LIFE SUPPORT ON MARS

I do believe there was a ball that was dropped with regards to the return of Life on Mars to ABC following a two-month hiatus. Okay, maybe not dropped. How about swung at and missed? And somehow, that ball got two strikes on one throw. One strike with the viewers (like me) who were already on board with the show and another with those viewers who might have been coming to it for the first time, especially on its new night.

The show was moved to Wednesdays were it seems to be a better thematic pairing with Lost. However, it actually slipped a little from where it was when paired with Grey's.

I thought it would be a good move. It was heavily promoted during Lost. The thing is, I don't think that was enough. Well, obviously it wasn't. But I don't think it was the right move to just ad blitz it and then stick it on at nine. And the episode that they did stick on...well, I have issues with it.

Firstly, there should have been more of an event built around it. Two options come to mind. Instead of the recap and two back-to-back Losts last week, maybe Life on Mars should have come back with Lost. I'm not sure results would have been much different. What I wanted to see...what I would have done is [armchair network exec] skip the repeat of the previous week's lost at 8/7c and air the previous episode ("The Man Who Sold The World") of Life on Mars in that slot. [/armchair network exec] It was a solid episode that really made of a meal out of Sam's time displaced situation, meeting his absentee father and learning some hard truths about him. It also started to get some cool mythos going on as Sam found himself in some creepy little house where the phone rang and a mysterious voice tells him to go the basement. It was a cliffhanger.

[armchair network exec]Then at 9/8c we get outthe new Lost. Hopefully the Losties were hanging out waiting for their show and caught the Life on Mars replay rather than having dinner with their families or some useless shit like that. Then at 10/9c, brand new Life on Mars. And not the crap one they aired last night ("Take A Look At The Lawmen").[/armchair network exec]

First problem, the teaser. The teaser sucked. While it set up the contentious relationship between Gene and his rival, it didn't really do what teasers do. It didn't tease shit. It didn't draw the viewer in to see how some crime is solved or anything. It played like a lame little vignette. An amusingly gruesome one, but still lame.

Secondly, remember how I said the last episode was a cliffhanger? And a cool one?

Yeah, completely unaddressed. No mention whatsofuckingever. And the crime story left something to be desired as well. Basically, the show didn't come back with it's A-game. Any of the previous eight aired episodes was better than this one.

I like this show. I like it a lot. I was really disappointed. I can forgive an off episode, but this was an important slot. It could set the tone for the rest of the season. Will it gain or slide?

Just my nine cents (two 1973 cents adjusted for inflation).

24 HOURS YOU'LL NOT HAVE

I was recently asked about the additional day of the week I discovered. Blergsday.

It's extremely useful. I wrote my one act play largely on Blergsdays.

Unfortunately, I can't really talk much about this additional day or how it can be found. Well, it's not so much that I can't. I won't. I don't trust you with it. You can't be trusted to respect Blergsday. Blergsday has to be used with extreme care and I just can't let it out to the world.

The scenario is quite clear. At first, it'll be used well. Additional time with one's family. One can catch up on their DVR recording. You know, get some writing done. Perhaps play some Frisbee Golf. Whatever floats your boat. Boat floating. All will be well and good, until it falls into the hands of the corporations. Or really just anybody in the business of business.

It starts quite simply. Let's say the fine people at Target learn of Blergsday. That a whole extra day that people could be buying stuff. Now, Target is open on Blergsday, where previously they weren't (because they don't know about it). Wal-Mart can't let that stand. Now they're open on Blergsday. And so is Home Depot, and Barnes & Noble and Office Max and IKEA and *this corporation's check bounced* and Nationwide Insurance and Motorola and Household Finance and your local Coca Cola Bottlers. Suddenly, now, everybody has to work on Blergsday. So they we are working eight days a week, as the Beatles said and wondering where the time goes and wishing fro an extra day of the week so we can get things done.

