On tonight’s Life On Mars, they find a dead girl whose face looks just like Annie, so they send Annie undercover to take her place and help route out the killer.
Lucky for them, it worked… but perhaps before sending Annie to be among the dead girl’s friends, they should’ve asked themselves “did she sound exactly like Annie?”
I’m blogging notes while watching last night’s premiere of Castle. SPOILERS WITHIN.
Going in, I’m positively inclined toward this series. For one thing, it’s Nathan Fillion. Like him from Firefly. (And of course I know what the hammer really is.) Plus, it seems to be a banter detective show, something bringing back the tradition of Remington Steele and Moonlighting. Nice to get away from the procedural tradition.
A publicist(?) introduces a mystery author as a “master of the macabre”. No, that’s an appelation generally reserved for horror creators.
Susan Sullivan! Of Dharma and Greg! We like her.
Dan Castellanata in the credits. Somebody is liking me here.
Casual treatment of murder comes with the banter format. I’ve been finding myself turning away from light-hearted detective books (well, books-on-tape) recently because of that, seems cheap and unreal to me, but for some reason I think I won’t mind so much in this context.
My early bet on the murder motive: since he’s killing in the manner of the author’s obscure books, it’s because he has a pile of first editions, and wants them to become valuable once the murders are publicized.
They argue over whether murderers kill without a reason. Two reasons why this murderer obviously has a reason. For one, the story wouldn’t make much point if it’s just random killing. But for a within-the-tale reason: a person not bringing logic to murder would not be interested in murder mysteries, which are all about bringing logic to murder.
Hmm… they just found their suspect, way too early, obviously a frame. I’m pretty sure it’s an ABC murder to kill off the social worker.
We’ll see ifthey bring in Cannell and Patterson every episode. (Feels like they wanted a third famous guy and he fell through.)
Yeah, he has figured out it’s an ABC murder.
45 minutes in and no Dan Castellanata yet. I think he did it.
At least the cop gets to figure things out at times, not just the writer.
Oh, there’s Dan. He’s a judge. Recurring?
It’s hard to buy “I’m only going to inherit $25 million” as motive. I hope there’s something more than that. (Seconds later.. they’re positing him as being tens of millions in debt. Still seems desperate.)
Bad guy is shredding evidence, then looks at the gun. Shred the gun!
All in all, not the ultimate expression of the banter form… but you never get that on the first episode anyway. Certainly watchable. Mrs. Nat’s TV liked it as well. We’ll set up to record the Saturday reruns, to avoid the conflict with Saving Grace. (I think I missed one last night recording this. Arg!)
Much is being made about Simpsons being renewed for another couple years. And yes, yes, it has earned its recognition for its impressive run. (The age of people who never really knew a Simpsons-free world astounds me.) But its very success has overshadowed other long-running successes. It looks like Power Rangers is coming to an end after 17 years. (I had to pay attention to that early on – wrote some Power Rangers comics. It had its place as cheap fun thrills for the young set. But I cannot say that I’ve followed any of what was going on with it for more than a decade.) Oh, that one might not be being ignored because of the Simpsons; I just felt like mentioning the show.
But the thing that’s blatantly under the Simpsons shadow is King of the Hill. It looks like it’s about to come to the end… after 13 seasons. 13 seasons. Stronger episodes and weaker ones in there, but overall, 13 quite entertaining seasons. And if any other primetime network sitcom had lasted that long or was coming to an end after that time, much more noise would be made.
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson hosts this week SNL. And if they can use him right… well, the first time he hosted SNL, I was dubious, and then he turned out to be everything an SNL host should. Amiable, charming, up to the material, and inspiring bits they would’ve done for no other host. So I have my hopes up!
ABC has cancelled Life on Mars. Can’t say I’m shocked. I was actually still watching, but it was at the bottom of my to-watch pile. It was something to have on while I wasn’t paying much attention. Some of the moments were good, some of the texture was good, but instead of focusing on the fish-out-of-water aspects or just doing the 1970s cop thing, it was far too focused on the show’s mythology, on the vast mystery of why this cop was suddenly in the 1970s. Boring, particularly at the point when all we’re being given is signs that it’s soooo mysterious and complexicated! Didn’t care, didn’t care, didn’t care. (Having said that, it’s actually a good thing that the network is letting them make one last episode to reveal What Was Going On. It’ll make the DVD set better, and it will help keep people from being discouraged from watching the next mythology show. Goodness knows there are enough unanswered mystery shows laying around.)
I’ve long felt there should be a word for hearing someone just died, and realizing that you’d assumed they’d been long dead. This, I’m glad to say, goes in the other direction. Back in my college days, I knew an older woman named Hilda Banks Shapiro. And I just thought she was friendly and smart lady, but otherwise just a character on the local academic scene. And then, as we chatted after the showing of a Marx Brothers movie on campus, she casually mentioned that she’d been playing piano at major concert halls when she was 16. So this was a woman who had achieved pretty impressive stuff… and then went on with what she wanted in life. Anyway, part of that conversation we had, over a quarter century ago now, is something I want to build the start of a book around someday, so I shan’t repeat it here.
But catching some odd how-to-play-the-piano spiel on a local PBS station, I got to thinking about her. I did the googly thing on her, and the first articles I pulled up were talking about her being 74… and they were from seven years ago. So I though, “ach, if that’s what’s coming up, she probably disappeared or at least became infirm in the meantime.” But then I find this nice piece on someone’s blog, from just a year ago, and it sounds like old Hilda is still spirited, active, and sharp. Quite some lady. Follow the link, it’s worth a read.
