TV Gods

Chuck -- Chuck vs. the Gravitron

2008-11-30T01:56:00.001-08:00

Chuck

Hermes: Chuck has a bizarre and rather absurd premise -- the titular character has all the CIA and NSA’s secrets downloaded into his head through a series of encoded images, and he has to become a spy because he’s the only one who can recognize that guy over there as a former KGB assassin -- all this while working at a thinly-disguised Best Buy. Despite the bizarre premise (or perhaps because of it), this is a very smart and charming show. It’s an homage and subtle parody of Bond-style spy films, with a lot of very funny stuff interspersed with great action scenes. Plus there’s Adam Baldwin (Jayne from Firefly) playing a very Jayne-like character, and lots of cheesecake shots of Chuck’s hot handler and a variety of femme fatales.

"Chuck vs. the Gravitron"

Hephaestos (Plot): "Chuck vs. the Gravitron" is the last episode in the “Jill” arc. Chuck used to date a girl named Jill. She left him for Bryce Larkin five years before the series. She came back in Chuck vs. the Ex and got back together with Chuck. Then we found out she was a spy working for the evil Fulcrum organization. Is everyone Chuck has ever known a spy? The last episode ended with the Jill reveal, with the implication that Chuck was in terrible trouble -- but it took half this episode to pay off. I was disappointed and a little bored. The side plot of Thanksgiving focused on Morgan and felt forced. The Buy More plots are generally becoming more forced, because Chuck is hardly ever involved in them at all anymore. I want to see how Chuck’s spying affects his work, not how Morgan deals with regular life while Chuck is off getting shot at. Unlike some episodes, the Buy More plot did intersect, with a tripwire Jeff set up tripping a spy and Big Mike fighting the “thieves” (spies). Plot (show): 4. Plot (this episode): 2.5.

Zeus (Character): This is, essentially, a Chuck character episode. Jill, who was spoken about but never seen for a season and a half, has returned, and Chuck has a chance to be happy with a girl. No, of course not, because that would be dull (no matter what Aphrodite thinks). So Jill does a “face heel turn.”

Hermes: Quick interjection. Zeus falsely assumes everyone watches professional wrestling. Wrestlers are known as “face” (good guy) or heel (bad guy), so when a wrestler goes bad, he does a face heel turn. And the other way, when a villain reforms, is a heel face turn. Got it?

Zeus: Then the newly villainous Jill makes a heel face turn, turning good because of her love for Chuck. Then she turns again, revealing that turning good was just a ploy. But maybe she wasn’t all bad… too many turns. You’ve twisted my head, and Heracles is completely lost. I realize it’s a spy show, but take it easy. The sexual tension between Chuck and Sarah is so thick you could cut it with a Spartan dagger, especially since she’s jealous of Jill -- and sexual tension is always interesting. Outside the Chuck/Jill/Sarah triangle, Morgan again shows his blind faith in Chuck when he accepts without question Chuck’s lie that he’s not involved with Jill -- and that level of faith should be reserved for WORSHIPPING ME! Morgan needs more backbone. Ellie gets a chance in this ep to be funny for once, as she nervously prepares Thanksgiving dinner for Captain Awesome’s parents -- but since the Awesomes never arrived, I feel irritated that they built my expectations up so high. Bottom line: Jill went over-the-top, and Morgan felt flat this week. Character (show): 4. Character (this episode): 2.

Apollo (Dialogue): Chuck usually makes me laugh out loud with its witty quips (somewhere between James Bond and Buffy the Vampire Slayer), but vs. the Gravitron was less impressive than most eps. I was particularly irritated by the one-sided phone conversation when Chuck repeated verbatim every single thing he (presumably) heard on the other end, which is a sign of sloppy writing. On the other hand, the callback “devious, aren’t I?” and the repeated line that Chuck “read the manual” (odd how no-one ever does that) felt like regular Chuck. Dialogue (show): 4. Dialogue (this episode): 2.

Athena (Intelligence): A common Chuck theme is that love makes you stupid. The superspies that populate the show’s universe seldom do things so stupid as to make you yell at the screen -- except when emotion is involved. Chuck has routinely screwed things up based on his desire to trust people, or his feelings for Sarah, or.… In this case, it’s his desire to trust Jill that screws him over. Interestingly, though Chuck usually ends the episode with things working out despite/because of the emotional decision, vs. the Gravitron actually forced Chuck to put his logic over his emotion and capture Jill. It was a wonderful character moment for him -- and Dionysos and the other Chuck/Sarah ‘shippers can start up again.
One irritating facet of the Chuck show is product placement. A number of advertisers have their thumbs in the popular Chuck pie, and they work their products into the show. Usually it works, or at least isn’t very noticeable (last week there was a lingering shot of an EA Games sticker, but the company apparently didn’t object to the plot hinging on illegal game-copying hardware, so they must not have any real creative control), nor was it particularly bad tonight -- but it was certainly there. Chuck tells Jill to take his car, the Matrix, and mentions several features of the car -- none of which have anything to do with why it would be a good getaway-mobile (okay, dashboard navigation might be useful, but an iPod jack?), and it was a wee bit awkward.
An odd, and yet interesting, thing about Chuck is how it combines the genres of spy films and the mundanities of ordinary geekdom -- the show could certainly be summed up as “a geek gets to live out his superspy fantasies” -- and since the spy films it homages/parodies are of the Bond variety, one of the dichotomies in the show is how attractive people are. Though Chuck himself is moderately handsome, with a “geek chic” charm, but the other Buy More employees are realistically ordinary in their looks: Jeff is rather hideous, Morgan and Lester are plain at best, Big Mike is a huge fat man, and while Anna is pretty, it’s in a weird geek-girl way rather than a Hollywood starlet way. But everyone related even tangentially to the spy world (that is, everyone else Chuck interacts with) is ridiculously attractive. As we know from the many, many cheesecake shots of Sarah, she’s hot -- as is every femme fatale Chuck encounters. Jill, of course, is no different.
This episode is a fair example of Chuck’s intelligence level. Intelligence (show and episode): 4.

