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The Freeness of Broad City

March 14, 2015
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Broad City is my favorite comedy right now next to Archer and Veep. It is the most consistently funny, irreverent and well-paced show. Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer are an incredibly talented duo. Talking about Broad City on the internet doesn’t seem to be as frequent as it was last season when it was being posited and upheld as the anti-Girls, and it was something new and fresh to an ecosystem that’s always looking to grind their teeth into new and fresh things to suck out anything worth turning into free content and meaningless discourse. While the second season has surpassed the first in quality and laughs, it’s lost that new show smell and, like most sitcoms, the stakes aren’t high enough to encourage devout appointment viewing; so it’s now phased into a second mode as just a solid, consistent show with a cult following and a number of people who catch it later.

The most fascinating aspect of Broad City to me is something I didn’t even pay attention to at first. There’s understood freeness in the world created by this show, most visibly in Ilana. At the beginning of the series, Ilana was romantically involved with Franklin–played by Hannibal Burress–but he was never explicitly her boyfriend and throughout the series, Ilana dates and hooks up and flirts and is open about her sexuality in a positive and affirming way. Franklin comes out whenever the show feels like using him but he’s not postured as a traditional romantic lead. It’s a quietly wonderful thing and even better, it’s never openly dealt with. It’s all just understood that this is who Ilana is and there’s no need to rationalize or justify this behavior: it just is what it is.

Abbi serves a purpose as the proto-straight woman. She’s a class A fuck up in a recognizable way. You root for her to get a training class at the gym she works at, or to find a new apartment or to hook up with some new weird dude or even just to make it through an episode unscathed. It doesn’t really rely on narcissism or sourness as code for complex in a way that shows up in a Girls. These two just co-exist together and try to make each day a success in whatever way they choose to define it each episode. There’s freedom in defining success on your own terms.

What Makes Us Want What We Want?

April 2, 2014
opinion piece, Television
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I’ve been thinking about Twin Peaks a lot lately. I finally got around to watching it two months ago and I’ve kicked myself ever since for not watching sooner. David Lynch’s circus of soap opera, mystery, intrigue and nightmares is one of the most unique, weird, heartbreaking and beautiful things I’ve ever watched and it’s amazing that a major TV network even gave this two seasons. I’ve been sad a lot and this show, strangely, brought me a lot of comfort. See a show like this sparked the imagination and experimental switch in my head which has been like a breath of fresh air.

Part of my depression has come about because of my place in life and the fact that I want to make a living writing and make a living filming but I haven’t come close to either. There comes a point where you’re so mired in hopelessness that you question whether or not you really want this. Is it really that I just hate my job or don’t find much excitement in the thing I studied in college? Would I really care as much if I were making enough money? Maybe this really is just a phase that I haven’t quite outgrown yet. Tumblrs with snarky, C-grade humor and wordpress blogs that devolve into narcissistic vents of frustrations don’t exactly make a great writer, and if I’m not actively trying to be better, what exactly am I doing?

Then you watch something like Twin Peaks and it all comes back to you. You remember what great art and great writing can do and you revert to that child that wanted to be guided by imagination before life pounded reality into the mind. It’s the same feeling you get from a great record or a breathtaking film. I am not a great writer but I yearn to be because I obsess over great writers. I don’t strive to have the answers or know the right thing to do, I only strive to learn, keep learning and always want to learn. That’s the feeling I get from a writer like James Baldwin or Toni Morrison, from a Ta-Nahesi Coates essay or from a television show like Twin Peaks. These are people following their mind’s road–wherever that may go. I like that sense of adventure and that effortlessness to take the mind as messy as it is and make something eloquent. A fiery passion can create a hungry min yearning to grow. I hope that fire walks with me.

True Detective Season 2: Bad Boys Edition

March 24, 2014
Movies, Television
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martin

Here me out.

