Unpopular TV Opinions You Hold

I love Season 4 and 5 of Angel. My cable has been out since Friday night and those two dvd sets were the first ones I picked up.

I really loved the second half of season 4 with the Jasmine storyline (minus the Connor/Cordelia sex, ew). I especially loved the Dark Wesley stuff in the beginning too.

I liked season 4 (especially after Jasmine showed up) of Angel and season 2 of Downton, too. I also thought it was soapy from the beginning, and as long as it stayed soapy with pretty Edwardian dresses and snarky Dowager quips, I was happy. Just because it's historical doesn't mean it has to be deep (or that my enjoyment of it needs to be deep, anyway).

And the last time I watched such scheming, villainy villains as Thomas and O'Brien, I think my age was in the single digits and it was a Saturday morning cartoon. I think they actually got a bit more human in the second season.

After trying to watch the pilot episode several times, I've been forced into a troubling realization: I can't seem to get into Firefly. I like Whedon, I like Fillon, I've enjoyed the actors in other roles, but I can't even begin to feign interest in the show itself.

I had the same problem with the pilot - took so many tries to even finish it. Once I got past that, though, I really enjoyed the rest. Still never rewatched the pilot though!

The pilot is kind of terrible. I tried to watch it alone and stopped about 15 minutes in. A few years later some friends who are big Firefly fans picked out their favorite episodes and we watched them together. That worked very well. I even went back and finished the pilot.

Since the pilot didn't actually air first, you could skip right to "The Train Job" (which sounds like a Leverage episode) since things were rewritten so it could function as a sort of pilot. You won't be lost. I didn't get really into the series until the fourth episode "Shindig" (which actually aired third, since they showed the pilot last). Once I got really hooked, I found I could enjoy rewatching the first few episodes which didn't really grab me the first time around.

I liked (but not loved) Serenity, but I never got into Firefly, and honestly, at this stage of the game, I can't be bothered.

I can't get past the bad attempts at Chinese. I don't even speak Mandarin and the bad accents was like nails on a chalkboard as imitated by a squeaky marker.

Is it unpopular to think that Serenity was way better than Firefly? Film is a different medium than serial episodes, obviously. The show grew on me, but I thought the movie was so much more cohesive and compelling than the entire series (which I realize was a rocky first season...but still). I feel like the movie reined everything in whereas the series was a mishmash of incomplete characterization and worldbuilding.

I watched Serenity without ever having watched Firefly, and I loved them both, but Serenity stands on its own well enough. It's obviously not necessary to have seen the series to know what the movie's about.

They over did the Western elements in the tv show and everytime they left the ship it was "Planet Back Lot".

The Dude wrote:They over did the Western elements in the tv show and everytime they left the ship it was "Planet Back Lot".

Yeah, the Western motif is what really did me in on this show. It doesn't make sense that people who can travel the vast distances of space and terraform planets would then throw up a shantytown and live like the Amish. The best eps were the ones set on the ship or more advanced planets.

My Supernatural UO:

I'm not particularly fond of Dean. This is partly because I just watched S1-S5 on DVD and from S4 on, it turned into The Dean Show. It's all about Dean, his manpain, the way he sacrificed his chance at normality, his miserable childhood, etc., with every episode featuring his Single Manly Tear Of Emo Manpain. Unlike Sam, who apparently had a great childhood, never sacrificed anything, etc. That, and I don't get why Sam is held solely responsible for the apocolypse that Dean started. Hey Dean, why don't YOU jump in the pit! The end of Swan Song really irked me. Dean goes driving off to Lisa's place, and we're supposed to feel bad for him because his fee fees are hurting, meanwhile, Sam is being tortured in hell. Again, it's all about his manpain.

Is it unpopular to think that Serenity was way better than Firefly? Film is a different medium than serial episodes, obviously. The show grew on me, but I thought the movie was so much more cohesive and compelling than the entire series (which I realize was a rocky first season...but still). I feel like the movie reined everything in whereas the series was a mishmash of incomplete characterization and worldbuilding. .

Totally agree.

