Media Monday — What’s new for Fall TV

Last week I went down the list of shows I can’t wait to return for Fall.  Most of them end up in my DVR, because quite frankly I don’t have time to watch them when they’re on air, and I like to fast forward through the commercials.

There’s not that much new TV I’m looking forward to this fall. I hate reality TV in general, especially network reality TV. I gave up on American Idol after Season 2. It’s just boring. There are some good looking new shows, like THE 100, and ALMOST HUMAN.  BACK IN THE GAME sounds like a re-boot of THE BAD NEWS BEARS, and we’ve taken a bunch of movies and turned them into shows, like ABOUT A BOY and BAD TEACHER (like teachers need any more help. Please stop.) There are more cop shows, like CHICAGO PD. Enough with the cop shows already, we have enough that are good. BUT, then we have…

AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D (ABC): Yeah, I am totally geeking out about this one. I honestly cannot wait for it.

COWORLD (SyFy): I am a Geek. I let my Geek flag fly. So watching a competition (I said I hate reality shows. I do. But THIS involves costumes and cosplay. All other arguments are invalid.) about cosplay is just like Geek Nirvana.

DRACULA (NBC): Nothing like taking out an old classic, dusting it off, and giving it new life. It worked for Sherlock Holmes (though I have yet to see a single episode of ELEMENTARY, I am faithful, as we all know, to the Cumberbatch.) At least this has good source material, and the talent is proven. I am not a fan of the vampire drama, not a Vampire Diaries or True Blood fan, but I might give this a gander.

THE GOLDBERGS (ABC): Okay, this one is a gimme. It’s brain candy, and as a child of the 80’s, I am powerless to resist. I love THE WEDDING SINGER too.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN WONDERLAND (ABC): Again, powerless in the face of Fairy Tale retellings. OUAT has dragged me in and held me captive for two seasons. And this is WONDERLAND. I seriously cannot wait for this one.

What are you looking forward to that’s new this fall?

Media Monday — Fall TV Preview

I’m back! Things just got away from me in the last couple of weeks, but I’m here now and working on keeping up with this blog schedule. One way is to pre-write posts a bunch at a time, which I will try to do. 

It’s the end of August, and we all know what that means. Back to school. End of beach days. Winter is coming (ha!). And…fall TV. The new fall lineup always excited me as a kid, my favorite shows picking back up where they left off, new shows taking a shot at grabbing some market share. This fall will see the return of some of the shows I can’t wait to get back to, like:

N.C.I.S. (CBS)– with the leaked news that Cote de Pablo is leaving the show during the premiere, it makes me sad, but I love this show, so I can’t wait to see how they write her off. I know they won’t kill her character, like they did with Sasha Alexander (who is now rocking’ it on Rizzoli & Isles, so I can’t complain about that one), but it’ll be interesting and sad to see her goodbye.

C.S.I (CBS)– I know, what’s with the acronyms? I’ve watched this show since day one, and of the two ‘spin-offs’, I only like the NYC one as much as the original. The big question at the end of last season was “Where are Ellie and Morgan?” Brass’s and Eckley’s daughters are missing, Morgan seeming to disappear before our eyes.  Sources say someone will die, and the premiere begins at a memorial service, but don’t know who it is yet. 

Bones (FOX)– If someone looked at my DVR, they’d think I was planning a murder. But again, love this show. Booth broke of the engagement with Bones after Pelant threatened to kill five people if he didn’t. I hear they will eventually get married, but it won’t come easy. Good. 

Revolution (NBC)– I cannot wait to see what happens now that the power is back on and that idiot released all the missiles…

Once Upon A Time (ABC) — While the show fell a little flat for me in Season 2, Season 3’s trip to Neverland promises a return to adventure and life-or-death situations and more flashbacks from the Enchanted Forest. I hope they leave the soap opera back in Storybrooke. 

Arrow (CW) — I have to admit…I’ve never seen this show. I should, especially now that John Barrowman is on it. Bad fangirl!

Grimm– I am not caught up on this, so don’t spoil it!! 

OF COURSE, how can we forget…

NEW Doctor Who (the 50th anniversary show AND the Christmas Special) !!!!!

NEW Sherlock (sometime…)

Next week I’ll post about NEW shows that I think I need to watch… 🙂

What returning shows are you looking forward to this fall??

 

Media Monday: TV Rewind — Revolution

I admit that I’m a little behind in posting this morning’s blog. I should have set this one up before I left for vacation and I was lazy and didn’t.  Anyway, I have wanted to talk about this show for awhile, because I think it gets a little overlooked. REVOLUTION is, in my opinion, one of the best written new shows on American network television.  But, of course it is, it’s J.J. Abrams! 

I admit that when I first saw the previews for this show, I immediately thought of The Hunger Games. A post-apocalyptic America, with a teenage girl main character who shoots a bow.  But Charlie is not so much like Katniss, though they share a similar drive for survival and sibling protection. There is a whole backstory that’s come into play in the second half of the first season, where we find out that the blackout wasn’t an accident, and that Charlie is closer to those who caused it than she realizes. I like this show for the great characters, multi-leveled and intriguing plot, and the ability to surprise me. 

I think you can stream Season 1 now, Season 2 starts in late September. Enjoy!

