I think I watch entirely too much TV
Jan. 28th, 2003 09:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwynmini reviews of Veritas: The Quest and Miracles
I can't believe I'm adding two more shows to my list o' things to watch, but considering that Firefly, Robbery Homicide Division, Birds of Prey, and MDs have all been cancelled, and Boomtown alternately annoys me and wins me over, I figured why not try out the new season replacement series?
Digression alert: I get Entertainment Weekly, and I was flipping through recent issues, noticing the ads for these new shows, and one thing really stuck out to me: youth rules. Considering how two shows that I loved that had more mature actors with that nice lived-in feeling were both cancelled early this year, I suppose it's not surprising that all the new shows are advertising heavily to the youth audience. But I resent it. My most heavy-duty fandom is Buffy, where I'm surrounded by mostly very young people, but I do also know a lot of folks my age who are seriously into it. I don't mind the youth focus, in fact, I like it; but what bugged me about these ads was that they all had a common look -- characters' faces in the forefront, with either one character larger than the rest, or the others kind of fanning back behind to show the supporting cast. In all cases, the youngest actor was given the largest space or the most focus, except for Queens Supreme, which focused on Oliver Platt because they're still clearly trying to make him and his hair a major TV star. After watching Veritas: The Quest last night, I felt even more resentful of the fact that the adults were hidden behind the kid, because the adults really were the primary actors in the show. The storyline pivots around the kid, but it's the adults who were the most clearly defined and the ones who provided the story momentum. I hate this feeling of marginalization as I get older, as if by being over 40 I'm supposed to only want to watch crap like Touched by an Angel or Murder, She Wrote. I like youthy things, fine, but I also appreciate seeing guys like William Fichtner and John Hannah, or Tom Sizemore, on my TV doing interesting things. Only the networks don't seem to believe that there are solid-income youngish adults who want to see them -- they don't support or advertise these shows, they emphasize the youngest actors in their ads, and they pump less and less money into dramas and put it all on extremely youth-based reality series, because apparently it doesn't matter if we're out there looking for good shows to watch and can also afford to buy nice cars and homes. Without a Trace and The Shield are two new successful shows with older actors, but WaT is definitely a plot-based drama where the characters are far less important than the storylines; and The Shield has the support of a cable network going out on a limb to try something new. Last year, 24 was the only new series I saw that also had that older guy dynamic, and even then, Kiefer's a pretty young dad. I sure don't feel old, but the networks are doing a good job of trying to lead me there. /end of my digressive rant
Anyways. Veritas was definitely the lesser of the two new shows, a weird hybrid of X-Files, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and a number of other things. But it was interesting for the most part, and definitely something I'll want to tune into in the future. I liked Arnold Vosloo's character a lot -- he has a cool mystique (and okay, I'm already fond of him, so I'm prejudiced) and unflappable calm that I appreciated, especially when it got noisy, and I liked the supporting characters, especially the long-faced guy from 24 last year and Six Feet Under. The kid... the kid I hate. This could be the thing that kills me on the show. XF and Indiana Jones didn't need kids, they had mature characters doing interesting things, so I'm not certain why they felt they needed to saddle the show with a whiny, annoying, shitheaded teenage brat who doesn't even have the decency to be jail-bait attractive, but I guess that all-powerful youth market is what counts.
I also thought they showed a lot of balls to admit they didn't have any idea what the show was about. I think they might have been trying for mysteriously X-Filesy, but having your main character actually say that he doesn't know what he's searching for when the show is based on... well, searching for something, is either incredibly stupid or incredibly gutsy, or maybe both. But he's a dynamic character, and I think they can do a lot with the mysterioso Mummy-type artifact hunting and action genre, as well as those Toronto settings, and I'll keep watching to see how it pans out.
Miracles
Now this was the show. I really thought it was going to be some crummy hybrid of XF and that PAX show with Adrian Pasdar and a little Touched by an Angel thrown in for good measure, but instead we got a creepy, interesting, dark, and darkly spiritual show with some fabulous cinematrography and excellent actors (I already think I want to vid this). Skeet Ulrich plays a guy who works for the Catholic church investigating possible miracles and paranormal situations, who's starting to have a crisis of faith when he wonders if there really is no God after all. But he investigates a boy who can heal, and starts to have dark, scary visions of possible outcomes that changes his perspective.
