Specificity is the soul of wit.

[curuchamion]

Or something like that. Um... this me having watched Piles Of New Stuff since renewing my Netflix a month ago, and wanting to natter about the stuff people on my flist kept telling me I should see. ;-)



Stargate: Atlantis - I've seen three episodes so far (if you count the pilot as one), and I suspect it will continue to be a "this should be so much better than it is" sort of show. There ought to be more exploring and professionalism and Here Are These Characters Being Awesome, and less of These Are The Stars, Worry Because They Are In Danger. And Dr Weir lost all my respect for her when she decided that blindness to the odds was more important than letting Teyla have the last rites of her religion; she's not even military, there is NO justification for that.

However, if there was a show that was these characters exploring the Pegasus Galaxy with better banter and more common sense (in other words if it was more like SG-1 in the right ways) I'd so watch it.

Mythbusters - It is SKIENCE. And it blows up. *huge grin* ;-)

Firefly - I saw the first episode. I am of two minds about watching the rest. On one hand, the set design and worldbuilding are pretty darn amazing and I should like to see more; on the other hand, the aggressive focus on sexuality as The Most Important Thing about each character makes me cranky. "Here's Kaylee. She's a good engineer and she's gay, and now you have been introduced to Kaylee." "These are Reavers. They rape you to death and they scare Jayne (and have a really ugly ship), and now you know about Reavers." o_O It got to the point where I wondered if they had a quota of gratuitous sexual references they were trying to hit.

The Real McCoys - The best I can say for it is that you can really tell it's based on vaudeville. The pacing and writing are terribly uneven, and there's no characterization whatsoever. Which is a shame, because Walter Brennan is a darn good actor and cute in an old-guy way.

Hamlet (the David Tennant version) - Well, I finally saw it. Then I telephoned my mother and told her it is the best version of Hamlet for characterization and acting. :D I do not wish to be pelted with rotten things, but I am still going to say that David Tennant makes a better Hamlet than he does a Doctor. He was born to play Hamlet. Wow.

(Also? All the casting was better than the Gilligan's Island Hamlet. Which I did not think was possible. WOW.)

The Sarah Jane Adventures - I really like the characters. I'm not in a huge hurry to see the rest of the show, but that's because RTD's hand in the writing and producing is very, very evident, and he annoys me.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 - I guess it just doesn't fit my sense of humor. I prefer mocking bad movies myself with my friends, rather than sitting through other people mocking them.

Psych - Somewhere about halfway through the pilot I went "Okay, THAT is the way to update Holmesian deductions". It is not particularly a show for fen who like the trappings of Holmesiana, but I've always been along for the deductions as much as for the character of Holmes himself, and Psych handles the problems of deducing in a modern world way better than the new Sherlock does. 'Scuse me for saying.

Highlander - Um, does it get any better? I got about halfway through the pilot, which appeared to consist entirely of soft porn, bad Phantom Menace swordfighting, and '80s clothes. (Although I was amused when Connor MacLeod smacked Duncan across the backside with the flat of his sword for showing off in practice. I've been known to do that myself. *g*)

The Middleman - All right, now here is a show I want to watch the rest of RIGHT NOW. eponymous_rose has amazingly good taste in telly; that's the third show her squeeing has persuaded me to watch (the others being S&S and Legend), and they've all been unqualified "must devour all canon and fic NOW, why is there not more?" successes. I like the characters, I love the writing - although I doubt I was expected to think it "realistic" as I found myself doing, lol - and I am vastly amused by the discovery that I spent most of 2006 designing Matt Keeslar's face. That's weird.



TL;DR: SGA begins to be boring. Mythbusters is awesome. Firefly is... if I could play in the 'verse without dealing with the characters, I would. The Real McCoys is lame. David Tennant's Hamlet is incredible. Sarah Jane Adventures is probably better on average than New Who. MST3K isn't my style. Psych is a fun show (and besides the pilot had Don S. Davis in it. Hands up, all who miss General Hammond.) Highlander is unwatchable-by-me if the first half of the pilot is a representative sample. And The Middleman is my new flash-in-the-pan fandom. :D

Comments

[pitry.livejournal.com]

SGA... yeah, "should be better than it is" is a pretty good way of describing it! They've got some amazing episodes, but mostly you're lucky if they're above mediocre. Also, they didn't know what to do with at least half their cast.

Specifically about Weir... she's very touch and go. I hate her for most of the first season, started liking her towards the end (she has some cool episodes), stopped liking her again in season 2 and fell in love with her in season 3. Basically, like everything Stargate, it's up to the writer: the writers who are interested in her (mainly Carl Binder if memory serves, possibly also Gero) are doing amazing things with her. The rest don't seem to understand why she's there.
(Not to mention the now infamous incident. The actress came to the writers with the newly received script, "this is very ooc, my character wouldn't do that!" The writers: "yeah, we know, but we need it for the plot. It stays."

It warms your heart, doesn't it.)

Firefly does play on tropes, and I can't say I'm in love with all the characters there (River is very problematic in this respect, she remains a cool idea rather than an actual character the entire show, as does the Shepherd, but I LOVE Kaylee!) but you want to watch it. It's only 13 episodes as it is!

I think you already know my opinion of SJA :)

*raises hand, misses General Hammond, sniff*

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

Can you recommend me some must-see episodes of SGA? I tend to be fairly good at figuring out plot developments after the fact, so "you need to have seen this in order to get that" shouldn't be a problem, but I know I'm not going to slog through five seasons. (I haven't even seen the whole first five seasons of SG-1 yet, and I like it way better.)

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Lesse...

