Thursday, May 24, 2007

The End Of Telly

Waaahhh!!! No more telly! The telly's gone! Last week marked the end of funny telly, with the latest seasons of '30 Rock', 'Scrubs' and 'The Office' finishing. No more Dr Spaceman, J.D or Dwight for aaaages!
As if this wasn't bad enough, this week heralded the death toll on the latest seasons of 3 of telly's best serious offerings. Oh, telly, what have we done to offend you so? That said, they were a mixed bag (caution: if you haven't seen them yet then SPOILERS follow so come back when you've watched them).

VERONICA MARS

Arrrghhh! Veronica, you frustrate me so! After 2 excellent first seasons this new one was so bitterly disappointing, with all too brief flashes of the show we used to love. In an effort to boast flagging ratings the showrunners stripped away everything that made V-Mars great, turning it into an OC-alike teen show cliche. Gone was the edginess, Veronica's outsider feistiness and Logan's borderline psychotic traits. This year, with no explanation whatsoever, Veronica was nice and popular, Logan was a 100% doe-eyed pussy and (most importantly) HALF the lead cast weren't even in OVER HALF the episodes!

And these measures didn't work, as the once-great show has now been cancelled. However, sometimes the luxury of not caring due to being cancelled can breed greatness, and that certainly seems to have been the case for the 2-hour finale. Gritty, dark and challenging, the writers seemed to be having fun with the character, and she actually was the character again. Logan went nutso again, with one of the best exiting lines for a character in any final episode I've ever seen. And - hooray - all the lead cast were involved! For most of this season I've not been too fussed, but after this finale I've been left yet again hankering for more Veronica. Bye bye, Miss Mars, a great send-off that you truly deserved.

HEROES

Now this one threw me. It's been a great year for serious telly, with Battlestar Galactica and Lost really producing the goods. But Heroes was the one show that, week after week, consistently upped the ante and stunned me with how much better every episode was. Plus, after months of build-up, we'd been promised this epic encounter between Peter and Sylar, the struggle to save millions of lives and characters descending into darkness.

What did we get? Possibly the most disappointing series finale I've ever seen. I first watched it at Stephen, and Si-Man rightly commented that no finale would satisfy what we expected. But I've seen it again since, and it's just horrible. Taut storytelling became diabolical pacing, interesting character arcs became sentimental schmaltz of the highest order, twists became the biggest cliches you can imagine.

Wost of all, the climactic battle betwixt Peter and Sylar amounted to little more than 2 mins of a street fistfight, while all the other characters we've invested months in (most of whom have a superpower) sit around and basically do fuck all. And either the producers had blown their budget by this point or just decided they didn't really need good special effects in their season finale. Oh yes, and an end coda that ripped off Evil Dead 2. I can't remember ever feeling quite so cheated by a telly as I did with this, and on this evidence I'm seriously considering skipping the next season.

LOST

Pay attention, Heroes, this is how you do a finale! Season 3 has been an absolutely stellar year for Lost, planting itself firmly back on track and easily beasting the first series that everyone raved about before realising it was a telly show they'd have to think about. But my god, they delivered an absolute mindfuck of an ending here, one that tied up many loose ends and fundamentally changed the show forever.

I really can't describe how utterly incredible, not to mention ballsy, this finale was without giving anything away. So go watch it, as they somehow managed to simultaneously tie-up everything that had gone before, leave questions for the future, and totally fuck up everything you thought you knew about the show. And kudos must go in spades to the writers and cast for actually taking the time to craft well-rounded characters in a mainstream show. It would have been so easy to keep bringing back Smokezilla for cheap thrills, but the team decided to focus on the people in the show. And that's rare in American telly. Matthew Fox in particular deserves special mention, as he's always been good on the show but here delivered one of the best, most heart-wrenching performances I've ever seen.


No more telly... waaaahhh!!!! (although 'Entourage', 'The Wire' and 'The Riches' await me...)

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