The title does a disservice in a way -- it sounds far too religious and smarmy for its own good, when in fact it was genuinely affecting in its creepy depiction of possible evil forces at work in the world, battling with the good. In the end, Callan (I think that's his name) gets hooked up with a mysterious quasi-religious group run by Angus MacFadyen who also investigate possible miracles. The story kept me completely hooked from beginning to end, even when I was having severe problems with my legs, and even surprised me on a number of occasions, especially when his car was hit by a train and he was horribly injured. I so didn't think they would do something that serious and dramatic, and yet they did, and it was violent and scary and really, really cool.
Skeet Ulrich is just a total cutie-pie with his adorable overbite and those wounded, almond-shaped eyes (and I defy anyone not to like someone named Skeet), and he plays a man demoralized, afraid, and confused by his faith wonderfully. I'm not even remotely religious and tend to run away from stories about religion; what worked here for me was seeing someone going through all these crises, trying to find his place within the world, and not so certain where he fits. I also like Angus MacFadyen a lot and it's cool to see him on a show on American TV. Hector Elizondo, as always, does great stuff. I think this may actually be the strongest new series I've seen this year, next to Firefly. I love struggling, confused characters (which is why I loved Firefly), and this show looks like it can deliver the goods if it gets a chance.
And of course, it's on ABC, not exactly known for groundbreaking niche show support, so it will die quickly. Tune in for some great camera work, nice acting, and cool stories before they cancel it.
I can't believe I'm adding two more shows to my list o' things to watch, but considering that Firefly, Robbery Homicide Division, Birds of Prey, and MDs have all been cancelled, and Boomtown alternately annoys me and wins me over, I figured why not try out the new season replacement series?
Digression alert: I get Entertainment Weekly, and I was flipping through recent issues, noticing the ads for these new shows, and one thing really stuck out to me: youth rules. Considering how two shows that I loved that had more mature actors with that nice lived-in feeling were both cancelled early this year, I suppose it's not surprising that all the new shows are advertising heavily to the youth audience. But I resent it. My most heavy-duty fandom is Buffy, where I'm surrounded by mostly very young people, but I do also know a lot of folks my age who are seriously into it. I don't mind the youth focus, in fact, I like it; but what bugged me about these ads was that they all had a common look -- characters' faces in the forefront, with either one character larger than the rest, or the others kind of fanning back behind to show the supporting cast. In all cases, the youngest actor was given the largest space or the most focus, except for Queens Supreme, which focused on Oliver Platt because they're still clearly trying to make him and his hair a major TV star. After watching Veritas: The Quest last night, I felt even more resentful of the fact that the adults were hidden behind the kid, because the adults really were the primary actors in the show. The storyline pivots around the kid, but it's the adults who were the most clearly defined and the ones who provided the story momentum. I hate this feeling of marginalization as I get older, as if by being over 40 I'm supposed to only want to watch crap like Touched by an Angel or Murder, She Wrote. I like youthy things, fine, but I also appreciate seeing guys like William Fichtner and John Hannah, or Tom Sizemore, on my TV doing interesting things. Only the networks don't seem to believe that there are solid-income youngish adults who want to see them -- they don't support or advertise these shows, they emphasize the youngest actors in their ads, and they pump less and less money into dramas and put it all on extremely youth-based reality series, because apparently it doesn't matter if we're out there looking for good shows to watch and can also afford to buy nice cars and homes. Without a Trace and The Shield are two new successful shows with older actors, but WaT is definitely a plot-based drama where the characters are far less important than the storylines; and The Shield has the support of a cable network going out on a limb to try something new. Last year, 24 was the only new series I saw that also had that older guy dynamic, and even then, Kiefer's a pretty young dad. I sure don't feel old, but the networks are doing a good job of trying to lead me there. /end of my digressive rant
Anyways. Veritas was definitely the lesser of the two new shows, a weird hybrid of X-Files, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and a number of other things. But it was interesting for the most part, and definitely something I'll want to tune into in the future. I liked Arnold Vosloo's character a lot -- he has a cool mystique (and okay, I'm already fond of him, so I'm prejudiced) and unflappable calm that I appreciated, especially when it got noisy, and I liked the supporting characters, especially the long-faced guy from 24 last year and Six Feet Under. The kid... the kid I hate. This could be the thing that kills me on the show. XF and Indiana Jones didn't need kids, they had mature characters doing interesting things, so I'm not certain why they felt they needed to saddle the show with a whiny, annoying, shitheaded teenage brat who doesn't even have the decency to be jail-bait attractive, but I guess that all-powerful youth market is what counts.
