What's On TV? or What's Wrong With TV?

I've been watching a lot...a whole lot...of TV lately. In the last few months there have been quite a few new shows to pop up that initially had me rather interested. I was excited about the return of Ian McShane, who was an absolutely genius as Al Swearengen in Dead, as King Silas in Kings, which is a modernized retelling of the biblical story of King David. I also had high hopes for the new, gritty and realistic cop drama Southland. Being a huge fan of The Wire, I thought maybe it would have that same real-world, dirty look at crime. And what about the quirky, comedic cop show The Unusuals - whose previews showed them tracking zombies, guys in hot dog costumes, and a whole host of bizarre characters. Sadly it seems that all of the new shows, and most of the existing shows, have left me incredibly disappointed. What's up with Chuck, House, Heroes, and Lost? Oh yeah, and Caprica. The run-down, after the jump.

Kings - It's occasionally heavy handed on the religious aspects of the story. Biblical allusions are one thing, biblical pimp slaps tend to sting a bit. On top of that, they completely wasted Ian McShane's Shakespearean ability to deliver beautiful soliloquies, and his oddly cool way of being a complete son-of-a-bitch. The story is a roller coaster of plodding and boring episodes with peaks of mildly interesting but still mostly plodding episodes in between. The show has already been halted and supposedly ran again over the summer. Whether it's being revamped, or just going to have the remaining episodes run out and canceled is yet to be seen.

Southland - This is one schizophrenic show. The first episode was borderline great, but then the second episode was borderline shit. Third episode...pretty damn interesting. Fourth episode...shit. The problem is that the 2 episodes so far that have focused on Det. Lydia Adams, the only non-white major character so far in a town that is approx. 50% Hispanic, have been crap. She's and overly sensitive and rather boring character who has overly sensitive and rather boring cases. The episodes that show the rookie and the vet are good so far, and any scene with the crazy ass retired/not-retired Officer Dewey is incredibly entertaining. I just don't think it's gonna make it, especially when Jay Leno comes back in it's current time slot.

The Unusuals - This is a text book case of bait and switch. They show us all this quirky, cool, silly stuff that is going to happen, making it sound like a NYPD Blue meets The Twilight Zone. Then when we actually get to see an episode, all that weird shit that happens is so minor and inconsequential that a majority of it is just filler and squawk being randomly spewed out by dispatch. The cases are boring, the characters are boring, Amber Tamblyn, as hot as she is, is all wrong as Det. Shraeger and Adam Goldberg, as funny and awesome as he is, is wasted as Det. Delahoy. I'm hoping this one gets canceled because I'm pissed off at being lied to.

Chuck - I love Chuck. The fictional man and the show. Chuck the man represents all off us dorks out there. We're weird, but there's so much more to us than social inadequacies. The show represents all our dreams. Action, adventure, espionage, really hot women that dig us for our minds and hearts. But after watching the last two episodes, which includes the season finale, I have to wonder if ONLY us nerds and dorks like it. It seems like the writers set the show up to where it would be just as logically for the show to be over as it would to continue next season. The network seems to be just as on the fence. Rumor has it that execs love it, but the ratings just aren't there. Hang in there Chuck!

Heores - God damn you Heroes. I keep giving you chances and you keep raping my eyes and remote control. I loved, loved, loved season one ALL THE WAY until the 1st season finale. I hated the finale. But I figured, ok....one bad episode out of an entire season...not bad. Then season 2 when all Back to the Future and sucked. Season 3 I thought I was finally going to be able to kick the habit because it had hit a new low with a solid 13 episodes that were absolute crap. Overly cliche, and poorly executed, with stories (like the secret formula) that built up to some great battle that never happened and repercussions (Hiro getting stuck without powers) that ultimately had little effect...and then they ripped out the whole Mutant Registration storyline from Xmen and it actually got better. And then they brought on the awesome Zeljko Ivanek (Damages, Oz) and shit started heating up. And then they had their finale where Sylar, who was again becoming interesting after taking shape shifting powers, rearranged his body and no longer had a known weakness, killed Nathan Petrelli (something that should have happened at the end of season 1, and hopefully Peter is next), but they fuck it all up by tranquilizing Sylar (despite his hyperactive, self-healing body, amongst other powers) and having Matt Parkman (who should also die) frying his brain and turning him into the dead Nathan Petrelli. Bull...shit. Die Heroes! Just die! Please!

House - What the fuck? Kumar leaves to go work at the White House (in real life, Kal Penn took a job as Associate Director of the White House Office of Public Liaison, for really real) and they have him commit suicide, and even they can't figure out a reason why? So now they have House staring at the face of guilt, grief, and possibly love like he's some alien trying to understand Shakespeare. He's an asshole, not retarded. Regardless, I still love you House (the man and the show).

Lost - It's lost, that's all there is to it. I don't think they have a fucking clue. Supposedly next season, reportedly the last season, will answer all the questions. At this point I don't think it even matters. What answer could possibly make all their flip-flopping and self-important ambiguous mystery worth the wait? Kill Jack, once and for all, show more Loche (I can't remember the last time we saw him for more than 5 minutes), find some way to make up for the whole time travel crap they've been pulling, and either do something with Desmond or get rid of him. Quit wasting so much damn time trying to make dramatic revelations that we figured out at least an episode prior (oh no, Charles Whitmore and white-haired lady are Daniel Faraday's parents). Oh, and I want an entire episode of Juliet and Kate making out.

Caprica - Now I left this last in case nobody bothered to go out and pay full DVD price for a 90-minute pilot episode. Essentially I think it's going to be crap, the series. The pilot wasn't terrible, but it seemed to cover a lot of ground that I really thought would have made up the first half of the first season. Instead of a good jumping point, it felt like a really long episode of The Outer Limits that doesn't quite wrap everything up right. None of the characters are very interesting. In fact they really only focus on three characters. They seems to have either rewrote or taking a lot of liberties with some of the history that was established in Battlestar Galactica. Either that or in 50 years (which is the time frame between Caprica and BSG) people got kinda stupid and forgot all their history, including that of their own families. It's a piss poor substitute for BSG and I don't think it'll last.

And that, is the lumped proof of the fact that I watch far too much crap on TV. Do you have any opinions on current TV? Do you have and disputes with my views? Let me know, leave comments.