Cox, Becker & House

So I guess I have a thing for bad-tempered doctors with hearts of gold.

Cox (from Scrubs), Becker (from Becker) and House (from, uh, House) all, sort of, fit the above description. But they are different in rather interesting ways. Cox and Becker, for instance, are much more functional than House and not just because of his leg. They have a greater ability to interact with others and, in Cox's case, are much more medically fallible.

In fact, Cox is the most realistic of the three. He is a very good doctor but, as far as I know (I've just started watching the show), not a genius. Becker isn't a genius either, but Becker sets himself apart by willingly staying in the Bronx when he could, with his credentials, make more money elsewhere.

Like the other two, Cox is aware of his own personality flaws (in the episode last night--these are reruns--he tells Newbie, "You want to be me? I don't even want to be me.") Unlike Becker, who isn't always aware of his effect on others, Cox--like House--can deliberately changed his behavior to produce an outcome, such as the episode where he provokes Kelso into taking back rounds--for Kelso's own good.

And Cox has an ex-wife girlfriend and a son and an intern who adores him.


Becker does eventually get a decent girlfriend--played by the very talented Nancy Travis. Like Cox, his personality, while not entirely environmentally induced, is strongly influenced by past unhappiness: multiple divorces, a bad childhood (that's Cox), etc. I'm not saying the writers use that material as an excuse for Cox and Becker's behavior, but it is important to understand their backgrounds in terms of the distinction between Becker & Cox and House.

With House, the producers (who I am now going to refer to as David Shore since Shore is the only one I know [from Due South, another great show]) are doing something rather difficult. House really isn't supposed to be a doctor with a heart of gold. House is really supposed to be a jerk. A complicated jerk but a jerk. The environmental complications--his leg, his lost girlfriend--do not fully explain him. I realize "The Jerk" was supposed to elucidate this, but I thought it was much better elucidated in the episode with the carpet stain. Yes, House plays games, but Shore wanted to make it clear, through that episode, that there's a real part to this guy that can't stand inconsistencies in his environment. It isn't supposed to be this weird thing that House goes through every now and again. It is supposed to BE House. All the stuff he does and says isn't a "front" or bad temper or a coping mechanism or disillusionment (which Cox, for example, portrays very well) but the guy himself. (Although House does have a stinky dad.)


And once you accept that basically House is NOT someone you would really want to spend time with, it gets a lot easier to spend time with him. He manipulates and plays games with people NOT because secretly he is trying to help them be better people (yuck) but because he really can't stand not to know why people do what they do. Other people create chaos, and he doesn't want chaos even though he believes in chaos. He MUST dig out Wilson's secrets. He MUST find out what is wrong with his patients. He MUST know.

Which makes him difficult to be around but a great diagnostician.

What makes all three of the doctors interesting to watch is that all three of them act the role of "fool"--not "fool" in the Ben Stiller sense but fool in the old Shakespearean/King Lear sense. They say things other people don't admit/want to hear. (I must include Cox's ex-wife girlfriend here, especially the episode where she keeps trying out lines like, "I'm not wholly myself when Cox isn't with me" and then saying, "No, it doesn't sound like me, does it?")

Now, I've got a big dose of Jane Austen in me--I believe in appropriate conversation for appropriate venues, but that didn't stop Jane Austen skewering people in her letters to Cassandra. It doesn't really work for effective day-to-day living; it is much better to accept other people's fallibilities and forgive and all that.

But it makes GREAT television.

TELEVISION

My Guess: The Next American Idol

I confess, I watched American Idol this season. I'm being apologetic NOT because I think people should be apologetic about watching television but because I'm usually down on "reality" TV. I don't want reality TV to take the place of good, old-fashioned non-reality TV--like Buffy and such. (CSI is more or less "reality" TV with non-reality characters, much like Law & Order, which is a lot like watching your local news, only more interesting.)

However, I did watch American Idol this season, mostly to listen to Simon's comments and to read Television Without Pity's summations. In any case, I've been surprised at how nobody (that I've read so far) has caught on to why Melinda got dropped.

