THE FALL SEASON - WEDNESDAY

THE WEEK IN TELEVISION

Wednesday.


 What do we have to soothe away the midweek blues? On the CW we have The Tomorrow People, a remake of a classic 1970s British TV series which I can remember watching at the time. As a kid I really wanted one of those teleporting belts. Sigh! I never got one. Anyway the remake is flash and jazzy and very 21st century. Its great to see a show like this brought to life again with all the splendor and amazement of modern effects making it what you wish it could have been back then. I have to admit I don't remember any of the original story lines (it was over 40 years ago) so I can't compare them to the new story lines. It is more than likely, though, that the producers have reworked the whole concept.


In this version The Tomorrow People are the next generation humans with super powers. However there is also an organization dedicated to rounding them up and neutralizing them. Each episode introduces a new character with powers and the Tomorrow People must get to them before they are captured. The show is similar in feel to S.H.I.E.L.D. and is not far away from the same kind of theme, namely super beings, enhanced soldiers,etc.
Steven, the main character realizes something strange is happening to him as he becomes an adult. Then a young woman starts contacting him telepathically. He meets up with her and her group. Things get complicated when it is revealed that Stevens uncle Jebadiah ( or Zebadiah, something Biblical anyway! If I was getting paid for this I'd go and check but I cant be bothered) is the head of the organization hunting down Tomorrow People, and wants Steven to work for him. He agrees to do it but only because he needs to be inside the organization to help his friends and find out what happened to his missing dad, who worked with his brother (Stevens uncle).

Tomorrow People is OK as an adventure/sci-fi series which mainly centers on the main characters to-ing and fro-ing from one camp to the other. The show is a bit of a let down, however because the plot is often let down by the ease with which the Tomorrow People pull off their missions, or escapes. At times when you think that there is no way out one is found that seems a bit too incredulous, such as Steven pretending to take Caras powers with His uncle practically breathing down his neck. He managed to stop time ( a feat he so far had not been able to control) and switch syringes. Its OK though, if you are into sci-fi, which I am.

Recently I have commented on videos by RevMichelleCollins on Youtube and mentioned her in a blog. She has been circulating a story that goes as follows:

The US government has spiked the water supply with nanobots. Their purpose is to make everyone ill. According to her source, a retired army colonel the government are going to turn off the power and these nanobots will be activated. Essentially, what she is describing is the plot of Revolution. In Revolution the power grid was turned off and people went back to a basic way of living. Season one ended when a so called patriot launched nuclear weapons, destroying major cities. The power had been restored by the
patriots specifically to launch a nuclear attack.



Season two sees the patriots return from Cuba, where they claim that the last vestiges of the US government have been hiding. Munro has been blamed for the nukes and Aaron appears to have super powers, being able to set people on fire from a distance. In fact, it turns out that his nanobots will protect him without his knowledge. Tom is well, being Tom, showing that he is willing to sell anyone out to get where he wants to be. He wants to infiltrate the patriots then destroy them. Sadly for him though, the man in charge of the people he is chasing for killing his wife in one of the nuke attacks turns out to her new husband. After Tom recovers from his WTF? moment he gets her alone and she tells him that she was following his advice and doing what it takes to survive.

Season one was a quest to get the power back on. It turns out that to do so would cause the world to ignite because the power lines would surge and cause explosions as well as affect the nanobots in peoples bodies. Season two is about who the patriots really are and what they are up to and, of course stop them. It has kept the momentum from the first series but lacks the clear cut differentiation of sides. It's hard to see where the series is going now that the power is not going back on and unclear as to what happens when the patriots are exposed. Its beginning to have a new world order feel : perhaps it is more predictive programming.

Another new series is Mob City. It is set in the L.A. in the 1940s and is about a special task force being set up to deal with organized crime. It is based on a series of books called L.A Noire. It boasts an excellent cast and is directed by Frank Darabont, director of The Walking Dead.

 They are being shown two episodes at a time on TNT. It has the usual mix of ruthless gangsters and corrupt cops which the new team have to deal with. Jon Berthnal stars as Joe Teague (Walking Dead) , Neal McDonough plays Captain William Parker (Justified, Desperate Housewives). Parker is determined to destroy organized crime and Teague is his lead agent, Teague is not exactly a clean cut officer. He has a past which keeps coming back to haunt him. Their targets include Mickey Cohen (Jeremy Luke), Bugsy Seagal (Edward Burns) and Sid Rothman (Robert Knepper, from the recently axed Cult).

  It is well made with a film noire sort of feel to it. It has all the classic gangster components, even down to the femme fatale, who in this case is the lead characters ex wife.  Alexa Davalos stars as his ex Jasmine Fontaine. There are no real surprises - it is a gangster show, pure and simple. Definitely worth a watch.

