Television

[Kathy Li]

DVD season sets. It's the only way to go.

Well, the season's heading into the home stretch. Carnivàle wraps up next week, and West Wing's down to three episodes. I'm dying for stuff to come back out of repeats and hit the afterburners.

I'm also happy to report that Point Pleasant has been axed. Hee hee. Normally, I'm sad when shows are cancelled, but PP was so bad, I'm actually all a-twitter.

I think my fave shows this season have been Lost, Medium, House, Gilmore Girls, and Carnivàle.

[Cress]

Haven't seen any of those really, but I LOVE West Wing. My mom and dad watch the reruns with me, and we MIGHT get one of the seasons on DVD. The only problem with that is that they're so expensive. I was at Best Buy a couple days ago with one of my friends and we were looking at all the TV shows that we would buy. Buffy was $50 for a season. I DO NOT have $50 hanging around to spend on Buffy. Although if I did, I would most definetely use it.

[Kathy Li]

Take a look at Costco or Target or Amazon. I've seen the Buffy/Angel sets go for around $40, and given that each set is six discs, that's a pretty good price.

And if you think those are expensive, don't look at the prices on the HBO series, they're about twice as much.

Is anybody else hoping that West Wing gets cancelled after this season? I don't wanna new POTUS or Staff...

[Cress]

I kind of want it to end, in that I don't think it will be very good with new people, and with the pres gone. I don't really watch the current episodes as much, but they're not as good as the old ones. Then again, I don't want it to end because I like the show, and new episodes mean it's on more often. I dunno, it's not my favoritest show in the world.
I can see what you mean about it being worth it, it's just kind of a lot to spend at once, especially it your income is $5 a week with very little hope of getting anything more since you don't babysit.

[Kathy Li]

Cress, I've always wondered why Blockbuster doesn't rent season sets of Buffy. Maybe netflix carries 'em?

BTW, dunno if anybody's mentioned it, but Little House on the Prairie (no, not THAT one), starts up on ABC this weekend. I have no idea if it's going to be any good, but it's Canadian shot, which gives me hope.

I also just checked the PBS Mystery! schedule, as it takes Masterpiece Theatre's place, and there's a new Miss Marple series that looks outstanding, and they're going to show the fourth Inspector Lynley series. This amuses me, since the BBC's just now airing the fifth series, and it looks as if they've gone completely off into the wild and started making up their own Lynley/Havers adventures, having run out of Elizabeth George books.

[papercrane]

Vaguely related--anyone seen the Buffy 'musical' Once More, With Feeling? It's gotten an in-joke following with a group of my friends...good stuff.

Also, I've been watching Monk lately. Quite a good series.

[Cress]

I haven't seen the musical episode...YET! MWAHAHAHAHA! Sorry, that was really weird, but I really want to see it, and the reruns are almost to it, so I can't wait till I get to see it. I do have the soundtrack (stole it from a friend) and it seems extremely depressing. I don't know why, but all the songs make me feel like crying.
Speaking of random episodes, who here has seen Hush? That scared me so bad. I'm a complete wuss when it comes to movies/TV. I think it's because I have an overactive imagination and the moment I'm alone it starts making up a whole bunch of completely random scenerios involving me dying. I think what freaked me out most about that episode was the way the Gentlemen smiled. It was most definetely scary because I know people who can smile like that.
I don't know if Netflix has Buffy, but I think Hollywood Video does.
I absolutely loathe Mystery. I'm sorry, but I saw one episode of it that scared me so horribly that I couldn't sleep for like a month. It was definetely not cool. I've kind of hated it since, but it's really well done.

[Kathy Li]

I sing songs from "Once More, With Feeling." I own the CD. I listened to the Wall-to-Wall Sondheim concert on XT, because Joss Whedon was talking to Sondheim about doing it.

Cress, if "Hush" freaked you out, you might wanna wait a while before seeing "The Body." I didn't turn a hair over "Hush" and loved it to pieces. "The Body" shook me to the core. Really powerful stuff. Be sure, when you do see it, that you've got control of the remote, so you can pause to catch your breath, or turn off the sound (not that that would've helped with "Hush" ).

Sorry to hear you were traumatized by Mystery!. Yeah, it's not for everybody. You have to like British murder mysteries, and these days, they're getting very cold and police-procedurey with that CSI gross factor worked in. However, Miss Marple might not be so bad. And heck, they're getting Derek Jacobi and Zoe Wanamaker to guest, so I'm there.

