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 |    My primary Writing.com blog. |
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Logocentric (adj). Regarding words and language as a fundamental expression of an external reality (especially applied as a negative term to traditional Western thought by postmodernist critics). Sometimes I just write whatever I feel like. Other times I respond to prompts, many taken from the following places:  "The Soundtrackers Group"  "Invalid Item" "Blogging Circle of Friends " "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" "JAFBG" "Take up Your Cross" Thanks for stopping by!  |
"Blog Harbor from The Talent Pond" PROMPT (DAY 4): Let's get nostalgic today. Let's talk about that one show that you were really sad to see canceled or just couldn't understand why in the world was canceled. Tell us why you loved it and if you know what brought its demise, share that too.I've always found this question difficult because there are a ton of shows that I think ended too soon, but then there's the whole issue of whether the show would be as iconic or memorable if it had dragged on for half a dozen seasons rather than going out on a high. Would Firefly or Freaks and Geeks or My So-Called Life be as beloved if it wasn't a one-season wonder? Would Veronica Mars have been able to maintain its quality for an extended period of time once the setting changed from high school to college? That's why I'm glad this question is centered more on an emotional response than a qualitative one. While there are a lot of options (see above references for some of them), my pick is:  I feel like this show hit that perfect bittersweet note in its cancelation; it had 25 total episodes across three short seasons, so it wasn't brief enough to become this iconic one-season wonder, and it wasn't on for so long that I feel like it had a good run. For example, Heroes had 79 episodes, Veronica Mars had 64, Leverage had 77, Burn Notice had 111, Psych had 121, and White Collar had 81... it's pretty hard to feel a show like that got the short end of the stick, even if I was disappointed when they stopped making new episodes. I think a series like The Newsroom is incredibly important, especially in today's climate where the very institution of journalism is under attack and sensationalist outlets that don't have standards in reporting are becoming more and more popular. This show did an amazing job of showing all the effort and investment that goes into accurate reporting, as well as characters weighing the business need for ratings against the mission of factual, informational reporting. The show made the incredibly smart choice to focus on real news stories by having the show episodes set a couple of years prior to their air dates, which allowed them to use actual newsworthy stories as the thrust of each episode. The first season was released in 2012, but covered stories like the shooting of former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords (2010), the Citizens United decision (2011), the killing of Osama Bin Laden (2011), etc., which really helped capture the significance of the job these characters do. Even if workplace dramas aren't your thing, I dare you to watch the Gabby Giffords episode (Season 1, Episode 4) or the Bin Laden episode (Season 1, Episode 7) and not get all the feels. I think what made the cancelation of this show particularly sad is that Aaron Sorkin created some brilliant characters, there are certainly no shortage of news stories, and after the extended run of The West Wing, it's pretty clear that there's a market for Aaron Sorkin's fast-talking workplace dramas. Imagine if a show like this had the same seven-season, 156 episode run as that show. It would still be on the air, and would have had the opportunity to cover stories like the Russian annexation of Crimea and the lifting of the Cuban embargo in 2014, the election of Justin Trudeau as Canada's new prime minister in 2015, the Paris climate agreement and Brexit and the U.S. presidential election in 2016... I'm really sad that we didn't get a chance to see the ACN News folks in The Newsroom get to tackle a much longer and diverse list of stories. |
"Blog Harbor from The Talent Pond" PROMPT (DAY 3): Okay, time to interject a little fantasy into this. If you could put yourself into any TV show as an active character, which show would it be and tell us about the character you'd play. Would you prefer to be yourself or someone much more exciting? It might seem a little weird to choose a dystopian science fiction setting as a desirable place to be, but per the prompt, I suppose I would choose to be one of the Meths... the wealthy elite who can afford to re-sleeve again and again as often as they wish. And some of the stuff in that last sentence didn't make any sense, please read on! Based on the novel of the same name by Richard K. Morgan, the world of Altered Carbon is one in which people's consciousness is stored in a "cortical stack," a digital disc that's stored in the vertebrae near the base of the skull. The cortical stack can be moved from one body to another, and as a result physical bodies are called "sleeves." If you're poor, when you die your cortical stack is put into storage and most likely forgotten about. But if you're rich, you can afford to "re-sleeve" in another body, which means rich people (called Meths in a reference to the long-lived biblical character Methuselah) can effectively life forever by transferring their cortical stack from one body to the next. I think the whole concept is fascinating. Obviously there's an incredible potential for abuse and sinful living (eat whatever you want and then just get yourself a new body once your old one is a three hundred pound, sky high cholesterol carrying diabetic mess... indulge in all kinds of depraved sexual activity until you contract some incurable STD... celebrate each 40th birthday by upgrading yourself to a physically perfect twenty-something in their prime), but what really appeals to me about the idea of transferring your cortical stack to another sleeve is twofold. First, you could quite literally live a thousand lifetimes. You'd