A Certain Slant of Light

Man, this hasn't been a good week for my shows. Castle gets canceled - which is honestly kind of a relief; I'm glad someone realized the show couldn't go on without Kate Beckett - and also Agent Carter.

I would have been devastated if Agent Carter had been canceled last year, but season 2 was kind of a mess, so I'm not broken-hearted. A little sad that they won't have a chance to pull things back together in season 3, but then, how often does a television show get better in season three?

I do have a couple of thoughts about how they could have made season 2 better.

1. Have a clear idea what zero matter does. I don't mean that the characters needed to figure it all out, but the writers needed to have a clearer sense how it worked. As it was, zero matter seemed to do whatever the hell they needed it to do that episode, which really drained the tension out of the finale. Will they find a way to contain the zero matter???? Well, uh, they seem to have surprisingly good control over zero matter whenever it's plot convenient. I bet they will.

2. This is the big one: cut down on the romantic storylines. Cut out Sousa's new girlfriend Violet entirely (they could always have Ana Jarvis nurse Peggy after she's wounded. Or, hell, give Sousa some medical school background) and cut the romantic part of the Jason Wilkes plot line.

I have the strong feeling that the writers introduced him to deflect criticisms of Agent Carter's lack of racial diversity in season one, and as far as I can tell their thought process was "An interracial romance! Nothing says 'we're not racist!' like an interracial romance!"

Which would be all well and good if they actually intended to follow through with the romance part, but as it was it all felt like a bizarre bait and switch. He's introduced as a romantic prospect... and then he becomes incorporeal! And now they can make him corporeal again, but only in an electromagnetic cage thing! And now he's a traitor! But only because he's afraid for his life! Or maybe evil? No, not evil, but our running time is coming to an end and he's not a romantic possibility anymore. Because reasons.

IMO the writers have shipped Peggy/Sousa from day one and never meant to follow through on Peggy/Wilkes, and in that case they should have dropped that whole romantic angle on the Wilkes subplot. It's not like Peggy needed to have a romantic interest in Wilkes to go to great lengths to save him, especially given that she feels responsible for Wilkes's plight.

If the writers desperately wanted an interracial romance, they could have made the Samberly character a black guy (and more compatible with Rose).

There are a bunch of other things they could have tweaked - the season, as I said, was kind of a mess - but I think those two things alone would have made it more cohesive and focused.

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, season 2. I watched season one last year (the year before last? sometime in the past…) and adored it, and I did enjoy season two but I didn’t think it was quite up to the mark set by season one. I find this happens with shows a lot: season one is great and then there’s a distinct falling off. It’s gotten to the point where I’m actually kind of glad when a favorite show gets canceled, because at least then I know it will remain undiminished by later, inferior additions…

Having said all that, I definitely plan to watch season three, which Netflix has helpfully put on instant. Thank you, Netflix!

Castle. I got halfway through season seven, to the episode where they resurrected the boring serial killer yet again. I realize that Castle is a show that likes to play with genres and genius serial killers are an integral part of the modern detective genre, but I don’t care for them and I care even less than usual about the particularly ludicrous serial killer concocted by Castle, so I skipped that episode and somehow never came back.

But at last Netflix has the DVDs! So I’ll skip that two-parter, watch the last few episodes of the season (one of them is an astronaut episode!!! The Martian has filled me with enthusiasm for all things astronaut this year), and then probably stop because I’ve heard season 8 has a lot of manufactured relationship drama. Oh, Castle. I guess all good things must come to an end.

Graceland, season 2. NETFLIX WHY DON’T YOU HAVE SEASON THREE YET??? I want to see the final season of this show so much!

I have a lot to say about this show and I’m not sure where to start, so I’m just going to redact it here in the (probably vain) hope that I’ll eventually write it a post of its own, as it deserves.

Although I will say here that I feel a burning desire for some Charlie/Amber. The undercover agent and her new bank robber buddy! The look on Charlie’s face when Amber first sashays into the diner to give the bank robbery deets: bored out of her skull as she waits for this “specialist” to arrive, surprised and interested when the specialist turns out to be a girl, and then - oh no she’s HOT as Amber slings herself into the booth and lists all the ways that their current bank robbery plan is the pits.