I also thought they showed a lot of balls to admit they didn't have any idea what the show was about. I think they might have been trying for mysteriously X-Filesy, but having your main character actually say that he doesn't know what he's searching for when the show is based on... well, searching for something, is either incredibly stupid or incredibly gutsy, or maybe both. But he's a dynamic character, and I think they can do a lot with the mysterioso Mummy-type artifact hunting and action genre, as well as those Toronto settings, and I'll keep watching to see how it pans out.
Miracles
Now this was the show. I really thought it was going to be some crummy hybrid of XF and that PAX show with Adrian Pasdar and a little Touched by an Angel thrown in for good measure, but instead we got a creepy, interesting, dark, and darkly spiritual show with some fabulous cinematrography and excellent actors (I already think I want to vid this). Skeet Ulrich plays a guy who works for the Catholic church investigating possible miracles and paranormal situations, who's starting to have a crisis of faith when he wonders if there really is no God after all. But he investigates a boy who can heal, and starts to have dark, scary visions of possible outcomes that changes his perspective.
The title does a disservice in a way -- it sounds far too religious and smarmy for its own good, when in fact it was genuinely affecting in its creepy depiction of possible evil forces at work in the world, battling with the good. In the end, Callan (I think that's his name) gets hooked up with a mysterious quasi-religious group run by Angus MacFadyen who also investigate possible miracles. The story kept me completely hooked from beginning to end, even when I was having severe problems with my legs, and even surprised me on a number of occasions, especially when his car was hit by a train and he was horribly injured. I so didn't think they would do something that serious and dramatic, and yet they did, and it was violent and scary and really, really cool.
Skeet Ulrich is just a total cutie-pie with his adorable overbite and those wounded, almond-shaped eyes (and I defy anyone not to like someone named Skeet), and he plays a man demoralized, afraid, and confused by his faith wonderfully. I'm not even remotely religious and tend to run away from stories about religion; what worked here for me was seeing someone going through all these crises, trying to find his place within the world, and not so certain where he fits. I also like Angus MacFadyen a lot and it's cool to see him on a show on American TV. Hector Elizondo, as always, does great stuff. I think this may actually be the strongest new series I've seen this year, next to Firefly. I love struggling, confused characters (which is why I loved Firefly), and this show looks like it can deliver the goods if it gets a chance.
And of course, it's on ABC, not exactly known for groundbreaking niche show support, so it will die quickly. Tune in for some great camera work, nice acting, and cool stories before they cancel it.
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no subject
Date: 2003-01-28 11:50 am (UTC)You Are Right
Date: 2003-01-28 05:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-01-29 06:45 am (UTC)My most heavy-duty fandom is Buffy, where I'm surrounded by mostly very young people, but I do also know a lot of folks my age who are seriously into it.
And at least one considerably older than you, you young whipper-snapper! Honestly, these kids today...
What concerns me about all this marketing to the kids is that it implies that the kids have the money. Not meaning to sound like the curmudgeonly old fart that I am, but back in my day, it was the parents who held the purse strings (and control of the television, for that matter). What's with this? How is it that they figure it's the kids who have all the money to spend? Not that I'm particularly well off atm, but still... Harumph.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-29 10:01 am (UTC)Re: You Are Right
Date: 2003-01-29 10:21 am (UTC)I'm starting to think this is a popular kink I knew nothing about! I've seen a number of people say this in relation to this show. Hmmm...
Also, was he actually a full-fledged priest? I thought at first he was, but then as the show went on, I wasn't convinced he was. Will have to go back and watch again to see.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-29 10:25 am (UTC)Yeah, me too. And I also wonder if the one lone kid in the cast is enough of a draw for the young adult audience. I mean, maybe whiny brats are more popular with teens these days than they were when I was a teen or early twenty-something, but if that was the sort of thing I'd be expected to find interesting, I'd be really disappointed. That's the secret of Buffy, I always though -- they combined the miseries and angst of teenhood with the emotional strength and intelligence of adulthood. Just throwing in Requisite Attractive Son/Daughter for a main character in a show in order to get younger people to watch kind of misses what made the Buffy formula successful. Not that I'm opinionated or anything.
Re: You Are Right
Date: 2003-01-29 11:03 am (UTC)Re: You Are Right
Date: 2003-01-29 03:57 pm (UTC)