Unsolicited Reviews of Random New Fall Programing

Hulu and I spent some quality time together over the weekend and the result is a series of thoughts and opinions about the following:

Blackish

I like this show probably as much as a white girl can.  There are a lot of comparisons to The Cosby Show being thrown around there, but as someone who grew up watching Cosby in real time, this feels like a completely different thing. Where the Cosbys were a family that also happened to be black, this is a black family. What does that mean? Hell if I know! I think what I'm trying to say here is this show manages to be very self-aware while being relatable and funny. It's good. I like it.

Selfie

Now this is as white-girl a show as a white girl show can be. It's kind of difficult to get into, but Karen Gillan does such a convincing job of being that valley girl everyone hates while somehow managing to also be likable that I ended up watching the whole episode when I might have steered away after the weak setup. Also, had I not stuck in there I may have missed the fact that this show is vaguely based on My Fair Lady, which IS EVERYTHING TO ME AND DESERVES A MILLION ITERATIONS OF THE HIGHEST QUALITY! Whether this is that remains to be seen, but it's an easy thirty minutes so I say watch it.

Gotham

So, there's a number of things you can do wrong when you're dealing with a subject matter that is pretty universally adored and still get away with it; you can be too heavy-handed, too campy, too dramatic, too nostalgic or just plain over-the-top and people will still excuse you because they want to like the show so they can watch the show and talk about the show with other people who are watching the show. What you can't do, under any circumstances, is be boring. You can't lose my interest. You can't lose my attention to Feedly every five minutes because then I'm just going to say screw it I'll come back to finish the episode later, which means never. I tried to watch this thing twice. TWICE! I'm at the 19:27 minutes marker and I just can't muster the energy to go any further. It should be all "Ooh, look it's the Riddler" and "there's young cat woman" or "Poison Ivy, wow!" I don't know why, but everybody in this show makes me tired. Even the chases seem slow. "A" for effort?

Forever

And then here's this show, which has no business getting watched all the way through. How many times are we going to do the thing where there's a hardened cop who finds an unconventional side-kick who doubles as a love interest? Now it's a guy who can't die because...he was struck by lightening one time? At sea? With a pocket watch? It's shoddy logic and a weak construct, but damn it if I wasn't entertained. Maybe it's the accent. I mean, look at the poster! Compare it to something like Gotham, where you've got some of the most famous and exciting comic book villains presented in a light you've never seen them before, with all the promise of fully fleshed out origin stories. Then there's Forever, which boasts a cityscape? Or this...

...a guy who looks heartily disappointed in me, somehow? I don't know what that look is, but it's not selling anything. And yet, the show was not bad. It was fine. I was entertained and I watched the whole thing. THAT MAKES NO SENSE! Maybe it's me; maybe I'm having a weird week or something. Hands up in the air - I don't know. 

Also, Hulu, I'd like to call you out on something here...

TOP 10 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR YOU

Since you watched...

You may also like How to Get Away With Murder.

|

How to Get Away With Murder

Drama

The brilliant, charismatic and seductive Professor Annalise Keating (Viola Davis) gets entangled with four law students from her class, “How to Get Away with Murder.” Little do they know that they... more

Really? These shows have nothing to do with each other. What the hell!?

Next time, an unsolicited set of reviews on returning shows that I'm pretty much just going to adore the shit out of. Until then, feel free to check out the above shows and disagree with me in comments (please won't somebody disagree with me in comments; so lonely). 

A New Post At Last

I don't think I've ever set up any expectation that my posting to this blog would be in any way consistent, either in frequency or quality. Why today, as opposed to any other day in the past three months, I've decided to return here is beyond me, except that I've just finished a very long and all-in-all very disappointing book and I have nowhere else to vent about it.

Another thing is, I'd hoped that my first post back would be something a little more momentous like announcing that I've finished that TV pilot script or...well, just that actually. I haven't. I'm two-thirds of the way through, but in all honesty that doesn't really matter since the entirety of it will have to be rewritten which I know doesn't negate the value of having written this version to start with but that it makes me feel like a failure. A slow failure.

There are a number of reasons why this version won't stand, not the least of which is the usual clumsy  structure and flat dialogue. It's too long. It doesn't make good use of conflict and there's an almost complete lack of subtext and dramatic irony. It's trying too hard. I'm at my wit's end with it because when I set out to write the thing it was this clear, entertaining but meaningful story that everyone was going to love - I mean, I enjoyed watching it unfold in my own mind (which sounds crazy, but unfortunately is not; a little insanity would likely make me a better writer).

And now the thing is on the page (computer screen) in its third iteration and still it's nothing like what I envisioned. The names are the same and they're all doing the things I thought they would do, but it's jumbled and doesn't feel the same as it did when I first planned it all out. And it's taken me so long - too long to write. It's painful. It's such a struggle to sit there and do the thing; even though I try to relax and just let the words come out without judgment I inevitably scrutinize every line and I hate them all.

I mean, what am I even doing this for? I know there's this thing writers do where they're like "oh god, it's so hard and such a struggle and blah blah blah" and it sounds so self-absorbed to think that writing should be made to seem so much harder than anything else. We make stuff up; how hard is that? Tried building a bridge lately? Fighting social injustices? Nursing?

Actually, I am a nurse and I can tell you firsthand that going to that hospital and putting in a thirteen hour day in which I will likely be dealing in the blood and body elimination of a number of other human beings with hygienic standards well below my own is less daunting of a task than sitting down to write a single page of this goddamn script!

Why?

Confidence. I know what I'm doing at work and when I do it well I have a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. There's nothing of the kind to be had when writing. I'm in constant doubt about my own abilities to produce something of the slightest quality and as such every move I make is called into question. It's torture, in a way, because I can't help doing it yet I'm miserable when I do and at the same time I beat myself up when I'm not doing it because I'm not doing it enough. What kind of hell is this?

I don't have a resolution to share and I'm sick of writing about this. I'm going to go watch The Mindy Project and finish my pint of ice cream with peanut butter thrown in there (for protein, you know) and maybe later I'll return to my script with a fresh perspective and try my hardest to grasp a sense of freedom in the acceptance that I'm hundreds of thousands of pages away from writing anything that is any good but if I keep going I'll get there someday.

That's sort of encouraging, right?

I want to throw something.