Remington Steele 2x06 and Elementary 1x08
Dec. 3rd, 2012 04:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quarter_to_fiveI have no idea why I still watch Elementary, it's just a thing that I do with my sister because we can never agree on something else to watch together. Once again, the mystery is boring to tears. Theres no intellectual hook or human sympathy element or anything. Ok, most people (me included) don't watch this kind of thing for the mystery but still! The problem with even character focused storytelling which does not have a good story is that it gives the characters nothing to do. They never have to stretch or be challenged or change or deal in any way with anything, and you can't even develop a real sympathy to characters like that.
A cause/symptom of the bad mysteries on Elementary is that theres never any good one-shot characters for them to bounce off (yes, theres was that episode with the child kidnapper. Thats the saving grace of this season, atm) and the show is so ALL ABOUT SHERLOCK that they never have each other to bounce off all that much either. Watson does nothing episode which is not entirely about Sherlock. All that guy who steps up to be his sponsor does is hang about and show his commitment to Sherlock. But at least we get Lisa Edelstein. You can't go wrong with Lisa Edelstein, can you? Well, you can, if the only thing you can think of doing with her is making her a killer hooker with a liking for crosswords instead of a personality (and, honestly, what a cop out with the solution.)
And what kind of lunatic has Lisa Edelstein and Lucy Liu in the same episode and manages to avoid having them ever exchange a word? Seriously? Fail. Terrible episode. One star out of the entire Pleiades for that thing with the wall being kind of clever.
Screw it,i'm going back to watching Remington Steele.
Ep 2.06 - A Steele at Any Price - is like an antidote to Elementary here. (and wow do they invite comparison) It has another great convulted farce plot with like half a dozen distinct one-shot characters, (3, I think, of whom are woman) all of whom are interesting or fun or sympathetic or something, ("She once said murder is the only truly erotic act.") and all of whom have their own agendas and personalities. It's also chock-full of the characters getting to do things - run around, climb walls, drive wildly, hide behind things, fall over, get into fights, etc - whereas Elementary in comparison turns out to consist almost entirely of people standing about in a series of differently decorated rooms.
If Elementary managed to deliver as some kind of intellectual/psychological drama, then ok, but it doesn't. It can't, really - it's far, far too precious about it's characters (and by characters, I mean Sherlock) dignity and image to toss them about the way RS does, and so RS, despite being a far lighter show, tonally (for the most part) ironically enough becomes the more compelling character study.
Anyway, enough comparisoning. RS here offers a bit of a role switch, again, with Steele being back in his element for once, and Laura being the newcomer taking to it with rabid, and perhaps unhealthy, enthusiasm. It's cute and funny (and Laura's "pretentious art critic" is hilarious) but it's also got an interesting undercurrent. Steele isn't just the one who's competent, he's also - within limits -the responsible adult, while Laura is all giggles and reckless changes of plan (and horniness!) Steeles typical irresponsibility is at least partially a product of being in this position of having someone else holding his hand, and Laura is perfectly capable of slipping into the same shoes when she's not the one holding up the world for once.
Vague side thought - Steele is really not a technophobe, is he? I had sort of assumed he was, but he doesn't even pretend he is, per say, it's just the whole 'louche upper class English playboy fellow' persona that he plays as being the one playing Remington Steele (uh, if you follow) kind of has that associated with it as a character type - his disdain towards guns and computers...but when nobody is watching, so to speak, he's got no problem hacking security systems or sending ur-emails.
A cause/symptom of the bad mysteries on Elementary is that theres never any good one-shot characters for them to bounce off (yes, theres was that episode with the child kidnapper. Thats the saving grace of this season, atm) and the show is so ALL ABOUT SHERLOCK that they never have each other to bounce off all that much either. Watson does nothing episode which is not entirely about Sherlock. All that guy who steps up to be his sponsor does is hang about and show his commitment to Sherlock. But at least we get Lisa Edelstein. You can't go wrong with Lisa Edelstein, can you? Well, you can, if the only thing you can think of doing with her is making her a killer hooker with a liking for crosswords instead of a personality (and, honestly, what a cop out with the solution.)
And what kind of lunatic has Lisa Edelstein and Lucy Liu in the same episode and manages to avoid having them ever exchange a word? Seriously? Fail. Terrible episode. One star out of the entire Pleiades for that thing with the wall being kind of clever.
Screw it,i'm going back to watching Remington Steele.
Ep 2.06 - A Steele at Any Price - is like an antidote to Elementary here. (and wow do they invite comparison) It has another great convulted farce plot with like half a dozen distinct one-shot characters, (3, I think, of whom are woman) all of whom are interesting or fun or sympathetic or something, ("She once said murder is the only truly erotic act.") and all of whom have their own agendas and personalities. It's also chock-full of the characters getting to do things - run around, climb walls, drive wildly, hide behind things, fall over, get into fights, etc - whereas Elementary in comparison turns out to consist almost entirely of people standing about in a series of differently decorated rooms.
If Elementary managed to deliver as some kind of intellectual/psychological drama, then ok, but it doesn't. It can't, really - it's far, far too precious about it's characters (and by characters, I mean Sherlock) dignity and image to toss them about the way RS does, and so RS, despite being a far lighter show, tonally (for the most part) ironically enough becomes the more compelling character study.
Anyway, enough comparisoning. RS here offers a bit of a role switch, again, with Steele being back in his element for once, and Laura being the newcomer taking to it with rabid, and perhaps unhealthy, enthusiasm. It's cute and funny (and Laura's "pretentious art critic" is hilarious) but it's also got an interesting undercurrent. Steele isn't just the one who's competent, he's also - within limits -the responsible adult, while Laura is all giggles and reckless changes of plan (and horniness!) Steeles typical irresponsibility is at least partially a product of being in this position of having someone else holding his hand, and Laura is perfectly capable of slipping into the same shoes when she's not the one holding up the world for once.
Vague side thought - Steele is really not a technophobe, is he? I had sort of assumed he was, but he doesn't even pretend he is, per say, it's just the whole 'louche upper class English playboy fellow' persona that he plays as being the one playing Remington Steele (uh, if you follow) kind of has that associated with it as a character type - his disdain towards guns and computers...but when nobody is watching, so to speak, he's got no problem hacking security systems or sending ur-emails.