The first season of True Detective was a interesting concept and technical feat surrounded by smothering pretentiousness and often silly dialogue. The show was a work in progress from beginning to end but it was always somewhat entertaining and interesting. The most intriguing part of the series is that it’s limited: every season will bring a new story and a new cast. This season brought us Woody Harrelson growling and clinging on to some dated sense of masculinity while also wishing he cold give it up; it also brought us Matthew McConaughey’s jaded, College-junior level ruminations on the meaning and inherent hopelessness of life. It was ridiculous but also kind of fun and I think True Detective should continue down this path.

This is what leads to my opinion that season 2 should be about Marcus Burnett and Mike Lowrey, otherwise known as Martin Lawrence and Will Smith from the 1995 film Bad Boys. For those of you who remember, Bad Boys was the directorial debut of a flashy commercial and music video director by the name of Michael Bay. It has the benefit of being early in Bay’s career, before he figured out how to shove in 4,382 explosions into a 2 and a half hour movie while still making time for racist stereotype humor and gratuitous shots of women’s asses. Bad Boys as it stands is just a cheesy action movie that looks like a sleek early 90s music video that is propelled by two great performances made by two Black actors about to completely blow up.

All this said, there’s no two people I would rather watch discover the evil hidden in all men while trying to infiltrate a secret cult of white supremacist Miami club owners who sacrifice 20-something bottle girls for their satanic rituals than these men. Just imagine it for a second: Marcus Burnett, family man, watching his 37 kids grow up and growing distant from his wife but refusing to admit that it’s happening. He just wants to do his job and go home to wife to spend some quality time. Instead he’s got to put him with this secret cult bullshit. He blames Mike for this because he blames Mike for everything. As far as he’s concerned Mike is a magnet for this type of shit. Everywhere ol’ Mikey Mike goes, there’s a secret cult sacrificing women in satanic rituals. The truth is, he blames Mike because he envies Mike. Who the fuck is this trust fund cop anyways? He rides around in the nicest cars, fucks supermodels and uses this job as an excuse to live out his Commando dreams. Marcus’ resentment is understandable: nobody envisions a life unfulfilled, a marriage with a spark that has faded and children who treat you like you don’t matter. This job is the only thing that makes Marcus feel like a man, even if only for a moment, but it isn’t enough. Marcus would never cheat on his wife though–he just can’t bring himself to–so instead he accepts this life; a life of emasculation in a world where male truthers are desperately clinging onto the most basest, aggressive senses of male ego. In this world Marcus continues to make sense of it all.

And what of Mike Lowrey: rich kid, action cop who crashes cars into giant explosion piles and buys another one afterwards. Who cares? None of it matters anyway. Another impossibly hot woman comes to his beautiful condo in order to be pleasured by him and then never heard from again. He’s happy to oblige because he’s always happy to oblige, doesn’t mean anything to him anyways, just the same thing every single day. Mike loved someone once but it didn’t work out, maybe it was the toll the job took on him, maybe he just didn’t know anything about love or maybe after years of causal meaningless sex the concept of love is too foreign to ever be taken seriously. Love is probably imaginary anyways, he figures, just something to distract us as we die alone. Something is happening to Mike the deeper he gets into the cult of Miami club owners. Clubs used to be nothing more to him then a place for overly priced Hennessy and scantily clad women paid to entertain your advances. It never occurred to him that this place could harbor the worst qualities in man but now it only makes all too much sense. The animalistic masculinity and aggression on display mixed with the countless cases of sexual assault? Of course nightclubs could be linked to satanic rituals, if only he’d seen it earlier. If only he’d seen a lot of things earlier. Mike’s been obsessing over this case in between periods of reading nihilist works from Jim Crawford and Eugene Thacker. He’s been trying to make Marcus understand his newfound viewpoint but Marcus isn’t having it. “Now’s not the time Mike” he says; he always says this, because time is a flat circle and we’re doomed to repeat the same things. Mike has found himself obsessed with the boogie monster that leads this cult. He wants to understand how he thinks. He’s stopped shaving and keeping up appearances, Marcus doesn’t get why. Marcus never gets why. At least not until the time is opportune for him to get why (probably episode 8), at that point Marcus will have some insightful commentary about the meaning of life and our place in it and Mike will look at him with bated breath and proclaim, “NOW THAT’S HOW YOU ‘SPOSED TO PROGNOSTICATE THE FATE OF HUMANITY! FROM NOW ON, THAT’S HOW YOU PROGNOSTICATE THE FATE OF HUMANITY!”