[Cress]

Actually, all that bothered me about Hush was how they smiled. STOP SMILING! AHHHHHH! Ok, I had to let that out. And how they moved. Little stuff like that majorly freaks me out, especially when paired with freaky music.
Which season is "The Body" in?
Actually, I think I've seen Mystery since then and it didn't bug me, it's just that one really freaked me out and I haven't particularly liked it since then for that reason. Again, really weird stuff freaks me out.
What was the concert you watched?

[meteorite]

Cress, I suggest you check out some of the Masterpiece Theater releases on DVD. For example, I think you will like Cadfael, which also stars Derek Jacobi. Brother Cadfael is a monk during the Middle Ages. He lives in a monastery in Wales, and solves mysteries. Very little gore, although there is usually a corpse or two. The original books are by Ellis Peters. Rather like The Name of the Rose, lite.

[papercrane]

re Cress' post a couple posts back: Depressing? It's really rather funny...good for a quick laugh if you don't want to think too hard.
Ooh, Cadfael! I love those. Bit like Father Brown, yes?

[Cress]

I realize that people singing about vampires is massively entertaining, and I think that if I was actually watching it I would be laughing my head off, but when you listen to the lyrics, some of the songs are really depressing. Like Giles'. I don't know why, but that song makes me so sad.
Huh, Cadfael. Never heard of it, but if I have any spare time *snort* I'll try to get it.

[Kathy Li]

The thing I love about "Once More, With Feeling" is that it's a book-driven musical, as well as being a Buffy episode, something I honestly didn't think could be done. And some of the songs are heartbreaking. I also felt the hair on the back of my neck go up when Tara and Giles began counterpointing each other. Whedon is amazing.

"The Body" is in Season Five. If you're heading for the musical episode (Season Six), you passed it.

The concert I was talking about was on 3/19. It was called Wall to Wall Sondheim, and was given by Symphony Space. They usually do a 12-hour concert to celebrate a specific classical composer, but this time they chose to celebrate Stephen Sondheim on his 75th birthday, so there was a 12-hour live concert of B'way performers doing their stuff, and a few discussion panels in between the sets. Joss Whedon was on "Sondheim and American Popular Culture".

Joss Whedon has often confessed that he's a Sondheim fanatic (and if you listen to the DVD commentary track on "Once More..." it's obvious that Joss is a massive musicals geek). And Frank Rich (once the New York Time theatre critic) knew about him, the Buffy musical, and dragged him onto the panel. And Sondheim obviously had no clue who Joss Whedon was, and Joss was acting like a total fanboy. It was soooo cool.

As for both Masterpiece Theatre and Mystery!, the thing is that both of them aren't series, really. They're showcases, which means that they repackage together an assortment of shows from a variety of sources, so that every few weeks you're getting something different. Liking or disliking one series on Mystery! never guarantees that you'll like/dislike ALL of them.

Love Jacobi, (I, Claudius!!) but never really got into Cadfael. But then, I'm not into the Ellis Peters novels, much, either.

I am hung up on Elizabeth George's Inspector Lynley, so I've had fun watching those, and am desperately amused to see that the BBC have run out of books, and have one completely made-up episode, and that the season after that, they're all completely-non-George.

[Cress]

Yeah, my favorite part of Once More is during Walk Through the Fire when they each sing a little blurb but there's someone singing underneath them the whole time. It's really amazing.
Sadly I haven't seen any commentaries. *sniffles* I'm seriously thinking of buying Season 1 on DVD though, so if or when that happens, you will be sure to hear about all the random stuff people talk about.
I love seeing famous people acting completely weird. It makes me feel good to know that they can be as stupid as I am sometimes.

[Kathy Li]

My absolute favorite moment in "Walk Through the Fire" is the fire engine going by. I wonder how many takes they needed to get that to synch up. Freaking amazing filmmaking.

Buffy doesn't have nearly enough commentaries. But the ones by Joss are always the best. By comparison, Aaron Sorkin is just boring on the West Wing dvds. But at least they've got commentary tracks. Most of the Sherlock Holmes discs never had any, until they finally thought to get John Madden to comment "The Priory School." That was a kick and a half.

I love DVD television season sets.