Well, after letting the episodes pile up on my DVR ever since the season opened, I finally bit the bullet and gave Heroes the boot last night.  I deleted all the stored up episodes as well as the series recording.  I realized that I kept saying, “I guess I have to watch Heroes at some point,” and if I’m saying that, it’s just not worth it.  As I look back, I think I only ever enjoyed the potential of that show, and rarely ever the show itself.  What a shame.

That said, I saw a trailer for an upcoming movie called Push that looks pretty interesting, and I thought, “Now THAT is more like what Heroes should have been.”  So we’ll wait and see if it holds up.

“It’s Harry Potter meets Lord of the Rings!”

“It’s Friends with an edge!”

What do these two phrases have in common?  The same thing as this season’s latest addition to “comparison condemnation”:

“If you like Lost and X-Files, you’ll love Fringe!”

In a few poorly-chosen words, these descriptions each spell the most heinous four-letter f-word in all of entertainment: Flop.

As a rule, any time the producers have to try to buy their audience by such overt comparisons to fan favorites of days gone by, it’s an indication that the show has no merit of its own and, despite their best efforts, will not appeal to the discerning viewer.

Such is definitely the case with the new Fox offering, Fringe.  True to title, Fringe will not be joining the mainstream of television hits this season.  My wife and I decided to give it a chance to pick up some of the TV entertainment void that has been left for several years by the exit of X-Files.  Sadly, the two programs can’t even be mentioned in the same sentence.

X-Files was tremendously entertaining because it was smart.  The dialogue was natural and believable.  The actors were charismatic.  You wanted to believe that they were real.

Fringe offers no such benefits. While the plot of the pilot episode was ok, the dialog was clunky, obviously over-laden with exposition of back stories and sub-plots that would be better left to viewer discovery.  The characters are vanilla at best.  The female lead, played in the pilot by Anna Torv, was bland and brought an annoying air of “seen it” to the role.  There was nothing new or interesting about her; just another girl playing out of her depth as an FBI agent, like so many before her.

Maybe the biggest surprise (for some) that Fringe has to offer is that J.J. Abrams really is a one-trick pony, and apparently that trick is good old fashioned summer action movies.  He really seemed to find his stride with Mission Impossible III, which I found very entertaining (considering it’s a Mission Impossible movie). Lost had its moments in the early seasons, but since then the story has gone in circles so many times, I have to agree with those who think the writers have no idea where they are going.  Several times during the 30 minute experiment with Fringe (yes, 30 minutes…that’s as far as we made it) I honestly couldn’t tell if I was watching the new show or just a bad back-story episode of Lost.  So many of the elements were lifted straight from the Lost template, right down to the weird horn crescendo that precedes every commercial break in both shows, you get the strong impression that Abrams just kind of mailed this one in.

Topping off the list of complaints is the experimental gimmicks that I can only assume were Abrams’ attempt to freshen the Lost model just enough to trick people into thinking it’s not the Lost model.  There’s something very off-putting about having scene locations established by having to fly through the words “Logan Airport Boston” or having the words “Baghdad Iraq” laid out in large block letters across the tops of the buildings in a panoramic of the city.  We watch TV to be taken away, to be drawn into the make-believe world that is being created on screen.  Such lame gimmicks immediately smack you back to reality.

So, all in all, I found nothing of value in Fringe, not even a mild curiosity.  The entire abbreviated experiment was nothing more than a waste of time.  I can only be grateful I didn’t stick around for the full hour.

Well, the long dry spell that is Summer television is now coming to an end, which means the Fall TV season is starting.  I’m always interested to see what new shows the networks will come up with, so I tend to set a lot of new series recordings, of which I expect maybe one or two will last more than two episodes before I determine they’re completely lame.  I care absolutely nothing about reality TV, which seems to be the dead horse of choice for the networks these days, so my options are even more limited, but based on what I’ve seen, these are the shows I think I’ll give a look:

New Shows: (Ordered by premier date)

1. Fringe (Fox: Sep. 9): Supposedly more like a new X-Files than a new Lost, but it might have potential
2. Knight Rider (NBC: Sep. 24): I’ve got to see at least one episode of this, because the TV movie they made to try to introduce it to the viewing audience was sooooo lame.  They got the guy who made the Fast and the Furious to come in to help, but I don’t see how that’s going to fix really bad actors.
3. Life on Mars (ABC: Oct 9): Don’t know much about it, but it’s drawn some big names.
4. Kath & Kim (NBC: Oct. 9): Comedy imported from Australia.  We’ll see if it translates.
5. My Own Worst Enemy (NBC: Oct. 13): I like Christian Slater, so we’ll see if it’s as cool as Alias was when it first started.
6. Eleventh Hour (CBS: Oct 9): The latest in CBS’s string of CSI type shows.  I don’t know a whole lot about it yet.
7. Crusoe (NBC: Oct. 17): Only just heard of it, but it sounds different than pretty much anything else on TV, and the production quality is supposed to be very high, reminiscent of Rome on HBO, so it could be cool.
8. Kings (NBC: Winter): Another one I’d never heard of until just recently.  I don’t know much about it, but it’s got a cool premise.
   