Nothing says super mega ultra hot like confidence and know-how! And THEN, Amber tests Charlie’s cool by having her rob a bar (“And get me a cheeseburger while you’re at it!”) and the two of them drive off together on Amber’s motorcycle, top speed.

Come on. Come on. That’s got to be followed by some exhilarated “Oh my God I just broke so many laws and it feels FUCKING GREAT” sex back at Amber’s crash pad, right? I want 500 fics of this on AO3.

...I could write ship manifestos like this for practically every character on the show, so you can see how the squee would take over this entire post.

Poirot. Still a delight. Acharming and always reliable period piece; occasionally the murder plots are a bit outlandish (I still think the ABC murders is silly), but really the murders are an excuse for Poirot to do his Poirot thing, and David Suchet is a marvelous Poirot. He owns that character. And I love the recurring side characters, too: Captain Hastings and Miss Lemon and Inspector Japp. In the later seasons they don’t always appear, but whenever they do I squeal with delight.

The X-Files. I saw the first half of season one, and… it’s just so nineties, you guys. I don’t mean the hair and the clothes - I don’t mind about those - but the mind-numbingly boring will-they-won’t-they sexual tensions (I already know they will, and I already know that I really, really don’t want them to) and the episodic storytelling.

I actually love episodic TV shows (see Poirot, above), but I think The X-Files would be almost immeasurably better if it had been written during the age of plot arcs. The fact that Mulder and Scully have to identify, tangle with, and (fail to) contain a new uncanny threat every single episode means that most of their antagonists feel woefully underexplored, and it also undermines the sense that these things are truly uncanny. After all, our heroes have figured them out in less than forty minutes.

KATHERINE BECKET, UNDERCOVER AS A RUSSIAN ASSASSIN. How does Castle keep giving me things I never knew I wanted??? Like, seriously, it is like they have a direct line to my brain.

And then they followed it up where the whole precinct redecorates like it's the seventies, and they all dress up and play seventies police precinct characters too - Becket attempting to act is beautiful. I love that this detail of her character is consistent, that she's not much of an actress, and that they manage to keep it consistent even during the episode where she's undercover. Basically she pulls it off by frowning a lot and not saying much. And now I want Becket and Natasha Romanov to meet, thank you, show. Maybe the actual Russian assassin who Becket impersonated was a schoolmate of Natasha's! -

Anyway. They're going to all this trouble (they got Castle's mother Martha to orchestrate it! SHE IS THE BEST) because they need to interview an old mob consigliere who went into such deep mourning after his mob boss died in 1978 that he still believes it's the seventies.

And I was all "He went into mourning so deep that he barely noticed the passing of forty years? For a friend? I am all for friendship, but come on." And then the show totally went there: the mob boss and the consigliere were in love! Which is an unusual twist for Castle and in between dying of laughter at the seventiesness of everything (they clearly had so much fun) I applaud them.

***

The one thing about season 6 that I'm not sure I'm fond of - I'm not sure I'm not fond of it, either; I think it will depend where it goes in the end - is that they've suddenly added a supernatural element to the show.

For the first five seasons, Castle came up with a lot of weird supernatural theories to explain crime scenes, and Becket always shot them down, and in the end Becket was always right: not necessarily about the exact method of the murder, but that it wasn't supernatural.

But in the sixth season, there are two episodes where is seems pretty clear (at least to me) that Castle's supernatural theories were proven right: there really was a time-traveling conspiracy, and that kid really did have psychokinetic powers. (He even pulled a Matilda where he danced inanimate objects around the room. I AM SO JEALOUS I HAVE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE ABLE TO DO THAT. Ahem.) And this week's invisibility episode is much the same. Okay, it's invisibility tech rather than actual wizardry, but sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, right?

On the one hand, this is super exciting and I think it will add a fun new variable to the mysteries: there really is a chance, however small, that something supernatural is going on.

