Jericho: And So It Ends

This weekend I bid an old friend goodbye. It was already departed; long departed, really. I was holding onto its memory as a little piece of hope and a way to preserve the effort that went into giving it a second lease on life.

I've blogged a whole lot about Jericho before here, including how much I enjoyed its excellent narrative, the fan effort to save the show for a second season after the first season's cliffhanger, and CBS' decision to actually renew the show for seven more episodes. I think it was pretty obvious at the time that those seven episodes were a bit of a 'Hail Mary' - a way to shut fans up, to stop the boxes of nuts arriving at CBS headquarters, and (thankfully) to give the narrative its much-needed closure.

In the meantime I've done a lot of things: moved to London, convinced other people to watch the show, even sat down at the same table as the executive at CBS who made the decision to renew the show (her name is Nancy T., and she's exceptionally cool) and discussed the nuts campaign with her. But what I never did until this weekend was watch the rest of the second season. I saw the first three episodes, then I stopped.

Why? The episodes move really fast, and almost all of them are cliffhangers themselves. I loved the show. Why wouldn't I watch?

Because I didn't want it to be over.

I enjoy the journey as much as I enjoy the destination, and with Jericho it was easier to leave it sitting on my table than to watch the last three hours of the show and complete it. I vaguely knew what would happen by reading summaries on the Internet, but it was still an unreal abstraction.

This weekend though I thought I'd go ahead and bid Jericho goodbye.

I'm glad I did. The last seven episodes form a hell of a good story arc. The show takes a decidedly different turn, heading into 24 territory for a little while. I wanted more of the small-town stuff that made the first season so great, and that drew me into the show in the first place, but I really liked where they took the show as far as the connections they drew between the plot and historical contexts. (I won't spoil it for you, it was a pretty nifty reveal.) It was a satisfying ending, and although I wanted the show to continue I was content with the story as it was.

I actually felt very similar to how I felt when another cultish favorite show of mine ended, Carnivale. The story could be further developed - but it didn't need to be. The characters can live on in imagination, or you can simply take their story as a start-to-finish plot, like a nice book you come back to read from time to time.

Reckon I'll be doing just that in a little while.

Thanks for all the awesomeness, Jericho. You will be missed, gone but not forgotten.

Summer Movies

28 Weeks Later.

Pirates 3.

I'm just not excited about Spiderman 3.

That's my list. Anyone got anything else I need to watch?

Oh yeah, and the Simpsons movie. But part of me doesn't want to go. After all, the South Park movie was the point where that series jumped the shark for me.

Of course, the Simpsons did it like seven seasons ago.

Weekend Watch: BSG

This weekend was Battlestar Galactica-a-riffic. Which is to say I finally got caught up on the series (thank you TV shows on DVD!) and watched the DVRed Season 3 premiere from last Friday night.

I admit that I avoided BSG due in no small part to the number of people who recommended it to me. Typically I will listen to a small number of friends who know me really well and share my tastes, who tell me "hey, you should check this out." When people I don't necessarily like or I know have poor taste tell me "hey, you should check this out," it's kind of like a Jason Repellant - it's a great way to keep me away from something.

But BSG turned out to be pretty damn good. Liz thought so too, which surprised me. And like I said, we are all caught up and ready for the new season.

The show's ambiguity is its best feature (it's pacing, however, it its worst: just a little too slow.) Are the humans supposed to represent America, or the Arab world, or Europe during World War II? What are the Cylons supposed to represent? Or are they supposed to represent anything at all, and instead just provide a scenario to explore what makes us human - or our relationships with the other members of our race?

It's one part Frankenstein (in that the Cylons are struggling to overcome the context in which they were created), one part Starship Troopers (how do you wage a war against an overwhelming enemy, and what do you sacrifice to win that war?), and one part Mad Max. And many other influences all coming together to create something worthwhile.

I'm optimistic about the direction the show will take this season, in a way I haven't been about a TV show for quite some time - especially a show that's not on HBO.