Exasperated Calculator

The Palace, a new series from ITV in the UK.

The setup is pretty simple: The West Wing meets The Queen.

That’s a difficult premise to live up to - one of the best TV series of all time, and one of the best films of recent years.

Inevitably, it doesn’t live up all the way to the source material, but it does come surprisingly close.

The show really covers three overlapping worlds - the feuds and conflicts of the royal family, the intrigues of the politicians and the political staff, and the below stairs antics of the pages and valets.

The political side works best - it’s so reminiscent of The West Wing that you can almost assign characters. The problems surrounding the king are well imagined, and the consequences play out nicely. There’s also some lovely acting from the king and his staff.

The family side is a bit more arch - the Princess Eleanor in particular is a fantastic villain. There’s a bit more scenery chewing, but it’s still fun stuff.

The weakest point is the servants side - it’s played quite ‘camp’, and the cast of characters is implausibly small for a palace. Fortunately not much time is spent on this stuff, and it can be quite funny.

Only five episodes in so far (out of eight for the initial first season order), but it’s worth watching.

What do I see in my email this morning but a link to this:

Would you like to be one of the first people in Australia to use TiVo?

TiVo currently needs enthusiastic individuals to help test TiVo before its launch into Australia next year. We need your help to ensure we provide the best customer experience for our TiVo users. Your feedback will shape the way we develop the TiVo service.

This can only mean that the Tivo is coming a lot closer in Australia. Given that it’s been out in the US for 10 years now the testing should be reasonably quick. They released a version in the UK a few years ago (which didn’t take off), so I imagine most of the technical problems in terms of PAL versus NTSC have been solved.

Given that I already have a Foxtel iQ box, you might wonder why I need another. The simple answer is that the software on the iQ is terrible, and it doesn’t do free-to-air channels except the ABC. So roll on the Tivo, I’m ready. I’ve even signed up for the beta.

The third season of Doctor Who just finished, so here’s some quick one paragraph reviews of the episodes. Spoilers (mild) for those in Australia and the US who haven’t seen them yet.

Read the rest of this entry »

As promised a long time ago, here’s a review of Season One of the fantastic US TV series Heroes.

I’m going to do this in two parts. First, I’m going to make some general (non-spoiler) comments. Then, off the main page, I’m going to make some more specific (spoiler) comments about some of the parts of the series, and some wild speculation about the future.

Overall, this is superb television. It shows the signs of a strong creator with a clear idea of what he’s trying to do. The creator, Tim Kring, clearly had a pretty good idea of which way he was going with the story. Like Babylon 5 and Twin Peaks the strength of the ongoing plot makes the show almost addictively compelling.

I was once a pretty big fan of comic books, and still enjoy the genre form (although not much of the actual comics these days). I’ve always loved the origin story in particular, the tale of how the heroes came to be. That’s what Season One of Heroes was all about. And I think the parts where it was weakest where the ones where it deviated from that story.

The other thing I’ve really enjoyed about the show is the production values. It’s the first show that I’ve watched that’s really made me appreciate the extra detail that High Definition can add. A couple of scenes in particular really blew me away.

That’s it for the general comments, now on to the spoilers (which cover to the end of Season One)…

Read the rest of this entry »

Updates on the shows from my earlier post:

• Jericho: Still not watching…
• Vanished: Didn’t entice me back.
• Smith: Still canceled.
• The Class: Every time I say ‘I’m giving up on this’, the show redeems itself with some really good, really dark writing. Still right on the edge every episode, but hanging on so far. But not a ‘must see’.
• Men in Trees: Continues to be entertaining, although I’m about 4 episodes behind now.
• Help Me Help You: Nope, too much focus on the Ted Danson character, and not enough on the other interesting people in the group therapy session. Gave up on it.
• The Nine: Not enough in it to sustain the premise, I gave up a few minutes before it got effectively canceled.
• Ugly Betty: Still entertaining, but the backlog is also building up a bit.
• Heroes: Just gets better and better every week. The best TV that I’ve seen in years and years. I’ll write a longer review in a few days, I hope.
• Studio 60: Distressingly uneven, with way too much tendency for Aaron Sorkin to take revenge on those who have ‘wronged’ him in the past, with every character standing for someone in his life. Plus the comedy bits just aren’t very funny. Still, enough to keep me interested.
• Friday Night Lights: Still keeping up there, very very good stuff (although it’s now dropped to second behind Heroes for the best show of the season).

And the two new shows since last time:

• 30 Rock: Great talent (Tina Fey in particular), but the delivery of this show is very strange. It’s very much a poor corporate vehicle of a show, with intermittent sparks of good writing overwhelmed by very poor, very cliched writing for most of it. Gave up after about 3 episodes.
• 20 Good Years: Intermittently funny, but nothing really new. A waste of a couple of very good actors.

Well, that’s it for now. I’ll try and get reviews up for Heroes, Friday Night Lights and Studio 60 sometime before the end of January, and then a recap at the end of the US TV season.

I’ve been watching (via the magic of the internet) a few of the new TV shows for this year from the US. A few thoughts (in order from worst to best):

• Jericho: Interestingly enough being aired the same week on Channel 10 here in Australia. Sadly, that’s the only interesting thing about this derivative bit of post-apocalyptic junk.
• Vanished: Because what the world needs is another CSI clone that only does kidnapping. Didn’t even watch 5 minutes worth.
• Smith: A nice ‘thief’ drama that was a bit too complicated for its own good. Got canceled, but I gave up first.
• The Class: Sitcom from one of the producers of Friends, where a group of people meet up years after they were together in primary school. Only just hanging on to my ‘watch’ list so far - it has the glimmer of something good, but there’s a lot of bad in there too.
• Men in Trees: Northern Exposure meets Sex in the City (I’m willing to bet that it was pitched to the network like that). But well made, with some good performances.
• Help Me Help You: A sitcom about people in a group therapy session. OK, with Ted Danson doing some interesting stuff.
• The Nine: Nine people who survive a bank robbery gone wrong deal with the aftermath. Nice stuff so far, with some good mystery set up. But it’d better not go all Lost and start to build more mystery than it resolves.
• Ugly Betty: Very strange, almost surrealistic comedy-drama set in a fashion magazine. Entertaining, but very very odd.
• Heroes: Unbreakable done for the small screen. Excellently paced and shot, with just some slight uncertainty about how well they’ll be able to deliver the plot developments that need to show up later.
• Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip: Aaron Sorkin’s latest show, set in a Saturday Night Live clone. Smart, well written, with snappy acting. Just not much new, as we’ve seen it all before in The West Wing and Sportsnight.
• Friday Night Lights: American high-school football in Texas. Stunning stuff, brilliantly shot and acted, with a rawness that you normally only see in independent cinema. Easily the best new show of the year.

Not yet rated: 30 Rock (not looking good) and 20 Good Years (maybe), which I’ve only seen one episode each of.

I’ll come back to this in a month or two to see which of those shows still survive - at least 2 will be culled, maybe 4.