Melinda was/is phenomenal. She's a true professional. And that's why she didn't win. American Idol is very American in that at some fundamental level we think we're watching, LIVE, an Horatio Alger book. Horatio Alger wrote a bunch of books back in the 19th century about poor boys making good. They were probably all poor white boys but they were plucky and intrepid and made money and moved into the middle class. (Unlike Jeffrey Archer characters, they remained pleasant people and didn't try to kill each other or other people.) And much has been written about how influential this idea is in the American psyche.

Well, yeah. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, no matter what grad-school tries to tell you. And it does explain American Idol. Melinda didn't need anyone's help to "make good." She was already a professional with style. American Idol did give her more confidence but other than that, her leap up the rung isn't quite as far as it will be for . . . Jordin.

Yup, that's my guess. I like Blake, and I think Blake is a very, very gifted young man. But, first, I agree with Joe R. from Television Without Pity that first place really won't do Blake any favors. Secondly, it will Jordin; it will make Jordin's life (I'll pause here and say that for the sake of Jordin's future happiness, I hope that isn't true in the long-term, but I'm sure it will be true in the short-term.) Jordin is not a professional (as far as I know). She's a high schooler with a powerful set of lungs who is the same age as the show. Ha Ha Ha. (I've been reading too much TWP, and I'm beginning to adopt the style. She's not, of course.) The point is, the voting audience can make a difference with Jordin's life, in a way they really couldn't in Melinda's. Based on descriptions of Melinda's graceful farewell (I never watch the result shows; I draw the line at that much substancelessness), I would say that the 29-year-old was kind of sick of the whole thing and ready to walk away. Which is lovely really. But if you're a voter on the show, you're going to want to vote in the person who cares to win. And the person who cares the most, I think, is Jordin.

TELEVISION

Spiderman, Angst, Redemption and All That Good Stuff

As a devotee of Spiderman 1 & 2, I went to see Spiderman 3 for my birthday, and I'm sorry to say I was disappointed.

It was basically me and a bunch of twenty-year-old males who also don't have to work on a Friday afternoon. They were disappointed as well. "Geez," one complained as we left the theatre, "they killed off the two best villains in one movie!"

I agreed although my complaint has more to do with Spiderman's, aka Peter Parker's, response to that killing. Or, to be more precise, Peter Parker's response to his bad side. Which is, to sum it up, not that much.

I'll give Tobey Maguire a pass on this one since I think he is a very talented actor, and I think he "got" the jerk part of the script very well. That is, I think he understood how to make Peter Parker a jerk without making him over-the-top villainous.

Here's the problem--he never really pays for being a jerk and hurting his friends and basically enabling one villain into existence. It's one of those "Well, he learned his lesson, he's sorry, hey, really, really bad things happened to him too, ya know, let's just let the whole thing drop" treatments. And that just doesn't work in terms of good storytelling.

I've been rewatching some Buffy and have been struck (again) by how much Whedon, whatever his personal theology, understands the concept of redemption in both a human and a literary sense. The fact is that "paying for it" or "feeling bad about it" or "being forgiven for it" or "accepting one's part in it" is a major theme is most of history's great literature, and it simply doesn't work to ignore that as a literary and a human reality. (A thorough introduction to the letters of Paul never did any writer any harm.)

In a purely technical sense, Angel is not Angelus, but he inhabits the same body, and therefore still pays for that body's crimes. (Additionally, there is a ton of evidence within the show itself that the type of harm a vampire does is based on the worst aspects of the original personality. So Spike becomes a passionate obsessive and Angel becomes a sadist and Willow and Xander form a weird sort of incestuous relationship where they torture Cordelia. In other words, in Whedon's universe, how you lived your life as a human will be reflected in exactly how awful or creepy you are as a vampire.)

Not only does redemption work on a literary and human level, but it also works on an emotional one. And I think that the powers-that-be for Spiderman 3 made a huge mistake here. The audience is willing to let the hero suffer. Really. I got the feeling with Spiderman 3 that the writers were trying to protect Peter Parker from the worst effects of his bad behavior. Why????? It doesn't hurt the hero in the audience's eyes if he/she is forced to pay/be sorry/make up for being a jerk.

