Watching Serials.

Two nights ago M. and I watched the series finale of Jericho. We completed all 29 episodes in about a month. That sounds like we tore through it, but the truth is that before we had Baby E. we might have seen it all within a week. We used to push our bedtimes back a lot, and egg each other on to watch "just one more episode". It's strange to think that, although most people reading can likely relate to what I'm talking about, the phenomena of watching an entire television series at one's own speed is relatively new in human history. Hell, the same thing can be said about TV in general. Now there is very little I like better in the realm of entertainment than to burn through the run of a series.

We liked Jericho. Neither the acting nor the writing was especially exceptional, but we were captivated by the premise of the show (remarked upon here). The narrative and the themes were particularly suited to the serial form. I can hardly imagine being a kid in the 50's and going to the theater to watch something similar. You'd actually have to wait weeks until the next installment in the chain of cliffhangers came out. That would be excruciating. I don't even think we'd have enough patience to wait for it on Netflix. We need to have all the episodes on hand so that we can pop it in whenever we anticipate having an hour of relative freedom. It's not just about our inability to delay gratification.

We're becoming old hands at considering market exigencies when it comes to television programming. If a show doesn't quickly garner a large audience, then it is gone without much hesitation. It doesn't usually matter whether the critics deem it a "quality" series. We internalized that lesson when Carnivale (which I still think is the best serial of all-time, followed closely by Twin Peaks) was cancelled. And I know we are not alone. So it wasn't devastating to see Jericho wrapped up in a slightly arbitrary way. It was less painful because we knew what was coming. I feel bad for those who invested themselves in watching it on network television. They had to face the disappointment of its unnatural death, as well as confront whatever dreck replaced it in its time slot.

What was interesting about the DVD package was that they included two versions of the last episode- one that was aired on broadcast television, and one that was meant to leave viewers wanting more. In this case the differences were subtle. M. and I differ in our requirements regarding resolution. Most of the major plot threads must be tied up, or otherwise M. feels a bit unsatisfied. On the other hand, I don't mind filling in the gaps on my own. Jericho met both of our requirements on that count. There was no feeling of being left hanging. Yet we did get the chance to imagine what a Season 3 could have looked like. It would have been nice to have been able to form a reasonable guess about where Carnivale was going when HBO pulled the plug.

Now we have to figure out what's next. We definitely plan to order the 4th season of Lost. That's a given. We are fully invested already. Aside from that I have a few ideas. There are some unresolved shows from the 90's that I missed and intend to order- FOX's Profit, CBS's American Gothic, and UPN's Nowhere Man. For most people, I believe these flew completely under the radar. As far as more contemporary viewing is concerned, I've already mentally committed to watching AMC's Mad Men. And Showtime's Dexter is calling out to me louder and louder. Finally, I have been convinced to give HBO's The Wire a try. There are just too many folks claiming that it's the best television drama ever produced. We'll see about that.

More Pleasant Diversions.

The other day I mentioned that my cultural diversions have trended recently toward the darker side of life. I'm reading a book about religious scenarios for the "end times". In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit to having a long fascination with apocalyptic situations. I didn't do much reading when I was in high school, but one series of books I did read was called (something along the lines of) the "Ranger Series". It was decidedly not highbrow literature. It was more the type of thing that a kid would read before moving on to Soldier of Fortune magazine. In fact, that accurately describes the path I took after reading this pulpy crap. From the little that I remember, I guess it was about a mercenary trying to make it in a post-nuclear war world.

Naturally the guy at the center of the story was tough and resourceful. Still, he also had some heart, and I guess that's what made the books "suitable" for children. I don't recall the details, yet I imagine they were pretty sordid. I was fascinated by the idea of surviving in those kinds of conditions. The typical everyday concerns melt away, and one's attitude is colored by an "every man for himself" mentality. The question is whether or not some core of morality is preserved, and how it is articulated. I guess I'm still interested in similar material, albeit with a more sophisticated shell. I loved Albert Camus' The Plague much more than I even enjoyed The Stranger. How people act in desperate times reveals their essential character (and blah,blah, blah).

Not too long ago I read Cormac McCarthy's The Road, and all of a sudden my obsessions returned with a vengeance. If there is any such thing as an essential work within the apocalyptic genre, it is that title. And given the fact that it earned a Pulitzer Prize, I don't have to feel particularly self-conscious about admiring it. Hell, it's "Art". Not too long from now, the film version will come out- it's directed by John Hillcoat (The Proposition), and stars Viggo Mortensen, Charlize Theron, and Kodi Smit-McPhee. I expect to enjoy it a lot. It was even filmed in-and-around Pittsburgh. I haven't been this excited for a film in a long time, so I'm almost certain to be disappointed.

Anyway, I couldn't just wait for that movie to get my visual fix. Last week M. and I decided to start watching the complete Jericho series. It originally ran on CBS between September of 2006 and March of this year, and evidently flew under the radar for most American television viewers. Most people that I mention it to have never even heard of the show. It did run for 29 episodes though, so someone must have been watching. Like almost everything else worth watching nowadays, it is a serial- so you have to keep up with it to understand what's going on. That puts a natural limit on viewership, as many simply aren't willing to commit to following along faithfully. In this case, that was a significant loss.

The premise of Jericho is that someone has managed to smuggle powerful barrel-sized nuclear bombs into several major US cities. It tracks the lives of the residents of the titular town, somewhere in Kansas. They appear initially as stereotypical small-townsfolk... the kind of "Real Americans" that Sarah Palin is so enamored with. But just as in reality, the characters turn out to be a lot more complex than you first expect. If it were any other way, then the show wouldn't be compelling. And after 12 episodes, we are hooked. In fact, I'm getting a bit of crap for taking a break to write this post. If I don't wrap things up, I'm liable to disappoint someone... so, more details later.