MAYBE I ALREADY DID...[NOW WITH TANGENTIAL UPDATE]

A couple of days back, Jutratest suggested I should do a spec of Heroes: Origins.

Background on the spin-off/series-within-a-series here.

When I first read of it, the first thing I thought was that the Heroes folks were throwing us spec monkeys a banana by making Heroes spec'able in a kinda cruel way. The thing about specs is that they demonstrate the ability to capture the voice and tone of a show, but I would think that each episode of Heroes: Origins stands to be very different from one another. Why else would you do something like getting Kevin Smith to write and direct one (as opposed to just directing, like he's done with Reaper and will do with Battlestar)?

[tangent] And while I've read of some concerned by Smith's directing Battlestar, that concern is unwarranted. While, by his own admission, he considers himself to not be that much of a director, the fact is that after several feature films, he at least has attained the skills to either set a tone (Reaper) or mimic a tone (Battlestar) which is the job of any director on an existing series (well, not "mimic,' but certainly 'maintain"). I think he'd have a bit of a career in TV, though he's said that he's not really up for that in this SModcast. Reaper showed him that he doesn't have the control he's used to, Heroes is a unique opportunity and being writer and director gives him some of that control back, and Battlestar is him being a fanboy.

EDITED TO ADD: Okay, Now he's not doing Battlestar.[/tangent]

Still, it's something I may well do anyway, a Heroes: Origins. I don't know how practically useful it will be. Maybe it's only going to be useful as a way to trick someone reading specs into reading a kinda pilot.

In press for Heroes: Origins the producers mentioned there might be some crossover from established Heroes characters. I'd very likely do that, just for the whole "voice" thing.

It occurred to me though, that I could very well take the title off of my current sci-fi pilot and put Heroes: Origins on it and I'd technically have it. I'd write in a Heroes character though. One who doesn't seem likely for the chop. I think I could get Greg Grunberg's Matt Parkman in there pretty smoothly.

This, of course, assumes we've got a handle on how Heroes: Origins will go.

A BRIEF POLITICAL OBSERVATION

Have you ever noticed that whenever something like Rumsfeld getting canned resigning, Libby getting convicted or Gonzales finally stepping down (in other words, when good things happen) it always seems to be during a Daily Show/Colbert Report hiatus, if not actually on the first day of said hiatus?

SCRIPTERY AND SCHEDULE TWO NARCOTICS

Just a worky update.

• New pilot well underway, a sci-fi thing that would fit in perfectly in the non-existent fourth hour of the upcoming Monday NBC line-up. Unlike the last couple of shots at a pilot, this one kind of built itself and then came over and said "hey, put your name on this!" Only pausing in the writing at the moment because of the vicodin.

God, I'm turning into House. Well, no. If I were House I would only write when on vicodin.

Also, this last week, I've been watching an enourmous amount of House, having picked up the third season and I'm grateful that the only commentary on the set happens to be on "Half Wit," my favorite episode of House (possibly ever, though I still dig "Three Stories" quite a lot.)

• Completed a script for an Image Slimline format project, but the artist lined up for it decided to pass on it. Since he's still interested in working with me and he's the rare case of the non-flake artist who takes breaking-in seriously, I'm working up several pitches for him and we'll see where it goes. Keeping the completed script as back-up in case some other artist with an appropriate style turns up in the future. If anything, it was useful for working out that set of muscles, as writing a comic is a very different thing from writing anything else.
  

• Contacted by someone I knew when I was like six. How weird is that? Involved in an east coast film making society and looking for low-budget shorts. Trying to work up something for that. Non-paying, but I'll have a short film of something I wrote.

• Still agonizing over what to spec next. Still want to do a Heroes, but that show is just so damn volatile, I don't want to put weeks of work into something that could become completely unviable the week after I finish it.

IT...IS HERE

I call him Steiny.

(P)REVIEW INDEX / FALL 2007

• (P)REVIEW: BIONIC WOMAN
• (P)REVIEW: CHUCK
• (P)REVIEW: LIPSTICK JUNGLE
• (P)REVIEW: PUSHING DAISIES
• (P)REVIEW: REAPER
• (P)REVIEW: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES

(P)REVIEW: LIPSTICK JUNGLE

Yeah, generally my tastes fall into some certain categories. Espionage. Science fiction. Action/adventure. But I don't like to confine myself in those. You stick to what you know you like, you're going to miss out on a lot of stuff. I would have missed out on stuff as widely-ranging as Gilmore Girls, House, and Veronica Mars if I had just let initial impressions stand. In fact, with those three shows, they defy an easy label as much as my tastes (I think) do.

It was with that spirit that I decided to have a look at Lipstick Jungle.

