Flash Forward Flahes Lost & Other Season Premieres

Hi

I thought it appropriate with today's weather to write about last week's Fall TV season premieres. Overall, I have to say that I'm quite pleased.

Flash Forward
Great start. I think most people I've talked to have taken an instant liking to this show, but one of the aspects that's really roping in people to the show are the Lost references. Consider the billboard in the background of this shot (link courtesy of Farooq). Not only this reference to Oceanic Airlines (and a comedic one if you squint your eyes to read it), but some sites out there (http://the-odi.blogspot.com/) are drawing comparisons to the numbers mentioned in Lost. Now, this obviously cannot be chalked to mere coincidence. It has to be one of the following reasons: (1) Great marketing to get Lost fans into a new show considering that this will be Lost's last season. I can imagine producers of the show sitting at their brainstorm sessions saying, "Ok, now that we've mind F'd these people into drawing parallels between the show [that may or may not exist], what can we do to keep them coming?" "I know!" chimes another producer, "Let's slowly sneak the entire cast of Lost into the show." And so enters Dominic Monaghan, the actor that plays Charlie in Lost, into the promo for the next show. And then there's Penny from Lost (actress Sonya Walger) who plays Olivia Benford. But, who knows, with the expiration of Lost, these actors may simply be well-liked to the network and are trying to capitalize on it. Alternatively, we might get into the second reason: (2) The Lost World and FF World are in fact the same "universe" and there are intentional crossover, overlapping stories. How ridiculous would that be?! Ridiculous in a possibly phenom sense, that is. That, for example, the worldwide blackout is related to the time traveling from the island or when Ben initially made the island disappear or... Well, for FF-Lost conspiracy theories, I'm sure you can find tons on the WWW. Regardless, even as a standalone product, Flash Forward is extremely interesting. The baseball footage where they showed some random person awake was eerily cool and intriguing. It makes you think of the many possibilities of what happened: a new natural phenomena? Aliens? Something that will always remain unknown? An act of God (azubillah; but I'm sure that will be a small theme)? A government conspiracy? Guess I'll have to stay tuned..

Heroes
Two-hour premieres are always good. This show started off Season 1 unbelievable. It was on its way to becoming one of my favorites shows of all time. I could probably watch Season 1's season finale 100x. Subsequent seasons, however, were lacking. I'm not sure what creator/producer Tim Kring was thinking. It was like he was taking a football team to the promised land, but inexplicably decides to bench his starters in favor of the third stringers. The last two seasons strayed away from the great ideas and themes of the first season; namely, the battle between good and evil (Peter: the embodiment of good, the reluctant hero; Hiro the eternal optimist; Sylar: the embodiment of evil). Actually, I think I still kept watching because of Sylar. He was always entertaining. Anyway, this season seems like its trying to return to what captivated us fans in the first place. Peter is back to his original job helping people out. He had a radio (reminiscent of Peter Parker in one of the Spider-Man movies) to listen to crimes and stop them -- using his Superman-esque (not quite, but you know what I mean) powers for good. Surprisingly, I enjoyed the duality of Nathan's character with him battling his inner Sylar and with Sylar getting in Parkman's head. I also like the mysterious new presumably evil character who is apparently on some mission of redemption, though you can tell he has some sort of grand plan. (What's his power btw?!) Also, for those that didn't know, the guy with the knives who moves really fast is the same guy who played Darth Maul in the fourth installment of Star Wars. Let's hope Heroes can keep the momentum. I'm not sure if I can take anymore disappointment...

Smallville
Phenom! Clark is finally trying to embrace his Kryptonian side and become who he is destined to be (that would be Superman -- i.e. a lesser version of myself). I like the costume. It's nothing fancy, but the S symbol is what's good to finally see. I also like the introduction of Zod (currently only a Major and not a General) and I'm intrigued as to why they don't have any of their powers. Seeing Zod interact with Tess will -- hopefully -- also prove to be an interesting development. Admittedly, though, I am really disappointed with how they simply killed off Doomsday from the prior season. He's the guy that kills Superman in the comics. There should have been an EPIC fight scene either last season or the start of this season. Anyway, the producers and writers can make it up to me by making Clark embrace his inner "It's a bird, It's a plane, It's Superman" by FLYING! C'mon! Ok, they did at least elude to it the premiere and successfully teased us by showing him jumping off the Statue of Liberty but then cut to another scene. Next episode with Metallo should be a good one...I hope.

Community
Hysterical pilot episode. This show had me at the trailer I saw when the character Abed (played by Chicago native Danny Pudi) replay a scene from classic Breakfast Club. I was dying. I really like the dialogue; it's witty, funny, and even charming. So while it may remind you of me, instead of solely checking me out, you should check this out, too.

Anyway, that's it for now. A few of my other regular shows haven't premiered as yet (i.e. Legend of the Seeker [a guilty pleasure], Lost, and my beloved Chuck), but I'll critique at that point.


Cheers