New Fall Television 2015: The Good News

As I mentioned lastweek, some of the new fall television shows we tried out didn’t live up to our expectations (even when those expectations were somewhat low).  Thankfully, other new shows are keeping us intrigued, at least for now.

First up, Blindspot:

It’s okay Jaimie Alexander -

we actually like your show.

This one has been publicized quite a bit, so you may know the premise already.  If that’s the case, forgive the duplication, but I’ve got a blog to write here, people.  I need to find words to fill up the page.  Anywhoo.  Jaimie Alexander (Lady Sif from the Thor movies and other Marvel creations) wakes up naked and covered in tattoos in a duffel bag in Times Square, her memory wiped completely blank.  She gets taken to the FBI, as one of her tattoos features the name of an agent in the local office.  Said agent and tattooed woman use her tattoos as clues to solve crimes and whatnot. 

“Kicking shit and taking names!

Blindspot!”

I’ll admit that when you type it out, the premise seems a bit stale, but honestly, we’re liking this one.  The cast is excellent (the guy playing the FBI agent is the exception – his main acting technique seems to be squinting, in a manly fashion), and things are connecting together in an intriguing way.  We watched one scene in the second episode we felt was just going to be boring character narrative on the agent, but it turned out to connect his past with the mystery woman in a way that’s interesting and we want to further explore.  We’ll keep watching this one to see where everything leads, but I can foresee the show running into pacing issues down the line; for example, once Jane Doe gets her memories back, does this just become CSI: Tattooed Lady Clues?  We’ll see.  I just read that this one has been picked up for a second season, so there's that.

Next, Minority Report:

No, Google, not that one.  This one:

Now, with 100% less scientology.

The show picks up where the movie left off – the Pre-Crime division has been disbanded, and the Pre-Cogs from the movie have been given their freedom to live their lives as they wish.  One of the male Pre-Cog twins (one of the main actors in the Generation Kill miniseries from HBO a few years ago.  Did you watch that?  You really should – it was outstanding.  Major props to Jake for showing us the light on that one) starts seeing visions of crimes, and in his attempt to stop them, he runs across and starts assisting an up and coming police officer.  Shenanigans ensue.  Actually, they don’t; it’s pretty serious most of the time.  There’s lots of very earnest dialogue about whether people should be allowed to make their own decisions or be incarcerated prematurely for crimes they may or may not commit – the typical “is free will a myth?” type of argument posed by multitudes of scholars over the years.  We may be just giving this one a pass because of our love for the movie (it was one of our favorites), but we don’t have any great scifi shows on our roster right now (Orphan Black, please come back soon), so it works for now.  I also read that this one had its 13 show order cut to 10, so that doesn't bode well for the future.

Finally, Heroes Reborn:

It’s hard to say if Heroes Reborn is truly a “new” show, since it’s a miniseries-length continuation of the original Heroes series which ran awhile back.  We enjoyed the first few seasons of the original show, but we fell away from it in Season 3 or 4 when it stopped entertaining us.  However, in interviews and whatnot, the creators seem to acknowledge where they may have gone awry in the original, so we were hopeful that this one would be interesting again.  So far, things are going pretty well.  I like the main focus on HRG (Horn Rimmed Glasses – aka what everyone called Noah Bennett before we learned his name in the first season), as he was a great character in the original show.  It’s also fun to see other characters from the original pop up every now and then, even if some of them don’t have major arcs (hey, it’s the Haitian!  Oh, now he’s dead!).

Well, here’s the Haitian in a publicity photo

that doesn’t align with what happened on the show.

Maybe he’s not quite as dead as we thought…

For now, we’re enjoying it.  We’re suckers for superhero stories (Chris would say, no, you’re a sucker for them.  He’d be right.  I made him go see Elektra in theaters way back when and he still holds it over my head), and this one is moving along in interesting directions.  Some of the new folks have odd powers.  For example, one Japanese girl can put herself inside video games, which doesn’t seem – yet – to be interacting with the larger storyline; this one, odd as it is, did give us the opportunity to hear “Leeerrrooyyy Jennkinnssssss” uttered on network tv though, so there’s that.  Also, I love that Zachary Levi gets to be in the show, but making Chuck evil?  What?  Anyway, there’s promise, and as long as the writers can wrangle the increasingly large set of characters and stories (something that seemed to be an issue in the original), maybe things can keep moving in the right direction.

Later!

Amy