Television

[Kathy Li]

Bump. Since ToGR conversation was heading in a Who-ish direction. I would like to caution anybody about to go all Whovian that the US is roughly three weeks behind the UK, so spoilers should be appropriately whited-out.

I am, btw, loving Season 4 so much, I cannot say. The advent of Donna as companion has been beyond the nifty. And the commentary tracks podcast on the BBC website has been an absolute hoot. (Although editing out the dead air on "Planet of the Ood" sort of defeats the purpose of it being a comentary track. Thankfully it's the only one so far that was done that way.)

Also, for the non-Whovian tv fans, I'd also like to mention that upfronts (where networks announce new shows and try to woo advertisers) are this week. By Friday, we'll have a near-complete picture of the upcoming fall season. I recommend lurking about the futon critic website.

Sniff. New Amsterdam has been axed. Sniff. But yay! Dollhouse shall be a midseason. I actually like this, given what happened to Firefly when Joss Whedon pushed for it to have a fall premiere instead of a midseason one. Like, say, Buffy...

[kk]

As said by Rubywolf:

I like Mythbusters.

Yay! I do too. I've seen most of the episodes...

Another show I like is Medium. Where I am, it's on Monday nights. I somehow can't remember the channel, however...

[Kathy Li]

I lost it when the Mythbusters guys cameoed on CSI last week. That was pretty funny.

Medium's fun, but the season ended last night. (sigh). It's NBC. Nearly everything finishes up its season next week: CSI, Criminal Minds, Numb3rs, Reaper, Smallville, etc. I think the only holdouts are Lost, Battlestar Galactica and Doctor Who. And then we have to wait until July for the summer season to start.

Also, looking over the stuff that the futon critic's dug up for the fall season, it looks like everyone wants to try xeroxing Heroes, which I suppose makes a switch from xeroxing 24 or CSI. A paramedic who can read minds. Someone (Christian Bale) with a split personality. The only thing that is sad to me is that someone's actually going completely their own road and doing Robinson Crusoe and it sounds bad. (sigh). And for the first time I can remember since Covington Cross, we're going to get a show simultaneously with the BBC: Merlin.

On the BBC side, I'm happy that there was a press release saying that Being Human had gotten picked up. That you had a werewolf, a vampire, and a ghost sitting around a pub wondering which houses they'd be sorted into at Hogwarts just made me happy.

BTW, the futon critic has a scorecard of cancelled/status unknown/returning/new shows for the fall season.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

Kathy, much as I liked Heroes, it's hard to say anything else is ripping it off when it ripped off JMS' "Rising Stars".

In "Rising Stars", there was a group of kids from the same town who developed superpowers after there was an energy discharge/explosion while their moms were pregnant. The story follows them as adults, discovering what their powers are truly meant for.

[Kathy Li]

I wouldn't say Heroes is ripping off Rising Stars--Rising Stars was really good. And you could say that any superhero anything is ripping off Superman (or Captain Marvel, or....), if you get down to it. And Rising Stars didn't have the generational element that Heroes is trying to create.

I'm just glad that Heroes has enough respect for comics to use a real comics artist (Tim Sale) for Isaac's paintings, and a real-life comics writer (Jeph Loeb) in the writing staff. The fact that their last show was Crossing Jordan meant my expectations were simply not that high. And without Bryan Fuller writing HRG & family, it just hasn't been the same. But, y'know--plus side: Pushing Daisies!

[Kathy Li]

Bump.

Well, the new Fall season's about to start, and I believe Merlin and Sarah Jane Adventures are about to make their way to the BBC airwaves. Anybody else girding up their loins to be watching stuff on the little screen? I, myself, a slightly intrigued at what Crusoe is going to be like, as well as being ecstatic at finally getting a full season of Pushing Daisies. Not so excited about True Blood, alas.

Although, of course, it's the midseason (Dec/Jan) when stuff really gets going for us in the US with Dollhouse, Virtuality, Leverage, The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency and NBC's airing of Merlin.

[meteorite]

RE: TrueBlood, I didn't realize until I read the TV listings that it was based on the Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris. Not too closely based, either, from what I've seen, but we'll give it a go. There seem to be more and more vampire movies and books lately; Goths must be thrilled to bits.

