If Raising Hope shows the “trailer trash” side of life, The Middle has its finger pressed firmly on what is so funny about sloppy, suburban existence. The writers and actors are adept at mining comic gold from this all too normal Heck family and the problems they have, from frantic Mom Frankie to stoic Dad Mike, the oldest teen boy Axl who doesn’t apply himself, eats everything in sight, plays guitars and video games, and usually goes around shirtless, the daughter Sue who is a bundle of goofy, frenetic energy, and finally the youngest boy Brick, a weird yet charming little kid obsessed with books and with strange ways, and I wouldn't be surprised if the fictional family doesn't find out at some point that he has Asperser’s.
But there is something else I like about this sitcom. It dares to deal with issues that are somewhat controversial, such as Christianity and homosexuality (Sue’s first boyfriend is obviously gay, and she loves her hippie-ish youth group leader from church, both of them clichéd, but handled well). Yet, like most other sitcoms that deal with such topics, they don’t just automatically come down on the side of the politically-correct liberal, but try to look at it from all sides, including the conservative side, and wind up being more thought provoking because of it. On one recent episode, when the youngest boy Brick has questions about the Bible, Sue has her youth group leader speak to him a couple of times, and she is very upset when her brother isn’t just “fixed”. Although the youth pastor character is still a cliché, he correctly tells Sue that he’s done what he can, but it is ultimately up to Brick as to whether or not he becomes a believer. Compare that with most other sitcoms where Christians are usually portrayed as overbearing and shrill, goody-two-shoe rabble-rousers who are, unlike the enlightened regulars, completely clueless about modern life.
 |
| image from http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20459145,00.html |
On The Closer, I'm behind on my DVR, but so far, Brenda and the team have to be so careful now, because somebody has it in for them! When investigating a crime scene, they now have to be so cautious not to do or say the wrong thing, lest they add another lawsuit to the pile instigated by that slimy and villainous attorney Peter Goldman, well played by Curtis Armstrong. So now they have to fill in logs down to the minutest details, and it appears to be sucking the life right out of them, such as in Captain Sharon Raydor (Mary McDonnell), who is so unhappy having to micro-manage the team now that she desperately wants a transfer!
I know what that’s like, though I didn't heed the warning signs to be extra careful and diligent. But really, who wants to have to work like that anyway, having to tippy-toe around and fill out intricate logs for fear of unfair repercussions? For whatever reason, this attorney wants to drag Brenda down, and in the finale to last season, when he started bringing up case upon case upon case and calling into question all of her actions and decisions, Kyra Sedgwick did so well playing the character as putting on a brave face, with a professional mask, like she has been able to do with so many criminals, yet you can see the break in that mask in her eyes, and so can that lawyer, and the camera pulled down to her hands, which were shaking. I’ve been there! When somebody wants you gone, they can find a reason. I’m sure I could have been extra careful with the person I once considered a friend, if I had wanted to. But this is the way the world works, and that old job of mine simply wasn't worth it.
A show like The Closer ties in with real life, and keeps it fresh and exciting. Of all the police procedurals we watch, including Castle, The Mentalist, Unforgettable, NCIS, and Blue Bloods, The Closer is actually the only one I would consider buying as a series because the characters and plots are just so well written and understandable. I like all these police shows, but they can often get rather mundane, and I absolutely love the characters on NCIS, but I usually don’t quite understand the plots and the Tom Clancy-like cases the team is assigned to investigate. But The Closer doesn’t ever seem to be mundane, and I can follow it. I don’t mind all the police politics like I do with some of these other shows. There are some really good police procedurals these days, and I’d include the Law & Order’s and CSI’s on that list as well, and The Closer stands among them as one of the best.
 |
I don’t know what it is, but fairy tales and fantasy seem to be all the rage these days. There are two new Snow White movies being released soon (Mirror, Mirror with Julia Roberts and the darker Snow White and the Huntsman with Charlize Theron), and there's Ever After, Enchanted, Red Riding Hood, Alice in Wonderland, the Shrek movies and Puss in Boots, The Brothers Grimm, lighter, modern day twists on the theme, such as Sydney White, and even shows like Grimm and Supernatural have entertained allusions to those old fairy tales. I guess a show like Once Upon a Time was therefore inevitable, and owes as much to films like Enchanted, Red Riding Hood, and Shrek as it does to the tales of the Grimm Brothers and Walt Disney’s classic retelling of other books and stories by the likes of JM Barrie, Lewis Carroll and Carlo Collodi. What an interesting twist on this idea! It’s basically the plot of Enchanted, though the fairy tale world these characters come from is much darker than the cartoon world of that film, and the characters, not knowing where they come from and of their true existence, are quite different from Amy Adams’ and James Marsden’s more enchanted take on the premise. The focus here, so far, is not so much on Snow White and Prince Charming, or their modern day equivalents of elementary school teacher Mary Margaret Blanchard and reawakened coma patient David Nolan as it is upon the rivalry between Jennifer Morrison’s Emma Swan and Lana Parrilla’s manipulative Mayor Regina Mills, and with the Mayor’s “son” Henry (who is actually Emma’s son) caught in the crossfire. The show usually goes back and forth between these characters’ fairy tale pasts and their present existence in the town of Storybrooke. Not even the Evil Queen who used this spell on them all can remember her own past, yet the true nature of each of these characters can be seen in their modern day doppelgangers. I like this show because it opens up and expands the possibilities of what entertainment can mean. Let’s just hope it isn't eventually watered down because the network can’t maintain the budget, like what has happened on The Walking Dead with the ousting of Frank Darabond over budget issues. Sometimes it works, but business and art don’t always make for the most comfortable or lucrative of relationships. Just ask anybody on the artistic side life, whether it be writers or actors, musicians, or even famous painters like Michelangelo and Van Gogh! The two sides don’t always play together nicely.  |
No comments:
Post a Comment