Take, for example, Edmund from C.S. Lewis' Narnia books. I've read some rather silly tut-tutting articles (by adults) who think that Edmund was a victim, poor little boy. Yet Edmund remains the favorite of many readers, both young and old (and including me). First of all, Lewis (and Paul) understood what the silly adults and Spiderman 3 writers failed to grasp: sin--once you've defined it--is sin, whatever the extenuating circumstances. Second of all, Lewis understood, as does Whedon (intuitively, I think), that in order to take someone seriously, you have to take their actions seriously as well as the consequences of those actions. Lewis takes his children protagonists seriously--which must be very refreshing to your average child.

To return to Spiderman 3, it's worth watching on a large screen, but not at full price. Wait for the $1 theatre.

MOVIES

Critiquing the Critiquers

I maintain in my thesis that the only people really talking about the arts--as in created works meant for audience consumption--are fans. Academe seems vaguely embarrassed, as intellectuals so often are, by the whole thought of people actually liking--as in enjoying, as in willingly partaking of without complaint--television or popular books. There seems to be this general idea, which one encounters initially amongst teenagers, that anything REALLY popular must be simply dreadful--as in filled with conservative, pro-establishment, capitalistic statements. Unfortunately, this leads many academics who want to explore popular culture to create unbelievably convoluted justifications for doing so. I recently read a book about romance novels by a professor who evidently enjoys said novels; however, she spent several chapters-worth arguing that just because a novel ends in marriage doesn't mean it is anti-feminist; the marriage actually represents a new beginning and a new state of society, etc. etc. She's right, but it would be so much easier if she'd just said, "I'm sorry you detractors think marriage stinks. I don't. Get over it."

Basically, to return to my thesis, I argue that while fans occasionally get caught up in this kind of foolishness, they are principally fans. That is, while they make hurumph noises about the media industry and all the greedy corporations, they are mostly interested in the WORK.

And this is enormously refreshing.

Take for instance, Jacob and Joe R. who critique American Idol for Television Without Pity. I confess, I watch American Idol now mostly so I can read the critiques. They vary considerably from week to week. Jacob is more poetic but less grammar conscious (lots and lots of run-on sentences). He also swears a lot more, so if that sort of thing bothers you, don't read him. Joe R. swears less and is more pithy. In general, although they both utilize sarcasm like a sledgehammar and are more than a little self-aware, making references to their own status as viewers as well as to other shows (academics call this "intertextuality" which means, well, making references to other shows), they do talk about THE SHOW. They talk about how well Ryan Seacreast did that night. They talk about the singers. They talk about the judges. They reference the audience's reactions. They dissect what the Idols wore. They make fun of the Idols' commercials.

Like any kind of in-depth, relentless dissection, it gets a bit tedious after awhile, but then so do academic treatises and said treatises get tedious much faster. And Joe R. and Jacob, without tying themselves into convoluted knots, take themselves much less seriously than your average popular culture academic.

And they often reach heights of perception and poetry. Regarding Sanjaya's release? dismissal? Joe R. writes, "When the time comes [for Sanjaya's last song], Sanjaya changes a lyric to 'Let's give 'em something to talk about, other than hair!' Man, that's so...he is very, very seventeen, is he not? That whole attitude of 'Let me try to deflect your criticism of me by wearing my hair in outlandish and frightening ways, but don't talk about me and mind your own business!'? Very seventeen. As if to prove my point, seventeen-year-old Jordin loves it. Even Simon has to give it a smirk. Hey, he's someone else's problem now."

And Jacob wrote the following concerning a young woman who, during try-outs, wanted to win approval from her mother. I happened to see this particular tryout, and I completely agree with Jacob's assessment.