On the other hand, I don't think the writers are going to be able to resist supernaturaling up their conspiracy, and the conspiracy is already slowly, insidiously infesting the whole show, like kudzu. Or possibly a strangler vine. The premise of the season (Castle was kidnapped by a mysterious secret organization that took away his memories because apparently he asked them to) already means that a ton of time gets devoted to the conspiracy.

I realize that arc story telling is all the rage on TV these days, but dammit, I want my case of the week format back. Castle did that really well (while also having character arcs going on in the margins around the cases, which they also did really well) and I see no evidence that the conspiracy is going to be half as delightful.

Day 26 - OMG WTF? season finale.

Um, I’m still kind of mad about the finale of Torchwood’s second season. Yes, kill all my favorite characters, why don’t you! One of them for the second time.

Of course, this saved me from watching any of the later seasons of Torchwood, so really it’s probably just as well.

Psych always seems to end its seasons with weird serial killer episodes that are really quite at odds with the goofy mysteries Psych does for most of the rest of the season. Castle also seems to end on weird conspiracy episodes, rather than their more straightforward crime-fighting episodes that are really much better. Presumably both shows have some rationales for this, but it seems weird that they both like to round off their seasons with stuff they do poorly, rather than by reminding their viewers of the things they do well.

1. Castle season five. I was worried that the show would go downhill now that Castle and Beckett got together. But aside from a couple hiccups early in the season - which are not even Caskett related, but a result of the Castle writers’ unfortunate and apparently growing fondness for conspiracy plots - it remains as delightful as ever. The sci fi convention episode, you guys! Castle’s comment that he’s fond of some space operas, like “that Joss Whedon show!” Beckett’s fervent defense of letting yourself love terrible things for their good parts!

(Beckett the secret nerd is a thing of beauty and a joy forever.)

I also enjoyed the Christmas episode. I am a total sucker for Christmas episodes and there were lots of sparkly decorations, but I also loved the meditative aspect of the episode, the themes about Christmas traditions and traditions in general and the way they change as life goes on - Ryan and Esposito’s old Christmas traditions shift now that Ryan is a married man (happy for Ryan, sad for Esposito; I really like how they deal with the changes Ryan’s marriage has wrought for their friendship.)

And Beckett got another great speech in this episode, about her Christmas tradition: standing guard at the precinct to watch over other people’s Christmases.

2. I’m almost caught up with New Girl. I would be entirely caught up with New Girl, except that the Fox people have apparently decided not to let the newest episodes online until eight days after they’ve aired. So if you missed an episode, there’s no way to catch up before the next one airs.

WHAT THE HECK, FOX? WHAT KIND OF POLICY IS THIS. DISAPPROVE.

I am growing increasingly certain that if someone drowned Schmidt in a bucket, nothing of value would be lost. I suspect that I am the only person in the world who feels this way about Schmidt.

3. I went to the cinema to see a Russian movie called Garpastum, which is about a couple of soccer-loving brothers in pre-Revolutionary St. Petersburg who are trying to make enough money to build a stadium. I feel like something must have been lost in translation, because I’m not actually sure what the point of this movie was, or if it even had one.

Their stadium must be much less expensive than what I envision when I think “stadium,” because they manage to hustle enough money to buy the field by betting on their street soccer games. Then they send a friend to buy the field, at which point the friend walks into some kind of feud and gets killed for seeing too much or something. Naturally the brothers lose their money, and then the revolution happens somewhere offscreen - we just skip over that part - and they never get their stadium.

Actually, maybe not having a point is the point? The brothers work hard to make these plans come true, but World War I and the Russian Revolution means that it all comes to naught.

Having a theme does not make the movie any less of a slog, but at least now I feel slightly less cheated.

Castle season 4 finale!

Castle and Beckett!

Beckett and Castle!

I would say FINALLY, except that I enjoyed every minute of Castle and Beckett’s four-season-long mating dance: the sexual tension simmering on the back burner, only very occasionally surfacing as an overt will-they-won’t-they, and coming to a boil just when it began to seem like the will-they-won’t-they was going to take over the show.