There are, of course, other reasons to look at it as well. I'll address that in a mo'.

Well, these things don't always work out, do they? Being Candace Bushnell's new series, based on her book, it certainly invited comparison to Sex and the City, and in that way I'd call this the less fun version of Sex and the City. There's even an attempt at a Mr. Big type character.

Quick overview: Three friends, a publishing exec (Kim Raver), a film exec (Brooke Shields) and a fashion designer (Lindsay Price), try balancing personal and professional lives as twenty-first century women.

Now, not being a twenty-first century woman myself and also not being one terribly inclined to subscribe to any sexist idea of what men and women can or can't do because they are men or women, I kind of find this being written for someone else. Not me.

To me, this whole thing feels like old news. I'm sure there are many people out there, many women out there, who struggle with the pitfalls of being a woman in power and trying to have a family and like that, but the way this show comes at those struggles is just so on the nose I found it a bit of a turn-off. It lacked subtlety. The kind of subtlety you might need to reach beyond women who wish they were these women (i.e. men). Since I don't imagine that successful women would want to come home and unwind by watching people dealing with the same issues they are (but with more money and/or style).

Though, you know what will get them men is the sex. All three leads spend copious amounts of time in their underwear. I fully expect a certain quota to be fulfilled in each episode.

At any rate, I just feel like most everything in here has been mined before. In fact, if you've ever had a conversation with someone about what women have to do or what they have to be (or think they have to be) to be a successful professional, you'll find it echoed in these five acts.

Kim Raver is the hard-edged business woman who tells Brooke Shields how to fire a guy because she was being too nice. That almost seems a sexist idea in and of itself and leads to the scene where a male sees a woman in power taking action and calls her a bitch. That was so unexpected because I wouldn't think that they'd line up that shot like a tee ball so blatantly.

The end (and spoiler alert here) is both where things get interesting and where I get the idea that they maybe run out of any sense of things being new territory before the first years is over. In Shield's characters first attempt to fire a director, she plays it soft "this isn't really working out the way I think we both want it to" and "you're not really happy are you?" and ends it with a hug. When that doesn't "take" she fires him the mean way. So now the director is going to sue her for making advances (the hug) and being fired when he didn't reciprocate.

The reversal of the typical sexual harassment thing. I knew it would come eventually, but already.

I acknowledge that this isn't exactly up my alley, but I don't see much in this other than a soap. The female version of Big Shots.

Oh, and total waste of Julian Sands. He should be wearing a black Italian suit and threatening people somewhere rather than being a husband to wrapped up in the world of antiquities to notice that his wife has a phone number scrawled in Sharpie on her thigh.

IT...WILL SOON BE HERE

Aug 18, 2007

4:36 AM

Departed FedEx location

(P)REVIEW: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES

When I first read the script for The Sarah Connor Chronicles, I enjoyed and disliked it both at the same time. I was bringing my own baggage into it and I knew it. I went into reading it being especially critical because I always thought that T2 was a great film that tied up nicely and that any considered attempts (not to mention the piece of crap third flick) strains the concept and it's continuity (which being a time-travelly thing is even more important). Especially since the date of Skynet's take over was very firmly established and has already come and gone. Continuing the tale seems overly contrived.

Now here's the thing. In my head I saw Linda Hamilton and, to some degree, Edward Furlong as Sarah and John. This would make some things a little better, but then I would remember that it's not going to be them and suddenly I become even more critical. I really needed to see this in action to make a judgment.

Now that I've finally seen Lena Headey and Thomas Dekker in action, I don't seem to have a problem with it. Not because they're especially good (and they're good), but because this iteration of the Terminator universe feels very different from the James Cameron flicks. I can almost come at this as being something else. Almost. Wise move.

I'm not really going to get into a plot overview here because all but the last act is your basic Terminator plot and the last act sets up the series and how they move the Terminator concept to continue functioning. If anything, that's my only problem with the pilot. I don't feel like I really got a taste of the series to come and if I really did, then I hope there's some tricks up their sleeve because if this is just The Fugitive with robots, I'm not sure about it. Worse though, I think they're probably just going to stay in L.A. the whole time. I've outlined before how I dislike too many TV shows actually taking place in L.A. Doesn't matter.

Do not take this as the pilot not being well written, because it is. Josh Friedman there. He's got the goods. It does give me faith that the series will be good and that I will enjoy it. I think it can get an good audience going if they can get them over the hump of watching something that doesn't have the original Terminator cast in it,

Then there's the subject of the school shooting portion of the pilot, which is being reshot as, I would guess, something completely different. I've got a few different ideas about this, none of which paints a particularly great picture of the current state of American society.

