San Francisco, 3:56 AM
Sun Dec 6
12 posts in the last 24 hours
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It's interesting enough to keep watching, but I don't see myself buying it on DVD. With Lost, I was hooked for true by the end of Walkabout.
The difference between these two shows is that Flasforward presents itself as itself, and if you don't buy into that from the very start, the show has nothing to keep you interested. With Lost, it presented itself as Gilligan's Island for a modern age, and only after it got you hooked on the original premise, setting, and characters did it reveal that everything you thought you were watching it for was largely inconsequential compared to the greater whole.
Lost's team also knew how to play the audience along, by both holding back on the really big mysteries, and by regularly answering the minor ones to keep the audience both interested and satisfied. FF started out really big by necessity, but they've been pretty stingy with the small stuff since then, so whatever they've shown us has barely registered compared to how the same things would have gone over on Lost this early in the game.
Maybe I'm the only one, but I saw the latest episode of FlashForward and said "THIS is why Demetri gets killed". It just screams that somewhere along the line, Mark gets desperate, starts drinking again, and ends up shooting Demetri.
Not sure how it's going to happen if they took his gun away, but I definitely got the feeling. Mark's stupid behavior combined with his very strong desire to do the right thing seems like it would be the result of a LOT of the bad things that have happened and will happen to him.
But yeah. This show essentially gets a shoulder shrug out of me. It started off interesting, but I just don't care about it. Just when I think it gets interesting, the directors/writers seem to get distracted and look at the new shiny plot idea instead.
@ace_rancid: This is true, but the woman specifically mentioned his FBI-issued gun. I suppose now that everything's changing he could use a different gun, but somehow I'm stuck on the idea that he uses THAT particular gun.
I watch sci-fi shows like FlashForward because I want to be shocked and amazed by the unknown. X-Files shocked me. LOST shocked me. Fringe shocked me. The only thing that has shocked me on FlashForward is discovering that Demetri and I share the same exact birthday, down to the year. (Which got an, "Oh, really? That's weird." reaction from me.) The rest? Dull as old dishwater.
"I would've loved it if we'd seen that Gough's suicide ended up being the event that caused the death of the
woman he was trying to save anyway, thereby proving that the events will happen nonetheless..."
That would be brilliant and I think would turn over the show. The mystery of fate vs. freewill or the combination of both would be brought to its rightful place, in the front of the storyline.
Between the suicide and the "I almost moved to your block" "ah, in the many worlds theory you did and we're together in another universe", I can't help but thinking they have already explained a good chunk of the destiny/not-destiny: "In their flash forwards" (sorry, couldn't help it) people saw a glimpse of another universe, one that's very close to this one, but with slight variations, just enough to keep us wondering which ones will actually happen (will Simcoe and WhateverHerName hook up because in another reality they already did?, will Dimitri really get shot?).
"well, Mark Benford, the alcoholic FBI agent who apparently thinks so little before he acts that it's a surprise that he's made it this far in his career without being fired multiple times already."
Thank you. I've been asking this same question for the last month or so. If this is Mark Benford sober, what kind of insufferable prick must he have been back when he was drinking? And how in God's name has he made it this far without murdering a small child?
I wouldn't go as far to say The Gift broke the narrative's central premise's back. It said there ARE ways for Free Will to derail Fate. But these are pyrriac victories, ones outside the toolbox of those barreling towards a fate they dread.
Along the same lines, some fear bedbug infestation since ridding their homes is so expensive. Pshaw, a few might say: gasoline is only $3/gal, and matches are free!
So, we know fate isn't locked into stone in FlashForward. We also know that Fate's grooves are dug very deep into the road.
This is one of the few times I have to agree with you. I was hooked after the first 2 or 3 episodes of Lost but this show still hasn't done it for me.
I don't care about the characters very much other than thinking Olivia should dump Mark for Lloyd. Mark hasn't shown any brilliance at his job like Gregory House or Robert Goren (L&O Criminal Intent) to explain why he's managed to last in the FBI so long with all his flaws.
