Roundup

No review this week. Nor even a quick and dirty, dashed off in half a minute, piss take of something eminently deserving of a good dose of the old urine extraction. This is due to the fact that the only truly 'new' addition to my schedule has been the revival of V, and such is my love of old school Visitor action I just can't bring myself to write about it until I can say something positive. So not yet then.

Elsewhere, things carry on much as before. Vampires continue to dominate, with no less than four shows; Forever Knight (just okay but it's early days and I've heard good things) Vampire Diaries (far better than it's Twilight-lite, if that's not compltely redundant, premise/publicity would have anyone believe, this show is poorly served by it's promotion, although it seems to be doing pretty well in the numbers game regardless) True Blood (sublime show with an 'A' cast down to the smallest roles) and Blade (woefully miscast lead, meaning the writers are forced to write a show which barely features him in order to minimise the damage he can do). A mixed bag to be sure.

Non vampire action is thinner on the ground. Other than the aforementioned V there is the latest run of The Sarah Jane Adventures (SJA), proving once again to be one of the smartest 'kids' shows of it's era (although pity poor Yasmin Paige, who is to SJA what Christopher Ecclestone is to modern Dr Who, ie best thing about it but largely forgotten because a vastly inferior replacement happened to stick around longer). Not that I'm bitter or anything.

Smallville chugs along nicely enough, building to a finale that manages to both satisfy (decent final punch up and despatch of bland villain Zod) and disappoint (compare and contrast this with some of the season finales Smallville provided us with in it's earlier years) in equal measure. And where was Kyle Gallner during that video conference, that's what I'd like to know.

I've still yet to watch the end of Heroes, although even as I type this I know that an episode is the next thing up on my tape. It's indicative of just how far this show has fallen for me that after sitting through an episode of (the abominable) S8 of Falcon Crest I actually turned off the tape when Heroes popped up next. Once upon a time I would have latched onto it as a very welcome antidote. (To S8, not Falcon Crest in its entirety, which I've loved for the most part) Now, I see it as more punishment.

DVDs of The Net and Robocop enable me to occasionally drop an episode of those into my viewing, although the weakness of each means that I'm rationing them so as not to breed contempt. The really good news on the DVD front is that I was recently able to pick up some cheap X-Men (90's series) discs, so my viewing of that show, previously stalled mid-S3, will soon recommence with The Dark Phoenix Saga. Sure to be a cracker.

All in all, the Quest trundles along, managing to keep me only moderately entertained compared to how I used to feel. Could Sci-Fi be losing it's grip on me? I don't think so. I argued recently, and do genuinely believe, that televised science fiction is better now than it has been in a long long time. That I know this to be the case, and yet still fail to be enthused, is perhaps a sign of my mood more than anything and I reckon all it will take is 1 or 2 truly spectacular projects to kick start my enthusiasm, in the way that The X-Files, Babylon 5, Buffy, Farscape and Lost did. Flashforward had the potential to do it, had it not died so prematurely. Perhaps The Event, due to begin airing in the UK this coming Friday, will be the one that blows my mind. Hell, it's got Laura Innes in it so it's gotta be at least a bit good.