Dionysos (Fun): Merciful Zeus! Chuck is such a fun show! Spy gadgets, witty lines, kung-fu fighting, hot girls getting long, slow close-ups of their barely-covered flesh…
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Excuse me. I’ll be right back. Let me just grab a tissue--
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I’m back, and feeling much better. So. Chuck. vs. the Gravitron. Well, let’s start right there. There’s a fight. In a freaking Gravitron. You know, those crazy centrifuge things they have at carnivals. Awesome scene, something I’ve never seen before. Then they follow it with the requisite hall-of-mirrors scene. YAAWWWNN. I would be happy if I never saw another hall-of-mirrors again. It has been done far too many times, and I don’t care if it’s an homage to spy films who’ve done it before. It’s just dull. As was the beginning of this ep. Last week, we were left with a magnificent cliffhanger as Casey and Sarah raced to tell Chuck that his girlfriend Jill was a spy. vs. the Gravitron starts with Chuck and Jill having a great time together. And he finds out she’s a spy. And does nothing about it for twenty minutes. Not exactly the action-packed episode opening I was promised last week. The carnival sequence and ending made up for it somewhat, but I wasn’t terribly jazzed about Big Mike tackling the big bad rather than more crazy kung-fu. In short, Chuck is an incredibly fun show, but this was an uninspiring episode. Fun (show): 5. Fun (this episode): 3.

Hermes (Overall): I think the consensus is that vs. the Gravitron was an uninspiring episode of a normally much-better program. If this was your first episode, try again next week. Overall (show): 4. Overall (this episode): 2.5.

Thanksgiving

2008-11-27T02:19:00.000-08:00

Dionysos: Thanksgiving! WOOO!!! All the cranberry wine and gravy beer you can drink! We won't be posting today... probably...

TV Gods: Show We Don't Watch -- Comedy A-M

2008-11-26T02:00:00.000-08:00

Shows We Don't Watch (and Why)

Comedy

30 Rock

Apollo: This isn’t my kind of humor. It seems very intelligently written, and I have no problem with it winning lots of rewards and having tons of fans. Just don’t ask me to watch it. I'm also somewhat bitter that it was at least tangentially responsible for “that other behind-the-scenes-of-a-sketch-comedy-show” show Studio 60, which I really loved, being cancelled.

American Dad

Dionysos: American Dad started off as Family Guy II, with no real difference between the shows. That was fine with me, because funny is funny. However, it irritated Zeus to no end, and he wouldn't let me watch it for a while. Thankfully, Stan Smith and his family have established themselves as distinct from the Griffins. And, dare we say, became a better show than Family Guy. Maybe it’s because Dad hasn’t been on as long, so it hasn’t gotten as tired, maybe it’s because the characters are more likeable (sure, Stan may be a paranoid parody-Conservative jackass, but he’s also a stand-up guy), maybe it’s because the storylines tend to have a little more direction (because Stan’s CIA job creates plots), hard to say. But though Zeus still won't let me watch either show every week, but when he lets me, I choose American Dad over Family Guy nine times out of ten.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Apollo: Proof positive that Mortals are different from Gods, because we just don’t get this show. In fact, this is true of virtually all of Adult Swim’s bizarre cartoons (though The Venture Bros., slightly more normal, is one of our favorite shows ever). Avoid ATHF if you want your comedy to make sense.

Dionysos: I give ATHF a full thumbs up!

Apollo: I rest my case.

Boston Legal

Zeus: I find it amazing that aging mortal William Shatner still has a career -- and the staff of Boston Legal know it, as he’s cast as the aging lawyer who used to be great, and everyone is surprised he’s still alive. James Spader and Shatner play off each other very well, and the rest of the cast is funny if unremarkable. The show itself is “dramedy,” with the same mix of straight law drama and slightly surreal comedy that made David E. Kelley’s previous show Ally McBeal famous. Boston Legal isn’t as good as McBeal was in its heyday, but Spader and Shatner are far less irritating than Calista Flockhart.

Breaking Bad

Hermes: We’ve heard good things about Bad, but we’re a little gun-shy about drug comedies since Weeds inspired Dionysos (and Pan) to go on a six-month bender.

Corner Gas

Dionysos: It's boring. I hate it. I won't allow it in my house.

Apollo: Dionysos can be a little irrational. Let me fill you in. This is the Canadian sitcom—in fact, we’ve heard that creator Brent Butt (we know) ups the “Canadian-ness” as much as possible to keep it distinct from its American colleagues (and keep the Canadian government’s Canadian Programming funding). Corner Gas is very mellow, quirky but not to a degree that might alienate anyone, and completely inoffensive. It is pretty clever, the cast is very funny, and we’re fans of the fact that it’s single-camera without a laugh track, but the Gas gang isn’t going to push any boundaries.

Curb Your Enthusiasm

Apollo: Modern audiences have become enamored of a phenomenon I call “squirm humor,” wherein the characters find themselves in embarrassing situations from which they cannot escape. Squirm humor is, according to me, the originator of drama, not actually funny, just -- well, squirmy. Larry David’s Curb is a proponent of squirm humor, but it also pushes all kinds of boundaries. If you like The Office, Seinfeld, and such, you should enjoy Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Dionysos: I, on the other hand, love squirm humor, and hate Curb -- it’s too pretentious.

Entourage

Apollo: This is another really smart show that is completely the wrong sense of humor for me. I have nothing intelligent to say about it.

Family Guy

Dionysos: We (by which I mean mostly me) have always hated the characters on Family Guy. We (by which I mean everyone who’s not Hades) have never been able to really enjoy a show where we hate the main character. Peter Griffin has no redeeming qualities whatsoever: he’s an idiotic, prejudiced, blowhard, and a jerk in every way that Homer Simpson isn’t. And then Lois and Meg are dull, Chris has one joke and a really annoying voice, Brian is only funny interacting with Stewie, and Stewie is underutilized (plus having devolved from an evil genius to the gay stereotype other gay stereotypes point at and say “at least we’re not that bad”). Hermes, Apollo, and I used to watch the show because it broke all the rules, took risks no one else would, and the quality of the jokes pushed beyond the piss-poor characterization. Now, the rule-breaking has apparently been codified into a new set of rules: Every three minutes, random flashback apropos of nothing; ensure nobody learns any lessons, ever; and whenever the show is running short, fill it with REALLY overly long jokes (anyone remember about a minute of Peter hurting his knee? Yeah, they do that all the time now). We say tip your hat to the show Family Guy used to be, and go watch The Venture Bros.