It's being altered, or so it was said, because of the Virginia Tech shootings.

First thing, this is slated to air in midseason. January. I'll not get into the discussion of how long is long enough, but it is something I thought of. Well just have Fox err on the safe side.

So, in erring on the safe side, one has to wonder why you'd even go for the school shooting thing in the first place. As it's being reshot, it isn't vital that things happen in the school (Unlike, say, "Earshot," which played off of school shootings to some degree and was pulled when Columbine happened). Also, it's probably not giving away much to say that it's a Terminator doing the shooting. Aren't school shootings happening just enough in this country that writing one into a TV show is about as safe a bet as putting everything you've got on boxcars? Twice in a row?

Is it going to be arc-driven, episodic or both? Well, probably not purely episodic. I wouldn't mind if it were totally arc-driven because I think it suits the show, but I think it needs to blend it in order to pick up viewers these days. Too many really bad arc shows have come and gone.

Oh, and Summer Glau is in severe danger of getting typecast as the cute bad-ass on account of she does it so well.

To wrap it up. Good stuff. I recommend watching it. I just need to see more.

OVERHEARD ON THE WIRE

"My standard for verisimilitude is simple and I came to it when I started to write prose narrative: fuck the average reader. "

-David Simon (creator of The Wire)

Interviewed in The Believer.

SOMEBODY NEEDS TO DISPATCH WAR ROCKET AJAX

"Hey, let's get the writing staff of South Beach to do Flash Gordon!"

That's not fair. There's so much more wrong with that show than just the writing.

Let me only talk about the good parts.

Nice logo.

I KNEW THIS GUY FROM SCANDANAVIA. HIS NAME WAS...TAG!

The following is Josh's fault.

It started (or rather I first encountered it) as Five Things You Don't Know About Me, in which one was also challenged to slip a fake in there and see who can spot it. So I did that. Then it morphed into seven things and now I've been tagged with the ten things which you may or may not know, so combining this tagging with the Five Things I did some time ago, you're getting fourteen things.

I'm so cheap. Or I'm a bargain.

10. I read a fucking lot. Just not so much books. Magazines, intertron webulator, comics. Sometimes, I just read like twenty or thirty clicks worth of the random article link on Wikipedia.

9. When I'm trying to come up up with something original (and by original, I mean not a spec), I find it difficult to sit down and enjoy new material. Comics, flicks, TV, the occasional book.

It was only once I nailed down the concept and details for my newest pilot project (something to fill the sci-fi slot) that I was able to finally dig into Crooked Little Vein, which appears to be a book. A book that dresses up your brain in a Godzilla costume and spike heels and then does naughty things to it and laughs. Do read it.

8. I've been asked four times now by industry professionals, after receiving compliments from them on my writing, where I went to school to learn to write like I do. I always enjoy the look I get when I tell them "Nowhere." Which leads me to...

7. My only post-high school education consists of a one-class-semester, followed by a year of skirting both sides of full time at a local community college in which I took no writing classes (psychology, history, philosophy) and enrolled essentially to be eligible to be the editor of the school paper (which I was, and snagged some awards for it too). Many of those classes, I dropped.

6. I have difficult to reconcile musical tastes. I have three favorite bands. Nine Inch Nails (seen live three times to date), Duran Duran (four times) and Pink Floyd (alas).

5. My friend Harkins and I came up with this thing that I thought just rawked. Most Saturdays, when I still lived in Illinois, my gang/clique/pack/cult/whatever would inevitably gather at his house. He's got an awesome custom built MAME machine. Anyway, for a while there we would mandate that those who came must bring with them a CD with exactly five songs burned on it (suck it, RIAA) that ascribed to theme declared the previous Saturday. These included such fives as "favorite songs ever," "guilty pleasures," "songs with the word fuck in it," "total cheese," and like so.

I had a hard time narrowing down some of the guilty pleasures, so I used this for one of the tracks. It freed up some room. My willingness to share this with you indicates that I don't have guilty pleasures.

4. I play the guitar. And by "play" I mean "experiment on in a Dr. Frankenstein like-way." Some people use picks. I also use little metal clips, the textured handle of a wrench, and owing to my favorite guitarist, on one occasion, a variable speed vibrator. I haven't done so for a good long while, but I've been eyeing this Steinberger and it may soon be time once again for me to do things that Luther Von Guitar never meant to happen. It can be an expensive hobby.

Also, my favorite guitarist used to be Reeves Gabrels (formerly of Tin Machine)...until he started singing.

