Hopping on the bandwagon here (or chuckwagon, if you will...har!) to help kick off ChuckMeMondays. Now that the show has been saved from cancellation, this is a concerted fan effort to keep it from ever becoming a "bubble" show again. Every Monday, starting June 1st, at 9pm EST people are encourage to watch an episode online on Hulu.com, NBC.com or TheWB.com (or on DVD if that's all you have). First season is available on TheWB.com at http://www.thewb.com/shows/chuck. Or right here on my blog:
Season 1, Episode 1: Chuck vs. The Pilot
Oh Chuck, you had me at "Bryce Larkin. Not an accoutant."
So they aired the first of the last three episodes of "Pushing Daisies" tonight. Honestly, I could never get into the show. Which surprised me because judging from the commercials when it was initially promoted it looked like something that would be up my alley. I tend to like stuff that's a little quirky, but "Pushing Daisies" kind of went beyond "a little" quirky. I think the best explanation I read about it was that the show was 'a little too twee.'
I know there's a lot of love for the show on the internet (at least the craggy little corners I hang around in) but something like that seems to work better as a one shot movie rather than a weekly series, I think. You know, during the holidays, where you're all set for something warm and fuzzy and a little bit twee. On a weekly basis, it's a bit much...even for me (which is saying something).
In other TV watching news, I decided to give "Alias" another try. I find that I have a tendancy towards spy stuff. Always have. But I gave this show a try once when it was on and didn't quite get hooked. That's okay. Some show's you just have to watch from the very beginning to really get a feel for them. Same thing happened to me with "Arrested Development". You have to get a feel for the characters.
Verdict? I like it. But not quite love though. JJ Abrams creates intriging storylines. Weird thing is Jennifer Garner. She's someone I've liked in other roles, and seems like one of those more grounded in reality, real person non-fame whore type celebrities. But in "Alias" she kind of bugs me. She's got skull face, looks like she's 12 and has the squeaky little girl voice. But maybe that the point - because of that she's the last person you'd expect to be a kickass spy. I guess it also works because she's a grad student still in college.
I will give her this - she does indeed kick ass. Kudos for the action scenes, Ms. Garner. You get the Princess Kickass blog gold ninja star of approval for those. Whether I'll continue with my "Alias" viewing is up in the air. I've heard the series gets pretty convolulted because the writers never had an end goal in mind. It suffered from what many TV series suffer from - make stuff up as you go along (i.e. are renewed for another season). Although there's hope out there as I'm starting to think a lot of tv series/writers are trying to avoid that particular pitfall. Anyway, "Alias" is going to be fun summer viewing at the very least.
What are blogs for but to ramble on about the unimportance of your life. Paste it up on the big e-billboard that is the Internet and see if anyone gives a damn. Heck, I'm happy if someone finds my random crap the slight bit amusing. Or you can just completely ignore me and skip on to the next page. What do I care? Can't say I'm not use to that.
It is kind of fun reflecting on life experiences in a semi-anonymous fashion. Especially the ironic stuff. See, I'm a musician. I've always been a musician even before I could play any instruments. That's how much music means to me. It strikes me to the core of my being - to the point where I would say I'm a musician first, human later.
One thing I think I should do is reflect on my music experiences much in the way I'm blogging about fandoms. Wish I could remember my music stuff as well as the fandom stuff but I'm hoping this exercise will jog my memory. I've had fun times playing in bands for the last 10 years. I want to get back into it but this time with a less serious focus. Lack of success in the past has freed me from giving a shit about making it in music. I just want to have fun.
Of course with this new attitude and focus of mine comes the irony. As soon as I accepted the fact that a music career was not in my cards, and that I'm fine with that, I start meeting and befriending all these people who work in the music business. Mind boggling. A music lawyer here, a music publisher there, and yesterday I spend the afternoon chatting it up with one of the hottest record producers going right now (and a seriously cool, real, nice, nice fellow).
But his talk of shutting down NYC for a party, or hanging out on billionaire's yachts, and other fab and glamorous stuff makes me realize, yeah, that's so not the life I'd fit in to. I lack the skill set (totally stolen phrase there - but its my new favorite). I'm sure I lack it on a variety of levels. Whatever my mission in life is suppose to be, my dreams of record deals, touring and recording seem so misguided now. Well except for the recording part. I'd still love to do that, but in a small scale excellent studio with a great engineer. And for no greater reason than its fun to be creative. Who cares if anyone notices?
Last week was Season Finale time. And honestly at the end of the episode, after all my going to bat for this show, I thought three words...Jumped. The. Shark. Damn it! Could it be? Say it ain't so!
Well it really isn't so. While the second to last episode of S2 was great. Maybe even the best episode of the series yet (and I'm coming around to that opinion as well, except I still think "Chuck vs. Santa Claus" is pretty fan-f*cking-tastic), this week's happened to hit all those occasional notes that kind of sort of bug me about the show. Here's a list:
The 80s references
Yes, I love the 80s references on this show, but sometimes I hate them. That's because I was in high school during the 80s and it's obvious the writers on "Chuck" skew quite a few years younger than me. While I was a teenager wishing there was some way, some how I could score tix from KROQ and a ride to see XTC at the Paladium (a show the band canceled and then ended up never performed live show again, but that's another story) the writers of "Chuck" were 8 year-olds watching crappy 80s movies like "Spies Like Us" in an endless loop on HBO... and loving it. (However, their use of Chevy Chase in the last 2 of 3 episodes has been inspired.)
Their 80s love is not quite the 80s I knew. And I feel I have dibs on those years. Yes, a song like "Mr. Roboto" is great cheesy fun. Heck, I had the 45 back then. But it's kind of an obvious 80s choice that other shows have mined already. I will grant them this - the song's lyrics do fit the theme of this show like a glove. Kilroy.