So yes, this absolutely needs to be True Detective season 2.

The Dynamic Duo

August 9, 2013
Television
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BB-2

 

*****Includes spoilers… sort of******

Like any good American citizen, I’m currently in the process of rewatching Breaking Bad. The dark and intense story of Walter White’s transition from mild-mannered to evil drug kingpen has been an incredibly satisfying and grisly development to sit through.

Upon rewatch, the show is even better but no less uncomfortable; the drug business, after all, is not for the faintest of hearts. While this is indeed the story of “Mr. Chips becoming Scarface”, it’s also a show about the relationship and evolution of Jesse Pinkman: the foul-mouthed brat that started the show taking cues lifestyle cues from XXL and the juggalo lifestyle.
But let’s discuss Walt. It’s hard for me to identify with the thought process behind still rooting for the guy. He’s killed, lied and stolen for selfish reasons (the family excuse is most flimsy), he’s always been an arrogant and condescending asshole who talks down to any and everyone and he’s really just incredibly insufferable and has made everyone’s lives worse (especially Pinkman’s but we’ll get to that). Yet on some level, I get it. Many have pointed out that from the beginning, Walt has never been much of a good guy. He was never evil either, he was just the prototypical embodiment of the spineless “Falling Down” white male constantly frustrated by the life unfairly bestowed on him. It’s the story that’s been told a million times, only here it’s done in a more engrossing way.
Walt’s story may have started as the tale of a man who wanted to provide for his family before his death from lung cancer, but it became the tale about a man’s thirst for power and control. The tale of a man who got to finally profit from his genius the way he always felt he should have. Pretty much every murder or pain he’s taken part in–that wasn’t about protecting himself–has been about holding onto control. The only unselfish murder he committed was to protect Jesse in season 3, otherwise he’s made being a terrible person look natural.  But man has he been fun to watch. All love and respect to Brian Cranston, he went from Malcolm’s dad to Heisenberg and he’s been perfect the whole way through.  The only time Walt was ever unbearable to watch happened in the middle of season 4 but that seemed to be purposeful. Walt may not be someone to root for but he has been a great foil and madmen to watch.
Now Jesse is truly the heartstrings of this show. From his beginnings as a scrappy little punk, Jesse has been through hell and back and has truly shown himself to be nothing more than a kid who’s fucked up a few times and has no real direction in life. From the day he partnered up with Walter he’s been shot at, beat up and on the verge of death or depression multiple times.  He’s a kid who probably needed just a few more hugs in order to have lived life as a doctor instead of a junkie dealer. He’s in constant search of a father figure or family; he tries to find it in Walter who, to his credit, has stuck by his side thus far but really Walter only needs Jesse because he trusts him and he’s easily manipulated by his bullshit. Any moment where Walt has the chance to treat Jesse like a peer and deal with what’s troubling him is almost always blown so that Walt can instead focus on himself.  After the events of seasons 2 and 3, Jesse realized what kind of person this life has turned him into and it eats at his soul. It’s heartbreaking because Aaron Paul sells it and it’s tragic because it’s an all too familiar tale of ill-conceived loyalty to anyone who’ll give a damn by someone who just wants to be loved.
And that’s where we’re at as we near the end of the series. A man who’s gone into the darkest spaces of the human soul and embraced it and another man who’s gone to the same spaces and just wants to be held. It’s not completely clear how this story will end exactly but it barely matters. What does matter is who these people end up as by the time it’s over and whether or not the things they’ve done will come back to bite them or just haunt them. These last 8 are sure to be intense but when it’s all said and down I’ll miss these characters because of the richness and tragedy of their stories. The dad and the street punk have come a long ways.

