I've been watching good stuff. Have you been watching good stuff?

It's been so very long, I'm sorry. It's been so long in fact that for a little while there I was staring at a blank screen, convinced that I had forgotten how to do one of these. Until I remembered that I had never really known how to do it and basically just made shit up as I went. After that, I was flying!

First thing's first, anyone expecting a post about Da Vinci's Demons; since that is what is mentioned in the 'Next Time' bit at the end of the last post... yeah, sorry, no. That was fecking ages ago and I've completely forgotten like 90% of what I was gonna say. Maybe after season 2, eh? If I'm still here. We cool, yo? Awesome.

TO THE POINT!

Just because I haven't been posting on here much of late; or, you know, at all; doesn't mean that I have been idle in my pursuit of the impossible quest. Oh hells no! Many and much is the sci-fi and fantasy that I've been cramming down my eyeholes and for the first time in a long time I'm actually enjoying more than I'm hating. There are some duffers of course; Atlantis springs immediately to mind, and, sickeningly, The Tomorrow People; but for the most part this last year has seen me getting very lucky with what I've watched.

Take Arrow for instance.

It's nonsense, of course it is, but it's enjoyable nonsense that doesn't take itself too seriously (except when it does, but they get that out of their system and move on pretty quickly).

Stephen Amell, or Tom Cruise's little brother as we must call him now that Natasha of House Kingston (she of Unspoiled Podcast, check 'em out) has pointed it out,

acquits himself well enough as the square jawed hero; although where he really shines is when playing the younger, more naive version of his character in flashback; and his bodyguard/friend/sidekick/hilarious pomposity burster Diggle, as played by David Ramsey, is one of my favourite creations of recent televisions seasons.

It's a shame that one of the shining lights of the first season had to be killed off the way they were but new paths are being forged this year and I for one am more than eager to go along for the ride. Especially if they keep Black Canary around.

It's not even about the leather

Then there's Supernatural. With three episodes left of S8; insert now traditional complaint about never quite managing to catch up; I'm going to have to throw my hat in with the minority opinion and say I'm loving this. It's not perfect, but after the (surprisingly) poor Sera Gamble seasons; how did she get it so wrong?; this run has been a real return to (almost) top form.

It's a little frustrating that they haven't managed a total return to the glory days because the niggles are so obvious and so easy to fix (says the layman who's never written a script). Stop having the season arc revolve around Sam and Dean falling out and just let them be brothers for 5 minutes; stop coming up with new and ingenious ways to alienate Castiel; stop trying to make us love Garth by having Dean warm to him...

Can't we all just get along?

I'll leave it there, before I lose myself in a rant. I don't want to bury the fact that I do indeed love the show now, almost as much as I did in the glory years.

And speaking of returning to past glories while inexplicably failing to see the problems that caused the fall from grace in the first place, I give you...

Actually, I give you...

I'm loving The Originals in a way that I haven't loved it's parent show in a very long time. In a way, that makes me all the more wary of the show, because I can already see it traveling down exactly the same path as TVD. The new characters are great, but there are too many of them; there are hardly any humans on the main roster (I count two, if you include the priest and he has cannon fodder written all over him); Klaus, stripped of his God-awful pining over Caroline is chasing another hot blonde within 5 minutes of the pilot starting; the over-used to the point of dramatic uselessness 'daggering' was used to put one of the leads on ice in the fucking pilot...

As I say, I'm enjoying the show. It's bringing back warm and fuzzy memories of when The Vampire Diaries could produce episodes that you actually believed would have some genuine consequences. I just hope that Julie Plec and her team can resist going back to their favourite old tricks time and again.

Oh, and give your greatest assets a chance to shine. Be it Claire Holt on The Originals, or Candice Accola on The Vampire Diaries, this franchise has two awesome female characters played by two fantastic actresses. Let them off the leash, let them be bad ass, and stop burying them under tired old love triangle bullshit.

The future of tv bad assery. If only they'd let her.

So that's what I'm currently watching, and enjoying. (Although you'd be forgiven for thinking I hated them from the tone of this post; I really need to stop moaning) Maybe it was taking a break from writing this blog that has allowed me to view these shows purely for the sake of viewing them, that has allowed me to garner more enjoyment than I had been for a while. If that proves to be the case, I may reconsider the renewed writing schedule I have planned, but for the meantime expect to see lots more of my meandering stream of consciousness waffle on here than has been the case for a while.  You love it!