I like Firefly, I still own the DVDs, but I'm also so glad it was cancelled. Because it was the type of show that could, no, would start to suck really, really fast as it went on. There was a lot of tangled-up backstory you could see trying to peek through the episodes, and I'm glad the show never got a chance to go all "Lost" on us. We've all seen it a hundred times: show has a good first season, then it plummets in its sophomore year. Or if it makes it okay past that, starts to drag on and on in its fifth or sixth season and you start wanting the show to die already so you can have closure. Serenity gave the perfect closure to Firefly and I never want any more.

Mulva wrote:Yeah, the Western motif is what really did me in on this show. It doesn't make sense that people who can travel the vast distances of space and terraform planets would then throw up a shantytown and live like the Amish. The best eps were the ones set on the ship or more advanced planets.

Yes! This always really bothered me about Firefly, even though I liked a lot of other stuff about it. They just tried too hard to blend together the Sci-fi and Western genres, shoehorning in Western stuff when it really didn't make any sense at all. These people can travel the stars but some folks still get burnt as witches? Why are there horses? When did the unwashed cowboy look make a big comeback? They'd have been much better off focusing on trying to capture the frontier spirit of Westerns rather than being so literal about it.

That and despite Wheedon's notion that the US and China were the two powers to open space we never saw any Asian people.

This is more unpopular on the Internets but I still really like Modern Family and think its still really good.

As a sign that I'm probably spending too much time reading tumblr...the Sherlock and Elementary kerfuffle is souring me on both shows. I love the BBC version, but only go into "trusted" fandom spaces because some of the reactions have been vile: I've seen racism, sexism and classism directed at Elementary as a show, at the characters on that show, at Lucy Liu in particular. It's been ugly, and I'm not surprised that the Elementary fandom is wary of the BBC fandom in general, because the ones who have been nasty have been at it for so long and been so loud about it that they're sometimes drowning out everything else with their shrieking.

OTOH, this has created an atmosphere where I think the Elementary fandom is reluctant to look at their own show in the critical way they watch the BBC version. Because, yeah, the BBC version has issues with its portrayal of race and gender in particular (and some misinformed notions about mental health issues thrown in for good measure, though the fandom is also really distorting what's presented in canon there IMO). Elementary isn't free of sexism, ableism and classism either, at least it hasn't been in the first three episodes. And since I like discussions about the shows I'm watching it's sort of annoying that there doesn't seem all that much acknowledgement about these things? Criticism isn't hateful bashing. Admitting that a favourite show does problematic things doesn't make anyone a "bad fan".

I think you are me. I've soured on Sherlock more than Elementary, but I think it's because of how Sherlock's crew -- Moffat, Gatiss, Brealey (until she backpedaled massively) and the British press are acting like CBS ate their baby or something. I don't understand why if you're a professional in the business you'd be talking so much smack about a show in public and on the record, especially since there is a chance that you'd be working with those people.

Elementary fans can also be a bit hyperdefensive at times -- they don't seem to realize that every slight doesn't need a response. And you don't need to be shrieking over it like the critics said something awful about your mother.

Oooh I really like Elementary, but then I would never hold a fandom against it's source material (although the Supernatural/Veronica Mars people certainly tried my patience). And while I think objectively and dispassionately the BBC version is more arty and 'good' I far far and away enjoy Elementary more. But I have been crazy in love with JLM for ages and ages and I love that his tatted up body and his tongue are part of the Sherlock canon now. As well I like Lucy Lui as Watson. Also I think I HATE BC as Sherlock. Is he more true to the source? Yep. Is he also the most assiest version of the whole ass that is Sherlock? YUP.

See, I would totally be with you normally, but I've been watching on the sidelines since the announcement happened (and I won't lie, I side-eyed CBS' announcement too, but got over it) and it's been nothing but vitriol and it's still going on. It's like the Sherlock folks are Taylor Swift and CBS is John Mayer or something. I really am not getting any joy out of Sherlock now, which sucks, because I do like it and it's a completely different animal than Elementary.