[This] is really upsetting, for some reason, to watch. I think it has to do with the anger. She's kind of a goober, this girl, and the 'TV pretty' speech is one of the few times she focuses on anything, and it's so sad because she's totally cute, with a strange deep duckly voice and dorky ways, and it just gets worse. 'Um, it did hurt a little, but [my mother is] coming around and supporting me a little bit.' [After the audition, which she bombs] Ryan Seacrest is this close to crying . . . and it's a strange little collage of things that shouldn't make you cry, like Ryan and Taylor Hicks and this weird girl, adding up to something pretty bleak, emotion-wise. I still don't think I've nailed it down exactly, but I think it's the sincerity of her, and the anger . . . and the complete lack of talent, and the fact that the four judges don't get it, but Ryan totally gets it, so there's a whole inside the room/outside the room issue, and no way to protect her.

Uh-huh. And again, all this analysis is coming about because these two guys watch THE SHOW and comment on THE SHOW and have opinions about THE SHOW. They do use their insights to jump off onto other topics, particularly Jacob who knows more about music in his pinky finger than I do in my whole life ever (I'm with Joe R. on this one who writes, "All this time I felt like a fraud because I was recapping this music show, and I have terrible taste in music, but now? I realize that I'm the perfect person to recap this show because everyone on here has terrible taste in music, too! It's like a weight has been lifted."). But principally, the two critiquers are concerned with THE SHOW--whether it is good or bad; what they don't like about it; what they like about it; what works; what falls flat, etc. etc. And I think, really, this is what academics don't get, humanities academics particularly who are SUPPOSED to care about literature and poetry and character development and such: you can't write about stuff, really write about stuff, that you don't love, and you can't love it if you're attaching "imperialistic-ideological-the-underpinnings-of-liminal-culture-ooh-are-we-supposed-to-like-this?-how-class/race/sex-conscious is it?" labels to it.

Which is why, in the long run, television and the fans will win.

TELEVISION

Latest Publication

My latest short story "Brutal Rituals" was just published in Space & Time Magazine ! Space & Time published my first two stories, "Birthright" and "Golden Hands."

FICTION

Through the Stargate

A long time ago, when Saturday night actually had shows on that I liked, I watched quite a lot of Stargate. I lost interest after awhile. Probably the show became a saga and sagas usually bore me. But I've started rewatching the show through Netflix. It doesn't have the same enthrallment factor for me as Star Trek or Law & Order or X-Files, but there are some definite pluses.

First, the premise makes slightly more sense than Star Trek. In science-fiction terms, of course. The only aliens are nasty, bad snake things (although more aliens are implied). Everyone else is human. No weird foreheads. No strange ridges. No elongated earlobes. Of course, it is highly doubtful that, absent a universal translator, they would all be able to understand each other. Language evolves, and a bunch of ancient Greeks, ripped away from their original culture, aren't going to speak anything that sounds even like modern Greek, let alone English. But, as E. Nesbit says in The Story of the Amulet, "I think I must have explained to you before how it was that the children were always able to understand the language of any place they might happen to be in, and to be themselves understood. If not, I have no time to explain it now."

Secondly, Stargate is darn good storytelling. There's a rather startling lack of theme. SG-1 goes to a planet. Bad guys are there. SG-1 outwits them. SG-1 goes home. And in the meantime, the audience gets a little bit of mythology and anthropology and lots of statues and stuff. In fact, it is really more fantasy with sci-fi trappings than anything else.

Thirdly, it is a military operation! Thank goodness for a military operation that doesn't pretend to be anything else. Earth is trying to find a way to defeat the bad guys and get allies; there's a notable lack of diplomatic speechifying. And, well, let's face it, fatigues are sexy. Guns are sexy. And those little earpieces that secret agents always wear are super sexy.

Of course, the team breaks protocol about every three seconds. It would be nice to watch a show where the team didn't break a thousand rules in order to go back for that one person or one friend or one artifact, consequently jeopardizing their lives, their mission, Earth and the entire human race. But still, it is nice that there is some structure/heirarchy to the whole operation. (Although I must say that the "President" is a stunningly understanding man who agrees with General Hammond to a truly extraordinary extent.)

