Sci Fi Alert

In their infinite wisdom, the morons at Sci Fi are going to make us wait until April before we can finally begin seeing the final season of Battlestar Galactica!  And we don’t even know yet if we’ll have to wait until 2009 to see the final episodes!

As any who isn’t living in hole knows by now, Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling recently outed Dumbledore as gay.  She got a fairly postive response to this outing from the 3,000 fans who came to see her at Carnegie Hall, but since then there has been quite a lot written and spoken about this announcement. 
Rowling says she’s shocked at the response, a lot of it negative, this annoucement is getting.  So my next question to Ms. Rowling is, “Shocked? Really?”  Has J. K. Rowling been living in a hole?  Surely she knows how this country has been for the last seven years under President George W. Bush?  The people who helped put this man in office quite vocally hate gays and lesbians and have been working to turn them into second class citizens since the man took the Oath of Office.  They already hate Rowling’s wonderful novels because they’re conviced the books will turn children into pagan, spell-casting, devil-worshippers.  The Harry Potter novels have been at or near the top of books groups have tried to get banned.  Any negative reaction they’re having should be expected and ignored.  To quote some friends of Ellen DeGeneres when she came out, “Dumbledore is gay.  That’s great!”

In what I’m sure is an effort to build word of mouth for the already much anticipated Battlestar Galactica telemovie, “Razor,” NBC Universal is planning several free showings of the episode in large cities.  So, if you live in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Dallas, Boston, Philadelphia, Seattle or Chicago you’ll get to see “Razor” two weeks before the rest of us do.

We already knew about the renewal of Sci Fi’s Eureka, but it looks like the network has also made an early renewal of Stargate: Atlantis.  I haven’t said much about either of these shows — I’m just not a very good reviewer — but Eureka just completed a very solid third season and Atlantis has really come into its own this season without sister series Stargate SG-1. 
To be honest, I’m not surprised Sci Fi renewed both these shows.  The ratings, for cable, are rather solid for both series and what else does Sci Fi have to offer viewers and advertisers in the way of good scripted television?  They pretty much ran off BSG and Flash Gordon hasn’t actually lit the ratings on fire.  Sci Fi is known for making some pretty stupid decisions about their programming, but not renewing these series would have been disaster for them.

You know, I’m alays hopeful when I read a Sci Fi Channel annoucement of a new series that sounds promising, but we know how Sci Fi is, don’t we?  I was hopeful when Sci Fi annouced they would take a property with a lot of potential like Flash Gordon and turn it into something good.  As we now know, Flash Gordon turned out to be a complete piece of crap; so much so that I had to stop watching.  Well, now it sounds like they have yet another interesting idea, can we trust the network to live up to that promise?
The new series is entitled Revolution and it revolves around a group of colonists on a planet 50 light years away from Earth called New America (yeah, kind of unoriginal as colony names go).  Earth is apparently the bad guy here and the series will tackle themes that sound very similar in tone to Battlestar Galactica.  I find that a bit interesting since Flash Gordon was meant to be the anti-BSG, but maybe Sci Fi learned a lesson.

Over the next few weeks leading up the the much anticipated (at least by me) Battlestar Galactica: Razor, Sci Fi will air 2 minute flashback previews of the movie during episodes of Flash Gordon.  Fortunately, Sci Fi is also making them available on Pulse website, which good since I’ve given up on Flash Gordon and stopped watching.  So far, the mini-episodes are focusing on a young William “Husker” Adama during the first Cylon war.  Cast in the role of the young Adama is Nico Cortez, who is absolutley fantastic.  He’s done a great job of matching his vocal styling and mannerisms to Edward James Olmos without making it look fake.  If you need a BSG fix, these little 2-minute episodes are the answer.

