Posts from — April 2008

I suppose I can’t out and out disagree with Stacey’s love for the second season of “Buffy”. But calling it one of the best seasons of the last 20 years, now that’s a stretch. Still, since I love “Angel”, I’ll let Pajiba have their fangasm.

I’ve always had this love/hate thing going on with “Buffy though. I loved the original movie with Kristy Swanson. Like memorized all the lines (and cheers) kind of love. So I gave the first season a looksie. Sarah Michelle Gellar wasn’t so annoying during the first three seasons and did a pretty good job with the humor. But after they sent Angel to Los Angeles, I jumped ship for the “Angel” series.

After that, I never really watched the rest of the Buffy seasons. But once F/X started showing the heck out Buffy, I managed to watch almost every episode without even trying very hard! I’m no Joss Whedon worshipper, but if there’s nothing else on, an hour with the Buffy gang kills the time quite well.

Back in the day, I loved this cartoon called “Fluppy Dogs“. After searching online to buy it on dvd, it turns out it wasn’t a series at all. I figure they must have showed the tv movie repeatedly on The Disney Channel, since I certainly remember watching it a bunch as a kid. The tv special premiered on November 27, 1986 on ABC.

I had no luck finding an official copy to buy, although I did find a blurry You Tube version.

I could probably buy a DVD-R that was burned from someone’s vhs copy. But I’d much rather have a Disney sanctioned dvd. What gives, Disney? I thought they loved money and would release just about anything from their library.

I found this “Lost” widget today and thought I’d share. My Sawyer nickname is “Half-Pint”. I suppose it’s because I described myself as short, which isn’t very clever.  I guess they’re just trying to say Sawyer calls it like he sees it.

New episodes of “Lost” start up again on Thursday, April 24th, 10/9c.

Thanks for the spreading the Farscape love, Pajiba. I’m just sad they beat me to the punch. In the future, I’ll have to cover season one or two.

“Farscape” is the best sci-fi show I’ve seen in the last 20 years hands down. “FireFly”, “BSG”, and “Babylon 5″ can’t even come close to the amount of creativity, humor, action, and wonderful acting on this Jim Henson show.

Still, it was mere luck that it was on those four seasons. Nevertheless, I was devastated when it was cancelled. I even boycotted Battlestar Galactica (kinda still am) because it had a hand in Farscape’s cancellation. At least, SciFi softened the cancellation blow with the mini-series wrap up: “The Peacekeeper Wars“. I can’t wait for them to release the series on Blu-Ray, so I can watch it on my roommate’s Sony plasma TV.

Since I watch so much television, I usually save entire seasons on my DVR. Once the finale airs, I can finish the whole season in a straight shot or at my leisure.

This is the case for F/X’s “Damages”, and boy am I glad I did. The finale was a doozy with all that dramatic irony fueling the final reveals. Not to mention, it was alot easier to follow the double-crosses without having to wait a week in between episodes.

The show uses a flashback structure where it starts and ends each episode in the present, but shows the past in between to reveal a how the whole thing started. Each week you learn more about the events surrounding Ellen (Rose Byrne) and how she came to be charged with the murder of her fiance. Ellen works for Patty Hewes (Glenn Close), a top notch hold no prisoners litigator. The Hewes firm is trying a civil suit against Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson) whose company fell apart due to financial fraud, sorta like Enron.

I’m telling you this show is intense! The acting is superb, I even like Rose Byrne despite hating her in anything else with her. After the finale, I was very afraid of Patty Hewes. She’s not a person you want to get mad.

Season 1 is out on DVD, so catch up before they start the second season.

Through the wonders of netflix, I was reminded of “Forever Knight“. I didn’t actually watch it when it was on network television. The Sci Fi Channel was where I saw most of the episodes, and typically out of order. Thus, it was news to me that Rick Springfield starred in the original tv movie from which the series was based upon. And only until I saw the dvd boxes did I learn that there were three seasons, thus it being dubbed “The Forever Knight Trilogy”.

“Forever Knight” tells the tale of the vampire detective, Nicholas Knight (Geraint Wyn Davies). He’s an 800 year old vampire, hailing from France, who wants to make amends for his violent ways by solving murders. He even seems to think at some point he can become mortal again. This mortality dream is strung along for the lifetime of the series.

Nick’s arch enemy is Lacroix (Nigel Bennett), the vampire who sired him. Lacroix finds it completely unacceptable that Nick does not embrace his vampiric instincts. And thus, they play an endless game of cat and mouse.

It’s not the best vampire genre show, “Angel” is much much better since that show tried to expand on the myth. Forever Knight plays up all the vampire stereotypes and simply interweaves them into the standard murder procedural outline. Nevertheless, it is entertaining to watch, even if the effects seem a bit cheesy now. Davies excels in the role and really gets the viewer to empathize with his plight.

This blog is going to be about obscure tv shows from all eras. My tv knowledge spans from the fifties (though that is a bit hazy) to today. I’m pretty good on remember sitcoms, cop dramas, sci-fi shows, and eighties soaps like “Falcon Crest” and “Knots Landing”. I hope to discover other shows that I may have missed or were shown in other countries.

To give you an idea of my varied tastes, here’s a short list of shows I hold dear:

“Silk Stalkings”, “Farscape”, “Footballer’s Wives” (UK), “Forever Knight”, “The Jeffersons”, “Mr. Ed”, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”, “Silent Witness” (UK), and “Cowboy Bebop”.