rose_griffes: John Reese from Person of Interest on CBS (reese (the *other* messed-up Reese))
rose_griffes ([personal profile] rose_griffes) wrote2012-09-30 07:47 pm

teevee stuff

Sort of catching up on TV. Ish.

Doctor Who: "Dinosaurs on a Spaceship" was cute but somewhat forgettable. Nefertiti was a delight and I liked the character growth in Brian Williams--in particular his relationship with Rory, something that played out more two episodes later. "A Town Called Mercy" didn't work for me. I got bored and started multi-tasking on the computer as I watched. "The Power of Three" was much better. Brian! *hearts*

And now "The Angels Take Manhattan", an episode that almost does well enough on the emotional front to make me overlook the logic flaws. Almost. (Weeping Angel logic fail, if anyone's curious.) Good use of River Song; I loved her dress, I loved Melody Malone's noir detective story. Didn't much love the hiding of her injury, nor the speech about why. But I suppose that's really Eleven's issue, now, isn't it? Eleven has crappy issues. Far less crappy than Ten's, but still.

Amy and Rory: I'm mostly at peace with this. My fear would be that they would get separated, whether by death or something else. This works, because I have every hope that the couple that has survived plasticity, multiple deaths and many planets will be able to handle 1930's New York. (Assuming that's where they went. We really don't know for certain, right?)

I do feel sad that Brian Williams won't be able to see his son and daughter-in-law again. Hopefully Eleven or River will tell him what happened. :(


I finally watched the premiere episode of Elementary on the CBS website. Ugh, their video quality is horrible. The episode itself worked well for me: I'm a sucker for male-female detecting buddies, and this was a nice start. Watson felt very equal to Holmes, rather than having Watson be 'less' in power as is often done in recent adaptations. She showed herself more than willing to stand up to Holmes's inappropriate behavior. And Holmes didn't make me hate him straightaway, which has also been a bug in recent adaptations. I'll definitely watch again next week. (Based on the preview, Jon Michael Hill, who once played a murderous thug on Person of Interest, will get his Elementary debut in 1.02. I think he's going to play a recurring character, a police detective.)

We'll see if this show holds my attention long enough to get its own tag.


Person of Interest 2.01 "The Contingency". Yay, show is back! And that was an excellent beginning. I knew very few spoilers, and found myself riveted. Even the spoiler I did know--that there was a dog named Bear--worked out quite well, to my delight. It's funny, this show has often taken storytelling themes that I feel are overworked/overwrought and turned them into stories I really like.

Even the parts that might normally make me roll my eyes worked well in context, such as Reese 'negotiating' with the Machine. I did still giggle a bit, but I also really wanted to know if it would work.

Speaking of giggling, there were some fantastic deliberately comic moments, mostly due to John Reese's deadpan delivery of information in combination with his badassery. "I'm the guy who shot him and stole his badge." "I'm guessing you don't speak Dutch." "So... go be a cop!"

Fusco had his moments as well. And Miles Leon, the number of the week.

The writing took Root in a really fascinating direction. A sort-of altruistic motivation? Also, we're reminded of just how clever she is at planning things, in case we'd forgotten over the summer.

The flashbacks to Finch with his protégé the Machine were the heart of the episode, getting a significant amount of screentime.

"Pack your bags, Carter. We're going to Texas." Okay, who else besides me wants all the fic now? Especially if the dog is with them. (Gen would be great--especially something a bit more comical--but het would also be great. Non-canon shipping, hurrah!)

BTW, they filmed "Texas" in New York state, based on the spoiler pics I saw over the summer. Heh. Instead of Toronto subbing for NYC, we'll get NYC subbing for Texas!


I'll have to catch up on Fringe and Parks and Recreation soon. With Fringe I'm continuing what I did the latter half of season four: wait eight days until the episode is available online legally for free. Unless there's a dramatic jump upward in quality, I'm okay with waiting.
chaila: by me (fringe - olivia)

[personal profile] chaila 2012-10-01 06:38 pm (UTC)(link)
FYI I don't think there's an 8-day gap with Fringe anymore. I haven't watched it--and I don't think I will, but who knows!--but the new ep showed up in my Hulu queue the next day, I think. At any event, it's available now. Unless you watch it somewhere else! Then disregard. :)
chaila: by me (tscc/fringe - sarah/olivia)

[personal profile] chaila 2012-10-02 03:37 am (UTC)(link)
Oh duh, I'm an idiot. I just signed up for Hulu Plus this week, and totally didn't realize that's why several things seemed to come up quicker. *facepalm* For a minute there, I thought somebody in charge got a clue and realized having a delay is kind of stupid. Heh.

[identity profile] angstbunny.livejournal.com 2012-10-01 01:13 am (UTC)(link)
there were some fantastic deliberately comic moments, mostly due to John Reese's deadpan delivery of information in combination with his badassery

RITE? I laughed SO HARD. In a good way. I think I rewatched the Dutch commands scene 20342094820943 times in a row. Oh Reese.

[identity profile] rose-griffes.livejournal.com 2012-10-02 02:04 am (UTC)(link)
I rewatched that scene a few times myself. :)

[identity profile] litlover12.livejournal.com 2012-10-01 01:33 am (UTC)(link)
"It's funny, this show has often taken storytelling themes that I feel are overworked/overwrought and turned them into stories I really like."

Yeah, they're really good at that! Oh my gosh, Reese reprogramming the dog = hilarious!

I don't see Root as altruistic -- more a raw Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest type.

[identity profile] rose-griffes.livejournal.com 2012-10-02 02:05 am (UTC)(link)
Hm, Root does have a more Darwinian view. But at the same time, she's wanting the 'shackles' on the Machine to be loosened. So maybe an altruistic (for the Machine only) Darwinian.