PerExWriMo, Day 4 + V
Nov. 4th, 2009 07:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
newnumber6At 12,000 words (I round, but only down), not bad, on a decent pace. Completed one story, start to finish. Not a good one, probably unsaleable at least without massive rewriting, but finished. Got into a bit of a groove of a longer work I've been noodling around in my head for a while, too. So it's going pretty easy.
Watched V last night. And... well, it wasn't bad, at first. In fact, I quite enjoyed the first 20-30 minutes of it. Lots of people I recognized too. But after that, my interest started to wane... (spoilers ahoy):
Okay, I watched V, long long ago. And somewhat more recently (but still fairly long ago), I used to watch reruns of V: The Series on Space. In any event, I remember the basics of the plot. And my main problem is that this seems to be a retread. Big surprise, huh? I mean, a remake of a series being like the original? Well, yeah. I know, it's part of the deal, but I was actually hoping for something more of a reimagining, like Battlestar Galactica. But instead it seems like they're planning on using the exact same mythos and hitting the main plot points too, with only a little bit of change. Not just from seeing the episode, but also I read an article on the web where the producers mentioned all the iconic moments of the first series, and how they intended on hitting all of them and putting their own spin on them. And that's a problem.
When I saw the kid, I thought, "Oh damn, he's the young guy who joins the V's human police force/jack booted thugs', and although I didn't identify the "good alien who works with the humans", I knew it was coming (I was actually hoping it'd be Alan Tudyk's character. I guess I was half-right... now if any Firefly actors appear in the series I'm going to assume they're visitors. The pattern is established!).
V worked originally in part because it was a surprise, nobody knew what was going to happen. Now everybody does. So it's lost that, right off the bat, by following the original. And without the surprise... it's not all that great. Aliens seek water on Earth (ignoring all the free cometary ice)! And probably like to eat humans (haven't gotten to that point, maybe they'll simply make it a desire for conquest)!
The only significant change I noticed, I'm not even sure if it was a change. Perhaps someone on my Flist can refresh my memory - the notion that the Visitors had been on Earth before, operating secretly in 'sleeper cells'. I don't recall that, and so it strikes me as a new development. And possibly a good one. Lets the "world" still be getting to know the visitors, and the heroes have somebody to fight without it looking like they're actively striking the Visitors.
Everything else, though, felt familiar, and even stale. Real stale. I mean, in the 80s, I might have accepted reptilian aliens with a thin covering of human skin that made them basically look completely normal. But that was the 80s. And I was in elementary school. It's goofy. Cheesy. And not in a self-conscious fun way, but in a way that contrasts the attempted realism of character dynamics, etc.
But the first 20 minutes or so, the 'arrival' and people's reactions to it? That was cool. It really makes me crave a series that explores a 'first contact' scenario where the aliens AREN'T human-eating reptile nazis right off the bat. There've been ones that've done it before, but we're overdue. I think that's one of my other problems with the series. They've set up the Visitors as the badguys right away, without much ambiguity... maybe they'll reveal there's more to it later, but it's not a good sign. I like a little complexity in my SF.
Oh, and, I think Morena's a beautiful woman, but... with really short hair like that? She looks like some kind of strange lizard creature. Something about her face or bone structure or smile, I don't know, really needs a longer (or at least wider) set of hair to make it not look creepy. I don't know if that's just really good casting... I guess it is. Or maybe there's makeup involved to enhance the effect. But it's making me not want to look at her and that's a crime! A crime I say!
And Heroes. Man, when I said it was marginally better this year? I was not expecting the last episode. CRAP. (Big spoilers):
So, the whole episode is based around Hiro going back and time to Save Charlie. Hey, didn't we already do this in Season One, right after he died? And he realized that he couldn't change destiny, that she was meant to die? And it was kind of a sweet story, if a bit hokey.
Bad idea: Go back into a sweet story that involves a death and realizing they can't save everybody and have them 'fix it'. Conceptually bad. I love seeing Jayna Mays again as much as everyone, but should have left it be.
Second, highlights the continuity problems. HRG is searching for Sylar but can't find him because "nobody knows what he looks like". I guess we're ignoring the plot from last year where HRG and Elle spied on Sylar to watch him make his 'first kill'. I approve in theory, but STOP GOING BACK INTO YOUR PAST AND HIGHLIGHTING IT.