Chappelle’s Show: 10 Years Later

January 22, 2013
Television
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On January 22, 2003, Comedy Central premiered a new sketch comedy series by a funny, yet relatively unknown comic named Dave Chappelle. Named simply Chappelle’s Show, it was a modest little production that aired on a Tuesday and, suffice it to say, one of the most important moments in television began. I remember watching the first episode in my room with the sound low, because my parents did not allow me and my sisters to watch TV during the school week. I remember that very funny (and now incredibly dated) opening sketch and I remember that great blooper of that first sketch that followed it. Then, of course, there was the final sketch of the night: the black white supremacist frontline sketch; I was still relatively young at this point but even then I knew how ridiculous this idea was and but I was still too young to fully grasp just how daring of a sketch it was. With it, Chappelle’s Show had already cemented its legacy in the first episode.

Ten years later, it’s hard to watch the show without thinking of it in some sort of pseudo-psychological way. You look for the cracks within the show that led to Chappelle quitting: the symbolism in the sketches, the hints of animosity, hell even Paul Mooney seems prophetic in retrospect. It’s hard to remember how you felt when you first watched the show all those years ago. For that first season, I remember loving it instantly (I also remember being one of the few of my fellow classmates watching) and I remember planning out ways that I could watch it each week without my parents catching me. The second season was even better—in fact,  it’s one of the best seasons of any television series—and suddenly everyone in my school knew every line of every sketch. I knew how great the show was then but, having been a television obsessive at that point (and just being an all-around pessimist), I never felt good about the show’s third season. At the time it was mostly a fear that it just wouldn’t be as funny or as good as those first two seasons but, as we all soon would find out, there was a lot more to it than that. By now we all know the story (and if you don’t, start here), the show was a machine and it no longer felt comfortable so Dave bolted. That’s not what matters believe it or not; despite the controversial ending of the entire series, Chappelle’s show was too good a series and too important a moment to have that overshadow it.

We could argue all day whether Dave should’ve left or not. Was the show getting too big to handle? Maybe, was it dangerously close to moving away from responsible yet extreme social commentary to just plain masked racism? Possibly, did he make the right call by turning down the money and leaving at the peak? It depends on what vantage point you look at the situation. What I do know is that for two years Dave Chappelle captured the world’s attention by putting on one of the most brilliant, important and funny programs to ever air on television. Yes there were the lost episodes that make season 3, and while it had some great moments, it just didn’t cut it—it’s basically The Godfather 3 of the series. Chappelle’s show was a phenomenon and a force; when you think of lil Jon, you’ll think of Dave first (same goes for Rick James, Prince, Wayne Brady and R. Kelly). I still say “game, blouses” and “this ain’t trading places nigga, this is real fucking life! Protect ya got damn neck!” on weekly basis. Charlie Murphy will always be the guy who got UNITY jabbed into his forehead, Donnell Rawlins will always be “Ashy Larry, Marcy projects… Marcy son, what!” Wayne Brady will always be the guy the scariest black actor ever and when a rapper says “turn my head phones up” or some variation on a track, I will forever laugh. When I remember Making The Band, all I’ll really remember is Chappelle’s parody of it; if I actually heard a white person scream “white power” in public, I would laugh because of Chappelle too. Tyrone Biggums, Tron, ridiculous comedy special tropes, Mos Def making bird calls and Dave running out of a press conference when questioned about oil are some of the best things ever, and no matter what Rashida Jones does she’s never more perfect than when she tells her friend all about “some pads that’ll make your flow mothafuckin’ tizight.” At the end of season 2, Dave’s last words were, “we shook up the world!” That you did Dave… that you did.

2012: Some Stuff Happened… In And Out Of Pop Culture

December 31, 2012
Movies, music, opinion piece, Television, Uncategorized
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Time keeps moving. It just keeps going–like a freight train headed for a deadly, explosive collision. 2012 was not my best year–most of it sucked actually–but that’s alright, most years aren’t my best years. In fact, out of all the years that ever were, most haven’t been favorable to me. At any rate, I have the time to delve into some shit to distract me from the ever approaching, crippling onset of severe depression that is real life. Let me not be the cynical asshole of the party for once, let’s delve into something much less gloomy.