Must see:
Season 1: Before I Sleep & Letters from Pegasus (it;s ridiculous that I'm including a clip show in that, but it's a)actually a much better way of catching up with the season! :) b) provides very good feeling for the characters c)got dowright funny bits)

Season 2: Grace Under Pressure, Michael

Season 3: The Real World, Common Ground, McKay and Mrs Miller, The Return, Tao of Rodney, Sunday (spoiler alert! spoiler alert!)

Season 4: Tabula Rasa, Quarantine, The Last Man

Season 5: The Shrine, Vegas

Otherwise good episodes: 38 minutes, Poisoning the Well, Home, The Storm/the Eye, Hot Zone, The Siege, Trinity, Critical Mass, The Long Goodbye, Allies/ No Man's Land/ Misbegotten, Phantoms, Echoes, Trio, Tracker, First Contact/ The Lost Tribe.. I might have missed something good in seasons 4-5, I've only ever seen them once because they were so terrible the first time round I didn't feel like inflicting them on myself for a second time.

SG1 is consistently better (maybe with the exception of season 10 vs. season 3 Atlantis). I don't know how they managed to fail so spectacularly with SGA (haven't bothered with SGU, TBH).

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, fair warning. The list is very much influenced by the characters I like.

[lolmac]

Random thoughts . . .

I'm told that SGA becomes much, much better after the first half of the first season. I've only watched part of S1 so far, and it did start to get better, but I haven't taken time to watch more than that. It's still on my "watch eventually" list, though.

Firefly: if you've only watched the pilot, keep going. (Kaylee is not gay, BTW.) Yes, this is a show in which all the characters have a strong sexual element to their personalities, but that's actually what most people are like in the real world. (And yes, I know that's not something you like, and it makes you uncomfortable.)

I've only seen the show once, and it was a few years back, but my recollection is that the sex isn't front and centre that often. There are some very good stories in it, and not that many episodes anyway. I'd skip the movie, though.

Highlander: completely with you on this one!

*raises hand, misses Hammond*

[happydalek.livejournal.com]

*Raises a hand for Hammond*

Stargate: I don't know how the people who made SG-1 for all those years, and kept it so consistently good, could fail so spectacularly with all of the spin offs. The sense of fun was gone. Everything became super serious business, the characters lacked depth and things to do. It blows my mind how radically different and less awesome SGA and SGU have been, and it makes me sad.

Firefly: I don't consider the pilot episode to be a great intro to the series, and neither did Fox. When the show originally aired, it began with "The Train Job," which is lots more entertaining. My personal favorites are "Jaynestown," "Ariel," and "Objects in Space." All are much MUCH more interesting than the pilot. Keep watching.

MST3K: Some are better than others. "Space Mutiny" is an absolute hoot. Others are lame. Your sense of humor may vary. Like you, I enjoy mickey-taking on my own with friends, and in high school, I took MST3K as permission to do so.

[clocketpatch]

I had the same problem with SG-1 to be honest (that, and the biggest problem with majoring in archaeology is having all of the fun of "aliens did it" ancient civilization stories systematically drilled out of you.)

MYTHBUSTERS!!! I've only been able to catch a few scattered episodes of this but I love it so much. *wants*

Firefly does get better. It's sort of a hit and miss with some episodes (and it seemed to be hitting its stride even more towards the end then BOOM cancellation). I agree that the focus on the sexuality and violence is just a bit... something anyways. The first episode is the worst if I recall correctly. Actually, after that whole extended battle flashback at the beginning I very nearly just switched off. My favourite episodes are Jaynestown and Out of Gas (and you have to see The Message, just for the hat).

I need to finish watch David Tennant's Hamlet, because it is awesome and I totally have access to it. I also have access to Lenin Naked and Star Trek. I need more time to watch these things... Damn you Internet and your time eatingness.


THE SARAH-JANE ADVENTURES!!!!!!!!! EEEEEE!!! Yes, they are SO much more consistent in quality than NuWho in general. Four series in and I think that there's only maybe two or three stories which fell down as actual clunkers, and then to balance them there are the finales which are actually *good*

Who knew that such a thing was possible in the Whoniverse?

And there is Clyde who is Teh Awesome (and like to out-act the Doctor). And Rani/Clyde (which is kind of going towards canon status whoot!) and Luke. And K-9 and Mr. Smith having their snark. And Mr. Smith's sexy theme music. And Sarah-Jane the 60+ female action figure. I'm not always completely pleased with how she's written at times (some of the writers don't seem to have got the memo that she's not a wibbly tear stained wreck thank you very much). But all and all AWESOMENESS! And it seems to get better with each passing series.

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

'(and you have to see The Message, just for the hat)'

If that is Jayne's yellow-and-orange "cunning hat", I've seen it... the design is viral among the knitting community. There is a tea cozy. :o However, I didn't know which episode it was in.

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Re: SG1. Trust me, as a linguist, it's JUST AS PAINFUL!

I'm repeatedly facing the "but I thought he was supposed to be a linguist what is this rubbish?!" feeling. Still love it though. :)

[eers.livejournal.com]

Sarah Jane Adventures, awesome, Hamlet, awesome, Psych, awesome. I never actually looked at it from a Holmes perspective (which is a bit silly on my part, actually, as I usually do), but you're right, lol. Also about the deducing-in-the-modern-world, probably, although I must say that Sherlock didn't do it that bad. But Psych is indeed better. Perhaps because it's more modern to begin with. Or because it's comedy. I dunno. I just love it. And the Hitchcock things XD Have you noticed that when James Roday is directing, the camera does something wholly different from what it usually does? Not that I'm an expert, haha :P

Oh God I can hardly wait for the next series. :D