3. Two speeding tickets. One day. Indiana. Pennsylvania. One resulted in an arrest warrant. I have been arrested once, in Illinois, because my exhaust inspection didn't process quickly enough and my license was thus suspended (so, as a result, not convicted) and I was speeding a bit (yes, convicted for that). By the way, when a cop puts you in the back of his car cuffed, they're not real amused to later find you uncuffed. Uh, yeah...I have one skill other than writing. Not especially marketable, but handy on rare occasion...though that wasn't one of them.

2. I have every Green Lantern comic going back to Green Lantern #1 (1960). It took a long time, but I did start when I was, like, eight.

1. After living in the Caribbean, in Florida, and currently in California, there's just this one thing. Me no swim.

And now, with the continuing tagginess. I think most people have already been tagged by this one by now, so...if you already did this and I forgot disregard this tag. Or, if you feel like disregarding this tag, disregard this tag. It's really just an excuse to point links to folks what I dig.

1. Russell Lissau (writer of The Batman Strikes and cool journalist dude). As I write this he's at Wizard World Chicago, pimping his work. Damn, I miss hanging out at the con with him. Good times. Good times.

2. Greg Rucka (who totally doesn't have time for this shit anyway).

3. Shaniqua (not her real name)

4. Jonah Weiland (real name and generally awesome guy)

5. Aly (crafty chick extraordinaire)

(P)REVIEW: REAPER

The supernatural version of Chuck? Or is Chuck the techno/espionage version of Reaper?

Neither is especially accurate. All they have in common is the slacker main character. Too bad they're not on the same station on the same night, I think they kinda compliment each other. Interestingly, they were head-to-head until NBC moved Chuck to make a sci-fi Monday schedule.

Okay, Reaper goes like this. Young Sam (Bret Harrison) is having his twenty-first birthday and weirdness is afoot, largely having to do with the fact that his parents sold his soul to the Devil and the term, it appears, is up. Now, he has to be Peter Horton in Brimstone. Translation: catch escapees from Hell. Except sillier. Two words: unholy dustbuster.

It was said in the comments to (P)REVIEW: CHUCK that Reaper gets the slacker vibe much better and it does. How much of that has to do with Kevin Smith directing (showing a little (a little) more pinache than he usually does), I don't know. It does make me wonder what all those years of working on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit might have done to the writers of Reaper, Tara Butters and Michele Fazekas. Goes to show, don't get all pigeon-holey on people (foolish be those who do). They got the slacker thing pretty good.

Chuck is more geek than slacker. Sam is just genuine slacker. Nuff said on that.

Short of it, I liked this at least as much as Chuck, and I think that says a little something because I've kinda had my fill of demons and supernatural stuff in TV shows and I really like guns-and-spies crap. When I first read about this in pilot season last year, I could not care less. I think the show could be a lot of fun and it should stay the fuck away from getting too arc-ridden (don't get the idea that I'm anti-arc, just...you know...not always called for and too easy to overdo), which it didn't really lay down anything like that, so...points. Gimme a demon of the week and some good stuff with his friends.

Reaper's supporting cast really shines, from his parents who regret having done the unthinkable to his grungy slacker bud, Sock (Tyler Labine) to the "chick" of the piece (a.k.a. the love interest) Andi.

Andi in the pilot is played by Nikki Reed and alas, she has been recast. This, for me, would be a cuase for great sadness were it not for that fact that she's been replaced by Missy Peregrym. We have spoken before on these digital pages of The Peregrym. Let us not belabor the point.

So, yeah, I'd be watching this anyway. Hopefully, Andi gets a bigger role as the series progresses. She not directly involved in the demon catching, nor does she even know about it. I'd like to see that change...and in a way I've not seen before.

Ray Wise is the Devil. No argument here. A devil looking to make Sam into less of a slacker. He want to see him do well in service to Stan, you know. Makes me wonder a bit how much the slacker vibe will be sustained once Sam has a little experience under his belt in hunting down the damned. Ah, Sock will always be sidekicky slacker boy.

So far, pilot-wise. Stuff's looking good (though I think I'm the only one who likes Bionic Woman).

SDCC ROUND UP

All (my) writings concerning San Diego events have now been posted.

CCI XTRA: NBC Unveils New "Bionic Woman"

CCI XTRA: "Smallville" Brings Supergirl to Comic-Con

CCI: McFarlane To 'Haunt' Comics Again

CCI: Niles Meets Frazetta, Dracula Meets the Wolfman

CCI: Remender Unleashes Frazetta's "Creatures"

CCI: Ortega Deals with Warriors and Demons

CCI: Guice Goes Exclusive with Marvel

CCI: Fotos expands Frazetta line of comics

CCI: Kidwell Enters Frazetta's Dark Kingdom

More (P)reviews to come, also.