Other shows I’m watching that are coming back:

1. Bones (Fox: Sep 3): This show cracks me up in how ridiculous it is, but it’s fun to watch.
2. Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Fox: Sep. 8): I didn’t expect much from this show, but it’s actually quite good.
3. Supernatural (CW: Sep. 18): This is my only CW show.  It’s actually pretty entertaining.
4. Heroes (NBC: Sep. 22): This show has almost lost me so many times.  I’ll see if it improves.
5. Chuck (NBC: Sep. 29): It’s very tongue-in-cheek, but it’s pretty funny.
6. The Office (NBC: Sep 25): Funnier every season.
7. Life (NBC: Sep 29): I really like this show.  The premise is interesting, and the lead actor plays the part very well.
8. Pushing Daisies (ABC: Oct 1): Some of the most clever script-writing on TV, I think.  Very humorous, and Jim Dale’s narration (the guy from the Harry Potter audio books) is always awesome.
9. CSI (CBS: Oct 9): The original is still good, but they really go for the gross-out factor these days.
10. Lost (ABC: Winter): Of course.

So what are the rest of you interested in watching this fall?

Ok, so my wife and I have been test driving NBC’s new gimmick TV show, Fear Itself. The promo is that they’ve tapped some semi-named horror film directors to direct one-hour mini-movies, so each episode is directed by a different director and each is a self-contained short film.  As you might assume from the title, they’re supposed to be scary…supposed being the operative word here.

After two episodes, the show feels more like the directors trying to entertain their own whims rather than create and spin engaging thrillers.  In the case of last night’s episode–directed by John Landis and starring Maggie Lawson and James Roday of Psych fame (both of whom I find tremendously entertaining on their regular gig, which also might be my favorite series currently in production)–it felt more like Landis just mailed it in.  Like he sent a first year film school intern to do his job under Landis’s name.  The dialog was clunky, the performances were anything but genuine or believable (particularly from the supporting cast).  It’s almost offensive how dumb these directors must think the audience is if they think they can revert to the same old gags and gimmicks that every would-be horror director has used since the dawn of the the talkie. I expected much more from Landis, who has to his credit such creep-outs as An American Werewolf in London and Michael Jackson’s Thriller (granted that one isn’t really scary, but at least well made).

Pile onto this pile of debris the uber-lame “twist” endings that they’re all trying to pull off and you have the makings of a world-class flop fest spread out over the course of the summer weeks.  For example, in Landis’s episode, Lawson’s character is about to marry Roday’s character (aptly named Carlos…because when I see James Roday I immediately think Latino…??).  Minutes before the ceremony, Lawson receives a mysterious note by way of her bride’s maid, who received it from the hard-of-hearing priest (played by William B. Davis, best known as Cancer Man from the X-Files), who received it from a mysterious woman in a red head scarf.  The note warns Lawson that her soon-to-be-husband is a serial killer.

Well, since the authenticity of this note and the validity of its contents certainly can’t be questioned–ya know, considering the certainty of the source and all–she immediately goes into “flip out” mode and almost calls off the wedding.

Long story short, she goes through with the wedding, proceeds to suspect her new husband, who has suddenly turned into over-the-top-I-might-be-a-serial-killer-man complete with sinister laugh, and the two ultimately end up back in the church, in the confessional (each in their own booth), for the big reveal and final showdown.  After much whining and whimpering on Lawson’s part, and much pseudo-sinisterness from Roday, it’s time for the big twist, which is…

Lawson is the serial killer.  The note was meant for Carlos (Roday).

Now, you’re missing the full impact of this ridiculous turn of events because there’s much context that you have to understand in order to really get how lame and incoherent this was, but you get the idea.

So needless to say, Fear Itself is a definite must-miss, unless you’re hoping to practice up on your MST3K chops. I’m not impressed, and judging from the two episodes I’ve seen, maybe the show’s whole existence is little more than an exercise in self-congratulations on the part of the directors (or a thinly veiled insult to viewers who the directors assume aren’t smart enough to tell the difference).