Review: Limitless

Show: Limitless
Network: CBS

I absolutely loved the film of the same name starring Bradley Cooper from 2011. I thought it was a tight piece of writing with just the right amount of suspense, humor, and character. The show delivers all of this as well, but tosses in that pesky cop/civilian trope that is so overdone (I mean, three of the five shows that I saw this week used that format). The show not only takes place in the same world as the movie, but Bradley Cooper actually made a guest appearance as his character.

Pros:
I really like how this particular show actually utilizes science fiction to its advantage. It takes something like drug addiction, turns it on its head by asking the question: what if the drug didn’t get you high, but made you really smart? Who wouldn’t be addicted to being the smartest person on the plant?

Another tick in the positive column is how they actually deal with teaming up the cop with a civilian. The cop and her boss actually have a conversation about it, and while I still don’t necessarily buy it, the show at least spends more than a sentence on the subject. Actually, the reason the main character is teamed up with the investigator is hit on very early, and then cemented later. The government has tried to reverse engineer the drug, but their test subjects went crazy and died; the main character has not. They see him as a tool, which I’m sure will lead to all kinds of tension later when this is made apparent to the main character.

Cons:
Again, this uses the very issue that I have complained about in almost all of my reviews so far. I don’t like these shows where a well-trained investigator is thrust together with an average person who is their literal complete opposite. Enough! Find another gimmick! While Watson was not exactly equal to Holmes’s intellect, he was far from the great detective’s opposite.

At first I thought this was actually going to pull off a miracle and not have an overlying story arc that will surface in some way in every episode—but I was wrong. In the last few moments, the investigator turns to the main character and reveals that she believes her father may have been high on the same super-drug, but that he turned up dead days later. Now she wants to use her partner and his access to the drug to track down who actually makes it and avenge her father’s death. Yeesh!

Is it worth your time?
Absolutely. The pilot was strong and left plenty of room for growth. If they stay on track and follow everything they have laid down, it will be quite good (as long as CBS doesn’t pull out too soon and leave us with another Journeyman).

Will I keep watching?
Absolutely. I will keep watching this show until it starts going downhill—which can happen very quickly anymore.

Review: Scream Queens

Show: Scream Queens
Network: Fox

If you like American Horror Story, Scream, and other shows of that nature, then you might like Scream Queens. It’s the story of a sorority house plagued by a masked killer with something to avenge. Now if that seems more like a 90-minute movie instead of a weekly drama, then you aren’t alone. But Fox seems to have some idea where they want to go, and it goes well beyond just the standard slasher fare.

Pros:
Well, if you were a huge fan of MTV’s Scream, then this is right up your alley. Also, if you like girls in their underwear being murdered, then you have also hit on a winner.

Jaime Lee Curtis! She’s a pot-smoking, student-boinking dean of students and she is a wicked bitch! I could watch hours of just her interacting with life on a college campus.

Cons:
This show fails in so many ways. First of all, the show can’t seem to figure out who the main character is. They bounce around so much that I just can’t tell. Also, I really hate the Chanel character (played by Emma Roberts, who made her bones playing a similar character on American Horror Story: Coven and Freak Show). But I don’t hate her because she’s vile and detestable and shallow and a waste of humanity. I hate her because she is so over-the-top with these characteristics; as in, going the extra mile to pull out every cliché and trope in the “bitch” bag of tricks.

Another stumbling block is that I don’t care about any of the characters—especially those who are being killed off. They are just in the show to die and they add nothing to the overall story.

This show also fails to really have their big names pay off. Besides Jaime Lee Curtis, the show starred Ariana Grande, who I am familiar enough with to know she is a bigger name than deserves to be killed off in the first reel. If there are going to be other guest stars in the future, I hope they take better advantage of their talents and names.

Finally, like the much-better counterpart, Scream, there are far too many red herrings. And for as early as we are in the show, there are just too damn many. Scream did a good job of at least giving all of the red herrings plausible motive to be the killer. Scream Queens, on the other hand, is just tossing clichés at the wall and seeing what sticks.

Is it worth your time?
Probably not. There is some humor, but be prepared to severely suspend your belief of how the real world works. Also, I wouldn’t get too wrapped up in any of the characters, because they will probably bite the big one more quickly than George R. R. Martin can decide to kill characters he’s spent decades building up.

Will I keep watching?
I’ll give this another episode to get interesting, otherwise I’m going to pass because there are far better horror shows on TV now-a-days that I don't need a fix that bad.

Review: The Muppets

Show: The Muppets
Network: ABC

When it was announced that the Muppets would be returning to TV in their own show on primetime, I was more than a little excited. I’m not as big a fan of the Muppets as some might be, but I have always loved their particular style of humor and wit.

Pros:

The writing was good; it felt somewhat natural. Well, as natural as talking wads of felt and fabric can be.

Cons:

As much as it pains me, this show had a lot of faults.

For starters, it was dark. I mean, the maudlin Kermit was a brash departure from his usual go-with-the-flow kind of character. He was borderline depressed throughout the whole episode, even when he was interacting with his new pig girlfriend—whose character is so underdeveloped that I don’t even know her name off the top of my head. This leads into my second complaint.

It was far too serious for a Muppets show. The serious overtones of Kermit and Miss Piggy’s breakup were the main point of the show, and led to the revelation of why and how the two fictional characters broke up: after more than 40 years, Kermit finally got fed up with Piggy’s disregard for his feelings. Another situation that was kind of played very heavy-handed was the overt allusions to antisemitism when the character of Fozzie bear meets his girlfriend’s parents for dinner. The parents make generalizations about bears that Fozzie finds uncomfortable, while the mother tries to be polite and ends up being too sensitive. And none of the jokes were on point. They all seemed to miss the mark just slightly. And gone was the humor and intelligent wit that they had been a staple of the Muppets for many years. It was all just…dry.

My final letdown was that the show isn’t breaking any new ground for the Muppets. This is an “update” from the original 1970s show where the Muppets are struggling to put on a television variety program—only now they are using the format (and possibly the set) for The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon with Miss Piggy as the talk show host. Only with the reality show premise of The Office that is so overdone in comedy now that even Gonzo pokes fun at the cliché. If they really wanted to draw me in the writers could have done something different, like have them running a talent agency representing all kinds of bizarre clients—some being the celebrity guest of the week. 

Is it worth your time?

It really depends on how big a fan you are of the Muppets. If you are a casual fan, like myself, you might find this show dry and lackluster. If you are a die-hard fan, you might like it just because of the fact that something you like is back on TV and that might blind you a little to the shortcomings.

Will I keep watching?

The show has set up that Kermit and Miss Piggy will be getting back together, and that will probably make things a little more normal. But truth-be-told, I don’t have high hopes for this show. I think society has changed too much and we apparently want our kids watching primetime sitcoms that emphasize sex jokes, white guilt, and more stereotypes than you can name. Gone are the days where the Muppets used clever writing to disguise innuendo; where anyone can watch and laugh. I will watch another two episodes, but if I don’t get the Muppets I know and love, I’m done.