Articles of Quality

Okay, first of all, go read this. Seriously, go. This whole post is centered on that article, it's not that long, so I'll wait.

You done? Good.

I have some basic complaints about this article (aside from the pretentiously proprietary, "Hey that's my thing"). First of all, it's terribly written, with a thesis statement that isn't supported by the body of the article. Secondly, if LOST is the only example of deep, thought-provoking television that the author could come up with, perhaps she's not anything close the the authority she writes like she is. I mean, what about Studio 60? Babylon 5? Soap?

Deeper than that, though:

Sure, there are some astounding clunkers, but television is getting better and better. Writing is more compelling, better actors are becoming attached to televised projects.

What? Tell me, do you watch anything that's actually on, or do you only Netflix dead shows? Writing is not getting better in television. It's exactly the same as in any other medium: Primarily competent but bland with a few sparkling gems that stand out from the mire. And since Aaron Sorkin has departed from television for awhile with no return in sight, JMS is doing Superman (correct me if I'm wrong on that one), Joss Whedon's busy with the Avengers and Cap,  Andrew Marlowe's doing Castle (one of the aforementioned gems), and... no other great TV writers spring to mind.

Which means that we're left with Glee and (shudder) CSI.

What about that "better actors" comment?

Anyone who doesn't know who Richard Mulligan is should be ashamed of themselves. And from the same show, Robert Guillaume. From other great shows: Andreas Katsulos, Peter Jurasik, Alan Tudyk, Ed Wasser, Jewel Staite, Katheryn Helmond, Bradley Whitford, Matthew Perry (I'm forgiving him for Friends), Timothy Busfield, Thomas Gibson, Stana Katic, Emily Proctor (I don't forgive her for CSI: Miami, though), Richard Schiff, Dule Hill, Kathryn Joosten, Paul Gross, Nathan Fillion, Kelsey Grammer, Neil Patrick Harris, John Larroquette, John Lithgow, French Stewart, Robert Carlyle, Michael C. Hall. I'm sure there are more that I missed, but I think my point has been made.

The acting is as good now as it ever has been, the writing is the same. The trick is that most of everything is crap. Sturgeon's Law. It's not that the television is getting better, it's that there's so much more of it that it's easier to find the good stuff.

Television won't just "get better." Sorry, but it won't. As with any other medium, it's only as good as the people in it, and the people who pay attention to it. I can agree that television has been sidelined as an entertainment medium. I can't agree with... anything else in that article.

How will TV get better? Simple. We need to have higher expectations. There should be no "good enough," no "well, it's only a sitcom," no acceptance of the mediocre.

It can be better. But it always starts with the audience, and that, kids, is you.

-Gets off soapbox-

Unique

Okay, this has come up before, but I've gotten it a bit more angrily today, and I think it bears addressing.

I am not Yahtzee. I am not trying to imitate Yahtzee, and I am not "ripping off" Yahtzee.

Superficially, yes, there's quite a bit of resemblance. We use the slide-show style videos, speak rather quickly, and tend to be harsh on out topics.

However, there are things that make Zero Punctuation, Zero Punctuation, and those defining characteristics are absent from my videos. Similarly, I do have my own style. I write and speak differently, and I animate differently. The art style, media that's critiqued, and judgments are different.

He uses extended analogies. I don't. He uses a considerable amount of profanity. I don't. He anthropomorphizes everything. I don't.

I spoke quickly on my submission video because I had a lot to say. There's nothing to read into there. There was no intention to copy or rip-off, and I really don't think that I did. In fact, throughout my reviews, I've worked rather hard to keep from pulling too much from any one source of inspiration (and there are several).

In summary. The videos and the reviews are me. They're not me trying to be someone or something else. Anyone who knows me can see my fingerprints all over these videos, and the majority of my viewers (though they don't know me personally) are, I think, discerning enough to see past the superficial resemblance.

I shall say no more on the subject, but I've broken it down for you here. For the love of whatever you consider holy, please do not accuse me of ripping off Yahtzee, or ZP again. It's not true, and no amount of fanboy indignation will make it so.

The Escapist Film Festival

No time for extensive rambling right now, but the video gallery for the film competition I entered my Burn Notice review into is here. Go vote!

Burn Notice

There's something about That Show that's been bothering me since I learned it. It really doesn't have a whole lot to do with the actual quality of the show, but it's been bugging me.

Apparently the producers let Gabrielle Anwar choose most of her own costumes.

