TV: Gilmore Girls

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Awesome characters, bibliophilia, favourite things, geekery, shows I identify with, shows I love, Spoiler alert!, thank goodness for netflix, TV

I have been revisiting one of my favourite shows recently, since it’s been available on netflix: Gilmore Girls. You’re right, it’s not my usual science fiction or crime drama fare, but it has excellent writing, witty dialogue and some brilliant casting.

One of the things that makes a show is excellent casting – when the cast has chemistry that adds that extra spark and drama to the show: it’s the glue that makes it WORK. Gilmore girls is a prime example of this. Not only that, it’s a show about a single mother and her daughter crammed with literary references. What’s not to love? Throw in some kooky small-town dynamics, offbeat characters and some really good plot lines and voila, one of my favourite shows.

I love how the show catches the small-town flavour so well, without making it cheesy. Everyone knows everyone and the sense of community is almost a character in itself. I love how the high society social constraints are viewed through an absurdist lens, too: Rory’s experience with the debutante ball, for instance, or Lorelai’s run -in with Emily’s DAR meetings or the Cotillion.

And can I just gush for a moment about how many female characters there are on this show who just plain rock? First of all, we have Lorelai, who forged her own life out of sheer determination and raised her daughter to be a fair and hard working individual. She came from money, but she decided it was better to do things on her own rather than bend to the will of others. She flies in the face of the stereotype single mother on welfare and I love her for it. In fact she’s working towards her dream of opening her own inn with the fabulous and scattered Sookie. She’s sarcastic and witty, but she never fails to support the people in her life who are important to her. Even though she struggles to have a relationship with her parents, she doesn’t stand in the way of them having one with her daughter. Even when she reaches her goal, she doesn’t let her commitment to the inn override her relationships.

Then there’s Rory, who I have heard some complain about as the ‘special snowflake’ daughter – but I think even with her privilege and her Ivy-league aspirations, she breaks the stereotype too. She’s determined to go to Harvard, but not just because Lorelai wants her to, she has a goal and knows, because of her mom, that she has to work to get it. And she’s far from perfect – her relationships with boys are just as awkward and painful as anyone else  – even when she tries to do the right thing. When she finally goes to university, she has the same determination her mother had, to do things on her own terms.

But it doesn’t stop here! Lane Kim! Can I just say that in a mostly white cast, it was refreshing to have Rory’s best friend be a Korean girl? And not just any Korean girl with the (almost) stereotypical tiger mom, but one who is a music fiend of epic proportions and who also, like Rory and Lorelai, has a goal she will work for against all odds? And she’s not just a sidekick, token person of colour here either, she’s got real agency and that’s also great. So often you get shows that are hooked on one or two man characters and you don’t get to learn anything about the other characters. Not so with this show!

I also love cantankerous Luke Danes. Everyone in this show loves to flout social norms and societal expectations and Luke isn’t an exception. Instead of running his dad’s hardware store, he turns it into a diner. He doesn’t agree with anything just because, in fact he’s always the voice of reasonable objection. Or not. Sometimes he just objects to get Taylor’s goat, which seems to be a town sport. And what makes Luke better is the relationship he has with Lorelai. I love it, they’re best friends and neither of them is even totally aware of it for the first few seasons and it just keeps getting better and better. He is always there for her and for Rory in a way that Christopher wasn’t when times were hard and I think it’s really interesting how that triangle develops in the last season. (Why did you cancel it! oh why!). Luke and Christopher bring out the worst in each other.

I love them all: Miss Patty, the dance teacher who’s unapologetic about her sex life and desires, Babette with her cat obsession and her cool cat husband, Sookie and Jackson, Taylor, Kirk and the mildly psychotic Paris… I could babble on, but I shall not.

Oh and let’s not forget Michele with his accent and his incomprehensible love of his Chow Chows. He’s so acerbic and catty and sometimes I feel like poor Michele while I am at work:

Reading: The Dogs of Riga – Henning Mankell
Listening to: Old Devil – Emancipator
Eating: Froot Loops
Drinking: mmmmmilk
Word count: 745

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TV: New Tricks

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Alun Armstrong, Amanda Redman, crime drama, Denis Lawson, Dennis Waterman, geekery, guilty pleasures, James Bolam, New Tricks, TV

As much as I prefer to read or do things that require my brain to do some work, I do love a good TV show. With the internet and Netflix as they are now we have the opportunity to see more shows than we did say when I was a kid: when there was a maximum of thirteen channels and at least two of them were dedicated to news and/or sports.

My mother recommended a show she had found on DVD at her local library: New Tricks. She said it was funny because it was about three retired police officers who were hired to solve cold cases. What she didn’t tell me – and I imagine she knew I’d figure it out for myself – was how awesome the show was in other ways.

For one, the show is a BBC One production which bumped it up a notch before I even started watching and for two, said retirees are overseen by a woman. What’s awesome about this, is that she’s an epitome of a strong female character: Detective Superintendent Sandra Pullman has moved up the ranks on her own merits which is obviously respected by her superiors and as the show progresses increasingly by her charges. Her appointment to UCOS: Unsolved Crimes and Open Case Squad was due to a mistake on her part which could otherwise have resulted in a demotion. The fact that her superior gave her the opportunity spoke volumes for his confidence in her abilities even though she was unwilling to take the project on to start with. Now it could have been very easy for the show to turn this into a gimmick or a joke and while they do have fun with it, it never becomes campy or pedantic which just speaks to the quality of the writing – and to the chemistry of the cast.