What a really exceptional episode!  There was so much going on that it’s hard to know what to talk about first.
***SPOILERS***
Let’s start with the character of Elizabeth Weir.  In her swansong episode, Torri Higginson gave one of the best performances of her short time on the series, and it didn’t hurt that she had some really great writing to back it up.  In this episode, the Atlantis crew decide to take a risk and go to the Replicator planet for a bit of Z.P.M. thievery.  With the help of Elizabeth controlled nanites they are able to infiltrate the Replicator homeworld and steal the Z.P.M.  While Sheppard and Ronon are doing that, McKay discovers the Wraith attack protocol that’s been long hidden and inactive in their programming.  Seeing this as a way to do away with their greatest enemy Pegasus galaxy enemy (besides the Replicators), the team decides to restart the protocol by uploading one of McKay Deus ex Machina programs.  Unfortunately, the Replicators discover the team is up to and go after Sheppard and Ronon.  This is where Dr. Weir and Torri Higginson shine.  Weir confronts the Replicator leader, Oberoth, and literally brings the man to his knees.  She takes control of the Replicators and gives Sheppard and Ronon the time they need to complete the upload; however, in the process she sacrifices herself so they can escape.  Higginson is due to make at least 2 more appearances this season, so we’ll see what influence she has over the Replicators.  The character of Dr. Weir was always a strong, if underused character.  It will be interesting how the writers finish up her story now that Weir is part of the Replicator collective.
Amanda Tapping’s Col. Samantha Carter was seen very little in this episode, and that was OK.  The series needed time to take care of the Weir storyline and they did that well.  It will be interesting to see how Tapping fits into the Atlantis cast.  Her character has always been the McKay (although more courageous and less obnoxious) of the Stargate SG-1 team.  Although, in the last couple years Stargate SG-1 was on the air the character of Carter often had to take a back seat to Daniel Jackson and lost screen time to Claudia Black.  Atlantis usually concentrates on its four main characters — Sheppard, Teyla, Ronon, and McKay — but I hope the Atlantis writers do a better job of utilizing Tapping’s talent.  It will be interesting to see how the scientist juggles her military duties.
These first two episodes have really been about John Sheppard and his ability to step into the leaders role and make the hard decisions.  It’s nice to see that.  Too often they play the comedy card with Sheppard and I think that’s ultimately destructive to the character.  Sure, Col. O’Neill had his moments of humor, but the writers knew when to stop the comedy and let O’Neill be the leader when he needed to be, the same needs to happen with Sheppard and I think they got off to a good start in these first few episodes.  It will be interesting to see how they develop the dynamic between Sheppard and Carter.  Now that Sheppard’s had a taste of being the one in command of Atlantis I wonder how he will react to playing second fiddle once again.
Finally, there’s the Wraith.  Now that the Atlantis team has successful reprogrammed the Replicators to take over their original duty what will that mean for the enemy that has plagued the Pegasus galaxy for millions of years?  What will that mean for Stargate: Atlantis.  Who will be the Big Bad if both the Replicators and the Wraith are busy fighting each other?  Only time will tell.
Overall, these first two episodes but are enough people watching?  Once again, Sci Fi has made the bonehead decision to air a niche series smack in the middle of the network’s major premieres.  With Fridays becomming more competitive among the major networks I think Stargate: Atlantis is going to have a rough time attracting viewers.  Hopefully, Sci Fi can see this and Battlestar Galactica are the only really good and watchable shows they have on the air right now.

