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by Rick Norwood
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SF on TV | |
I have a copy of the Harlan Ellison script of the Hugo Award winning episode of Star Trek, "The City on
the Edge of Forever," and at one point he gives the following directions to an actor: Run all out. Don't just
saunter across the set. Sauntering across the set is bad. Stopping to engage in a soul-searching dialogue is worse.
I enjoyed the action-packed ending of Last Resort. The characters and acting are excellent. But
it only lasted half a season, and will probably go the way of Defying Gravity, another sf tv show with
good characters and good scripts that only lasted 13 episodes.
Of all the sf television that first aired in the 21st century, I suspect the only shows that will still be watched
ten years from now are Enterprise, Smallville, Firefly, and Lost. Maybe
some of us will still remember Battlestar Galactica, Heroes, Terminator: The
Sarah Connor Chronicles, and Dollhouse.
The Walking Dead and Touch return in February. And evidently somebody
likes Beauty and the Beast. It won the People's Choice Award for Favorite New Drama, even though
it has less than two million viewers.
SF on TV in February 2013
Doctor Who, Game of Thrones, Grimm, and Revolution return in March.
Who killed Laura Palmer?
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Rick Norwood is a mathematician and writer whose small press publishing house, Manuscript Press, has published books by Hal Clement, R.A. Lafferty, and Hal Foster. He is also the editor of Comics Revue Monthly, which publishes such classic comic strips as Flash Gordon, Sky Masters, Modesty Blaise, Tarzan, Odd Bodkins, Casey Ruggles, The Phantom, Gasoline Alley, Krazy Kat, Alley Oop, Little Orphan Annie, Barnaby, Buz Sawyer, and Steve Canyon. Visit his web site at comicsrevue.com. |
I watched the final episodes of Fringe and Last Resort this month. Both
will soon be forgotten. The final ep of Fringe was two hours, but to stretch it for two
hours they had to have one character let himself be captures by the bad guys, for no reason at all. The
show also violated one of my prime directives of good screenwriting: when you're in a hurry, don't stop to talk.
Saturday, February 2
 
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