Gerry Standing is very obviously the product of his upbringing and the boys-only club that the police force was when he was in his youth. Having three ex wives and an eye for the ladies just tops the cake. He’s still on good terms with all his wives even though he complains about how much the kids cost him. He owns an old flashy car an a taste for gambling, which prompted him to apply for UCOS. He’s a bit crass and opinionated, but there’s no arguing that his sleuthing skills are top notch.

Ex-Detective Chief Superintendent Jack Halford reminded me of one of my uncles. By turns cantankerous and clever, he seemed to be the team’s straight man but his sense of humour often got the better of him and of everyone else. Having been Sandra’s mentor and superior in the murder squad, he is the unofficial second in command.

Brian ‘Memory’ Lane is far more than his remarkable memory, OCD and recovering alcoholism. His altruism and his obsessive need to figure things out often gets him into trouble. I have to say that Brian has been one of my favourites from the start.

What I like about the show is that it goes beyond the run of the mill police drama. All the characters have flaws: Sandra’s love life is one of the things she sacrificed for her career, Jack is haunted by his wife’s death, and the other two struggle with addictions. (And they do struggle – it’s not just a plot device or something tossed in to make a character more interesting!) Each of the characters undergo an arc as the series progresses and they still manage to solve crimes – sometimes with questionable old school tactics – but solve them they do. It’s not like the characters just walk in every morning and start a new case either, there are narrative threads that go through the series and they even refer back to things they’ve solved already. I used to hate when the writers of a show would essentially do the same story but with different people and places just to have the culprit be slightly different. The audience is not stupid and this show, for the most part, knows that. Where it’s received criticism from the cast that the writers play it too safe, it’s done well for the past 11 seasons.

Even though Gerry’s the only cast member still on the show, I’m not disappointed with the replacements, which is usually a death sentence for a show. Each character left in a reasonable manner; it wasn’t like they just suddenly disappeared with a silly expository scene in a single episode and then everyone forgot they even existed. The remaining characters are affected by the loss too – for example Brian refuses to let Steve McAndrew sit at the desk that used to be Jack’s and that just makes the whole thing that much more poignant.

Random facts: Apparently the show began as a one off episode, but people loved it so much they completed the season. Dennis Waterman, who plays Gerry, also sings the theme song. The woman who plays Brian’s long suffering wife Esther, is James Bolam (Jack)’s wife. Amanda Redman (Sandra Pullman) has nasty scarring on one arm from an accident when she was less than two years old. Not once in the series does anyone make mention of it and I think that is a sign of how far we’ve come in terms of the beauty standards. The show is not interested in looks and don’t bother to goop on makeup to hide what might be considered an imperfection. Denis Lawson (McAndrew) was in the original Star Wars trilogy as Wedge Antilles. Alun Armstrong (Brian) is the only other one to have had parts in some pretty big movies: Eragon, Van Helsing, The Mummy Returns, Sleepy Hollow and Braveheart. He was also in the original version of Get Carter. Also, it seems all of them have done something related to Dickens or Shakespeare.

Geek Moment: Orphan Black

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geekery, Orphan Black, sci-fi, science fiction, Tatiana Maslany, TV

There are seldom shows on tv that get me worked up and excited for their premier – even as a die hard trekkie in my youth the season premier of the current incarnation wasn’t an event the way is has become for some recent shows. Most of the shows I love I have on dvd as soon as possible and marathon the crap out of them. You know, Heroes, Alias, Dr. Who, Castle, The Mentalist, Breaking Bad, Dark Angel. Star Trek.

But there are a few I just can’t wait for. These days it’s Game of Thrones, obviously and Orphan Black. I probably don’t have to explain my obsession with Game of Thrones – it’s so different from other series in it’s genre that it pretty much sells itself. However, that is another post.

Orphan Black is something else again.

Up until this show, Canadian TV has been relatively limited to semi-successful comedy – at least outside of Canada. You know, Trailer Park Boys, Red Green, Kids in the Hall, Rick Mercer and This Hour has 22 Minutes. Recently some very high quality shows have come out of the Canadian Film industry; Continuum, Bomb Girls and Flash Point are among my favourites. (And if you’ve never seen Street Legal, DaVinci’s Inquest, Beachcombers, Due South or Road to Avonlea, you’re missing out on some very good Canadian Television.) I’ll be nice and give you the list of Canadian TV that’s out there so you can check it out later.

Canadian television is often underrated.

Enter Orphan Black: Not only have we got some tight and excellent writing, and some brilliant camera work, but we have an excellent cast. Tatiana Maslany, who plays our lead character and her clones does an amazing job. If you don’t know the premise, it starts with Sarah seeing a woman in the train station who, when she turns around, looks exactly like her. Before Sarah can say or do anything, the woman steps in front of the train. Being short on cash, Sarah hesitates only a few moments before she scoops up the other woman’s purse and assumes her identity. Shortly thereafter she discovers that she and several other women are clones. By the time I was done the first episode I was hooked. Hubs asked me what I was watching when I was partway through and I could only wave my hand at him. He sat down next to me and neither of us said a word for the next two episodes.