Ok, rewatching this I'm starting to love this scene
The Music
I, for one, am not usually one to complain about the music on this show. I frickin' love the music they use on this show. Cake's "Short Skirt, Long Jacket" as the show's theme song is perfect. And don't get me started on "Creature Fear" and the hand porn scene. I love the music so much that I've got a playlist on my Ipod made up exclusively of songs I've heard on this show. But there have been a couple episodes late in Season 2 where I've found the music intrusive and awkward. Maybe it's because I just didn't like the songs. Or it's just the case it felt like they were using too many songs, for too long and too loud during an episode. Particularly if the songs sounded like the crappy songs used in the movie "Juno," overplayed 80s classics or bad Bangles imitations. (I neither love nor hate The Bangles but they were a pretty average band, really. If you're going to imitate someone, go for greatness or improve upon the average.)
Sadly, no amount of "Friday I'm In Love" by The Cure (another obvious 80s tune, but still a great tune) could make up for the music miscues in this episode. Of course, your mileage may vary.
Chuck Fu
When I read discussion threads after an episode there's always that person pointing out "well that's not how that works in real life" and proceeds to tell you how it really would operate in real life. You just want to say, dude, STFU, it's a TV show. You're suppose to willfully suspend disbelief - especially on a show like "Chuck" or you'd never have any fun.
That is, until the show delved into two areas I know pretty well in real life. The band Jeffster perform "Mr. Roboto" at Awesome and Ellie's (first) wedding and manage to drown out the knife throwing, paratrooper crashing through sky lights, raging machine gun fight going on in the reception hall next door to the chapel...with no amplifiers! You'd need The Who's late 70s set up to drown out a battle royale like that, but I chose to forgive this one.
Later Chuck re-Intersects himself with an upload that does far more than the previous version of the program did. He's not only re-installed goverment secrets into his brain, he's also installed some physical abilities he never had before. They go all "The Matrix" on us, turning Chuck into Neo complete with the line "I know kung fu" (sorry I'm not the biggest "Matrix" fan). You don't pull off moves like that without conditioning your body to be able to handle it. You'd pull all kinds of muscles, tendons and ligaments. But, I've decided to give a pass on this as well because 1) Chuck is a young guy 2) he has shown quite a bit of physical agility in the past 3) the actor playing Chuck was able to pull off a lot of the moves himself with just a little training (including a pretty impressive drop kick).
But what really bugged me about this bit of character development was that Chuck always used his intelligence to get out of sticky situations since he didn't have the training or fighting abilities of the goverment agents charged with protecting him. I had hoped they were going in the direction of giving him some training to be able to protect himself a bit while keeping his greatest asset - his superbrain. Then again, I don't think the Chuck Fu will be a permanent fixture. It will be something that works sometimes, and not others. On the other hand it does save the show from getting stale with 'Chuck saves the day again buy doing something clever' storylines.
Over the Top Action
I've already noted the writers must have watched 80s movies on cable in an endless loop when they were kids. Nothing said over the top action like 80s movies. And you can tell the writers on this show love to revisit those gems. I'm game. I love action. I love action done well (but not action just for the sake of, well, action). It's one of the things I love about this show. They do action well. But I fear the writers love for all the things I've listed above could get out of hand and overshadow the things that make this show such a loveable, endearing, fun show.
Jumped the Shark? Nah
So untimately I had to rethink my Jump the Shark opinion. A lot of these peeves are really just my own personal thing. Upon rewatching the episode with this in mind and accepting it for its over the top basking in 80s glory episode that it was, it was a pretty damn entertaining well put together hour of television. A television action-comedy opera if you will. And seriously without "Chuck" (which is still a possibility as NBC has yet to renew it) where would I get my action, comedy, drama, suspense, vicious girl fights, romance, bromance, gun battles, and explosions?
Final notes:
Bruce Boxleitner has aged really well. It's cool with the movie "Tron" playing such an important role on this show they actually got Tron to be on the show. Not to mention he played a spy on a show which had a similar premise to "Chuck" with the roles reversed.
I love that since Ellie and Awesome are now married there are now two sets of Dr. and Mrs. Dr. Awesome's in the (Chuck)world.
Of course Devon "Captain Awesome" Woodcomb's middle name would be Christian. It's perfect. And so is he.
Speaking of which, one of my favorite lines from this season - Chuck to Ellie: "Don't go all crazy-doctor-sister on me!" - gets overlooked.
Although I don't think the Orange Orange Yogurt shop will be around if this show gets a Season 3 (no more OOSuper Secret Liar), I did like that Sarah wore orange low top "Chucks" with her uniform to go along with Chuck's standard issue high top Converse Chuck Taylors he always wears. It's nice to see another show getting into couples clothing continuity.
Speaking of couples - Really, who is Chuck's true love on this show? Sarah, his CIA handler, John Casey his NSA handler, Morgan is Best Friend Forever or Ellie, his sister he'll do just about anything for? Seriously, a case could be made for all of them.
I hope Scott Bakula returns to the show playing Chuck and Ellie's dad. He was great. I loved that through him they revealed having an Intersect in your head may be damaging to your health in the long run. Nice way to raise the stakes.
Its 12:41am on a Friday night. I'm sitting on the floor in front the tv playing guitar (I'm playing guitar, not the tv). I look up. Its an infomercial, but oh my sweet lord, its an infomercial for The Midnight Special on DVD.
You just don't know. You just don't know! Before MTV and music videos, there was The Midnight Special. It was the show a young pre-teen rock-n-roll geek like me discovered when I managed to stay up really really late one night. And my word it was pure magic!
All the top artist of that day and age performing live on late tv. Performing live. Real instruments. Real singers. Real musicians at the top of their game. And now all that is being released on DVD. How can I be so lucky?
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