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capri0mniFor as long as I can remember,* I've had a hard time dealing with suspense and scariness coming out of ye old TeeVee Boxxe, especially when the Suspenseful Music swells. From a very early age, I learned to tell, from the music, and the plot, down to the second, almost, when the gun was going to be fired, or the bad guy was going to burst through the door.
When I was a young girl, and did not have control over the channel switcher, I'd stick my fingers in my ears and close my eyes (much to the amusement of my parents), until just after the climax in the action. Then, I'd rejoin the story in time to see the consequences, and how the characters dealt with it.
When I became and adult, and had my own hand on the channel switcher, I learned to keep track of several stories at once, flipping back and forth between two or three, keeping track of the timing of each plot simultaneously in my head, and flipping back to my chosen favorite for the final scene (and it works, mostly, even though I may miss some key details -- but not very much, if I may be so bold as to boast about my 1337 story-following skills)
Okay, now that you know, I'll post my own reactions to the finales of Bones (Monday), and NCIS (Tuesday), even though, in total, I only watched about 15-20 minutes of each episode.
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alto2 pointed out, the writers gratuitously assassinated the character of poor Zach... throughout his time on the show, he's been written as the most brilliant member of the team. He's also been the one written as the one least comfortable with violence (earlier -- was it this season, or last? -- he tried to sign up for the Iraq war, and was sent home by his superiors because he couldn't handle it). And even though he was the youngest member of the team, he was also extremely confident in his own abilities. So -- What were they smoking when they thought it credible that he'd be the one to get sucked into to the lair of a human-sacrifising, mass murdering, conspiracist?
The only thing I can think of, that makes any sense at all, is that this is another example of the American attitude that I wrote about in this rant about anti-intellectualism that I posted back in March. The one-sentance version goes like this: "Intellegence far above the average is unnatural, and anyone who posesses it is not to be trusted, and is inherently dangerous." It seems like the writers were relying on the unquestioned acceptance of this trope to make that "plot twist" even remotely believable.
Also, they have a new young and uber-geeky character in that psychologist guy, and there's no room for two geeks in a sexy crime drama, don't you know...
Okay, I did miss the plot point where the director died in the first hour (I was online, and let the clock get away from me -- also, I'd forgotten that this was really two seperate episodes spliced together, because of the writers' strike, instead of being written as a single two-hour episode, which alters the suspense rhythm. So I was completely baffled as to why the 'director' was suddenly speaking with a Russian accent. ...Don't mind me, my set's gone bad, and I couldn't see her face very clearly. Thanks to online episode reviews, though, this lj-cut will be "WTF?!"-free.
Anyway, it's totally believable that the new director would split up the team. From the beginning, he never trusted their closeness, and, realistically, if their allegiences are stronger for each other than for the government that gives them their missions, they probably would be broken up.
I don't expect them to stay broken up, however (after all, a couple of seasons ago, Gibbs himself quit the team). And in the meantime, Abby and Ducky will still be there to play the role of the core of the team. And that's a good thing (NCIS is one show where the geeks do get some respect, and are not stereotypes). Also, I may actually like the new characters.
*Two years old, for the record -- and don't believe the psychologists who say that no one can remember that far back, because I know it started when my parents were fans of Star Trek, TOS, and that was 1966 (long before syndication and vhs). And I wasn't scared, so much, by the monsters, but by the ray guns the humans always shot at the monsters.
When I was a young girl, and did not have control over the channel switcher, I'd stick my fingers in my ears and close my eyes (much to the amusement of my parents), until just after the climax in the action. Then, I'd rejoin the story in time to see the consequences, and how the characters dealt with it.
When I became and adult, and had my own hand on the channel switcher, I learned to keep track of several stories at once, flipping back and forth between two or three, keeping track of the timing of each plot simultaneously in my head, and flipping back to my chosen favorite for the final scene (and it works, mostly, even though I may miss some key details -- but not very much, if I may be so bold as to boast about my 1337 story-following skills)
Okay, now that you know, I'll post my own reactions to the finales of Bones (Monday), and NCIS (Tuesday), even though, in total, I only watched about 15-20 minutes of each episode.
As
alto2 pointed out, the writers gratuitously assassinated the character of poor Zach... throughout his time on the show, he's been written as the most brilliant member of the team. He's also been the one written as the one least comfortable with violence (earlier -- was it this season, or last? -- he tried to sign up for the Iraq war, and was sent home by his superiors because he couldn't handle it). And even though he was the youngest member of the team, he was also extremely confident in his own abilities. So -- What were they smoking when they thought it credible that he'd be the one to get sucked into to the lair of a human-sacrifising, mass murdering, conspiracist?The only thing I can think of, that makes any sense at all, is that this is another example of the American attitude that I wrote about in this rant about anti-intellectualism that I posted back in March. The one-sentance version goes like this: "Intellegence far above the average is unnatural, and anyone who posesses it is not to be trusted, and is inherently dangerous." It seems like the writers were relying on the unquestioned acceptance of this trope to make that "plot twist" even remotely believable.
Also, they have a new young and uber-geeky character in that psychologist guy, and there's no room for two geeks in a sexy crime drama, don't you know...
Okay, I did miss the plot point where the director died in the first hour (I was online, and let the clock get away from me -- also, I'd forgotten that this was really two seperate episodes spliced together, because of the writers' strike, instead of being written as a single two-hour episode, which alters the suspense rhythm. So I was completely baffled as to why the 'director' was suddenly speaking with a Russian accent. ...Don't mind me, my set's gone bad, and I couldn't see her face very clearly. Thanks to online episode reviews, though, this lj-cut will be "WTF?!"-free.
Anyway, it's totally believable that the new director would split up the team. From the beginning, he never trusted their closeness, and, realistically, if their allegiences are stronger for each other than for the government that gives them their missions, they probably would be broken up.
I don't expect them to stay broken up, however (after all, a couple of seasons ago, Gibbs himself quit the team). And in the meantime, Abby and Ducky will still be there to play the role of the core of the team. And that's a good thing (NCIS is one show where the geeks do get some respect, and are not stereotypes). Also, I may actually like the new characters.
*Two years old, for the record -- and don't believe the psychologists who say that no one can remember that far back, because I know it started when my parents were fans of Star Trek, TOS, and that was 1966 (long before syndication and vhs). And I wasn't scared, so much, by the monsters, but by the ray guns the humans always shot at the monsters.
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no subject
Date: 2008-05-21 08:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-21 08:33 pm (UTC)(And don't even get me started on the AllTel [sp?] commercials. Those are just ugly, and the main reason I'd never consider using them as my carrier...)
no subject
Date: 2008-05-22 09:44 pm (UTC)Jim RobinsonTom Morrow will make a triumphant return to smack Vance in the mouth and tell him he's an arse and he's being sent to their Dundee office or something.no subject
Date: 2008-05-22 10:27 pm (UTC)Someone in the replies posted the speculation/hope that the team will find out some way to work together, anyway, find out Vance's dark secret, and get rid of him.
In the meantime, Abby and Ducky are still around, and they are my favorites, anyway. :-)