Flight of the Conchords

Dionysos: Get on some mild-altering substance before you watch Conchords, and you will love it.

Frisky Dingo

Dionysos: This show may or may not still exist -- it’s “on hiatus” from Adult Swim. A standard blink-and-you’ll-miss-it 15-minute Adult Swim cartoon, Dingo has a style that gives surreal a bad name. Poorly animated (on purpose, as is standard procedure for most Adult Swim shows), Dingo follows the super-villain Killface, who’s bad at his job, and his nemesis Xander Crews/Awesome-X, who’s even worse. However, there are very little actual super-heroics going on, as many episodes go on truly bizarre tangents, such as Killface and Xander working in a sweatshop making Awesome-X action figures. A little more sensible than most Adult Swim fare, but it’s an acquired taste at best. I vote for watching it, but Apollo hates it with the passion of a thousand suns.

King of the Hill

Athena: I have always said that the only reason King of the Hill was animated was because creator Mike Judge was used to animation after Beavis and Butt-Head. In the same way as Malcolm in the Middle was a cartoon that happens to be live-action, Hill is a a live-action show that happens to be a cartoon. Nothing occurs that couldn’t happen on an ordinary show, and it’s actually a remarkably ordinary world compared to a number of live sitcoms. But I digress. Hill has been an underappreciated workhorse of the sitcom world for thirteen seasons. It is a bit mundane for our own tastes, but undeniably smart and enjoyable. Unfortunately, the much flashier Simpsons and Family Guy have outshone it, and 2008-2009 will be Hill’s last season. Shed a tear and wait breathlessly for what Mike Judge will make next.

Little Mosque on the Prairie

Hermes: A Canadian sitcom focusing on an Islamic community in Saskatchewan. Religious persecution is a little beyond our ken, so we stay away.

Metalocalypse

Hephaestos: You would think I would like heavy metal. I don’t.

Monk

Zeus: A mortal crime show I can actually stand due to its fascinating lead character, Monk has been doing the same thing for eight years now. Admittedly, it’s very good at this thing: Monk runs across the hackneyed mystery of the week. He provides both tremendous humor and even greater pathos as the pathetic OCD-ridden shell of a man who is Adrian Monk. I try to ignore the stupid mystery which is not the reason I watch this show, and I am sorely tempted to fast-forward through the summation to the funny and heartwarming/breaking end to the emotional subplot which is why I watch the show. The problem is that Monk never tries anything new. A recent episode featured Monk regressing to a happier time, providing much laughter as he acted about five years old. Then he “recovered,” and all I could think at the end of the episode was “Oh, great. He gets to go back to his miserable life? LOOK AT HOW SAD HE IS!!!!!! I WILL SMITE YOU, HACK WRITERS!!!!!!”

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Shows We Don't Watch: Action L-Z

2008-11-24T01:06:00.000-08:00

Shows We Don't Watch: Action L-Z

The Law & Order Franchise

Zeus: I shall rant again on the topic of mortal lawmen. We do not care if some mundane murderer is caught or not, especially when both they and their pursuers are dull -- which is certainly true of the Law & Order characters. The characterization of the original L&O is close to nonexistent -- but SVU improves on the original series' format through the rich characterization of Benson and Stabler. However, Apollo and I eventually came to realize that the writers were never going to spend enough time on the characters to actually do anything with them, and we lost interest. Criminal Intent is just Vincent D’Onofrio chewing scenery.

Life

Dionysos: The premise is bizarre but fun -- cop goes to goes to jail for twenty years, gets out, goes back to the police force -- but it’s a cop show, so Zeus won’t let me watch it. Maybe one day…

The Mentalist

Zeus: The Mentalist features an interesting premise and a decent script, but is ruined by the cast. Though it is yet another procedural, the premise -- a former magician and fake psychic works as a consultant for the police -- promised enough characterization to be interesting. The lead figures out crimes by figuring out people’s psyches the way most TV detectives figure out physical evidence. The problem is, Simon Baker plays the titular “mentalist” with an incredibly irritating mix of vague stares and scenery-chewing overacting. Seriously. A lot of vague stares. Let’s see how he likes staring vaguely after he’s BEEN HIT BY A LIGHTNING BOLT! Given that The Mentalist has just been picked up for a full season, this irritation with the lead must not be shared by all mortals, but it does mean that whatever great things this show may or may not do, we won’t be able to stand watching them.

NCIS

Ares: For a series about the military, there is shockingly little violence.

Numb3rs

Athena: Unsurprisingly, I enjoy the premise of this series. Numb3rs glamorizes mathematics, the purest of all intellectual pursuits, by using them -- as so often on TV -- to fight crime. It was intriguing and fresh -- for about a season and a half, when they ran out of ways to apply mathematics to the FBI, and started re-using ideas and shoehorning in the math. To be fair, we may have been victims of “sophomore slump,” but we have no overriding desire to go back and be sure.

Prison Break

Dionysos: How could a show about a prison break not be fun? Watch Prison Break, and you’ll have the answer. A show with a premise that could only sustain one season has now dragged out into four. Frankly unbelievable, and with an incredibly uncharismatic cast, I quick-draw channel-change after Terminator to avoid even a minute of this.

Robin Hood

Hermes: The umpteenth version of the Robin Hood legend, this BBC show made so little impression on us when we tried it out, we can’t even remember why we decided not to keep watching it.