[marina salem]

Pushing Daisies!

Alas, William Peterson is leaving CSI. His and Jorja Fox's leaving has totally destroyed my sister's love of the show. I don't much care, since I've not seen much of the recent seasons, but she was heartbroken. She'll be fine.

What is up with all the vampires these days? They live in the dark, they want to suck your blood, big deal. Nothing hot about that. I wonder if CBS axed Moonlight. I hope so.

Heroes, 24, Criminal Minds, CSI: NY, and NCIS are all coming back too. On the NCIS note, I wonder what they're going to do now the team's split up. But they did that on CSI as well and it worked out in the end, so we must have faith.

[Lazy Leopard]

Having had the series brought to my attention, I actually noticed a trailer for Merlin on the BBC last night. I guess I'll have to give some thought to watching at least the first episode now...

(Oh, I do so hate websites which insist I run not just JavaScript, but Flash as well. If you ever want to keep me out of a site, combine those two and make it impossible to do anything without them both...)

[Kathy Li]

Originally posted by meteorite:
RE: TrueBlood, I didn't realize until I read the TV listings that it was based on the Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris. Not too closely based, either, from what I've seen, but we'll give it a go. There seem to be more and more vampire movies and books lately; Goths must be thrilled to bits.

I blame Buffy. They did it so well, everybody now assumes that fans will flock to anything vampiric as a result, and they forget that it has to be done well for us to like it.

Re: True Blood, yeah, they seem to have confused Harris with Hamilton (sigh). Still, there are enough Harris bits in it to keep me coming back, and the showrunner did Six Feet Under, so there's a glimmer of a promise of quality. But it's still kinda annoying they just didn't do Harris straight-on.

marina: I didn't know Peterson was leaving. I may have to give CSI up (at last, I can do it!). I did know that Rosenbaum and Glover (not to mentio the showrunners Millar & Gough) were leaving Smallville. A show should really never last more than seven years. They tend to get to be parodies of themselves by that point, and I think the only drama show that ever beat the longevity odds was M*A*S*H.

Rick: Oh, I so totally know what you mean. I hate Flash-only sites, but they seem to be getting more and more prevalent, and the tv folks can't seem to build a site without 'em. Sorry, I should've linked to the press pack for Merlin as well.

[Garrett Fitzgerald]

Originally posted by kli6:
I believe Merlin and Sarah Jane Adventures are about to make their way to the BBC airwaves.

Mary Stewart has spoiled me -- her Merlin from The Crystal Cave et seq. is far too well-drawn a character for me to deal well with other versions. :-)

[Kathy Li]

I'm lucky, I don't have that problem. I like Mary Stewart's version. But I also like Malory's, Tennyson's, E.B. White's, and even Shakespeare & Rowley's.

Plus, Tony Head is playing Uther, and they've stuck a wig on Richard Wilson. Now that I gotta see...

[Emi]

I wish I could get BBC!! They all sound really good and I want to watch them!

What I'm looking forward to watching are My Own Worst Enemy, Pushing Daisies, Kath and Kim, and Fringe!!! All these new shows and then some of the old ones...

Is Moonlight not coming back?!? I actually liked that show. The little bit that I saw... maybe those few bits and pieces were only the good parts of the show. *shrugs* Oh well.

What station is True Blood supposed to be on?

[Kathy Li]

No worries, Emi. NBC is going to show us Merlin in the midseason, and Sci-Fi Channel will probably be picking up Sarah Jane Adventures again, so we just have to wait.

I'm not that excited about Fringe, sorry. I mean, Lost is fun but stupid, and so was Alias and I watched the entire series of The X-Files, so I think I'm staying away from Fringe. Too many other shows to watch.

Yes, Moonlight got cancelled, sorry. And True Blood is on HBO.

[Emi]

Kathy: Yay that's good. Haha. I don't know why I put Fringe under the group of shows I want to see.. haha. I don't even know what that's about!

Ugh, I don't get HBO. That stinks... haha. I'm absolutely loving Pushing Daisies. It's so cute and funny. I actually get to watch it this season. Oh there's this new show... Criminal Minds that is so cool. I got really intrigued by it.

The new season of CSI is supposed to be really good this year. I'm excited.