That may not sound like such a bad thing, I mean, the actress should know her character better than anyone else right? Well yes, but that doesn't make it okay.

There's a lot that goes into costuming that I, with eight years of experience in technical theatre, had no notion of until I took a class devoted to costumes. It's not ever just about "what the character would wear." In fact, "what the character would wear" is generally considered after fabric choice, color, style, scenography, and whether she can fight in those shoes. Once everything has been hashed out, then they look at "what the character would wear" from what's left.

The result of Anwar picking her wardrobe? An insufferable amount of short, ugly-ass dresses in a limited color palette that's totally inappropriate for her coloring, and no bras. I can't stress enough how much I'm bothered by the lack of bra. For someone who might have to get into a fist fight on moment's notice, bras are awesomely practical.

And the wedge heels. Good Gods. First off, high heels in combat is downright stupid. Breaking an ankle fighting, or at the very least twisting one, is shockingly easy. Heels throw off your posture and balance and make combat almost impossible unless you already outweigh and outreach your opponent by a significant margin, which is unlikely if only because there's not a whole lot of men or orangutans who wear heels. Then there's wedge heels, which are actually more awkward than ordinary spike heels. They're worse for balance and leverage.

So then why does Fiona wear them? Because the actress who picked them out likes them.

What a bullshit reason. Actors act. Costumers dress. Seems like a pretty straightforward division of labor to me, but then here I go again, expecting people to do their jobs competently. The actress stepped out of bounds, the producers allowed it, and the costumer didn't fight back.

I'm having some serious trouble expressing just how much I'm bothered by this, so discuss among yourselves: Does an actor have the right to choose their own costumes in a show where physical limits must be observed for safety reasons? Or indeed, should an actor be able to say anything to a costumer other than, "Excuse me, but I tore out the underarm tossing the baddie into a wall, can you do something about that please?" in the politest and most obsequious of tones?

Edit to add: Also, the store is opening on December first, and the lease starts of November first, so I will in no way be attempting to keep up with my review schedule. I'll still work on them, but slower. Especially as Burn Notice must be submitted by October twenty-ninth, so it's a priority.

Also, one week until Monthly Munchkin!

From the Audience

Yeah, I know, been doing a lot of these. Bite me, I'm watching unmemorable TV. What show you ask? Well, I can't tell you; I don't remember.

On the Time Travel episode in SGU Season 1: It was resolved (mostly, sorta) in the webisodes. Really, all it shows is Eli and the others watching the final recording from the retrieved Keeno.
--Izkata


Webisode. Gech, that really is a terrible word. It's difficult to say, and SpellCheck doesn't recognize it. Incidently, SpellCheck also doesn't recognize SpellCheck. In any case, I totally get expanding upon the world that the producers have built in web content, but the bulk of the plot and everything should probably be in the original medium. In other words, it's a television show so everything that goes into the show should be complete and self-reliant. It should not depend on the web content to explain basic plot points.

As to the blue aliens.. Check out the full Season 2 trailer. They did something to Chloe (no longer so useless, eh? =P )
--Izkata


No, she's still useless. In fact, she's so useless she needs an external force in order to have any bearing on anything. Take that.

... But yeah, I see that you are trying to fill a niche that no one is really covering at the Escapist right now. And it is a welcome addition, since I'm a big fan of series TV and that content is missing from most anywhere right now, except straight media entertainment sites. I'd say you should expand your range of possible targets to be any episodic series, since web content is a slowly growing format now. ... but I wrote this whole thing mainly to say: Babylon 5, the greatest sci-fi drama of all time? You, Ma'am, are my new personal hero.

--Shawn

Actually, that's the whole reason I started critiquing TV shows in the first place: No one else was doing it. Well, there are people that do individual episodes, and there are the reviewers that marketing people pay to review shows, but they don't really count. And you're very welcome, Sir. I do my best.

I discussed the idea of expanding into web serieses and that opened up a whole new can of worms: What, precisely, is my purview? So after some conversation I have decided to lay down some rules here where I can look for them if I feel like breaking them.

1. Anything episodic visual media is mine for the reviewing. Miniseries: yes. Made for TV movies: no.

2. Web serieses are also good to review, but in moderation. The bulk of my reviews should be actual television shows. I shall probably resort to web series when I'm behind schedule and need something fast.

3. Web supplements to television shows may be reviewed separately, but will not be considered part of the content to their show. See above comments about web content for explanation, if you haven't yet gleaned my preconceptions about web content.

