Weekend of DEATH!

Ok, so I’m relaxing on Saturday night, catching up with some episodes of my favorites shows (That would be Torchwood and Battlestar Galactica for those of you who haven’t been paying attention) when I realize that someone appointed this the weekend of mass slaughter in American Sci-fi television. Yes, I know Torchwood is British but it was on BBC America, so I’m still counting it.
So, first Torchwood. Ihave to say, after the flashback episode, I saw this one coming. I knew people were going to die, and at the moment Jack’s lost brother Grey showed up I knew he would be evil. Not that they teased that much. The who reunion went hug-stabby-stabby. So, you know, evil from the start.

But why did it have to be Tosh? Watching her pull herself down into the medlab and administer a painkiller even though she knew she was a goner, just so she’d be cogent enough to talk Owen through shutting down the reactor, in hopes of saving his life … way to go, Tosh. Owen was not worthy of you. Owen’s own death … well, he’d died already and I’ve never really liked the character, but I did get a little lump in my throat during that last conversation, when he’s raging against death and Tosh asks him to stop because he was breaking her heart. Made more poignant by the fact that Tosh never told him she was dying too. And they did find the one way of killing Owen that would actually work, being dissolved in radioactive goo. (side note: would this work on Jack too, or would he still be alive even though he was in molecular-dispersal form). Can’t say I’m not really sorry to see Owen go (sorry, Burn Gorman, but you just never rang true for me in a rare case of me liking the writing but not the performance. See also: Tracy Scoggins in Babylon 5), but Tosh’s exit really hurt. It was made even more bittersweet by the attempted palliative of her last message, found by the surviving members of the team as they cleaned up her station. “It’s all right.”

And so from there I went to Battlestar Galactica. Now, this is not a show you go to when you want to feel good about life. This episode, though … Oh my holy frakking god.

We knew it was going to go bad when Cally found out her husband, chief Tyrol, was a cylon. This is the girl who shot Boomer, remember. And her conflicted, victim-abuser relationship with the chief would come into play in some sickening ways. So, when she found out and went totally bugshit crazy, it made sense, especially since we’d spent a lot of the episode dealing with her already burgeoning stress-induced breakdown. This quite rightfully tipped her over the edge.
Now, Cally’s been one of those important characters that haven’t necessarily had starring roles on the series. She bit the ear off a revolutionairy on the prison ship when he tried to rape her. She got trapped on Kobol with Hotshot, where she was the first to use the term “Motherfrakker,” which was since become a show staple. She was beaten by Tyrol when he was going crazy after finding out his last girlfriend was a cylon. She later married Tyrol and moved with him to New Caprica, whereupon it was her arrest and planned execution that drove a lot of the plot.

And now this. She knocks Tyrol unconscious, takes her baby, and goes to the airlock. At this point I was prepared for that. The direction of these scenes really showed us how Cally’s world had shrunk to encompass only that which she could experience inside her own head. Her husband is a cyclon. That means her baby is a cylon. Her world is over.

She sets the airlock so that it will space both her and little Nicky, who is of course, crying his little curly head off.

This was going to be brutal. And usually I would turn off a show that did something like this and never watch again (I have a thing about little kids dying because of my own family’s history. It’s why I can’t watch a lot of horror. Yes, I know about the Mist and will never forgive Stephen King) but this show earned it. It was supposed to be brutal.

And then Tory shows up, talks Cally down, takes the baby.

Throws Cally across the airlock and spaces her, while the confused child watches. We see Cally’s astounded, frozen face, as she floats away in the dark.

It could have been so much worse, but … whoa.

This is the first time that we have seen one of the final five cylons, those who are fundamentally different than the rest, do something despicable. But even so … Cally had just tried to murder her own child. And Tory is afraid of being exposed. So, there’s the argument that this was a strange kind of self-defense. Well, I could make that argument if Tory had not done it so coolly, so dispassionately. So, probably not self defense.

And since I brought up the women if refrigerators concept in the post about Bonnie Richmond, I should mention it here. Yes, we have two dead women. But for it to be a true fridging, two factors must be in evidence. The characters cannot die heroically. And they must be killed as part of someone else’s storyline, not in a culmination of their own. It helps if they’re killed by men, but that’s not necessary.

