Monday, July 24, 2006

Shakespeare would be working for the BBC

Have you seen BBC America lately? They just keep hitting them out of the park. The Footballers Wives would kick the crap out of those weak bitches on Wysteria Lane, and rumor has it Life on Mars is another brilliant piece of fiction. It premieres this week.

I've been watching a lot of Hex recently, so MAJOR SPOILER WARNING if you're into that show and didn't see the last episode. The writers went balls out on the way to the season finale.

Cassy is the main character on that show. Blonde, pretty, a talented witch in a line of mystical ancestors, and she recently got pregnant with a seemingly evil demon baby who has yet to do anything particularly objectionable. Her best friend is a lesbian ghost. They kept building up that the ghost was finally going to disappear soon. Her days were numbered; even she accepted it as an inevitablility. No more Thelma.

Then, in the middle of a ritual Cassy jumped under the knife to save her baby, sending her into some dark shadowy oblivion. It happened suddenly, and Thelma had about thirty seconds to say goodbye, but it was long enough to send tears down my face.

They killed off the main character. Killed her in a way that I'd be hard pressed to see how they'd bring her back. It was like something they would have done on Angel, like when they killed off Fred but more shocking because of its suddenness. Good on the writers. They convinced me that Thelma the ghost was out, then killed off the lead. A ballsy move. I can't think of a show on the air in America that would have taken that risk with the story.

If you haven't seen Hex, check it out. The writers have cajones the size of Great Britain.

4 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:06 AM

    I'd love to see what kind of TV show Shakespeare would create. It would be terribly interesting, if a bit inaccessible.

    I contend that David Mamet is a modern Shakespeare, at least in terms of his use of language.

    So we'll see if he ever does a TV show.

    And I so don't have time for a new TV show. I just got the 5th season of Smallville and I'm ripping through watching those. And then I have to catch up on Entourage. But Hex sounds interesting, so I'll have to give it a look.

    Did you ever see the British show Spaced? Now that was a comedy.

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  2. Anonymous4:05 PM

    He's doing The Unit. First season reruns run on Fri. night, CBS. Top ten show so far. Hope it sticks around. Wanna spec it.

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  3. I've only seen a few things that David Mamet has written, and I haven't watched The Unit at all. I'll have to pay more attention to his work.

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  4. Anonymous8:34 PM

    Wow, I gotta check out The Unit, now. Though I've never been into CBS shows.

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