4. Other rules that I decide to create as the situation arises.

So, within my utterly arbitrary rules, I can review Dr. Horrible because it was released in scheduled segments, like a miniseries (Insert maniacal laughter here). So that's exactly what I shall do. It's only forty-five minutes of watching, so I can get it done in time for Sunday, which will push White Collar back to next week and put me back on schedule. Bonus!

Review Talk

I don't usually talk about the critiques themselves here. In fact, I try to avoid talking about the critiques at all, as I feel it makes me look like I don't have anything better to do than stalk YouTube and hit F5 every thirty seconds just in case there's Another View. 'Cause, you know, I would never do anything like that.

But three days ago I posted The Mentalist and I did my usual rounds of Facebook and The Escapist and then walked away from the computer for awhile. Okay, I went to sleep, but point is, I didn't stalk it. And then it got sixty four views in twelve hours. For scale, even Heroes: The All Bad All the Time Edition, my most watched video to date, took a week to hit sixty five.

I know it's not crazy-viral or anything, but for me, that's a lot of views, really fast. Well, yesterday The Mentalist passed 100 views and as of writing is sitting pretty at 107.

And it's freaking me out.

I mean, yes I know that for my videos to become popular, people actually have to watch them, and yes I've been getting steadily more views as I keep doing this, and yes the fall premiers are coming up so searches are up, but damn, ya'll.

So, yeah. Thanks, Everyone Who Watches My Videos.

Oh! And since I'm taking this week off to start a rolling schedule, I shall link a the video that's selected by The Audience. There's a poll here if you want to vote, or just comment with your choice from the list below and I'll add the results together. I really don't expect to get a whole shit-ton of results, but The Mentalist has surprised me this week, and ya'll might as well.

Criminal Minds
Glee
Castle
Eastwick
Numb3rs
Heroes: The Good Stuff Edition
Heroes: The All Bad All the Time Edition
The Mentalist

Make your choice!

Feeding the Trolls

First thing's first: There was a bit of a conversation that you may want to be aware of for this one. I'm not going to recount it, but check out that link if you're interested or if this post doesn't make a ton of sense right off the bat.

So yeah, I got my first troll. It's not that I mind the criticism, in fact, I did ask for it. What I mind is that Liquidcathedral assumed that my goal is to be like Yahtzee and MovieBob, and then implied that they are only popular because of the cursing, blind hatred, and pop culture references.

Now, I would like to be as popular and widely viewed as Yahtzee and MovieBob. Duh. However, I want to be that popular because I express legitimate opinions, not because of the dick jokes. No I don't curse all that much. My vocabulary is large enough that I can express complex opinions far more fluently than four-letter words would seem to allow, expressive as curse words can be.

I also got called "Yahtzee's lost sister who reviews tv shows", and I'm not sure how to take that. Maybe it's a good association, what with Yahtzee actually being good and everything. Maybe it's implied that I'm the red-headed stepchild, you know, the one without talent. And that's terrible. So yeah, I'm a tad confused, but the guy also gave me legitimate criticism so I'm not too concerned.

But the troll. Yes, I know that another responder called me a troll, but he was very polite about it, so I don't mind; I did get rather more insulting than I'd like to admit, but I had fun responding to the blind baiting in what I feel was an appropriate manner. A manner inspired by Franklin Habit. Sadly I can't claim it, but I'm glad I got the opportunity to use it.

Now this got sort of tangental, but to sum up my feelings on the subject: I asked for criticism, not abuse, and if you're not a moderator on the Escapist, then you really have no place comparing me to "Escapist standards". Be polite to me, and I'll be polite to you. Give me an irrelevant statement, and you'll get one right back...

Bitch.

From the Audience

Way back in my Numb3rs review thread that I posted to The Escapist, there was some discussion about Castle. A viewer expressed disbelief that I'd actually liked Castle, to which someone (who I can't assume actually watched my review) responded:


"Castle's main problem is the cops. Nathan Fillion's character is great, the scenes with his mother and daughter are great, and the core concept is sound. Then they bring in the annoying female lead and her comic-relief friends and ruin the whole thing. The writing team on Castle need to take a long, hard look at The Mentalist to learn how to write Comedy Male Lead and Serious Cop Lead."  --sosolidshoe (emphasis added)


I responded to that thread, but I think there's a concept here that deserves some thought. Sosolidshoe has implied that Castle would be better if it were more like The Mentalist. But they're different shows. Now, I haven't actually watched any of The Mentalist yet, so this is pure pre-review speculation, but it seems to me that the more one show is like another, the worse off it is. After all, they have to share an audience, so wouldn't it be prudent to be as different a cop show as possible in order to attract people that the other show doesn't?