Magic New Abilities: Sylar has the ability to not only sense blood clots in people's brains, but can also FIX them, without even opening the skull. If you're wondering why he doesn't just use his TK and magic knowledge of the human brain to just kill people instantly and then look at their skulls later to get their powers, you're not alone. I mean, if they had Sylar open her skull and fix it manually and then reseal it, well, it'd be gross,but at least it would make sense (except for one other problem, below).
Then of course, fun with lame ways to keep the timeline intact - Hiro encounters Sylar in the past and fights him, gets him to heal his girlfriend with the promise of "hey I know the future and I'll tell you about it." Except, really, it's no reason at all, and Hiro's power is way too cool to pass up for a VAGUE promise of advance knowledge (especially since, if he got it, he could find out the information himself). There's plenty of times where Sylar could have surprised Hiro and killed him before he could stop time, and access wild powers.
I've said it before (in response to Daleks in Manhattan, I believe). When someone in your audience is screaming for the super scary bad guy to just KILL THE HERO when he has a chance, YOU'RE WRITING WRONG.
Anyway, I guess now in the show we're living in some bizarro alternate future where Sylar never received Charlie's power and knew about Hiro in advance but never took any different moves from the ones we saw in Season One. Maybe they'll use it to explain all the other continuity errors. "All the stuff we saw that doesn't make sense? It's because every few episodes, somebody's been time travelling and altering things, and we just didn't tell you. That's why nobody knows Claire can heal other people with her blood. In this timeline, she never found out!"
Meh. I'm really not fond of Hiro's "OMG CHARLIE IS MY TRUE LOVE FOREVER AND EVER" fixation too. It's actually a little creepy. Yeah, I know he spent time with her in the past, but in previous episodes it seemed more that he just really liked her and wanted to save her.
Another ep that should not have happened. Hiro should have learned its lesson. Going into the past/future got OLD. If you HAD to do another time travel ep where Hiro tries to save somebody he loves and gets used for that, you know what this episode should have been? Hiro trying to save his father. Carnival-Guy-From-Prison-Break then abducts him to keep him from Hiro. Then at least it wouldn't have pissed on a sweet story. And we'd get George Takei, dammit.
Edit: Oh, and the "Stop the TV Tax" vs "Keep Local TV alive" commercials have been annoying for awhile but, leaving aside the issues entirely for a moment... I really want to punch the the "Stop the TV Tax" spokesman in the face. I just wanted to say that.
Watched V last night. And... well, it wasn't bad, at first. In fact, I quite enjoyed the first 20-30 minutes of it. Lots of people I recognized too. But after that, my interest started to wane... (spoilers ahoy):
Okay, I watched V, long long ago. And somewhat more recently (but still fairly long ago), I used to watch reruns of V: The Series on Space. In any event, I remember the basics of the plot. And my main problem is that this seems to be a retread. Big surprise, huh? I mean, a remake of a series being like the original? Well, yeah. I know, it's part of the deal, but I was actually hoping for something more of a reimagining, like Battlestar Galactica. But instead it seems like they're planning on using the exact same mythos and hitting the main plot points too, with only a little bit of change. Not just from seeing the episode, but also I read an article on the web where the producers mentioned all the iconic moments of the first series, and how they intended on hitting all of them and putting their own spin on them. And that's a problem.
When I saw the kid, I thought, "Oh damn, he's the young guy who joins the V's human police force/jack booted thugs', and although I didn't identify the "good alien who works with the humans", I knew it was coming (I was actually hoping it'd be Alan Tudyk's character. I guess I was half-right... now if any Firefly actors appear in the series I'm going to assume they're visitors. The pattern is established!).
V worked originally in part because it was a surprise, nobody knew what was going to happen. Now everybody does. So it's lost that, right off the bat, by following the original. And without the surprise... it's not all that great. Aliens seek water on Earth (ignoring all the free cometary ice)! And probably like to eat humans (haven't gotten to that point, maybe they'll simply make it a desire for conquest)!
The only significant change I noticed, I'm not even sure if it was a change. Perhaps someone on my Flist can refresh my memory - the notion that the Visitors had been on Earth before, operating secretly in 'sleeper cells'. I don't recall that, and so it strikes me as a new development. And possibly a good one. Lets the "world" still be getting to know the visitors, and the heroes have somebody to fight without it looking like they're actively striking the Visitors.
Everything else, though, felt familiar, and even stale. Real stale. I mean, in the 80s, I might have accepted reptilian aliens with a thin covering of human skin that made them basically look completely normal. But that was the 80s. And I was in elementary school. It's goofy. Cheesy. And not in a self-conscious fun way, but in a way that contrasts the attempted realism of character dynamics, etc.