never run out of time to travel to the places you wanted to see, read the books you want to read, take up the hobbies you want to take up, etc. You could spend a decade traveling the planet and experiencing all it has to offer. And then another fifty years reading all the classics. And then another twenty years becoming a world-class pianist. And another fifteen developing professional-level aptitude in your sport of choice. There's something incredibly appealing about the idea of being able to live all the lives you've ever wanted to live. Second, I'm fascinated by the idea of potentially experiencing the world from a different perspective. Imagine the lessons we could learn and the tolerance we could adopt if we literally spent the time in another person's skin. As a middle-class white male, try as I might to be understanding and sympathetic to the experiences of others, I'll never truly know what it actually feels like to live as someone else. What if we could all experience what it's like to be a female fighting for equal pay and recognition in the workplace? Or a black man interacting with the police? Or an undocumented immigrant trying to make a new life for themselves in a new country? Or an attractive person being objectified? Or an unattractive person trying to connect with someone? The dystopian future of Altered Carbon is probably not an ideal world to live in... but the mechanism by which the wealthy people in that society are able to continue their existence and live many lives' worth of experiences would be a fascinating place to live for a while. |
"Blog Harbor from The Talent Pond" PROMPT (DAY 2): This time let's discuss that one show, with the character that just doesn't seem to fit. You wish you could just pluck them out of the show and replace them with someone else. What show is it and why don't you think they fit? Don't get me wrong; I love Sigourney Weaver. Ripley is an icon. "There is no Dana, only Zuul!" She's brilliant in cult classics like Galaxy Quest and Heartbreakers. But the one role she just plain didn't pull off was Alexandra in The Defenders. I can see why the producers would want her (I mean, just look at her IMDB page for heaven's sake!), but it was really hard to buy her as the nearly-immortal, nigh-untouchable leader of a centuries-old criminal organization with its own army of ninjas. Now, I don't think it's entirely her fault. This series had so many cringe-worthy, ham-fisted lines that I lost count. So I'm not sure it's entirely all Sigourney's fault when there's dialogue like this: Alexandra: "Please tell your wife she makes it even better than they did in Constantinople." Waiter: "I think you mean Istanbul, ma'am. Constantinople, this is its ancient name." Alexandra: "Oh yes, of course."  Talk about hit-you-in-the-face-with-a-frying-pan blatant. If you want us to believe that she's an incredibly sophisticated, calculating, world-traveling, brilliant crime lord, how do you expect us to believe she's going to accidentally forget that Turkey's largest city underwent a name change in the distant past? "Hey audience! Did you notice that? She's way older than she seems because she forgot that it's not called Constantinople anymore! See? SEE??? Did you catch that?"  This show had a lot of flaws, and Sigourney Weaver's character was a major one. Even though I adore her as an actress and think (well, thought) she could do no wrong, her character was one that I wish they would have just scrapped and started over with. It felt like a situation where they tried to script a character to be worthy of Sigourney, when they should have written a more compelling character and cast it accordingly. |
"Blog Harbor from The Talent Pond" PROMPT (DAY 1): Let's start out simple. What is your favorite series to watch lately? It can be new or just something you found but it was canceled years ago. You tell us why you like it and what it's about.I have a really hard time choosing favorites, so I'm glad the prompt gave me some cover and qualified it with "lately."  While there have been quite a few series that I've really enjoyed in recent months, the one that's really stuck with me with Westworld.  Anybody who knows me knows that I love me a good genre mashup, so a sci-fi western hits me right in the amygdala. The story is set in a futuristic Wild West-themed amusement park called - you guessed it - Westworld, where android hosts interact with affluent guests who are allowed to live out their every indulgence and visit their every dark fantasy upon the hosts. But let's pretend for a minute that for some people, that premise might not make it a must-watch (crazy!). Maybe we should look at the show's pedigree. It was created by Jonathan Nolan (Person of Interest, co-writer of The Dark Knight, brother of Christopher Nolan). He created the show with his wife, Lisa Joy (Burn Notice, Pushing Daisies). Their producing partner is J.J. Abrams (you should know what he's worked on...  ). It's based on a story by Michael Crichton (yeah, that Michael Crichton). And that's not even mentioning the all-star cast. I'm pretty sure Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Jeffrey Wright, Tessa Thompson, James Marsden, Ed Harris, and Anthony Hopkins have like a couple dozen award nominations between them, and they really have it dialed in here. Plus, it's on HBO which, you know, has a decent track record of producing okay shows.  When the show first came out, I held off on watching because I didn't want to have to wait for the episodes to be doled out a week at a time. But then I got distracted with other shows, only recently rediscovered it and decided to jump in... and man, it was worth the wait. Even better, all the poor suckers that watched it when it first aired have had to wait almost a year and a half for a new season. But by the time I finished binging the series over a period of a couple of days, I discovered the new season is set to debut in just a few short weeks! Honestly, if you like mysteries, or layered storytelling, or nuanced actor performances, or surprising twists, or robot westerns... I don't think this will disappoint. |
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