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tenayaFirst, Pushing Daisies. From what I understand The Norwegians was the last scheduled episode. They have three more in the can but at the moment, they aren't on the schedule. ABC are bastards. Boston Legal and Pushing Daisies? I am bereft. I do watch Dirty, Sexy Money but feel it's jumped the shark. I still enjoy the acting and actors but once the characters start acting out of character, I get distant. Anyway, Pushing Daisies, how do I love thee? With each episode, I love you more. I love all the characters. I was a little cool towards Olive at first because I thought she was going to be the jealous woman who does destructive things, but she is so sweet..and smart, too. You just don't see a character like hers. I adore her nick name, Itty Bitty. It just makes me laugh. In fact there are so many things about this show that delights me; the characters, the dialogue, the sets, the costumes, the plot. I adore Emerson Cod. It's unbelievably charming, witty and fun. Have I mentioned that ABC are bastards?
Criminal Minds. We've had some Hotch eps, some Reid eps and last week was a Morgan ep. This week belonged to Mitch Pileggi who was awesome. He usually plays a hard ass, tough and mean and Norman couldn't have been further from that. Wounded, quietly--desperately--flailing, a man unable to cope. The first car crash was one of the best I've seen of late. And that smile Norman gives as he drives away from the chaos was chilling because he looked so satisfied and happy. I mean, I've seen actors look happy as their characters do something monsterous, but there was something more there, something that made your skin crawl. At the end, his realization, his devastation was so sad. I felt so sorry for him and did wish that he was going to get help, but as I thought he had been a caring family man, he was destined to live a life of self condemnation and horror, no matter what the courts decide.
A couple of other points I must mention. Reid squeaking in the back seat during the car chase was too cute. Also, while I have a low threshold for twee, the scene at the end with JJ and her baby did not annoy me. It was kinda sweet, particularly when Hotch smiled. Hotch has had such a hard time but it's all played so restrained. He, too, is in pain but is managing to keep it all together unlike Norman.
Lastly, we have The Lost Treasure of the Grand Canyon. You know, I do wish MS would do something that wasn't on SciFi or the Hallmark channel. :::sigh::: Oh well.
I do wonder how much the director influences MS's choices. Obviously, the parasol and the dweeby, painful moment where he's practicing what to say to Susan was just bad writing. In fact, per usual for a SciFi movie, there was a lot of bad writing. And what's with the names? Langford? Dr. Jordan? We make jokes about the 43 Canadian actors but who knew there were a limited number of character names? Sara, Jonas, Davis? And I thought I could tell that Shanks really wanted to throw that parasol into the next time zone.
Anyway, by the time everyone but Jacob had gone into town and I had caught myself noticing how nice and buff JR Bourne's character was, I began to wonder if there had been an error in casting. Why cast Shanks as a fastidious loser? He's the lead and he looks heroic; I figured the character would have to undergo a transition for this to make any sense. And luckily, he did.
To briefly recap things that caught my attention: What was the point of Hildy? Her character was all over the map. And what? This ambitious, cut-throat woman rejects her life and decides to stay because a handsome young man smiles at her? Of course, maybe she'd get along well in that society.
I did like seeing Shanks do some Indiana Jones type stuff, and I liked him being right: reason and knowledge providing good choices through danger.
Shannon Doherty was pretty bland and there's nothing to add to that. Totally unremarkable.
The first time I felt any emotional resonance *anywhere* (and this includes watching people being killed, hello? How about a little terror?) was when Jacob was watching Susan bathe. There was a yearning there, kind of chaste instead of leering. It was sweet and poignant.
I finally could see the point in casting MS when we got to the big temple scene at the end. He did a pretty good fake out that I could buy that would awe the believers. His destruction of the temple worked for me because I could see how it was character growth for him. He had been very respectful of this culture and wanted it to be left untouched. But in order to save the lives of his companions and his love, he had to destroy the temple and adversely impact the native religion. I was "huh?" when he decided to stay (again, poor writing) and then Jacob does show up (yay) but then he tells us of some pretty exciting things he did to escape that we missed! Again, poor writing.