But the first 20 minutes or so, the 'arrival' and people's reactions to it? That was cool. It really makes me crave a series that explores a 'first contact' scenario where the aliens AREN'T human-eating reptile nazis right off the bat. There've been ones that've done it before, but we're overdue. I think that's one of my other problems with the series. They've set up the Visitors as the badguys right away, without much ambiguity... maybe they'll reveal there's more to it later, but it's not a good sign. I like a little complexity in my SF.
Oh, and, I think Morena's a beautiful woman, but... with really short hair like that? She looks like some kind of strange lizard creature. Something about her face or bone structure or smile, I don't know, really needs a longer (or at least wider) set of hair to make it not look creepy. I don't know if that's just really good casting... I guess it is. Or maybe there's makeup involved to enhance the effect. But it's making me not want to look at her and that's a crime! A crime I say!
And Heroes. Man, when I said it was marginally better this year? I was not expecting the last episode. CRAP. (Big spoilers):
So, the whole episode is based around Hiro going back and time to Save Charlie. Hey, didn't we already do this in Season One, right after he died? And he realized that he couldn't change destiny, that she was meant to die? And it was kind of a sweet story, if a bit hokey.
Bad idea: Go back into a sweet story that involves a death and realizing they can't save everybody and have them 'fix it'. Conceptually bad. I love seeing Jayna Mays again as much as everyone, but should have left it be.
Second, highlights the continuity problems. HRG is searching for Sylar but can't find him because "nobody knows what he looks like". I guess we're ignoring the plot from last year where HRG and Elle spied on Sylar to watch him make his 'first kill'. I approve in theory, but STOP GOING BACK INTO YOUR PAST AND HIGHLIGHTING IT.
Magic New Abilities: Sylar has the ability to not only sense blood clots in people's brains, but can also FIX them, without even opening the skull. If you're wondering why he doesn't just use his TK and magic knowledge of the human brain to just kill people instantly and then look at their skulls later to get their powers, you're not alone. I mean, if they had Sylar open her skull and fix it manually and then reseal it, well, it'd be gross,but at least it would make sense (except for one other problem, below).
Then of course, fun with lame ways to keep the timeline intact - Hiro encounters Sylar in the past and fights him, gets him to heal his girlfriend with the promise of "hey I know the future and I'll tell you about it." Except, really, it's no reason at all, and Hiro's power is way too cool to pass up for a VAGUE promise of advance knowledge (especially since, if he got it, he could find out the information himself). There's plenty of times where Sylar could have surprised Hiro and killed him before he could stop time, and access wild powers.
I've said it before (in response to Daleks in Manhattan, I believe). When someone in your audience is screaming for the super scary bad guy to just KILL THE HERO when he has a chance, YOU'RE WRITING WRONG.
Anyway, I guess now in the show we're living in some bizarro alternate future where Sylar never received Charlie's power and knew about Hiro in advance but never took any different moves from the ones we saw in Season One. Maybe they'll use it to explain all the other continuity errors. "All the stuff we saw that doesn't make sense? It's because every few episodes, somebody's been time travelling and altering things, and we just didn't tell you. That's why nobody knows Claire can heal other people with her blood. In this timeline, she never found out!"
Meh. I'm really not fond of Hiro's "OMG CHARLIE IS MY TRUE LOVE FOREVER AND EVER" fixation too. It's actually a little creepy. Yeah, I know he spent time with her in the past, but in previous episodes it seemed more that he just really liked her and wanted to save her.
Another ep that should not have happened. Hiro should have learned its lesson. Going into the past/future got OLD. If you HAD to do another time travel ep where Hiro tries to save somebody he loves and gets used for that, you know what this episode should have been? Hiro trying to save his father. Carnival-Guy-From-Prison-Break then abducts him to keep him from Hiro. Then at least it wouldn't have pissed on a sweet story. And we'd get George Takei, dammit.
Edit: Oh, and the "Stop the TV Tax" vs "Keep Local TV alive" commercials have been annoying for awhile but, leaving aside the issues entirely for a moment... I really want to punch the the "Stop the TV Tax" spokesman in the face. I just wanted to say that.
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Date: 2009-11-05 03:53 am (UTC)Oh, and Morena's hair. I read she cut it for the role, so maybe that's the look they wanted from the beginning. She's supposed to look beautiful and creepy? I like it. It reminds me of Audrey Hepburn's hair in Roman Holiday and I totally just went girly on you.
Incidentally, my uncle had an extra copy of V the miniseries lying around so that'll be arriving in the mail. Then I can make a better judgment.