Fourthly, they kept the same characters as in the movie. I really admired them for this. There seems to be a (largely American) idea that if you don't have the same actors, you have to create a whole new back story. Timothy Hutton's Nero Wolfe series proves that viewers are fully capable of separating actors from characters and can accept the same actor in different roles or different actors in the same role. It's all fiction. So, I like the fact that in Stargate, Daniel is still Daniel and Jack is still Jack even if they aren't James Spader and Kurt Russell.

Along the same lines, the team is a likable team. This is very, very important to these kinds of shows. I happen to get a huge kick out of Richard Dean Anderson (who I much prefer as Jack rather than MacGyver). He reminds me of Charles Parker from Dorothy Sayer's Peter Wimsey mystery series; they have the same laid-back "ohhh-kay then" kind of attitude. It's a refreshing change from angsty, furrowed-browed heroes (although Jack O'Neill has plenty of furrowing stuff in his past). On top of all that, Andersen is willing to do just about anything. Shortly into the first season, he plays both a caveman and a 90-year-old. In both cases, there's no self-consciousness. You can always tell. Self-conscious actors make the viewer uncomfortable. Andersen doesn't seem to care what the writers throw at him (this was one thing I always liked about Jonathan Frakes).

Plus I like Daniel and Carter. And I really like Teal'c. I think Christopher Judge is a whole bunch of fun as well as a very handsome guy. I admire him for unabashedly acting in Stargate kinds of shows (rather like Kevin Conroy--Batman--who I also really admire; I like it when actors find their range and stick to it).

CATEGORY: TV

Lady in the Water Review

First, I should mention that Shyamalan is a virtuoso of atmosphere. It is not simply that one or two or three scenes in his films have atmosphere but that each film leaves one with a definite impression--of fear, apprehension, loneliness. The result is that his films feel whole; they hang together. It is a nice change from the "then this happens, then this happens" feeling of so many movies and books (although Shymalan comes pretty close to that approach in Lady). He also has a tremendous ability to command strong and unusual performances from a range of actors.

I came to the movie with zero expectations. This was a good thing. If I had watched the movie expecting, well, the movie that was previewed, I would have been sorely disappointing. There are so many great mermaid myths out there, why not utilize them? But the movie isn't really about mermaids or merpeople or merlore. About a half hour into the film, I decided that Shyamalan is really talking about writing. Or rather, the process of writing. Or, to be specific, Shyamalan's process of writing.

How does one create a story? How does one determine the purpose of the characters, their influence on each other and on the plot? Naturally, the film arrives at the conclusion so often used by Shyamalan himself: the purpose of the characters can never be determined until the very end, where it will reveal itself in unexpected ways. Personally, I think Shyamalan overuses this approach, but I found the process by which he arrives at that particular writing choice to be fascinating. His tendency to use "trick" endings is built into his understanding of story itself. (And it is no mistake that Story's name is "story.")

Considering Shyamalan's proclivity for unexpected endings, I was touched that he saved for himself the role of the writer. Wrapped up in this role is, of course, the wish of every writer that his or her work will be profound, remembered, influential. But Shyamalan (who is, by the way, eminently photographable) saves the role from too much back-patting with the writer's final question to Story. With stammering incoherence, the writer acknowledges the improbability that words alone change the world; he knows how fragile or ill-remembered words can be. Language only becomes a risk when the writer risks himself.

And that willingness to risk is applauded over the critic's pithy deconstructions (however hilarious). Although I did wonder if Shyamalan was indulging himself a bit there. Well, it's his film; he can do what he likes.

At the risk of being eaten, I will indulge in some of my own criticisms. Like all of Shyamalan's work, I am not sure how much I see in his work compared to how much Shyamlan intended. Granted, work with substance is preferable to work without substance. But in order to move Shyamalan from good filmmaker to classic filmmaker, I think he needs more purpose: a sense of direction. Like The Village, Lady in the Water seems to have so many great ideas without focus. The ideas are engaging; Shyamalan has a lot to say. But the form or structure behind the "lots of something to say" is missing.

Still, I recommend Lady in the Water; I advise only no expectations.

CATEGORY: MOVIES