Sarah Jane Adventures

Hephaestos: I am a great fan of Doctor Who. A man who lives by his wits and his knowledge of technology. Sarah Jane is Doctor Who for kids. Intelligently written. Sarah Jane is the same kind of intellectual hero as the Doctor. The show is very obviously aimed at children and excludes adult viewers. We cannot watch it. Interesting Who trivia: Sarah Jane Smith showed up on Doctor Who in 1973. The character (and actress) spun off into her own Adventures in 2007. 34 years for her own spin-off. A long time to wait (for a mortal).

Smallville

Athena: We really wish this were a better show. We really, really do. A fascinating premise, with such flawed execution it makes us sad. Superman is the iconic American mythic hero, Heracles for the modern age, and investigating his roots should be fascinating. Unfortunately, poor acting, worse writing, and a Monster of the Week/Teen Soap format makes Smallville an unwatchable nightmare.

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Cancellations: Athena both exults and rants; Dionysos and Hades merely weep.

2008-11-21T16:49:00.001-08:00

Athena: The fools at ABC have made a grievous error. The magnificent show Pushing Daisies, one of the most intelligent programs on network TV, has been canceled. The thirteen episodes made for the 2nd season shall be the last of Daisies, unless creator Bryan Fuller succeeds in his stated plans of following the show up with a DC comic book and/or a feature film. And all this before I even had the chance to sing the praises of Daisies here on TV Gods. We Olympians bid a fond farewell to this charming series that pleased us all.

Hades: I MUST SPEAK. DAISIES GAVE RESPECT TO THE DEAD -- AND THE "ALIVE AGAIN", IN A WAY UNCOMMON ON TELEVISION. NOW THEY HAVE TAKEN IT AWAY, AND THE DEAD AND I ARE ALONE AGAIN. I WEEP.

Athena: On the other hand, the series that I found most antagonistic, the intensely stupid and slanderous (if, in Dionysos's opinion, "fun") Valentine was canceled by the CW. In fact, CW's Sunday night programming had been handed off to a new company, Media Rights Capital, and now the CW is regretting that move, breaking off ties to MRC and canceling all their shows -- Valentine, Easy Money, 4Real, and In Harm's Way. I am exultant, for Valentine treated its viewers like Romans.

Hermes: A quick note. Athena is not up-to-date on "PC" language. On behalf of TV Gods, I'd like to retract her implication that Romans are stupid, uncultured boors, and instead replace the word "Romans" with "blonds."

Dionysos: i've been drinking. i've always been drinking, but i drank a lot. now. a little big ago. cause valentine was fun. it was sexy and fun and even hephaestos was pretty and i wanted to see how they cast me and i'm sad now. BACCHAE! Come! Please me!

Hermes: In other renewal/cancellation news: Terminator was renewed through the season (as we previously reported); Life on Mars got another four episodes, it has yet to get a full-season pickup; Eli Stone and Dirty Sexy Money also fell to the ABC chopping block. Further updates as the rest of the networks make their decisions.

Shows We Don't Watch: Action A-K

2008-11-20T21:21:00.000-08:00

Look below for a special guest appearance by Hades, Lord of the Dead!

Shows We Don't Watch (and why)

Action

Athena: In the first two (maybe three or even four, depending on if you're more like me or Ares) seasons, this was one of the most innovative, exciting shows on TV. However, the writing staff has a practice of deliberately only planning about two or three episodes ahead, to provide more “spontaneity.” I call it a Tragically stupid idea -- their decision to keep things fresh by not planning ahead meant that after a while, this meant that they were constantly reusing old storylines because they couldn’t be bothered to take the time to come up with new ones. This is a plan that backfired on them as badly as Cronus trying to kill Papa Zeus when he was a baby. This, plus the 24 tendency to kill off everyone the audience was starting to care about means that we don’t watch Jack Bauer anymore.

Cold Case

Zeus: We have little interest in shows about enforcing the laws of Man. In my own bailiwick, Cold Case, like most procedurals, spends too much time investigating the crimes and not enough time investigating the inner turmoil of the characters.

Criminal Minds

HADES: HELLO. I AM HADES, GOD OF THE DEAD. YOU MAY CALL ME DL (FOR DARK LORD). I HAVE A PREDELICTION FOR STORIES ABOUT SERIAL KILLERS. THE OTHERS CALL ME MORBID, AND ALLOW ME TO WATCH ONLY DEXTER TO FILL MY CRAVING. I AM SAD.

The CSI franchise

Zeus: There used to be cowboys on TV. I like cowboys. They have an elemental honor to them, like the Heroes of old. Now there are procedurals, walking through the dry and boring steps of dry and boring Mortal law officers. And CSI is the ur-procedural, which started them all. FOR THIS, I SHALL SMITE JERRY BRUCKHEIMER, AND CURSE HIS LINE FOREVER!!!

Fear Itself

Zeus: A horror anthology show. I disapprove of anthology shows. The advantage TV has over movies, the reason I allowed it to be created, is to explore character deeply week-by-week. With no recurring characters, the allure is gone.

Knight Rider

Dionysos: We didn't expect much from this one -- just a fun, popcorn-and-wine romp. But no. It's so stupid, it's not even fun! I made it at most ten minutes before I not only turned it off, but got Hephaestos to smash the TV with a hammer. Incredibly bad plotting, dialogue, fight scenes, acting -- merciful Zeus, EVERYTHING -- immediately told us THIS IS A WASTE OF PERFECTLY GOOD FILM.

End of Fall Premieres

2008-11-20T00:35:00.001-08:00

Hermes: All right, TV fans. That’s all the fall series premieres we’re aware of. We’re happy to hear about others we missed, so we can give them a shot—or some arguments on our judgment. Just don’t expect Ares to be sympathetic to Kath and Kim-lovers.

You may note that we judged this fall’s new shows rather harshly, not giving anything a higher overall score than “3”. This isn’t because we hate mortal TV, only that we haven’t been wowed by anything that started this season. You’ll see a much higher score on some of our favorite shows.

New Shows: Worst Week

2008-11-20T00:31:00.001-08:00

Worst Week

Hermes: I am going to hand off this short review to Athena, who feels like ranting.

