off the TV bucket list with this one.

My third favorite Monday night show (not at all in that order) is not a new series, but rather one that I should've introduced myself to much sooner:



Being Human



(SPOILER ALERT!)



I had always meant to watch this from the start, considering my love of werewolves and ghosties portrayed not in a typical horror sense, but I just never really got around to it. After my roommate insisted that I give it a go, and after watching Sam Huntington being generally adorable in "Dylan Dog," I decided that I might as well take a peek at the pilot episode. Yeah, that one little curious peek became a Thursday-Sunday marathon of endless Netlfix watching, only coming up for air for other, less important things like food or my job or taking my poor dogs out to pee. This was the first show in a long time that I could not make myself break away from until I was fully caught up to the newly premiered fourth season, and thus far the new episodes have me thinking that it'll be the best season yet! With my favorite character, Josh (Sam Huntington), being stuck in half-werewolf mode, Aidan's past wife coming back to slaughter anything with fangs, and Sally going all super ghost/witch mode, I find myself being frustrated that I now have to wait a full week between episodes. I want to go back to the hours of seamless viewing instead of screaming, "Oh crap!" at the end of every Monday. Now I know how people who watch soap operas feel. I need more of the gore and the anguish and the surprises and the pain, and that little bit of humor between the characters that I adore so much. I need it now. Why is it not Monday yet???



Oh, right, because now that the full slate that is Monday epicness is over we can move on to the rest of the week.



On Tuesday nights we have the other show that spearheaded my return to television:



Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.



I will start this little blurb with a reminder that I love comics, especially Marvel comics, and for the most part I'm a gigantic geek fan of the Marvel movie universe. I also happen to love pretty much all things Whedon. That being said, I was super stoked to learn about this show hitting the air, and even had my own countdown set for the premiere, which I very much enjoyed. Then came the second episode...then the third...and I found myself feeling a tad disappointed, to be honest. While I wasn't under the same impression of so many other would-be fans that the show would be full of Marvel superheroes, admittedly I was not overly impressed by some of the plots and characters. Luckily things have picked up in more recent episodes, and I feel like I may have been right in my belief that (like other Whedon projects of the past), the show just needed a little time to get off the ground. I haven't even been super annoyed by Skye (the series' leading lady) like I was for the first several episodes. So, with the disappointment and subpar plots and a character I couldn't really previously stand, why did I and do I still not only stick with the show, but also kind of love it? First, I enjoy the bigger Marvel breadcrumbs that get dropped here and there, like playing a really obvious game of Where's Waldo for those of us fans of both the Avengers movies and the comics. Second, I missed Coulson, and it's fun having him back. Third, I have faith that Whedon will keep improving on the storyline and depth of the characters, making the show evolve into something even more amazing. Fourth, I adore the holy frakkin' hell out of FitzSimmons! Fitz, in particular, is the type of youthful, awkward, geeky character that I can't help but fall in love with, but who lately has been showing some potential to be someone a little more hardcore under the surface. It makes me think that if not for Simmons - his sweet, chipper, equally awkward counterpart/lab partner - Fitz might have evolved into one of Marvel's evil geniuses. I'm hoping there'll be more exploration of that darker layer later in the series, which is definitely good enough reason for me to stick around. That and, well, the recent promise of more of those fan-desired superhero appearances.



Speaking of superpowers, that brings us right into Wednesday where I stumbled upon yet another show that I hadn't intended on watching, but I'm oh-so-glad that I did:



The Tomorrow People



Now I know that at some point in my childhood there was apparently a prior Tomorrow People that, if I did watch, I have no memory of. I didn't check out this revamped version out of any sort of curiosity of how it measured up to its predecessor. I turned it on because it was a Wednesday night, I wasn't in the mood to write, and I was bored. It came as a very pleasant surprise to me that I loved it to about a million pieces! To me, it's kind of like the movie Push (which I also love to a million pieces), only with undercover agents and rebels in hiding and crazy love triangles and a villain who you absolutely hate one minute, then sort of feel bad for the next, followed by finding yourself kind of rooting for the guy despite your better judgement. With lots of fights involving teleportation effects (a la Jumper), characters who are able to stop time, objects floating via telekinetic ability, and lots of telepathic communication, this show is boiling over with all the things that make my geek side squeee! Mix that up with an impressive cast of young actors who are able to portray the kinds of characters that one becomes attached to very quickly, and we've got a solid, must-watch series on our hands. Plus, it's on the CW, which despite the fact that it's cancelled a few of my favorites in the past, it tends to let a series hang on a little longer before it decides whether it needs to pull the plug or not. I think with this particular series they won't have to.



Jumping over Thursday (I gave OUAT Wonderland a shot, but it didn't take), we move on to Friday, my last television day of the week:



Dracula



I am not, despite appearances, a major vampire fan. I tend to like the stories and characters revolving around vampire lore, but I'm not overly fascinated by by the whole angst-ridden, sexually alluring, blood-drinking personas that make up the typical vampire. Spike was fun because he was kind of a jerkface and I tend to go for the outcast-of-the-group type, I watch True Blood for the Shifters more than the vamps, and Being Human has all the werewolf love I could ever ask for. I do not watch, nor care to watch, The Vampire Diaries or The Originals, and the Twilight movies makes me want to cry myself to sleep at night (seriously, what's wrong with kids these days?). So why do I consider Dracula to be amongst my favorite shows? Admittedly the fact that Jonathan Rhys Meyers was plastered all over Los Angeles helped draw me in (what girl could resist that?), but more so was the fact that the show is about Dracula. It's the original tale in all its horrid glory, retold with all the same players on the board, but with some very interesting twists in the original plot. We've got Harker and Mina, Lucy and Helsing, and a slew of original characters all interacting how they shouldn't be interacting, set in a time period where they shouldn't be set, yet still able to maintain the original integrity of the Dracula story. It's sad and violent and exciting and romantic, and also sort of confusing because you're not certain at times who you should be rooting for. Good guys are not necessarily good guys, the bad guys are more monstrous than the monster, and the characters stuck in the middle are being pulled from one side to the other as the storylines unfold. Sitr in a bit of Edison/Tesla steampunky fun, and count me a forever fan. I look forward to watching the rest of the classic story being retold in the most unique fashion I've ever seen!



So that's pretty much a breakdown of my regular TV week. I'm also gradually getting myself caught up on Grimm (we'll call that one a guilty pleasure), and I'm on the line of starting up with Bitten. I do love me some werewolves, but the CG wolves I've seen in the previews look sort of awful. We'll see if I can get past that, which I'm sure I'll report on once I give the show a shot. In the meantime, throw some of the above Supe and Scifi flavor into your drama soup, ladies and gents! I guarantee the kick to your palette will be totally worth it!
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