Monthly Archives: February 2013
Liz Tells Frank What Happened In “Continuum” (Sorta.)
Dear Frank,
Sometimes this blog is a place where I provide a genuine public service for you and others, by telling you everything you might need to know about a certain media item so that you never have to consume it yourself. And sometimes it is a place where I just tell you about something I liked recently, and urge you and others to check it out, and maybe I don’t reveal too much about it along the way to enable said checking-out.
We’re doing the second thing today. Continuum, Frank! A show worth checking out!
Well, very specifically, a show worth checking out if (like me) you cut your sci-fi teeth on The X-Files and other genre shows that were shot in Canada in the 1990s. I don’t know what it is about the combination of grey skies, pine trees, and low-budget special effects that I find so charming, but any time I even sniff a hint of Vancouver or Toronto in a show’s exterior shots, I feel like I’ve come home.
So Continuum, which is not only shot in Canada but IS CANADIAN and is actually SET IN CANADA, had an easy in with my heart. And we haven’t even gotten to the strong female protagonist yet! Read the rest of this entry
Liz Tells Frank Why She Struggles With “Walking Dead” But Loves “Warm Bodies”
Dear Frank,
It’s taken me more than a few years to understand why (despite being a total slut for any sort of fantasy or sci-fi narrative) I don’t really like zombie stories: They make for very hopeless storytelling. I can get on board with post-apocalypse narratives; I can get on board with horror. But zombie stories combine the two, often in a dark gruesome way, and goddamn if I’ve always failed to really engage with them.
The exception, though, happens because of love. Always because of love.
Let’s start with The Walking Dead. If I had been single in the year 2010, I would never have finished watching the first season; I didn’t hate it, but I found it awfully bleak for regular viewing.
However, I was not single in 2010, and the guy liked the show and didn’t have cable, so we watched it at my place — when Season 2 premiered a year later, after my relationship status had changed, I realized that on the bright side, I wouldn’t have to continue watching it. Read the rest of this entry
Liz Tells Frank What Happened In Netflix’s “House of Cards”
Dear Frank,
I think a lot about Hunter S. Thompson — admiring, as you do, his insane approach to the art of writing, and also the conceit of “gonzo journalism,” of throwing yourself into a situation with no idea what might result, except (hopefully) an article recounting what happened. Or, at the very least, the author’s memory of what happened.
It’s this fondness for Thompson that makes me do silly things like volunteer to watch Netflix’s House of Cards in one giant binge on opening day. I might not have taken on the assignment for GigaOM if I had steady work at the moment, but in this time of employment-seeking, it’s nice to prove that one of my job skills is being able to watch an entire season of television in one day.
I wrote about the feel of the binge-viewing experience already, but what actually happens in the David Fincher produced/occasionally-directed political thriller that might just change television as we know it forever? Frank, I’m glad you asked. Read the rest of this entry
Liz Tells Frank What Happened In... 