Athena: Here we have another dismally failed comedy (and BBC import/remake). It takes the basic methodology of slapstick, takes away everything that makes it funny, and stretches it into twenty-two minutes. I watched the first half of the first episode and speared the TV. After a short introduction to the lead character, during which we got little information except “he’s a nice guy” and “he likes his girlfriend,” bad things started happening to him. No rhyme or reason, no interesting reactions from him, no tragic Destiny, not even very interesting bad things. Just shitty stuff happening to a nice guy. Sure, that might be funny for about two minutes, but you cannot sustain an entire show, let alone an entire series, on this premise. Beat the producers to death with sticks. Straight 1 on all counts!

Hermes: Whoo! Deadly! Here we go--

All scores are from 1 (bad) - 5 (good)
Hephaestos (Plot): 1
Zeus (Character): 1
Apollo (Dialogue): 1
Athena (Intelligence): 1
Dionysos (Fun): 1
Hermes (Overall): 1

New Shows: Valentine

2008-11-19T00:16:00.000-08:00

Valentine

Hermes: Valentine is an odd duck. It lies at an uncomfortable level -- too weird for the mainstream, but not quirky enough to really hold the attention of the geek crowd. Plus, it’s really quite sappy. The premise is this: Aphrodite, Eros, the Pythia oracle, and for some reason Hercules are still around in the present day, and run a business bringing soul mates together. Needless to say, all of us hate our portrayals. When they realize that they don’t really "get" modern people, they hire a romance novelist to help them out (because all shows need human characters, apparently). Plus Eros has a “lust gun.”

Hephaestos (plot): The plots of Valentine are simple and rote. They have no complex twists or challenging concepts. They are straightforward and easy to understand, for good and bad. The presence of the supernatural is low for a show about the Olympians. The Gods switch between completely downplaying their godlike-ness (the only real supernatural powers we’ve seen are the aforementioned lust gun and the oracle seeing the future in a Jacuzzi) and explaining ad nauseum the history and role of the Gods (which they get all wrong). On the good side, the man who plays me is very attractive and relatively true to me, except missing my limp. Plot: 2.

Zeus (character): GODS ARE MAJESTIC! GODS ARE WONDROUS! GODS HAVE NO NEED FOR MORTALS! However, Eros really is the bonehead that Valentine portrays. The soul mates that form the core of each episode are really, really sweet with each other, which is heartwarming if you're as sappy as Hestia or Hermes, or STOMACH-TURNING IF YOU ARE KING OF THE GODS! Valentine never spends more than the teaser setting up the love between the soul mates -- and it is unneeded, because Fate says they belong together. I know the power of Destiny -- destiny was the only reason my own father failed to murder me. For mortals, the destiny-over-character-development may be distasteful. Character: 3.

Apollo (dialogue): The dialogue is simple but effective -- except when the writers try to reach beyond their limits. Then their hubris takes them down. The best example is the third episode, in which a brilliant playwright teaches a famous sex symbol to be a great actress. The problem came during the climax, in which a "great" scene was "wonderfully" acted in the show-within-a-show -- or rather, the actress gave atrociously bad writing a laughable performance. These writers have no poetry in their souls. Dialogue: 2.

Athena (intelligence): Valentine, while admittedly "cute" (a description I disdain), is aimed at the lowest of all possible denominators. The Olympian characters have for some reason renamed themselves with names like Grace (Aphrodite) and Danny (Eros). The plots are simplistic, the characters stereotypes. These writers use their brains only for cooling their blood, not for thinking. Intelligence: 1.

Dionysos (fun): My family has so much bad to say about Valentine. Personally, I look forward to seeing myself on it. The show is irrevent, a bit tongue-in-cheek, and has really fun, if improbable, situations. Plus, the cast and writing are S-E-X-X-Y. I mean, Eros has a lust gun! Fun: 4.

Hermes (overall): This is an odd little show. We think it lives on a tightrope between too weird and too normal, and it’s probably going to fall off soon. Overall: 2.5.

All scores are from 1 (bad) - 5 (good)
Hephaestos (Plot): 2
Zeus (Character): 3
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 1
Dionysos (Fun): 4
Hermes (Overall): 2.5