I think the most revelatory moments for me this year involved realizing how much I miss my family and also how much I no longer feel too strongly about hip-hop music. It was a pretty seamless shift to be honest, listening to so much of any kind of music over and over would make anyone go crazy. Yeah, there’s a lot of variety and all types of unique artists out there but after awhile it all becomes of blur of noise over the same exact 808. So while I’m quick to state that Kendrick Lamar’s chilling portrait of Compton life Good Kid, m.A.A.d City is one of the best records made this year and one of the best rap records I’ve head in a long time, that’s not really saying much. I’ve listened to lots of rap records in the past few years and I don’t remember much about most of them–even the ones I liked. It’s not their fault, it’s the generation we live in. Music has become disposable… in all genres yes, but rap has been affected the most. So while Big Boi, Killer Mike, Joey Bada$$ and Action Bronson had solid releases, it’s hard to fathom me remembering much about them a year-plus from now (Joey maybe).

On the whole, some of the best music I heard this year wasn’t from this year… and the stuff that was from this year are too sparse or obscure. As far as full albums go, it was a pretty average year. Jessie Ware, Fiona Apple, Kendrick Lamar (as mentioned above) and How To Dress Well made highly enjoyable music this year. On the R&B front, only 4 acts stick out in my mind as worth discussing–Frank Ocean, Miguel, Solange and D’angelo. Miguel had a strong return with his second album Kaleidoscope Dream; an album that continues to grow on me with each passing day. D’angelo gets a shout-out for the simple fact that his return to performing for fans and audiences was perfect–because it was on his own terms. He didn’t have to parade himself half-naked to a gaggle of people who only give a shit about one song of his; he went out there, brought the funk and catered to his own style. I’ll be forever jealous for never getting the chance to see it this year. Then we get to Frank Ocean and Solange, a pair I lump together because they both made two of the most buzzworthy releases in R&B. Truth be told, I will give Frankie his credit. Channel Orange was one of the best albums of the year. That being said, personally, it didn’t do much for me. I recognize it’s good, soulful, passionate and experimental enough to separate it from anything else released this year–it just didn’t affect me like it probably should’ve. Now if I were to pick my favorite R&B record this year, it would have to be the baby Knowles True EP. Before you start, I’m not trying to be a contrarian. I genuinely like Solange a lot and to compare her to her sister musically would be silly–inevitable–but silly. Beyonce’ will always be the Cheerleader Summa Cum Laude Prom Queen of music but Solange is like the black sheep sister who goes to that art school across the street, the one who got you into all your favorite obscure bands and movies that you’ll never convince to marry you because “that’s just not her style”. This just so happens to be my type of girl.

Movies were better this year than last, even the most mundane-seeming had its enjoyable moments (s/o to Premium Rush). Movies like The Avengers proved you can still have a fun, light-hearted superhero movie and it will be just as great as the super-serious new dark tone everyone wants to turn their comic book movies into. Speaking of which, despite the fact Christopher Nolan seemed to be exhausted after Inception and just went into auto-pilot and completely phoned it in with The Dark Knight Rises, once you chose to ignore its plot holes and decided against taking it as seriously as it begs you too, you find that it still makes for a grandiose yet fun movie. Tom Hardy as Bane will forever be the second best idea followed closely after Bane having that voice of his. Despite not getting to see The Masterduring its theatrical run, its divisiveness doesn’t surprise me. Paul Thomas Anderson has slowly but surely found himself turning into a new sort-of Stanley Kubrick, in the sense that they both made films in order to derive some sort of specific reaction–be it positive or negative. To me, I always figured The Master would be the Synecdoche, New York of this year. A movie too chaotic to just be discarded. It had to be dissected and deciphered by anyone who watched it, whether they hated it or not. Speaking of divisiveness, the two biggest harborer of critical commentary came at the end of the year. Zero Dark Thirty, while being a critic favorite, incited controversy about its subject matter (the manhunt for Osama Bin Laden) from both the conservative and liberal sides of the aisle–much the same way the director, Kathryn Bigelow, received the same type of controversy for The Hurt Locker. Then there’s Django Unchained, Quentin Tarantino’s spaghetti western set during slavery. As you can imagine, the film has garnered its own share of animosity for its historical inaccuracy and it’s overall depiction of slavery. Basically, Quentin Tarantino is facing controversy for being Quentin Tarantino… you know, the same guy who did the exact same thing with Nazi Germany and the Holocaust in Inglorious Basterds. This then leaves me thinking, since not much was really said about that movie but a lot is being said about this one, I can only assume one of three things is happening: 1) nobody’s ever heard of Quentin Tarantino 2) a bunch of people are too in their feelings about the idea of using slavery as a backdrop for a story about a black bounty hunter killing slave masters rather than it being some overblown history lesson or 3) the subject hits a little too close to home here in America. At any rate, the movie I enjoyed the most this year had to be Moonrise Kingdom, Wes Anderson’s finest movie since The Royal Tenenbaums. From the intense attention to detail to the color scheme and the character studies of young love and adult insecurities, it was classic Anderson. Anderson’s schtick may have lost some of its luster, but he still knows how to put together a wonderfully ecstatic indie faux-fairy tale.