Well, this was certainly an improvement over the pilot episode, but this series still has a long way to go.  The best thing about this episode is that Katee Sackhoff’s Sarah Corvus was only a minor presence throughout.  Again, it’s not that I dislike Sackhoff; far from it.  She’s just too overpowering of an actress.  This series needs to be about Jaime Sommers, and last night’s episode was about Jaime Sommers; I liked that.  Still, the show continues to need work.  One positive improvement from the pilot was Michelle Ryan.  She seems more comfortable in the role than she did in the pilot and she also seems to be in better shape.  I still don’t know if she was the right choice, but there’s nothing to be done about that now.
***MINOR SPOILERS***
This episode seemed like something out of Alias, but it worked well for establishing Jaime’s new role in the super secret organization that proclaims to be “saving” the world from all those baddies.  I think one thing that is interesting about this organization is there is room for interpretation here.  Are they out to save the world?  Or are they out change the world to their own way of thinking.  Unlike the OSI on the original Bionic Woman, which was obviously an organization out to do good, there’s some grey with this one.  They make horrible gases that can wipe out an entire town, the Paradise Lose of this episode, and they have no problem engaging in acts of torture to get their way.  At the same time, they also seem to have good intentions, but we all know what they say about good intentions.  It will be interesting to see how this organization is develop over time.
“Paradise Lost” was a rather basic episode.  Jaime and Ruth head out to the small town of Paradise that has apparently been decimated by a gas manufactured by Jamie’s new employer. What follows is some rather mundane action fights that show off Michelle Ryan’s new action hero cred.  This episode also featured the debut of “special guest star” Isaiah Washington as another of Jaime’s mentors.  I have a really negative emotional reaction every time I see Washington, but he was good in this role and considering his character’s take-no-prisoners mind set he should have an interesting relationship with Jamie; one that has the potential to be very explosive.
Overall, this was certainly an improvement; good enough that I’m willing to keep watching.  Let’s hope the writing improves.

Well, ABC has been pushing this series all summer.  Did it live up the hype?  It did for me.  I think I make have found a favorite new show.  Pushing Daisies is by the most original and different show to appear on network television in a very, very long time.  Bravo to ABC for taking a chance on something so different and quirky.  As anyone who’s seen the previews will know, Ned (played wonderfully by Lee Pace), can reanimating anything with a touch of his hand (and I assume any body part), but the caveat is the person can only live for a minute or someone else around Ned will die.  Nature’s a little bitchy like that, I guess.  Moreover, once Ned touches the person or object again it’s dead for good.
**SPOILERS***
Like most pilots, or in this case pie-lette, the first episode of Pushing Daisies spends a lot of time setting up the premise of the show, but unlike most series this first episode was wonderfully written, filmed, and acted.  Goofy looking Lee Pace is perfectly cast as the socially awkward Ned and he has a supporting cast around that includes Chi McBride and Kristin Chenoweth. In the pilot, Ned is a pie maker and owner of The Pie Hole.  To get money for his floundering business he begins helping Emerson Cord (Chi McBride), a private investigator, collect rewards offered on behalf of murder victims.  All is going well for them both until Ned’s childhood sweetheart, Chuck (Anna Friel), whom he hasn’t seen since they were children ends up being one of the murder victims.  In a touching, but very funny scene, Ned touches Chuck to bring her back to life and then can’t bring himself to touch her again.  The consequence of that action is a slimy funeral director who steals jewelry from the deceased dies while taking a crap on the toilet.  This leads Ned to bring Chuck back to his apartment where she figures what he and Emerson are doing with Chuck’s abilities.  By the end of the episode the mystery is solved, but this series (at least in the pilot) is not about the mystery.  I hope, at least, it will be about Ned and the way in which he must live his life; about Ned and Chuck and the fact that they care deeply for each other but can never touch lest Chuck die permanently.  I hope this series is about this quirky group of people that surround Ned and Chuck.  Only time will tell.
The series itself has a very Tim Burton-esque feel to it both in color and direction.  However, the series is directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and anyone who’s seen Sonnenfeld’s work in the Addams Family films will also notice a similarity to those works.  The one thing I’m not so sure about is the narration.  It’s done by J. K. Rowling’s favorite Harry Potter audio book narrator, Jim Dale, and he has the perfect voice for this kind of series but I think they used him too much.  Even in series like Grey’s Anatomy and Desperate Housewives, both of which use narration, it’s done sparingly.  In the case of both Grey’s and Housewives the narration is none at the beginning and end only.
Like I said, I really like this series.  It certainly did well in its first airing, but that may change with its second airing.  However, I think this is the kind of show that a loyal fan base similar to the loyal, although frustrated, fan base of another quirky series, Lost.  I hope Pushing Daisies can maintain a following because I really like it.  If so, I think it could be the Heroes of this television season.