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New Shows: True Blood

2008-11-17T23:50:00.000-08:00

True Blood
Hermes: The newest creation by the man behind Six Feet Under and American Beauty, True Blood has gotten a lot of critical acclaim and favorable reviews by respected mortals. And we must say, we are mystified as to why. We watched the pilot, and we didn’t see one thing in it we liked.
Hephaestos (Plot): The first premise, the foundation of True Blood's world, is interesting. Vampires come into the open when the chirurgeons, followers of Asklepios, develop synthetic human blood. The second premise is stranger and a shaky foundation: a Southern waitress is telepathic. She hears thoughts, and cannot shut them out, finding herself terribly burdened by constant bombardment by the thoughts of everyone around. Hence, is instantly attracted to a vampire who comes to town, because she cannot hear his thoughts. This romance would be hard-pressed to sustain a series, and there is little else of substance that occurs in this show -- its pace is very slow. Very little. Happens. In any. Given. Episode. Like watching. Steel. Harden. Plot: 1
Zeus (Character): Romance. Romancing. SEX. Vital components of almost any story, and certainly many of my own. It is a strong, but difficult, relationship on which to hang a story. It depends on a man and a woman (or a woman and a God, or two women, or a man and a goat...) who complement each other, who have what Aphrodite calls "chemistry." In television, the actors must also have this "chemistry." Series leads Sookie and Bill (Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer) have NONE! Their romance is not even synthetic, it is IMAGINARY. We must believe Sookie when she raves about Bill to others, but I see no interest between them in their scenes together (and I see ALL!) The other characters are the oldest archetypes -- in a tired, overused fashion: The flamboyantly gay cook; the sassy Black best friend (oh, the Carthaginian jokes we had in my day...); the rash brother, and the saintly grandmother. For making me hate mortals, even Anna Paquin (who must expect a visit from an amorous swan, if you catch my meaning), I give this True Blood CHARACTER: 1!
Apollo (Dialogue): There is a certain cadence to the speech of the American Southern. It is the most musical of the American accents, and I often wish it was the dominant instead of the flat Midwest and unremarkable West-Coast speech patterns. True Blood certainly gives one a taste of the delicious Southern sounds and slang. Oddly, the immortal vampire Bill displays none of the lyrical patterns of the classical Southern gentleman, but this I can forgive. Then there is the actual content of said dialogue. It is either painfully obvious, almost to the level of "I FEEL ANGRY," or so oblique as to lose all meaning. Perhaps subtext can be garnered if one digs deep enough, but I doubt its existence. Dialogue: Style 3, Substance 1 -- rounds to 2.
Athena (Intelligence): This show angers me, especially coming from the subtle Alan Ball. Within thirty seconds of viewing, the vampires' metaphor becomes clear: they represent ethnic minorities and the way they are marginalized in American culture. Additionally, because of the "coming out of hiding" portion of the story, they may represent the homosexual population. This is a fair and perfectly respectable metaphor, if perhaps a bit overused. However, the metaphor in True Blood is as subtle as Dionysos's flirtation -- and because of its portrayal, just as unwanted. It is my argument that a concept as rich in history as the vampire has far more potential than as a simple racism metaphor, but investigating vampiric subculture seems to be outside the scope of True Blood -- which makes the vampires no more than a clumsy substitute for a real series about factual racism. As an additional pet peeve shared between myself, Artemis, and Pan, True Blood’s vampires’ fangs come from their incisors rather than their canines, which is just ridiculous – fangs are extended canines! They just are! Take a look at any animal with fangs! Ahem. Excuse me. I lost my calm for a moment. In short, Intelligence: 1
Dionysos (Fun): Gakh! The second series in a row without a sense of humor. Or drinking (wine, not blood), or revelry. While there is explicit sex -- or at least, as explicit as American television dares to go. You are all prudes, and need to, as a nation, have a glass of my finest wines. Or twenty. Where was I? Yes, explicit sex -- which True Blood manages to strip of all its appeal, as if plain nudity were enough to stir a true man (or God)'s loins. Ecch. And, as Hephaestos mentioned in his stolid way, I could not find enough to drink to make this show go by quickly. Boooring! I certainly hope the next show we watch has a little more whimsy (and maybe some more sex). Fun: 1
Hermes: Whoof! That's negative, don'tcha think? The only one who had anything positive to say was Apollo, and that's only because he's got a thing for Southern accents. True Blood has served up a resounding 1.

All scores are from 1-5
Hephaestos (Plot): 1
Zeus (Character): 1
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 1
Dionysos (Fun): 1
Hermes (Overall): 1

Next up: A (per)version of us -- Aphrodite and Eros star in Valentine.

New Shows: Sons of Anarchy

2008-11-17T23:49:00.000-08:00

Sons of Anarchy

Ehh... Sorry, we never saw this. Dionysos wanted to see it terribly, and Ares agreed, but Hera refuses to let something as disreputable as biker gangs into her household. The rest of us didn't care enough to risk angering the only woman who Zeus fears (I DO NOT!!).

NO SCORE

TV Gods Sanctuary Review

2008-11-17T18:17:00.000-08:00

It has come to my attention (via a thunderbolt to the head) that I, Hermes, have been taking too active a role in the reviews so far, and they have reflected primarily my own take on a a particular show. This is, of course, fine with me, but big daddy Zeus wants his own say. So we're going to reformat the reviews slightly from now on. Each of my family will still be in charge of a specific facet of the review, but they will now be doing their own writing. We'll see how it goes, and if Dionysos is readable at all.

Sanctuary

Hermes: This is a (relatively) unprecedented show. Created as an online “webisode” program, but by professionals (mostly Stargate alums), and filmed mostly on green-screen, Sanctuary was picked up by Sci-Fi after they’d streamed the equivalent of their first two episodes on-line (which they then re-filmed for the regular show). So. Unprecedented. Too bad it’s not very good.
Hephaestos: It is not a bad premise -- the "Sanctuary" of the title is a place for monsters and mutants and mythical creatures to stay. They're safe there, and don't hurt mortals. It is good all around. But then there are the plots. The first two episodes were slow, like half-heated iron, and when the third episode moved a little faster, it was obvious that the writers had sped up the process of building the plot by reusing plot elements from other shows -- the villain hiding in plain sight is an old plot, easily broken without exquisite craftsmanship, which the Sanctuary writers do no have. Plot: 2
Zeus: I am DISSATISFIED! When I sit down to watch mortal storytelling, I expect heroes, like Heracles and Achilles! Stronger than men, in both physique and psyche. Their problems should be epic, not mundane. Sanctuary claims to be a Heroic show, with the immortal Doctor Magnus leading the team, and her daughter Ashley showing the same superheroic feats of athleticism and warfare as Atalanta. HOWEVER, Magnus is too perfect, filled with hubris, and Ashley has the personality of a silly young girl, and not a Heroine. Ah, and there is another character. Doctor Zimmerman. HE IS SO DULL I HAD FORGOTTEN HE EXISTED!!! The recurring villain, apparently your "Jack the Ripper," is the only interesting one in the bunch, and he has not nearly enough screen time. Bah! My ruling: CHARACTER: 2!
Apollo: There are two schools of thought on dialogue. Some think it should sound like real people speaking, complete with ums and uhs, and the rather limited vocabulary most mortals speak with. Others believe that dialogue should be lyrical, beautiful, ready to set to music. This lyricists, are, of course, correct. Mortals go to the theatre, or the TV set, to escape their life, to be lifted above it. For this to succeed, they must be exposed to speech more akin to that of Olympus. The Sanctuary dialogue is decidedly of the "realistic" variety -- but not so far as to be rustically charming, only dull. The characters do make themselves clear, but they spout no witticisms worthy of quotation. In addition, the lead, Amanda Tapping, otherwise a fine actress, puts on a strange and forced English accent, distracting at best and grating to the ears at worst. For the purely functional dialogue, I give Sanctuary Dialogue: 2.
Athena: It is good to see a fantastical show where not everything in the world is spelled out. Viewers have brains, they should exercise them, and Sanctuary gives a reasonable chance for the audience to do so. The world created owes something to mythology, and those familiar with the (inferior) Celtic mythos may recognize the Morrigan in the second episode, though this knowledge is not necessary to enjoy the story. Similarly, the presence of John Druitt, also known as "Jack the Ripper," will fascinate those familiar with English history a century gone -- and the show's version of "Jack" promises mystery that tantalizes the viewers. On the other hand, the plot of any given episode require far less brain-work. It may take a short time to acclimate oneself to the world at the opening and understand exactly what is going on, but after that, the audience is led by the hand. This dichotomy of exactly how much Sanctuary expects from its viewers is quite vexing, and leads me to give this judgment -- Intelligence: 3.
Dionysos: GROOAANNN... Must I watch this? Must I force-feed this gristle down my throat? Sanctuary is DULL. The characters are DULL. The plots are DULL. Even the action is DULL (partly because I don't much care if any of these characters take the big dirt nap). The show may be smart, it may be unprecedented, it may be the cure for cancer (cancer's a disease, right? You mortals have that?), but if it's not fun to watch, then what is the point? I would rather watch a dumb show like Valentine, that at least has a sense of humor, and attempts to give the audience something to enjoy. Fun: 1.
Hermes: Harsh words from many of my fellow Olympians. Dionysos really hates this thing. In short, we’d stay away from this one (and curse Sci-Fi for canceling Stargate Atlantis, which they probably did so they could afford Sanctuary), unless it gets better. It is showing signs of getting better, but it’s got an awfully long way to go. Overall: 2.