Well, you had one. It was called Blergsday and you ruined it. It's like whoever that first guy that decided to be opne on Sundays was. He ruined it for everyone.

Put simply, no Blergsday for you.

Suck it.

BTW, since I found Blergsday, i got to name it. So I did. But, just out of curiosity, I decided to google it. There were, out of three pages of results, two entries that didn't refer specifically to me Blergsday. it is possible I didn't forge the path to Blergsday myself. Or perhaps it was some kind of racial memory...or species memory. I dunno.

I'm gonna try to patent Blergsday. Being that I live in the U.S. it shouldn't be a problem, since the patent office here will apparently let you patent anything. Even things that exist in nature that were not invented or simple processes that everyone has been doing for, like, ever, in order to do everyday things.

HELLZ YEAH (FOR TODAY, THE 23rd of JANUARY IN THE YEAR OF OUR TIME LORD, 2009

Michelle Ryan to appear in "Planet of the Dead"

PROPWRITER

If I can't write the shows, can I write the stuff in the shows?

I've always been a big fan of extreme detail in props. Going back to the Okudagrams in Star Trek: the Next Generation full of both detail that fits established continuity and easter eggs.

With the recent Battlestar Prop Auction, I elected to torture myself by perusing the auction catalog, being that there was no way in hell I had the scratch to get even a broken keyboard ripped out of a CIC console. Beyond items like Helo's dogtags, Racetrack's wings and Cain's "razor," on of my favorite props was this odd bit. From the fairly unimpressive episode "Black Market," the report of the investigation of Fisk's murder.

Some industrious prop dude decided to go all out and write a full five-page report that would likely never be visible enough to read. They could have gone all lorem ipsum on its ass, but no. And the coolest bit, was he (or she) had a sense of humor. It's for item number three in the listing of stuff found in Fisk's quarters that I really, really wanted this. Just not to the tune of $350. Make clicky on the pic and have a look.

POTUS

Right then, one more day and night then let's all quit the Obamalotry and let the man just be President. The culty vibe is just getting downright creepy. And at this point "Yes, We Did" is just gloating.

I fear the backlash when he makes some grossly unpopular, if not actually wrong decision.

RED RIGHT HAND WILL RETURN AFTER THIS MESSAGE

I am vindicated!

Well, possibly not, as the following relies on information acquired from people in Chicago and as people in Chicago are known to vote for people multiple times well into rigor mortis, and as the consumer research industry is about as trustworthy as Amy Winehouse working as night watchperson at...well, a wine house...I regard the following information with a grain of salt that weighs a couple of couple kilograms. However, I will write the following as though it is 100% irrefutable fact and will not accept arguments to contrary.

I do own a DVR. This is important to know. I have a DVR and I rarely use it to skip over commercials. And not because I believe there is a certain duty to have to watch a few commercials now and again in order to keep us from having to pay for each and every channel, if not each ad every show, we watch on a case by case basis.

Perhaps I'm a little biased in this case, because this would mean, for me, that I would have to work so much to pay for the shows I watch that I would no longer have time to watch them. Sure, there's downloading, but there's a point where that's just obnoxious. In fact, in most cases where I ABSOLUTELY DO NOT DOWNLOAD ANY KIND OF television program, I either decide it's total crap and never download another one or I go on to purchase the inevitable DVDs (regardless of region) to add to my stupidly huge collection of TV on DVD.

I also do it because, to a certain extent, I prefer it. The shows (that have commercials) are written around them. Every act out is designed to keep you hanging around through the ads and get the resolution on the other end. To that I end, I argue that commercial breaks are actually a part of the pacing of the show. I don't want my act outs resolved to quickly, otherwise they feel like little bumps in the road. Make me wait. Even just a minute. Even just thirty seconds.

In fact, I kinda wish that on the discs for 24, they would include an option that would insert the appropriate amount of black screen between acts to make the episodes actually play out in real time. Just an option.