Tosh dies a hero. No question. She saves the world. She tries to save the man she loves (but does not deserve her!). So, no fridging here.

Cally … she’s not a hero, she is definitely a victim. But while she is reacting to events in her husband’s story, this is very much a part of her own. Cally has always struggled with living in this new world. This … this is Cally’s story, this is Cally’s end, not just an adjunct to Tyrol’s. So … no fridging here either.

But this was definitely the weekend of death. I have not watched the new Doctor Who yet, so please … no one tell me Martha got blasted into the sun or something (I know it’s impossible, since she was on Torchwood already). Still, at this rate, I’m expecting the Coen brothers to guest-direct a very special episode of 30 Rock where Kenneth the page is put through a wood chipper. Actually, if any show could pull that off, it would probably be 30 Rock. And Kenneth would probably survive it by the force of his sheer, plucky optimism.

Carry on ….

Go not gently into that good fridge: R.I.P. Bonnie Richmond

OK, I take back everything bad I said about Jericho. The last to episodes have been fantastic, as a truly evil enemy has reared its head, and the citizens of our plucky, home-spun little town has started to make the beginnings of a … dare I saw it … an insurgency. So, good job Jericho (and thanks for giving Heather a bigger role after distressingly leaving her out of the 2nd episode.

The real reason for this post though was to comment on the murder of Jericho’s resident little sister, Bonnie Richmond. My first reaction was … yikes…why her. But it made perfect sense, and the way it was done was first class. While the women in refrigerators charge is often invoked when a female character meets her death, I do not believe this is a case of a fridging.

Fridging occurs when a (usually)female character is offed to have some sort of effect on a male character, usually the protagonist. It is usually brutal, as this was, and is often presented in a sexualized way (though not always). Though they may have killed off Bonnie Richmond in a spectacular and ugly manner, she was not shoved in the fridge. In fact, Bonnie was given an exit befitting most male protagonists. Girls, usually young girls, don’t usually go out this way in things that aren’t written by Joss Whedon or Gail Simone. Her gender does give us added pathos, but as much of that comes from the fact that she was deaf. And I had a feeling she was a goner when they started leaning heavily on the “I’m going to Cheyenne to become a relief worker” plotline.


Bonnie died in a hail of bullets, wielding a shotgun in defense of her new big sis Mimi, who’d uncovered some “discrepancies” in the books of the military contractors given control of the town in post-wasteland America. She was fierce and brave and protective and became a serious threat to the Blackwater contracters storming her house. Yes, I mean “Ravenwood.”

And Jericho becomes the show it could be, its metaphor perhaps a little too on the nose, but intact and important. Bonnie’s death affects everyone, not just her big brother. (I had a feeling she was a goner when they started leaning heavily on the “I’m going to Cheyenne to become a relief worker” plotline.

Jericho has three episodes left. Watch them. They’re probably won’t be more, but now I know the creators can handle this.
And goodbye Bonnie. Your friends and family are going to nail someone’s ass to the wall.

Jericho Season 2

Jericho Season 2
Tuesday, 10:00 p.m. EST
starring: Skeet Ulrich, Ashley Scott, Kenneth
Mitchell, Brad Beyer, Alicia Coppola, Michael Gaston, Sprague Grayden, Esai Morales


You know, I’m always behind a fan-led rebellion against the corporate America that cancels a TV show. And when that campaign actually works? Awesome. Fans saved Jericho by sending tons and tons of nuts to CBS corporate offices, leading them to renew the show for seven episodes to, at least, wrap up the story. Go fans! However, sometimes when this happens, the show you’ve saved is Jericho. And that’s not always a good thing.

Jericho started off weakly last season. I mean, for a show about a nuclear attack that destroys the U.S., leaving a small Kansas town to fend for itself against enemies internal and external, it was astonishingly meh. The set up was fantastic. I loves me a good apocalypse story, and by focusing on the little people just trying to survive and make their way in a brand new world … what could possibly go wrong?

Well, for starters, they cast Skeet Ulrich as the lead character. Now, it's not that he’s spectacularly bad, he’s just … kind of there. No personality. Charisma-free, if you will. But not so charisma free that, Keanu-like, it actually goes out the other side and becomes actual charisma. Then, they saddled this prodigal-son character type with a ridiculous back-story involving the middle-east, an obvious Blackwater stand-in, and a sad-sack partner he helped get killed. Yawn. And let’s not even get into Lennie James as Robert “I was a cop in St. Louis” Hawkins.