All scores are from 1 (bad) - 5 (good)
Hephaestos (Plot): 2
Zeus (Character): 2
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 3
Dionysos (Fun): 1
Hermes (Overall): 2

If you like it, Digg it:

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New Shows: Merlin

2008-11-15T19:00:00.002-08:00

Merlin

This BBC program (no, you can’t watch it on American TV yet. You need to steal it on-line or wait for a year. Stop bitching) is a fun, Smallville-type look at the early years of Merlin and King Arthur. Well, kind of. They decided to make Merlin into a teenager and still put him in the same place as Arthur -- so they made them the same age, and Merlin is Arthur’s servant. And for some reason, Uther Pendragon is alive and well and Arthur is Prince, without stepbrother Kay or anything else viewers might recognize from fond memories of The Sword in the Stone. Now, we’ll admit we’re not terribly familiar with the original legend (wrong mythology) but we’re fairly certain that Arthur being an orphan was established when Arthur’s childhood was first mentioned. And we know that Merlin ain’t supposed to be his teenaged sidekick. Then we have the fact that Arthur’s love interest isn’t Guinevere, but Morgana, who is recast from half-sister and evil enchantress to a member of Uther’s court -- and Guinevere is her servant and Merlin’s love interest. Okay… oh, and Guinevere’s Black. Not to sound racist, but there weren’t a lot of African women around in the Middle Ages -- and their race would certainly not be completely ignored like Guinevere’s is in Merlin.

Okay, so Merlin has made so many changes to the mythos that it’s pretty much unrecognizable as the King Arthur myth. And it has a tendency to hit the note of “Merlin knows there’s bad magic, but he can’t reveal it because magic is outlawed and nobody will believe him” a bit too often. But if you can forget the fact that it’s supposed to be Camelot, and ignore the occasionally anachronistic dialogue (mostly insults, oddly enough), it’s a fun generic fantasy romp.

All scores are from 1-5
Hephaestos (Plot): 2
Zeus (Character): 4
Apollo (Dialogue): 3
Athena (Intelligence): 2
Dionysos (Fun): 3
Hermes (Overall): 3

New Shows: Life on Mars

2008-11-15T19:00:00.001-08:00

Life on Mars

Another American import of a British hit. Life on Mars is titled after a David Bowie song from 1973, and is so named because the premise is about a modern cop who hits his head and wakes up in ’73. No, we’re not going to ask you to “stay with us,” as that is simply a bizarre and, to our mind, not very rich premise. However, we did give the original BBC series a shot when it came out in ’06, only to determine that there really wasn’t much there. We honestly don’t know how the American series measures up, but since the UK version wasn’t our cuppa tea, we doubt the US one will be our black coffee.

NO SCORE

New Shows: Kath and Kim

2008-11-15T18:59:00.002-08:00

Kath and Kim

What the Hell is this? Apparently an import/remake of an Australian show, we can only hope that the original is better. Two talented and funny actresses (Molly Shannon and Selma Blair) are wasted on scripts that wouldn’t make a man on nitrous oxide laugh. We’re not even sure where the jokes are supposed to be half the time -- we think the main gag is that they’re both shallow and stupid, but we’re honestly not sure when we’re supposed to be laughing (and we don’t, even when that’s identified). You know it’s a lousy script when Molly Shannon can’t make it work -- merciful Zeus, she made Superstar halfway watchable. Stay far, far away from Kath and Kim.

All scores are from 1-5
Hephaestos (Plot): 1
Zeus (Character): 1
Apollo (Dialogue): 1
Athena (Intelligence): 1
Dionysos (Fun): 1
Hermes (Overall): 1

New Shows: Fringe

2008-11-15T18:59:00.001-08:00

Fringe

We are not sure how we feel about this. We really liked the premiere. The second and third episodes kind of left us cold. The fourth was quite good, and the fifth wasn’t bad at all. It’s so damned hyped that that makes us a little turned off, then we try to go back the other way, but it’s under discussion if we go too far. The premise is good: It’s basically The X-Files, except that the investigations have official support, and everything is based around super-science (“fringe” science) instead of aliens AND ghosts AND technological conspiracies. The thing is, the characters are not that interesting. The three leads are an FBI agent, a crazy scientist (and we do mean crazy, he spent the last 17 years in an asylum), and the scientist’s son. The scientist is a fantastic character. It’s the guy that played Denethor, the Steward of Gondor (who jumped off a cliff while on fire, just to make sure his death was the most awesome thing in his life, or so we must assume) from Return of the King, and sharp writing and an amazing performance make his insanity completely believable as well as very entertaining. However, one character cannot a show make, as the lead is really dull, and the snarky son is underutilized (in fact, he has no job on the show other than “keep your father in line,” which means they have to really work to keep him involved in the cases). The supporting cast is simply exposition machines, and while the episode-specific characters are pretty good, the fact that they show up the lead cast is problematic.