It’s unusual for me to like a canon couple quite as much as I like Castle and Beckett, and I think it is because the writers were content to let the romance simmer in the background. Often canon couples’ romance seems to be entirely about their romance - as if there’s nothing to their feelings for each other except the will-they-won’t-they - and while Castle and Beckett’s feelings for each other color all their interactions, of course

Castle loves Beckett for being so driven and tough and stopping at nothing to close her cases, and being, above all, so brave - and I think this is one of the reasons he’s so disappointed that she doesn’t acknowledge that he told her he loved her; because that refusal seems cowardly, and her bravery is one of the things he loves about her.

And Beckett loves Castle for being outwardly goofy and helping her loosen up, but inwardly - though he hides it well, so she doesn’t realize for a while - just as serious and driven as she is.

Anyway. I’m hoping that next season writers pick up Castle and Beckett’s disagreement from this episode again, because while it’s nice that Castle and Beckett have finally admitted they love each other, they still have some really awkward conversations that they need to get through. Chief among them - Beckett clearly won’t (and, in a sense, can’t) stop looking for the conspiracy that killed her mother, and Castle equally can’t stand to watch her put herself in harm’s way.

I’m thinking Castle is going to have to be the one to budge, both because Beckett is clearly immovable and because chasing the conspiracy clearly has more plot potential than hiding. Which means there will probably be more conspiracy episodes next season, sadface.

***

However, the next season won’t be out on DVD for a while, so I’m looking for something new to watch. I am thinking - The Borgias! Because Italy! And also the History Channel’s new Vikings series looks Relevant to My Interests, because almost canonical OT3!, (sineala linked these photos that is apparently the canon dialogue, OMG) - but I have also heard it is really boring, and that is kind of a dealbreaker, never mind the OT3.

People are forever telling me “You should watch X! It gets good after season Y!” My favorite for this is Buffy. No one agrees which season it gets good after after; I’ve heard all the way up to season 3. As if I’m going to waste 72 hours of my life watching a show on the assurance that eventually I’ll actually enjoy it. No, thank you, I expect my television to entertain me every episode.

I should probably give Bomb Girls one more episode to prove that it is up to the task...

I got to Castle episode 4.14 today, "The Blue Butterfly," and OMG you guys Castle has its own film noir forties AU episode! Castle is a PI, Becket is a gangster's moll, Ryan and Esposito are low-life gangsters (Ryan has an Irish accent!), Lanie is a singer, and it all takes place in a swanky 1940s bar.

This is the BEST THING EVER. All television shows should have film noir episodes. Castle wears a trenchcoat! Becket has beautiful forties hair!

Actually, I think Castle should do, like, a seasonal AU episode. THINK OF THE POSSIBILITIES. There could be an episode set in Edith Wharton's high society New York! Becket could wear a bustle and a giant ridiculous hat! (And possibility hit Wharton with a parasol? I can dream, right?) An episode about Dutch New York! Okay, that might be going back a bit farther than anyone else but me would want...

THINK OF THE POSSIBILITIES.

Other awesome Castle episodes in season 4: the superhero episode! An episode about a haunted house! An episode which I am pretty sure is six kinds of fanservice, featuring Castle and Becket waking up handcuffed together with no memory of how they got there! I am totally okay with this. (There was a tiger involved.)

I think it's kind of a shame that the Castle writers keeping drifting back to their overarching conspiracy plot, because really the show is at its most hilarious and interesting when it's doing ridiculous concept episodes.

I just found and interesting article about Little Free Libraries, which are like...a miniature bookcase, encased in a box shaped like a little house or an old-style telephone booth or whatever (it's only a matter of time before a Tardis-shaped Little Free Library pops up!), where people can take a book or leave a book.

I want one.

***

In other news, my friend Emma has gotten me watching Castle. We've seen the first five episodes, and occasionally I want to hit Castle upside the head with a blunt object, but so far Beckett has been thwacking him for me so it's not too annoying.

Also, the scene where he and his daughter play laser tag together is SO CUTE.