So Wednesday is trans-humanism followed by the apocalypse then a trip in to the past to watch the violence and greed that made America what it is today. A nice midweek mix.

THE FALL SEASON - TUESDAY

Tuesday has thrown up a mixed bag this fall. Marvels Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (ABC) is like Marvel without superheroes. I mean, you expect super powers from a marvel story but none are on display. Agent Coulson, who died in one of the films is alive again and in charge of a squad made up of a super soldier, two nerdy boffins, a pilot with a history that she doesn't like to talk about ( but that provides us with flashbacks) and a hacker that they meet on their first outing. They deal with the uncanny and the superhuman, seeking them out and bringing them in for readjustment. It is the same kind of easy watching as Sleepy Hollow, no thinking required but good fun.

CBS are showing my favorite program of recent times - Person of interest. In its second series the big brother spying background seems appropriate what with Mr Snowdens recent revelations, and all. POI is about the surveillance state. A computer genius, Harold Finch played by Michael Emerson of Lost fame creates a machine that analyses data and comes up with names of potential terrorists. However, Harold created a back door into the system to deal with the victims and perpetrators of other crimes that were not related to incidents of terrorism and were being disregarded. All he gets is a social security number. He doesn't know if the person is to be stopped or saved. He recruits an ex special ops soldier called John Reece (Jim Caviezel, number six in The Prisoner remake). Reece deals out the necessary violence and has help from two police officers. Season two has introduced a new member to the team, Reece's old partner in special ops. That's right, the one that tried to kill him. I still love this show although I was sad to see Carter get killed. I rather liked her.

This is the kind of program that falls in to the category of "predictive programming". According to believers in predictive programming the elite are about to radically change society. They want a world govt and international laws that will replace national laws. PP is supposed to get people prepared for the coming changes by subtly releasing information in popular tv shows and movies. This is supposed to soften people up before the implementation of change and also persuade people to accept the changes. I'm not sure if there are statistics to show if it actually works or not but my instinct is that it wouldn't work. I think that people for the most part can tell the difference between fantasy and reality. It would be a lot more logical to push ideas through bogus news stories and documentaries. At least these are made with an assumed air of plausibility which can sway the viewer.

SARAH SHAHI Becomes a regular in the new series

Whatever else it may be POI is gripping and entertaining. In addition, it turns out, it may not be far from the truth either.

Moving on, the CW has gone all spooky, airing The Originals from 8.00 pm to 9.00 pm followed by Supernatural (9.00 to 10.00 pm). The Originals is a new show which is based around a family of a brother, sister and half brother who are the original vampires, now centuries old. At one time they were big in New Orleans but left. Now, 80 years later they return, because half brother Klaus (who is also half vampire and half werewolf) wants to reclaim their own kingdom.

 This is a fantasy world which includes as inhabitants vampires, werewolves and witches, as well as humans. The Vampires rule, have thrown out the werewolves and forbidden witches to practice magic. This kind of stuff is not normally my cup of tea but I have to confess I have found The Originals to be quite fascinating. There are plot twists all over the place that keep it moving forward and good interplay between the main characters. Daniel Gillies is quietly menacing as Elijah Mickaelson and his half brother Klaus, played by Joseph Morgan  is great as the volatile half breed who's usually uninterrupted blood-lust has been slightly tempered by the news that he has got a werewolf girl pregnant. It turns out that half breeds are super powerful so there are those from each community that want his baby killed.

We now go from new program to one that seems will never reach an end. I used to really love this show but it is now downgraded to "like" status because I keep asking myself, What next? I mean the Winchester boys have opened the gates of hell and the world is overrun by demons. To beat them Sam went to hell, coming back, now possessed by the Devil, he has to rid himself of Satan and close the gates of hell. Then in heaven (where the angels are every bit as bad as the demons of hell) there is a power struggle because god is missing, no-one knows where he is. Somewhere along the line Dean gets sent to purgatory along with Castiel, an angel, and takes an entire series to get out. Next they manage to get tricked into shutting down heaven which results in all the angels being expelled and becoming fallen angels who await the receipt of a human host. Oh, and prior to this they stopped the apocalypse so I'm now wondering where the show is going. I hope that is accurate, apologies to fans if not- its season nine and Im working from memory.

 They still do great random comedy episodes such as the recent Halloween special, but I thought that the writers had it nicely sewn up a few series back (possibly season five). The world was saved from an apocalypse, they were settling down with families: it seemed a good place to end it. Mind you, part of me still doesn't want it to end. Another part of me, however thinks that they are now flogging a dead horse.