Now comes this report from the Chicago Journal of Consumer Research, a wholly unimpeachable publication from the same great city that gave us Rod Blagojevich, Al Capone and a third guy.

In short, it says that commercial breaks make programs more enjoyable and that programs shown to study participants sans break reflected a decline in enjoyment in later half of the program. I trust this is not because they were shown recent episodes of Heroes.

Adam Avitable, whether he recalls or not, once impugned my sanity for not skipping through the ads on time shifted viewing. In fact, he waits a few minutes before watching any live airing specifically so that he can skip through them later.

He's missing out.

This is not to say, though that I believe that all programs should have commercials. Dare not infer such a thing. The Wire was not written to have them and therefore, 'tis good as it is. Also, I'm all in favor of Fox's attempt to charge a premium for advertising on shows with reduced commercial breaks. Unfortunately, perhaps, one of those two shows was Dollhouse, which isn't going to be breaking any new demo ground on Friday nights. They still doing that with that?

Anyway. I watch commercials. And with good reason.

Besides, sometimes...though not nearly often enough, the commercials themselves can be enjoyable.



Peter Storemare. Teh awesum.

THE NEED FOR BLERGSDAY

What am I working on? What am I not working on. And I've scarcely had the time of late to work on any of that, but steps are being taken. Discipline will be imposed. The laws of temporal physics may even be violated. The secret eighth day of the week may be called upon. Blergsday.

In TV spec world, I've started on two specs just to get them rolling. Theoretically they are in a state where I can pick them up again when the time is right. Why is the time not quite right? Both a re new series, neither has been picked up for a second season, but I have high hopes for both. Leverage and Life on Mars. They've been placed in a holding pattern until I can be more certain that I wouldn't be pouring another 50 pages of brain squeezings just for the exercise of it.

There's the King Vs. Queen comic book project. It's been moving gradually along for a while, but it's soon to pick up the pace. I'd like to have it in some kind of shape by SDCC.

Foremost in the queue though is the one-act play. At least a dozen ideas had come and gone, then, when I'd all but forgotten about doing a one-act, I'd set about thinking up a feature script. Despite the fact that I don't really want to write a feature script, but maybe I should. But it's going to have to be an idea I just can't not write...and don't see as a story told in 13 to 22 hour segments over a period of five to seven years.

Well, I had an idea. One that was in the lead. It might still be a feature. A lot of things about it formed pretty quickly in my head when I devised it. The title. The logline, the tag line on the poster. I even instantly cast it. It's going to be a terrorism-themed thriller. It's about a twisted wrong kind of love and villainy.

Then I realized that that same kernel can work in a different context and a shrunk down plot. Instead of an al-Qaeda terrorist as the central character, why not a masked villain, I might have been inspired by Doctor Horrible, which I got on DVD the same week. I wanted to transpose it like that to free up my voice to be a little weirder, maybe grab a laugh or two, though I wouldn't characterise it as a comedy.

It's called I Am Mastermind. First draft should be done in about a week or two. Then it'll be subject to the slaughter (i.e notes). Then another draft or two, then I'll be looking for some boards to put it on.

What else?

I've got the next Auslander story for Astonishing Adventures ("My Hostage, My Hero," I love coming up with pulpy titles) worked out to about 90% in my head. Need to get that done by the end of the month.

Then I've been considering of my time management will allow me to attempt get involved in a certain publishing project getting underway beneath a mighty and pulpy hand.

And trying to get my CBR work back on track.

And there was this post.

REVIEW: DEMONS on ITV

More British TV stuff, what say?

So...watched the new supernatural series from ITV, Demons, last night.

That's a mistake I won't be making again.

Rarely does a pilot come along that is just so monstrously stupid that I will immediately swear off any further efforts from the series. Usually, given a premise I find remotely interesting, at worst I'll just put off giving the show another chance by leaving the 2nd episode on the DVR, and then the 3rd, and then the 4th, until there are so many backed up it's clear I'm just not interested enough to care. In this case though, the impression was strong enough. No more.