I don't blame Moffat, Gatiss, etc., being a little peeved about how things went, but I can't help but think that this public snark (especially when Moffat was all "THIS WILL RUIN THE BRAND" -- as if he created Holmes) from them is kind of like a validation for people to be horrible to each other. It also just seems so tasteless to be talking about this in public. There's a difference between saying "I can't believe those cocksuckers are doing this on the heels of us," to your friends and doing it on public blast.

So I guess for me, it's that everyone's been kind of pissy about it that makes me lose my taste for something. You never saw Ritchie, etc., talking about how Sherlock was stealing their thunder (not that they really had anything to worry about, but still). Fans can talk and that's fine, but when the producers and crew of a show start publicly saying shit? That's when the taste goes out of my mouth. That's just some crass behavior there.

LOL, if being a Disney mouse didn't ruin the brand, I don't think being a CBS procedural will either. I also think if you're going to use a public domain source, maybe you shouldn't be so territorial.

I'm glad I've stayed out of the fandom/showrunner(!) kerfuffles entirely. I enjoyed the BBC series when I watched it, and I enjoy the CBS series, in no small part because it is smart enough I don't feel insulted but easy enough that I can still enjoy it when I watch when I'm dead exhausted after work. (The BBC series, I need a clearer mind for, not to mention a bit more free time.) Johnny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu have great chemistry (not romantic chemistry, honestly--I don't actually see sexual tension there) but so do Eggs Benedict and Martin Freeman. I think it's cool that I get to watch two talented actors do two different interpretations of a the same classic character in a contemporary setting. (Even without the gender switch, Watson seems to have had more variation over the various versions.)

The criticism I don't get at ALL is the "making Watson a woman is homophobic!" There isn't any canon gay relationship, and the wink-wink-nudge-nudge way the BBC show handles it---well, it's not remotely progressive, and compared to the number of openly gay characters (many of whom are in relationships) that have been on TV*, THAT seems more actively homophobic than changing a character who has been officially a platonic relationship into a woman.

*sidenote: I have no idea how common gay characters/relationships are British television, since what I can get of that is a lot more limited. But I don't think US popular culture is exactly ahead of the UK on queer acceptance.

Heh, I guess I'll be adding another UO: I don't agree that JLM's Holmes is less of an ass than BC's Sherlock. JLM's Sherlock is more manipulative and can package his assholery in a more "socially pleasant" fashion, but he's just as nasty as BC's Sherlock IMO. He reminds me a bit of Patrick Jane in that respect. I also think that the BBC version of the character is just as vulnerable and emotional as the CBS version, it's just expressed in different ways.

Another Sherlock UO: John Watson is just as bad as Sherlock. Theirs is a dysfunctional, mutally enabling relationship. I love their chemistry, but IMO part of its greatness is how screwed up it is. And John absolutely contributes to that. He's a jerk to his girlfriends. He's not above looking the other way when Sherlock throws people out the window, or shooting people in cold blood himself. He regularly resorts to "you're not human" nonsense when he's upset with Sherlock. This is what I find delightful about the BBC version: They're both so screwed up and scary in complementary ways LOL.

But Holmes (in all the stories I've read), isn't all sunshine and lollipops. He's an ass at times, so all the Holmeses should have that arrogance and manipulation in mind. It's just a matter of how they do it.

I always think of it as the emotional maturity, how old are they scale. BC's Holmes is like the one we first meet in A Study in Scarlet -- he's just isolated, young and emotionally clueless. RDJ and JLM's Holmeses are a little older, still clueless, but they're learning how to behave a bit in society. Brett's Holmes and Canon Holmes are later in life, when they've really realized that to manipulate people, you need a little sugar at times to get what you want.

As for the homophobic argument, I don't even know where to start with that one. I personally think there's some misogyny in there along with a queer fetish thing going on. It's not like Moffat and Gatiss are going to write a big sex scene for Holmes and Watson for the next series. They're going to continue queer-baiting because they know fandom wants that. The self-congratulatory feeling sometimes about that just annoys the fuck out of me. Baiting fandom isn't progressive -- it's called milking a cash cow.