The show has a tendency to go too far. The third episode includes two crazy super-science problems, apparently unrelated, each of which could have supported an episode on their own. And it has the highest body count of any show we can think of. Your average cop or hospital show has one, maybe two deaths per episode. An action show might have two redshirts or guest stars and a half-dozen mooks bite it. Fringe opened with an entire 747 going down, killed a busload of people in the third episode, another six in the teaser to episode five… it’s really quite absurd.

It seems like we’ve simply been bashing Fringe. But if it had only bad things, we wouldn’t still be undecided on it. It explores interesting areas of fringe science, has an interesting arc plot running along underneath the episodic, it has some nice investigative and action sequences, and, as we said, the scientist is really damn fun (and has a lot of pathos, too). So we don’t know. Jury’s still out. You might want to give it a shot.

All scores are from 1-5
Hephaestos (Plot): 3
Zeus (Character): 4 (Walter) 1 (everyone else)
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 3
Dionysos (Fun): 3
Hermes (Overall): 3

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New Shows: Eleventh Hour

2008-11-15T18:58:00.000-08:00

Eleventh Hour

A BBC import/remake, Eleventh Hour is about an FBI science advisor who runs around and solves crimes about the cutting-edge of science. Unlike, say, Fringe, this is about real science (or as real as you can get on TV) -- and that might be where it went wrong. The first thing we heard about it was that fans were pissed that the remake made the two leads younger and prettier -- Rufus Sewell instead of Patrick Stewart, and a younger, thinner girl for his female bodyguard (interesting to show the American audience vs. the British audience -- the hot bodyguard that every guy hits on in the BBC series is the same woman who plays the “unattractive,” “fat,” Scottish clothing designer on Ugly Betty). We watched the American pilot, and were unimpressed. So we decided to check out the original and see where the Americans went wrong. And you know what? They didn’t! It’s a practically line-for-line, shot-for-shot remake, with only a couple bits that are too “explicit” for American TV and a few superfluous scenes cut for time. So the thing is -- the original isn’t very good. It’s dull, and no matter how much you like to listen to Patrick Stewart talk, he can’t hold our attention for an entire episode. So Eleventh Hour is dull and uninspired, but for once, you can’t blame that on the translation. It was translated perfectly; it’s just that the source material wasn’t worth the effort.

All scores are from 1-5
Hephaestos (Plot): 3
Zeus (Character): 2
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 4
Dionysos (Fun): 1
Hermes (Overall): 2

New Shows: Crusoe

2008-11-15T18:55:00.000-08:00

Since we’re just starting out, we’re going to begin with two special features before we move into the weekly episode guides. First, we’ll show you our impressions of the 2008 fall season, and then of every scripted show we could think of. It’ll give you mortals a sense of our tastes, and information on what shows we’ll be following on a weekly basis.

Crusoe

Do you remember when Lost started, and everyone thought it was going to be a serious Gilligan’s Island, with the question of how they were going to get off the island every episode? And how JJ Abrams and Damon Lindelof surprised us by making it about how cool the island was? Yeah, Crusoe is the Gilligan’s Island thing. It is, unsurprisingly, the story of Robinson Crusoe, stretched out into an episodic format. The first episode featured pirates looking for treasure, but they were dispatched by the end, which leads us to conclude that we’re looking at Crusoe as Gilligan. In fact, he’s more The Professor -- his island is a mass of Rube Goldberg devices, from crazy traps to a hamster-wheel bridge (no, we can’t explain it any better) to a ridiculously complicated signaling device right out of Wile E. Coyote’s repertoire. Of course, they’ve reworked the racist “Friday” character--he still takes his name from the day Crusoe found him and refers to himself as “Friday” in the third person, but now it’s because he’s “making fun” of Crusoe and the fact that the white man can’t pronounce his real name. Right. He still has a Wookiee Lifedebt to Crusoe -- you saved our life, so we’ll be your slave, we mean friend, until you die.

There are Lost rip-off flashback sequences throughout the show, but they fail to be entertaining or even particularly enlightening as to Crusoe’s character. And then there are the coincidences. Okay, so Crusoe’s island happens to have pirate treasure on it. We’ll buy it, because otherwise it’s Cast Away on a weekly basis. Then at the climax, he figures out that the pirate treasure just happens to be buried right where he built his treehouse. Uh-huh. Then, he blows up the pirates, and guess what is right under there feet, unearthed by the explosion? THE GOLD!!! We. Don’t. Think. So. The only thing to watch Crusoe for is reasonably cool action sequences (a nifty swordfight in the premiere), some bizarre bamboo MacGyver sequences, and the fact that the costumes and dialogue are a reasonable facsimile of the 17th century. Otherwise, keep of off Crusoe’s island and go to Lost’s.

All scores are from 1 (bad) to 5 (good)
Hephaestos (Plot): 1
Zeus (Character): 2
Apollo (Dialogue): 2
Athena (Intelligence): 2
Dionysos (Fun): 2
Hermes (Overall): 2

TV Gods

Chuck -- Chuck vs. the Gravitron

Thanksgiving

TV Gods: Show We Don't Watch -- Comedy A-M

Shows We Don't Watch: Action L-Z

Cancellations: Athena both exults and rants; Dionysos and Hades merely weep.

Shows We Don't Watch: Action A-K

Categories

End of Fall Premieres

New Shows: Worst Week

New Shows: Valentine

New Shows: True Blood

New Shows: Sons of Anarchy

TV Gods Sanctuary Review

New Shows: Merlin

New Shows: Life on Mars

New Shows: Kath and Kim

New Shows: Fringe

New Shows: Eleventh Hour

New Shows: Crusoe