The single worst move they made, however, was framing the main character’s romantic prospects around so-charisma-free-she-comes-keanu-like-out-the-other-side-and-then-dives-back-in-to-sucking again Ashley Scott character. Instant hate by almost everyone. It was so bad that when Ulrich had more obvious chemistry with Sprague Grayden’s Heather they made a ridiculous move to take her off-screen as if we would be so desparate for romance we would accept Ulrich and Scott together at the end of the season. It’s basically Smallville’s Lana problem.

But anyway, toward the end of the season actual plot developed, and the show allowed some characters with actual personality to assume center stage (Hi, Stanley and Mimi) and killed off some of the more annoying (you are not missed, April). Unfortunately, Ashley Scott’s Emily is still alive. They all but redeemed themselves when, as one of the final images of Season One, they showed us Heather looking at a new flag of the Country, promising intrigue to come.

So, Season Two is finally here, and I still have a burning question: shouldn’t the apocalypse be more exciting than this?

What works: There are nuggets here of the potential the series has always shown. The plot is moving along as we’re getting more information about the new nation forming out of the west. The series seems to be taking on more of an epic feel. This could be both good and bad.

The addition of Esai Morales as the military leader is promising, as is the attention paid to Stanley and Mimi. And the first episode feature Heather in a prominent role which seems like it will be important later. There are a lot of pieces here that could really work.

What doesn’t: We still have Emily around. And Ulrich is still our lead. Heather is absent from the second episode, which is not promising at all. I can’t even be intrigued anymore when Hawkins talks about the bomb he has in his basement. We’re supposed to take as fact that this new government is eeeevil when we’re shown no eamples of them being, actually, evil. Misguided and heavy-handed? Sure? Shifty? You bet? They have apparently commisioned some evile tetbooks, and they are getting ready to re-write the constitution. These things are defenitely not good, but if they’re the big bad, they’re not there yet. So, once again… the apocalypse = boring. That shit is not right.

Bottom line: I’ll watch this season, and post here if it gets better, but for now … yes, the apocalypse really should be more exciting than this.

Torchwood Season 2

Torchwood

BBC America Saturdays 9:00 e.s.t.

starring: John Barrowman, Eve Miles, Burn Gorman, Naoko Mori, Gareth David-Lloyd

Whenever I saw the name Torchwood on my DVR’s now playing list last fall, it would be an immediate watch now. You know how it is, there are some shows you are excited about, but might save until a few episodes pile up to enjoy in one sitting. Lost is like that for me. Others, you give a little “ugh” and watch because you’ve already gotten involved in a series, but at a certain point it becomes a chore before you man up and just delete the damn thing for your season pass list. Others, you sit and watch immediately because you just can’t wait. Sometimes, these are the very shows you’re embarrassed to admit you watch. Such was the case with me and Torchwood.

Let me be clear, I loved this show. It’s basically a british version of the X-files, centering around a team assembled and led by a Doctor Who supporting character, the immortal time agent Captain Jack Harkness. They investigate the weird and the secret, the occult and the just plain wrong, and they think they do it with panache and style (your mileage may vary). In its first season, Torchwood worked better as an idea of a tv show that it did as an actual tv show. The episodes were wildly uneven in quality with some of them, like Small Worlds, which reimagined a fairly malevolent fairy mythology and They Keep killing Suzie, which played with the unfortunate consequences of a resurrection on the higher end of the quality spectrum and others, like Cyberwoman and Combat taking genre tropes and stringing them in Christmas lights. The season ended on a mixed note, with the team fighting a breakdown of the time/space vortex in Cardiff and a abysmally literal interpretation of the devil coming to town to make trouble.

The main problem the show had was that it thought it was groundbreaking, and kept reminding of us how groundbreaking it was, especially in the area of sexuality. It’s creators nonchalantly threw out comments like “Oh, everyone’s bi on Torchwood” and every single character had a same-sex encounter, even if it was only hinted at. All this is fine, and it would be a progressive approach to the issue is some of it didn’t come across so gimmicky, so “oh, look what we’re getting away with now,” that it actually cheapened the issue.