Media Monday: TV Rewind– Sherlock

I’m in a bit of a lull right now, getting ready for vacation, nothing new on TV, so I thought I’d go back and talk a little bit about SHERLOCK. This bit of BBC TV, like pretty much everything they put out, is brilliant. An updated, 21st century version of Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary Consulting Detective.

Benedict Cumberbatch stars as Sherlock Holmes, with Martin Freeman (Bilbo Baggins from THE HOBBIT) playing Dr. John Watson. The chemistry between the two is outstanding, Cumberbatch’s off-the-cuff, impulsive, almost Asperger-like way of dealing with the world playing off of Freeman’s down-to-earth, real Everyman. The books translate exceptionally well, with Watson’s chronicling Holmes’ adventures in ink and paper turning into Watson’s blog. Everyone’s come along for the ride: LeStrade, Moriaty, even Irene Adler. Written by the brilliant Steven Moffat of Doctor Who fame, it’s a grip-the-edge-of-your-seat, not just WHO, but HOW did they do it.

Best of all, it has what I think every TV show and movie needs– MOAR Cumberbatch. Just brilliance on a stick, I could watch him read the ingredients of a box of Cheerios. I mean, how awesome is the name Benedict Cumberbatch?

The one downside of this show is that a season is just three episodes long. Yes, they are an hour-and-a-half each, but ONLY THREE EPISODES. There are two episodes available to watch now on all the usual streaming sites, and Season 3 will premier this fall.

Meanwhile,  watch this video he and Martin Freeman did for Comic-Con, where Benedict gives us some spoilers for Season 3. DO NOT watch if you haven’t watched the previous two seasons and/or hate spoilers.

Media Monday: TV Rewind — Grimm

This is a new show for me. I wanted to watch it when it first premiered, but for some reason I don’t remember now, I didn’t. I think another show I was well-involved with was on opposite. But, now, through the power of Netflix, I can watch all the episodes in a row whenever I want. Lately I’ve taken to watching while I’m sweating on a cardio machine at the gym. It’s good distraction, because I LOVE this show.

The basic premise is that the main character, Nick, is part of a long line of familial tradition. He is a Grimm — a guardian that protects mankind from the creatures that haunt the pages of the tales told by Wilhelm and Jacob. It is his job to hunt them, but he, well, takes a little different take on the hunting part. See, Nick is a cop.

If you’ve spent more than five minutes with me, you know that I am a lover of fairy tales. Especially Grimm’s. I mean, like everyone else I grew up on Disney, but I had a copy of Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales that I picked up at a yard sale when I was a kid, and I read the crap out of that thing. Now I own a much nice copy that I got on sale at B&N, and it sits over my writing desk. I am also a lover of fairy tale retellings. I love when writers include the little original things that may go unnoticed by people who don’t love fairy tales as much as I do.

The other reason I love this show is that it doesn’t shy away from the original material. Well, it DOES, obviously. I mean, this show takes place in modern day Portland, not mid-17th century Germany. What I mean is that these are not Uncle Walt’s fairy tales. They  honor the tradition of blood and gore that make Grimm’s so …grim. People die, arms get ripped off.

But they also put in funny little things, like in the episode The Three Bad Wolves, the last little pig-guy lives in..a brick house. They don’t go out of their way to point it out, but if you’re paying attention, you’ll get all these awesome little Easter eggs. (Of course, The Three Little Pigs is not a Grimm tale, but I’m not picky).

I also find it HYSTERICAL that Monroe, the Blutbod (Big Bad Wolf) that Nick is friends with, drives a VW Bug.

This is only one of my favorite shows/movies that involve fairy-tale retelling, but if you haven’t checked this out yet, you need to.

Summer Rewind: Warehouse 13

I am a Netflix/Amazon video streaming junkie. There, I’ve admitted it. (The first step in getting help is admitting you’ve got a problem). I don’t watch a lot of movies on either service; but I DO watch a good many of my favorite TV shows. And since I’m on summer vacation from the Day Job, I get some extra time to revisit some of my old favorites.

(I also have wi-fi at the gym, so I stream stuff on my Kindle while I’m pumping away at the cardio machine.)

One of my favorite shows is SyFy’s (Sorry, can’t get over that weird spelling) Warehouse 13. I have loved this show since the pilot, for several reasons. The cast has great chemistry (and Eddie McClintock isn’t bad to look at either. I must put him in a book someday), and it’s written by one of the great SF TV writers out there, Jane Espenson. If you don’t know who she is, you should. She’s been involved in several other shows you might have heard of– Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Torchwood, and ABC’s hit from last season, Once Upon A Time. Yeah, I am pretty much on Team Jane.

But this show really hits me where I live as a genre writer. Well done, quirky, great dialogue, and it has two things that I hold dear to my writer’s heart — Steampunk elements and Artifacts That Do Weird Things.  The Library of Athena series is based on mythological Artifacts That Can Destroy the World, and this is very much like that. And the mashup of modern and Victorian-era stuff is just too cool for school. A computer with antique typewriter keys? A stun gun called a Tesla? I’m in Heaven! So much inspiration for writing, just lying around waiting to be picked up.

I have to find out when the new season starts.