At least at the end we were given a pretty tore up Jacob and the shallow among us could enjoy the peek a boo fun of trying to see past the rags MS was wearing.
All in all, better than Megasnake and that bee film, but Sumuru probably was better.
Criminal Minds. We've had some Hotch eps, some Reid eps and last week was a Morgan ep. This week belonged to Mitch Pileggi who was awesome. He usually plays a hard ass, tough and mean and Norman couldn't have been further from that. Wounded, quietly--desperately--flailing, a man unable to cope. The first car crash was one of the best I've seen of late. And that smile Norman gives as he drives away from the chaos was chilling because he looked so satisfied and happy. I mean, I've seen actors look happy as their characters do something monsterous, but there was something more there, something that made your skin crawl. At the end, his realization, his devastation was so sad. I felt so sorry for him and did wish that he was going to get help, but as I thought he had been a caring family man, he was destined to live a life of self condemnation and horror, no matter what the courts decide.
A couple of other points I must mention. Reid squeaking in the back seat during the car chase was too cute. Also, while I have a low threshold for twee, the scene at the end with JJ and her baby did not annoy me. It was kinda sweet, particularly when Hotch smiled. Hotch has had such a hard time but it's all played so restrained. He, too, is in pain but is managing to keep it all together unlike Norman.
Lastly, we have The Lost Treasure of the Grand Canyon. You know, I do wish MS would do something that wasn't on SciFi or the Hallmark channel. :::sigh::: Oh well.
I do wonder how much the director influences MS's choices. Obviously, the parasol and the dweeby, painful moment where he's practicing what to say to Susan was just bad writing. In fact, per usual for a SciFi movie, there was a lot of bad writing. And what's with the names? Langford? Dr. Jordan? We make jokes about the 43 Canadian actors but who knew there were a limited number of character names? Sara, Jonas, Davis? And I thought I could tell that Shanks really wanted to throw that parasol into the next time zone.
Anyway, by the time everyone but Jacob had gone into town and I had caught myself noticing how nice and buff JR Bourne's character was, I began to wonder if there had been an error in casting. Why cast Shanks as a fastidious loser? He's the lead and he looks heroic; I figured the character would have to undergo a transition for this to make any sense. And luckily, he did.
To briefly recap things that caught my attention: What was the point of Hildy? Her character was all over the map. And what? This ambitious, cut-throat woman rejects her life and decides to stay because a handsome young man smiles at her? Of course, maybe she'd get along well in that society.
I did like seeing Shanks do some Indiana Jones type stuff, and I liked him being right: reason and knowledge providing good choices through danger.
Shannon Doherty was pretty bland and there's nothing to add to that. Totally unremarkable.
The first time I felt any emotional resonance *anywhere* (and this includes watching people being killed, hello? How about a little terror?) was when Jacob was watching Susan bathe. There was a yearning there, kind of chaste instead of leering. It was sweet and poignant.
I finally could see the point in casting MS when we got to the big temple scene at the end. He did a pretty good fake out that I could buy that would awe the believers. His destruction of the temple worked for me because I could see how it was character growth for him. He had been very respectful of this culture and wanted it to be left untouched. But in order to save the lives of his companions and his love, he had to destroy the temple and adversely impact the native religion. I was "huh?" when he decided to stay (again, poor writing) and then Jacob does show up (yay) but then he tells us of some pretty exciting things he did to escape that we missed! Again, poor writing.
At least at the end we were given a pretty tore up Jacob and the shallow among us could enjoy the peek a boo fun of trying to see past the rags MS was wearing.
All in all, better than Megasnake and that bee film, but Sumuru probably was better.
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Date: 2008-12-24 03:12 am (UTC)I think Michael may have gone to the same poor-British-accent school that Amanda did. I felt he wasn't able to put any oomph into some of his lines, because he was concentrating on the accent too much. But he sounded just like Daniel when he was speaking "alien" languages. (g)