Still, I loved every minute of it. What can I say, some shows just push the right buttons.

Season two just started on BBC America. The first two episodes added Buffy alum James Marsters to the supporting cast as a rogue time agent who once had a relationship with Captain Jack. The second started what looked to be a season-long arc about a secret alien invasion, which could have ended up like the worst of the obtuse X-Files mysteries but actually developed the plot while leaving it open for more.

What works: These first two episodes are on par with the strongest episodes of Season one. Of the two, I preferred the second, in its paranoia-inducing concept of finding out that you are not who you think you are. The first, with Marsters, would have been a disaster if not for Marsters’ performace, as it’s basically a macguffin hunt that turns out, predictably, to have been an exercise in misdirection. The actors seem to have settled in, the writing is more assured. The show seems to have found its tone, combining camp and suspense, in a way that it rarely did in season one. The characters seem more natural too. When Captain Jack and Captain Jon hart make out while busting apart a Cardiff bar, it actually seems character driven, and not just a stunt.

What doesn’t: I’m still not a great fan of Burn Gorman’s Dr. Owen Harper, and Eve Miles’ Gwen grates at times, as does her boyfriend, who I’d really hoped was dead during the finale. The villains are stronger as well, but this is still Torchwod’s weakest aspect.

Bottom line: Better than it was, but still by no means perfect. Still, I probably love it more because of its imperfections.

Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles

Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles

starring: Lena Headey, Thomas Dekker, Summer Glau, Richard T. Jones

Fox Mondays 9:00 est.

I wasn’t expecting to like Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles as much as I did. In fact, when I first started hearing about this project, months ago, I had almost zero interest. It felt like a step backward for the series, and in many ways it still is, but it’s a step backward that makes sense. For once.

This series takes place between the movies Terminator 2 and Terminator 3, and its events effectively wipe Terminator 3 from the record, either ignoring it completely or making it so those events never take place. This suits me just fine, as I’d never seen T3, so it significantly flattened my learning curve. It is, in short, the story of Sarah and John Conner running from killer robots, protected by a defender sent back from John’s future as the leader of humanity against the machine race. Sounds a lot like T2, and it is, but there’s a key difference. Now that the T-101 is governing California, the future needs a new defender, and here the producers make a really interesting choice.

Knowing any “buff-guy” type is going to live forever in Schwarzenegger’s shadow, they replaced him with former Ballerina and Firefly psychic commando Summer Glau. Glau’s casting is inspired. She’d already proven her action-hero chops in Joss Whedon’s Serenity, so whether or not she could handle the action sequences was never in doubt. But while her River Tam was a wreck of brilliant tics and undulations, she could summon a stiff coldness and directness of purpose that Glau brings back here in her Cameron. It works really well, and not just because “hey, it’s a pretty little girl who can kick ass” because I would hope, as a culture, that we are past that now, but because no one questions it.

With Glau and Lena Headey, as Sarah Conner, as the characters protecting a teenage boy acting as the “damsel in distress” in most situations, it could easily be a self-conscious “girl power” statement, which would be just fine. But the fact that its not presented that way, that it’s just that these two characters happen to be women and no one, absolutely no one, in at least the first two episodes, questions their credentials to do so, is completely refreshing.

I also love Headey’s Sarah Conner. She’s significantly less buffed-out than Linda Hamilton in T2, but that doesn’t make her less tough. It’s a quieter strength she brings to bear hear, born of hope and passion, a passion to make the world a better place than she knows it is otherwise going to be. The fact that she knows she’s coming off as a paranoid schizophrenic, and that any ping they make on the system of the world can bring down Armageddon, makes her more than a little bit guarded. But she’s not cold.

Thomas Dekker, center of the gay-not gay Heroes’ Zack controversy steps in for Edward Furlongas fifteen-year-old John Conner, the future savior of humanity. He and Headey have great chemistry together, and he walks a fine line between petulant teenager and heroic young man in a way that completely fits that part. There’s not much else to say about him, as Headey bears most of the first two episodes’ emotional weight.

Bottom Line: Much better than it should be, and a welcome addition to the schedule especially in the Strike Era. I have a few logistics/plot hole problems (no i.d.'s, but they have cel phones already?), but for right now, I’m in. I’ve always a sucker for a band of plucky rebels.