Not entirely surprised, in retrospect. It comes from the producers behind Hex (which I very much disliked) and the NBC-bound Merlin (didn't care for it that much, but better). They've really set themselves up in the business of supernatural teen series. As such, Life on Mars' Philip Glenister is completely wasted in this show (in which he plays an American, who appears to be such for no other reason than maybe to facilitate selling the series stateside. An American named Rupert? There are no Americans named Rupert. There's a law. USC 24 § 3 § 226. Look it up).

The only good thing, I was going to say, would be the demon design. They did get on my good side in the opening minute by having this weird little gremliny guy with a crazy monocle or something. But that was it. In fact, supernatural character design was very much the nail in the coffin on this. That in a 'mo.

Glensiter's good. He's a good actor. He does a reasonable American accent. He's also exposition guy. He spends a good amount of time explaining the series twist on Stoker-based Dracula mythology, an oh-so original idea in and of itself. Basically, the Van Helsing's were real (Again?) and we're following the descendant, Luke (seems to be the hot TV teen name in UK). He is, unfortunately, the real central character. And he's got a Scooby gang. There's Mina Harker, who's been scrubbing her blood to fight off vampirism. And Ruby, some girl I don't give a shit about. And when she gets kidnapped by the bad guy and Luke goes running to save here, the inspired choice of music is..."Ruby" by the Kaiser Chiefs. How's that for on-the-nose? Together, they're going to fight the half-lives (because we need yet another word to group all monsters under).

Like Hex, it has shades of Buffy. Like Hex, it has none of the style or humor. Well, there's humor, but I don't think it was intended. See, young Luke gets dragged into this life when a vampire bounty hunter with a mad-on for the Van Helsing clan shows up to make trouble. This guy is the nail I spoke of.

First off, his name is Gladiolas Thwip. I'm not sure I would even buy that as the name of an eccentric Venus Flytrap trainer found dead in his own greenhouse on an (unfortunately never to be produced) episode of Pushing Daisies. Seriously? Gladiolas Thwip? Not terribly fearsome, is it?

That's not the worst part. The worst part is that he appears to be a vampire chicken.

Plotwise, it's a by-the-numbers pilot. Just a bad one. Filled with cliche. One of the tip offs should be when the series creators cant be arsed to write their own first episode. It was left to a Pete Tabern (who's, of course, written some Hex).

If this pops up on BBC America, perhaps as a companion piece to ITV's just-fine Primeval...run. Run away.

THE NEW DOCTOR WHO IS...

...Matt Smith.

...and whatever you think, you're probably wrong. Well, that's assuming you're thinking bad things. I knew a lot of people who found Doctor Who for the first time during Eccleston's season and couldn't fathom the thought of another Doctor. They eyed Tennant with suspicion. Until he actually became the Doctor, then he was the new favorite.

I now know just as many who became fans during the Tennant tenure. They going through a similar thing. Just as I did when I was a kid and my first Doctor regenerated. But each new Doctor is a wonderous thing. We'll always have favorites, but new Doctors can reach new parts of the character. I know of no other series that can do such a thing and anyone trying it now, would be ripping it off.

And Smith? Yeah, he's young. Very. The youngest Doctor yet. And the photos aren't very Doctorly, but he's not the Doctor yet. He's just the actor named to be the Doctor.

One can never imagine the next Doctor being as good as the current Doctor, and yes, Tennant is a hard act to follow, but until we actually see the new Doctor, being the Doctor, there's nothing to say one way or the other.

But with Moffat at the wheel, I'm none too worried.

While I admit to some initial dubiousness...you know, instinctual dubiousness, once I saw this young man speak about being the Doctor, I can very much see the Doctor in him that Piers Wenger spoke of. I look forward to his first series, while I will also savor the remaining Tennant specials.