That's the entire point of the gimmick. All procedurals have them to avoid being completely generic, some fail, but most do alright in that regard. And I'm sure this will earn me the ire of the Internet, but I actually hate procedurals. If I judge them by the standards of character shows, some can do alright, but procedurals are massively overdone and some just have to reach so far in order to provide a unique gimmick that my suspension of disbelief has fallen right from the start. Like Numb3rs. And White Collar (which I also have not yet seen, but it looks like a pile of shit with a side of fries, so I despair of the day when it comes up on my list).


And the Heroes: TABAtTE is ready to post tomorrow morning, so in response to sosolidshoe, next week's critique will be on The Mentalist. I just hope it's not as agonizing as Heroes.


Edited to add: Oh yeah, it's 9/11. It's not that I don't care... well okay, it is that I don't care. Living in the past never helped anyone, the dead are still dead, and we're still locked in a pointless war with a concept. Can't fight a concept, and it was a major conceit to even try. You can say that makes me un-American. I can say, "Bite me."

Shameless Self-Promotion

The internal debate entitled "What the Hell am I Going to Put in My First Post" rages on, which isn't terribly surprising, since this blogging idea occurred to me perhaps ten minutes ago for the sole purpose of giving my review series more exposure. Oh, and also for some clarification of points I don't get to explain very well in the video due to time constraints. However, I don't tend to get much feedback, so maybe a format that encourages commenting will help? I dunno, let's see.

-Half an hour of browser flash games later-

So I was cruising the Escapist User Reviews forums today, and I noticed that I seem to be the only person reviewing television shows. I checked the index and there were only a handful of entries for tv shows (that aren't anime) and the most recent of them went up in May. This got me to thinking... why the hell is this such a niche thing? If there's a demand for critiques of other entertainment media, surely there's a demand for tv show critiques, too. Running under the assumption that there is, why don't more people review tv?

I speculated in my first Heroes video that part of the problem is the sheer quantity of stuff to pore through. I still think that's the case, but it does need to be qualified, as video game reviewers generally have fifteen to twenty hours (maybe not "generally" so much as "hopefully") of material to work through and criticize. Television on the other hand... well, if it's an hour long episode, then there's about forty-two minutes of actual show in it. Typical seasons have twenty-four episodes. Which means that a single season is eighteen hours of material that's created over a period of seven or eight months.

That usually (again, "hopefully") means that the show will evolve. Especially in the first season, which is why I always start with the first season of a show, since it's important to be aware of where a show started when you start tearing it apart. It's a great thing when shows evolve; in the first season, shows need to accustom themselves to their tools, so it's necessary that they stay out of strict episode formulas to fully explore the possibilities with their budget, crew, writers and actors. Later seasons, though, should evolve to avoid treading old ground. That's the whole reason that shows with a conflict-of-the-week have over-arcing storylines: without story arcs they get a little stale. And by "a little" I mean "stale enough bounce when thrown down on the counter in frustration because someone finished the peanut butter and put the jar back in the cabinet."

However, that kind of evolution makes a show difficult to summarize into an eight minute video. Premises are easily summarized into a sentence or two, but every statement that I could make about characters or inter-play or subtext (with I generally stay away from because nothing spells doom better than criticizing something so purely subjective as subtext) can be refuted with an example from any number of episodes or scenes that just don't fit the tone of the rest of the show. As happens pretty frequently with shows that have writing teams or cyclic directors. There's never a single person on which to blame a great wrong. Which is probably for the best considering the number of people that would leap to write terrible things in their livejournal.

You know, I think the primary deterrent is the quantity of material to look at when critiquing television. I mean, I watch these shows for ten to twelve hours a day and I can't ever just sit back and enjoy them. Even shows I love must be painstakingly picked apart for flaws that I then must weigh based on egregiousness. I know that it looks like fun, but it actually is work. I was rather surprised, since I'd set myself a schedule of one video a week and now I'm looking at that going "What the fucking hell was I thinking?"

Well, I could ramble in this vein for some time yet but I think I'm'a watch some more Heroes instead. If you watch my videos and have some feedback for me, feel free to comment here, or send me an email at opinionatedtvATyahooDOTcom.

And on Sunday the video for "Heroes, the All Bad, All the Time Edition" goes up on YouTube.