The final journey in to fantasy for the night comes courtesy of the family channel and is called Ravenswood. It is a spin-off from the Pretty Little Liars series and is a lot less graphic than the previous two shows (well obviously, it's on the family channel, Duh!). Mind you, I'm getting sick of the gratuitous sex and violence on TV. I wish that we could go back to the days when things were just implied. At least it kept the viewers imagination alive. Ravenswood is about a town of that name which a young man and a girl he has befriended on the bus are on their way to. When they get there they see a cemetery which has their graves and the grave of three other teenagers, who they happen to bump in to. The girl has an uncle that they stay with. He is the town Mortician and is decidedly weird. Anyway to be brief the five kids end up in a car together, have a crash and the new girl is killed. Fear not! however, as she hangs around as a friendly ghost and a story begins where the kids want to know why they are targeted for death. They do some research and discover that there have been accidents in the past involving five teenagers. Against this backdrop they discover that there are malevolent spirits that are out to get them.

It's a pleasant show but I suspect it is way too tame for most adult tastes.

Well that's Tuesday done. I am trying not to get too in depth with the analysis. I just want to give a feel for what the shows are like and return to them when the seasonal festivities are over and the tv schedule returns to something like normal, because I'm not sure what is on a mid season break and what is back to its regular slot in the new year.

The Fall season

A round up of the fall season in the states

It has been a long time since I last commented on the content we viewers are offered on TV. I thought that as I have been absent for so long, rather than write about one program I would cast my eye over the schedule and look at the programs that I have been watching.

My viewing schedule was in good shape at the start of the season. However, as is usual at this time of year the US TV schedule is basically dropped for a month in favor of xmas specials, endless repeats and seemingly endless sports coverage. Add to the mix my pet hate genre the reality show and you basically have a whole load of nothing from week two in December until new year.

So beginning with Monday here are some programs of varying interest.Fox have been screening a new show called sleepy hollow. Recently there have been a lot of supernatural and ghost stories. The horror genre is also spawning new shows. Someone at Fox must have decided to combine a bit of every genre and throw a bit of rip van winkle as well. Having said that I have to admit it is fairly entertaining if you are in to this kind of thing. Tom Milson, who plays Ichabod Crane, resurrected 18th century civil war hero and Nicole Behari (Lt. Abbie Mills) have a good chemistry and the banter between them is funny at times. It is a program for the times as the theme running through the series is the coming of the apocalypse, which Crane and Mills are trying to stop.

A much more satisfying program is The Blacklist (NBC). It is a pacy political thriller in the Nikita mode, but with a more believable plot line than it. James Spader is brilliant as Raymond Reddington, an FBI agent who has been off the radar for years then suddenly shows up at FBI HQ with a list of the most wanted world criminals and information that will help capture them. In exchange for the information Reddington demands to be partnered by a young female agent called Elizabeth Keen. Keen was adopted as a young child and doesn't know who her father is. As the series progresses she begins to suspect that it is Reddington, although he denies it. To add to the intrigue Keens husband may not be who he claims to be and she doesn't know who to trust. Week by week the new partnership, with the help of a backup team hunt down and capture someone on the list. It is interesting to watch because although Reddington is cooperating with the FBI he is also carrying out a covert agenda of his own. This adds to the drama as the viewer is never quite sure what he will do next, although we soon come to expect him to do the right thing in the end.

Running in the same time slot as The Blacklist is Hostages on CBS. It is a political thriller about a surgeon who leads her field ( Dr Ellen Sanders played by Toni Colette) who is called upon to operate on the president. However on the eve of the operation a masked gang take the family of the Dr hostage and tell her she has to kill the president when she does the operation or she and her family will be killed. She is to switch the presidents pre- op medication then operate as normal. She switches the meds, but at the last minute aborts the operation. She outwits the gang, she thinks, but of course they still have her family.

My only complaint about the show is that in real life, at this point, the family would all be killed and the mission terminated. Not in TVland. The op is postponed for two weeks. It seems to me that whoever wants the president dead would find another way now. In episode three the ringleader, FBI hostage negotiator Duncan Carlisle (Dylan McDermott) who is actually the ringleader of the kidnappers has an attempt made on his own life by someone further up the chain of command that wants him punished for his failure.Why does someone want the president dead? In episode two there is a flashback of six months previously. Quintin Creasley  the Whitehouse chief of staff is telling Delaney that sometimes you have to look at the big picture:

"what they are doing is a necessary component of something much more important than just one man.... history calls upon us to do something bigger than we ever expected. Sometimes we are asked to shape the future of the world."
This could be a hint toward the New World Order. This may turn out to be an interesting show, to which I shall return in the future.

As you will see as we progress through the week there are some recurrent themes and plots as well as similarity in programs. I tend to watch things that are not too mainstream and not a comedy (does anyone know of an existing comedy that is actually funny?)

 Not a bad nights viewing, considering.