Because there are only ten episodes in a season, the suspense is drawn tight from the first. Questions are answered only to raise more questions. The last episode was such a cliff hanger that I shouted at the TV screen when it was over. “Noo!” So yes, I am excited about the premier this Season. Watch the trailer and catch up as fast as you can!

(re)Watching: Orphan Black
Listening to: Heaven Knows – The Pretty Reckless
Reading: Ruin & Beauty – Patricia Young
Eating: Perogies
Drinking: iced tea
Word Count: 980

Weirdness

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TV

I typed in my address wrong I switched the p and the s like so: “www.khalidarkmoon.blogpsot.com” and got a weird bible study page. I giggled, because of my own current religious status which, officially is “undecided” and disillusioned with organised religion on the whole, though there is certainly no lack of curiosity.

I watched the beginning of that TV series Revelations last night out of pure curiosity. It was on after the Yellowstone Volcano TV movie. (What is it with America and the slew of Armageddon/Apocalypse and huge natural disaster movies and books these days?) Anyway, I watched “Revelation” because I’m intrigued. I think it’s the only book in the bible that I’ve actually read the whole way through – aside from Daniel. I read some reviews of the show online and it seems that people either love it or hate it, and most of the reasoning seems to come from a religious standpoint. I.e. “I hate it because christians are whackos” or “This is a great show, you should watch it because then you’ll see that the end really is near” yadda yadda… I linked the one review I thought was less biased either way.

I watched it purely with interest, in much the same fashion I watched the 4400 and X-Files and even Star Trek – the “what if” stance. My motto, which comes from all my fiction workshops is “suspend your disbelief” for the duration and then make a judgment. Of course, I’m not sure if I can buy Bill Pullman as someone who can avert the Apocalypse, but I’m willing to go along for the ride just the same.

But all along, I couldn’t help thinking what would happen if the end really did happen, and judgment day came along and god said: “sorry guys, you had it wrong all along. I’m going to reincarnate you now.”

Now, I’m going to read about encrypting email.

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funnies, Gilmore Girls, TV

I love this episode.

4.20 – Luke Can See Her Face
written by Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino
directed by Matthew Diamond
transcript by Jenna with assistance by Canopus

OPEN AT LORELAI’S HOUSE [Lorelai walks downstairs and opens the front door to pick up the newspaper. A cat is sitting on the porch. Lorelai goes to the phone and dials.]

RORY: Hello?
LORELAI: They know.
RORY:Who knows?
LORELAI: The cats — they know that I’ve broken up with Jason and that I’m alone and they’ve decided it’s time for me to become a crazy cat lady.
RORY: What are you talking about?
LORELAI: There’s a cat on my doorstep.
RORY: Well, that’s better than a bun in your oven.
LORELAI: It’s just sitting there, staring at me, like he knew this moment was coming. It’s still there. Why is it still there?
RORY: Mom, it’s a stray. It’s passing through. It’s hanging out. Relax. Move away from the window and go back to bed.
LORELAI: It’s not fair. We just broke up. It just happened. I’m still young. It’s still possible that I’m gonna have a successful relationship. You don’t know. My eggs are still viable.
RORY: Are you yelling at me or the cat?
LORELAI: The cat. I think he flipped me off with his tail. I’m Babette.
RORY: Babette’s not single.
LORELAI: Whose side are you on? Circle the wagons.
RORY: Sorry.
LORELAI: Everyone knows. They can see it in my face. “She’s single again. She couldn’t make it work again. She picked the wrong guy again.” [to cat] Hey, do not lick yourself in front of me.
RORY: Mom, I need you to get a grip. You’re tired, you’re stressed out, and you’re not seeing things clearly.
LORELAI: Oh, my God!
RORY: What?
LORELAI: There are two of them. They’re not even easing me into this, those bastards. I give up. I guess I need to start collecting newspapers and magazines, find a blue bathrobe, lose my front teeth.
RORY: Well, obviously, you’ve got a busy day ahead of you, so I’m gonna let you go.
LORELAI: Yarn balls. I need to find some yarn balls.
RORY: Bye.
[Lorelai opens the front door.]
LORELAI: [to cats] Hey, I am a young, desirable woman.

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cat things, pet parents, TV

Need sleep.

BOTH of the damn cats are in heat, or some semblance of, so that they’re both yowling all night. Now that I’m up and having breakfast and showered, they’re silent. Why? Why is this so?

Having major ISSUES with my research outline. None of my inter-library loan things are going to be here in time – IF they even come. So now I’m going to have to go back to the library after work. Bah.

SO to make myself feel a little better, I’m watching an episode of Dead Like Me before I have to drag my sorry butt out the door. I love the opening sequence, with all the grim reapers doing ‘normal’ things

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quotations, TV

“It looks like someone ate a box of crayons and threw up a sweater” – Becker