Television continue to ride its golden-era out, with some of the best seasons of some of the most unique shows. 30 rock, after having slump season after slump season, went all out for the first half of its shortened final season; proving to be just as irreverent, tightly constructed and hilarious as it’s always been. Community experienced controversy after controversy, with the departure of showrunner Dan Harmon and the eventual departure of Chevy Chase, but still managed to have another wonderful and imaginative season–a season that served as a fitting end to Harmon’s tenure. Meanwhile, Parks & Recreation continued to be the best show on NBC’s (mostly) stellar Thursday night block.  Louie C.K.’s boundary-pushing character expose continues to be art disguised as comedy. Louie has almost perfected the act of making its audience just as unsure about things as Louis C.K. himself seems in each episode, while also challenging the notion of success and, as always, the bitter fight between happiness and depression. Speaking of which, Mad Men produced one of its most divisive seasons after being gone for 2 years. I fell on the camp that loved this season, a season which took the characters to dark places–in both reality and within themselves. If one word could be applied to this season, it would be worth. The worth of your soul, the worth of a spouse and the worth of self were all regular questions implied in episode after episode. Maybe that’s why I like it so much, the question of worth makes a regular appearance in my life as well. Speaking of the worth of souls, Breaking Bad continued to be the best thing on television. With an 8 episode half-season, Breaking Bad packed in as much as it could before its eventual finale in 2013; at times it proved hit or miss but when it hit it hit hard, providing some of the best television seen this year–including the gut-wrenching end to “Dead Freight”. The resolution to Breaking Bad in 2013 already makes that year awesome in my book, but the prospect of no more new episodes is a bad omen for 2014.

2012, much like real life, was uneven and maybe in the long run won’t be much to remember. Eventually nostalgia will be kind to it–like it is to every year, no matter how shitty. For me, it will be the year I got pushed to my absolute limit and came out stronger… but still not strong enough. It was the year I needed the best in entertainment to take me away from the life I was living and make me happy to be alive. It didn’t always succeed but it had a pretty good batting average. Here’s to 2013, let’s hope it’s a good one.

Will They, Won’t They

December 18, 2012
opinion piece, Television
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(this post contains spoilers for last night’s How I Met Your Mother. Reader beware.)

Last night, as I sat through another episode of a mostly lackluster HIMYM season, I tried my best not to let my irritation with Barney’s pointless relationship with Patrice and Ted’s pointless feelings for Robin ruin what was a pretty decent episode. Then it happened. An ending  that, despite the fact that I kinda saw it coming near the end of the episode, still overwhelmed me emotionally to the point of giddiness. Barney and Robin were together again–engaged even!–and suddenly everything about what made this show a good one in the first place began to show its face again. Yeah, the all too familiar tropes were there–dramatic presentation, flashbacks, a theatrical indie-rock soundtrack–yet I reacted to it like it was all new.