The plots are a total mess. Decide what kind of show you are and stick with it. And pick up the pace. It doesn't have to be 24 fast but give me a reason to pay attention to more than the first and last 2 minutes of the episode.
I really, really wanted to like this show, but couldn't for all the reasons listed above. The characters aren't compelling and the story is inherently broken. The best thing about the show was the first ten minutes or so, and the rest is just...meh. It's hard to believe that no one on the writing staff sat down and thought...If they all know abut their flashes, why are they all doing the most mundane things as if they didn't have the flashes in the first place. The only person that actually seems to be aware of the flashes is Benford. Which makes no sense. Also, I also thought that Gough was going to inadvertently kill that woman and that was the point in which I stopped watching. It's sad when a major network responsible for a decent number of crap shows shuts down the production because of quality control. Flash Forward is just one gimmick that they never seemed to really think out.
Maybe the show itself is some sort of social experiment. Maybe ABC is trying to find out how much they can dick with the audience before they turn away from ABC in droves.
I managed to watch this for all of two episodes and gave up. The entire reason? I just didn't care what happened to the characters. There was nothing in them that drew me into the story and made me want to know what happened to them as individuals. Sure, I was curious about what happened in the overall story, but not curious enough to watch these characters.
02:04 AM
The difference between these two shows is that Flasforward presents itself as itself, and if you don't buy into that from the very start, the show has nothing to keep you interested. With Lost, it presented itself as Gilligan's Island for a modern age, and only after it got you hooked on the original premise, setting, and characters did it reveal that everything you thought you were watching it for was largely inconsequential compared to the greater whole.
Lost's team also knew how to play the audience along, by both holding back on the really big mysteries, and by regularly answering the minor ones to keep the audience both interested and satisfied. FF started out really big by necessity, but they've been pretty stingy with the small stuff since then, so whatever they've shown us has barely registered compared to how the same things would have gone over on Lost this early in the game.
12/05/09
Not sure how it's going to happen if they took his gun away, but I definitely got the feeling. Mark's stupid behavior combined with his very strong desire to do the right thing seems like it would be the result of a LOT of the bad things that have happened and will happen to him.
But yeah. This show essentially gets a shoulder shrug out of me. It started off interesting, but I just don't care about it. Just when I think it gets interesting, the directors/writers seem to get distracted and look at the new shiny plot idea instead.
12/05/09
12/05/09
12/05/09
"I would've loved it if we'd seen that Gough's suicide ended up being the event that caused the death of the
woman he was trying to save anyway, thereby proving that the events will happen nonetheless..."
That would be brilliant and I think would turn over the show. The mystery of fate vs. freewill or the combination of both would be brought to its rightful place, in the front of the storyline.
12/05/09
12/05/09
Thank you. I've been asking this same question for the last month or so. If this is Mark Benford sober, what kind of insufferable prick must he have been back when he was drinking? And how in God's name has he made it this far without murdering a small child?
12/05/09
I believe the term face à claques applies.
12/05/09
Along the same lines, some fear bedbug infestation since ridding their homes is so expensive. Pshaw, a few might say: gasoline is only $3/gal, and matches are free!
So, we know fate isn't locked into stone in FlashForward. We also know that Fate's grooves are dug very deep into the road.
12/05/09
12/05/09
I don't care about the characters very much other than thinking Olivia should dump Mark for Lloyd. Mark hasn't shown any brilliance at his job like Gregory House or Robert Goren (L&O Criminal Intent) to explain why he's managed to last in the FBI so long with all his flaws.
The plots are a total mess. Decide what kind of show you are and stick with it. And pick up the pace. It doesn't have to be 24 fast but give me a reason to pay attention to more than the first and last 2 minutes of the episode.
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11/30/09
It's pretty good... compared to the other FF episodes anyhow, but shit actually happens, and we get quite a few answers.
So not to shabby overall.