Then I calmed down and started to hate myself. You see I thought I couldn’t bring myself to care about “will-they or won’t-they” anymore. We knew Barney and Robin would get together (even if it wasn’t revealed within the show already), so it wasn’t a surprise. Yes, the investment we as viewers have put into these characters play a large part in our reactions to what happens to them, but I think most people can agree that stretching the ultimate ending for these two out as long as possible got pretty annoying. In fact, that’s the problem with all the “will they or won’t they” couples on TV… it overstays its welcome.

Friends was the first abuser. Ross and Rachael were America’s favorite couple that weren’t… well, they were for one season, but that was it. The biggest issue with this one was that the two of them weren’t a couple for so long that you almost forgot about the whole thing. I remember watching the final episode and thinking “ehhh, I forgot all about that”. The U.S. edition of The Office sought to grip its viewers with Jim and Pam they same way the original U.K. series did with Tim and Dawn, and it worked… for 3 years. Rather than drag it out year after year, they brought the saga to a close with Jim asking Pam on a date in the season 3 finale and P am saying yes, it was the cutest damn shit ever and if that had been the end of the series I would’ve been fine with it. Instead the show went on–for years past its prime–and Jim and Pam became the boring couple that everyone remembers used to be cool.

But nobody was a worse perpetrator than J.D. and Elliott from Scrubs. Insufferable doesn’t even begin to describe it. It started great (as it always does), J.D. seems to like Elliott, Elliott seems to like J.D., so will they or won’t they? Then they did, for one–well 2 I guess–episodes. It was an interesting concept, following the initial honeymoon period of a relationship only to find that life, ego and personal insecurities get in the way of what you thought you wanted. Maybe it would’ve been perfect if it had stayed that way, maybe it would’ve still worked if they had worked through it (even if it was later down the road), but it didn’t work because they over did it. They broke up, got together, broke up, hooked up again, stopped, etc. By the time they back together (again) and J.D. realizes 2 seconds later that he doesn’t want her, I was officially done with those two.

As far as getting it right, that’s a little trickier. Maybe it’s because most TV shows last too long, but it’s rare that people strike the right balance. The Office U.K. got as close to perfect as you can get. Spaced was great because it was an open-ended story that worked best that way. Both Community and Parks And Recreation get points for playing around with the trope by having damn near every character hook up with each other at one point. Maybe it is just an outdated trope representing an old fashioned way of entertainment; but, as last night showed me, there’s still some magic left in that old bag of tricks.

The Next Step For The Walking Dead

October 15, 2012
Television
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My frustration with AMC’s The Walking Dead has always been that I wanted to like it more than I actually did. It had all the things that usually appeal to me: based on a graphic novel, zombies, apocalyptic situations, it’s on AMC; yet despite all this, it always seemed close (but not close enough) to a great show. It is still a decent show however, so I marathon’d the show and caught up on as much of series as I could before the season premiere last night.

All of that leads me to last night’s episode, “seed”, which opens with Rick, Daryl, T-Dog and Carl breaking into a house and clearing all the walkers out–desperately searching for any food and resources they can find. It’s a scene without much dialogue that finds the gang sitting around the living room trying to figure out where to go from here, then more walkers show up and it’s time to vacate the premises. It’s evident that time has passed within the world of the show; people are older, Lori is more pregnant and there’s a more mature sense of camaraderie amongst the group. The action and grit are heavy in this episode, as the group finds themselves trying to turn a prison into their safe haven. From either taking out or locking out all of the walkers in the vicinity (in a fantastic sequence of teamwork and marksmanship I might add) to going full-force into the prison, which leads to a gruesome sequence involving Rick having to hack off Hershel’s foot after he’s bitten, not to mention the episode ends with the group finding a whole other batch of survivors holing themselves up in the prison.

By all accounts it seems as though The Walking Dead is well on its way to being a better show; one that’s not stuck in on slow motion, but time will tell as the season goes on. For the time being, I finally find myself enjoying the show the way I always wished I had from the beginning.

Sidenote: Danai Gurira, who plays Michonne according to the closing credits, is so badass with the way she kills walkers. Their really isn’t much to say about her whole side story with Andrea yet but I just wanted to add that in there.

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