Review - Syfy's Being Human Season 1 Episode 6 - "It Takes Two to Make a Thing Go Wrong"

Photo courtesy NBC Universal

Being Human, Mondays on Syfy (9-10 pm ET)
This was another solid episode that moved each of the characters' stories forward, perhaps more equally than has been done in previous episodes.  I was pleased to see that Sally was given a storyline that seems to best fit her presence.  More than anything else right now, she is mad.  Enraged.  She calls it being in crisis but it appears that her only crisis is not being able to find a better outlet than to make the house rumble - which I love.  A great physical manifestation of all that is quietly boiling beneath her ostensibly invisible surface.  And I totally loved her daydream of revenge on Danny through Aidan's attack.  Her smile was perfect, and so was the music.  She does have some moments of hesitation when talking with Aidan about kharma, and when she learns that her new friend - "Being a ghost is boring, but a poltergeist?  Delicious!" - who thrives on revenge, apparently knows nothing about a door, or moving on.  Her one attempt at revenge on Danny went horribly wrong when Danny accused Bridget of "messing with him."  Danny's instability and Bridget's recognition of it, along with her belief in Sally's presence, will be interesting to watch.  It will also be interesting to see if anything more develops with the ring as a "charged object" now that it's been returned to Sally.  But hopefully they will deal more fully with Sally's conflict soon, and not turn her into little more than a whining mope.  Make her quietly mighty, either dark in her revenge or light in her power to rise above, and she will continue to be interesting.

Josh's storyline developed nicely this week, with his first date with Nora.  She's spunky and clearly intrigued, now that she is learning about some of Josh's hidden depths.  She's a nice addition to the group - I love that she calls Josh "doe-eyes" - in contrast with Josh's sister Emily.  Why did they have to saddle Josh with being the reason for two nightmare houseguests in a row?  Emily really seemed pretty great when we first met her at the beginning of the series, but as a wronged lover she's become an irritating, irresponsible, and at least somewhat manipulative drunk.  The only thing I found charming about her was when she raced Josh to the door, and that was less her being charming and more the writers nicely capturing a childhood-sibling-rivalry moment.  Still, nice that Josh had some shining moments of clever banter and well-earned pride in his pre-monster past that allowed him to look like he had potential for being a mature adult.

It took me more than one viewing of this episode to really "get" that Aidan's fixation on Rebecca's video was the fear he said he saw on her face.  I can't say that they didn't hit it hard enough; maybe I just kept missing it.  His feelings for her are clearly more than just protective, but he feels "responsible" for her, and is conflicted.  I really loved and was intrigued by what Aidan said to Marcus when we went to confront the vamps about the video: "You don't want me back.  You ever think what might happen?  You would be nothing all over again and you know it."  So, Aidan and Bishop were considered "gods" back in the day when they ran together?  Could be cool to see where this goes.

I may have finally figured out what they meant by the title of this episode.  The "two" would be Aidan and Rebecca, Josh and Emily, and Sally and Danny.  Or am I wrong?  I'm enjoying the clever titles they've been giving these episodes, but more often than not they leave me scratching my head as to their application.  A little thing, but it bugs me.

Overall, though, another solid episode, and as notably different from the original UK storyline this week as it was strikingly similar last week.  The US version will never be the UK version, and vice versa.  Both have many things to recommend them.  Vive la difference.

Lots of great lines this week; two favorites: 
Sally to Josh: "Is it picture day at school?"
Aidan, when Emily arrived at the brownstone: "What do people like to eat?  What do we, the people, like to eat?"

Review - Syfy's Being Human, Season 1 Episode 5, "The End of the World as We Knew It"

Photo courtesy of NBC Universal

Being Human airs Mondays at 9pm ET on SyFy.
Exclusive content and downloads at http://www.SyFy.com/BeingHuman

A very dramatic title for a somewhat less dramatic episode than the title promised.  In fairness, this episode more closely mimicked the UK version than any of the previous four episodes.  The two "big reveals" weren't, for any viewers familiar with the UK series.  The episode improved for me with a second viewing, and convenient amnesia about the overwrought title.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.  Let's start with something that absolutely was not in the UK version - a Catholic priest as a vampire.  Pretty shocking, really, and he was nicely creepy in his interpretation of scripture and his perception of God and life, and given a fair amount of air time.  Shut down completely, of course, when Aidan said "I get it, you're completely unhinged" and gave him a beatdown and some dental work.  Now that will be interesting.  Will Bishop actually help the priest, or is "taking care of" family to be interpreted in the mafia form of the term? 

I like that the show continues to clarify what is and isn't "true" of their … do we call them creatures?  I feel like they've done a decent job in living up to the series title, and it therefore terms like "creature" and "monster" become derogatory.  I decided to check out their blog - http://showblogs.syfy.com/howtobehuman/  (it's actually pretty entertaining, ostensibly written by each of them, with new entries every week) and I take from it that they all consider themselves cursed, so I'll go with that for now.  The Cursed.  Though of course, getting back to my previous discussion, Bishop and the priest - oh hahaha - do not consider themselves cursed, nor does Ray, at least not entirely.  I'd use "The Others" but that's been taken…

Bishop's discussion with Aidan shed light on a practical concern of vampirism: funding.  "We're vampires, not magicians" was an appreciated clarification, as many vampire stories include a healthy dose of magic.  Picking and choosing people to turn, people with money, power, and/or influence makes complete sense.  In giving his reason for turning the priest he also revealed his intriguing larger plan.  "Nobody sells eternal life like a priest."  But by presenting turning as an attractive offer to the right people, he foresees a day when the number of vampires combined with the power - influential power, not just physical power- will allow them to live out in the open.  "We live forever, humans don't, do the math, it's evolution. "  Bishop, who is living the full vampire life, is much stronger than Aidan, who is doing his best to avoid it.  I appreciate that the show is exploring the nature of the vampires and werewolves on a larger scale, while keeping our cursed as human as possible.

Was the big reveal that Ray was Hosh's "weredad" a surprise for the viewers?  Clearly not for me, since I know the UK series, but I presume it was as big a surprise for those who are new to the series as it originally was for fans of the original.  Ray's character was very convincingly disgusting throughout the previous episode and most of this one, but his loneliness and desperation were as heartbreaking as his public behavior was nauseating.  Ray also gave us a little more info on the series' take on werewolves: what they do when they are werewolves lingers as only flashes of memory when they are fully human. 

The other big reveal, that Danny killed Sally, was somewhat troubling to me but for the wrong reasons.  Sally's relationship with Danny is somewhat of a mystery.  She was sad, even distraught over losing Danny, but she wasn't needy with him, nor did she seem in any way fearful, even when they started to argue.  She didn't back off at all.  If they had a history of him abusing her, it was nowhere to be seen in their interactions.  I am fairly certain that I've never had friends in physically abusive relationships, so maybe it's a cliché, but Danny's behavior was totally out of left field, especially given Sally's reaction to it.  In the UK version, the reveal that her fiance caused the ghost's death was totally chilling, made moreso by the fact that it harkened back to his "she belonged to me" line when asked about his relationship with her.  During the flashback of the events leading up to her death, the ghost was pleading and terrified, knowing how her fiance was going to react to another instance of imagined betrayal.  Sally, on the other hand, feels internally strong, even though she is clearly sad.  Her retribution on Danny was not the act of someone overcoming desperation, but of someone taking command.

Which I loved.  I loved that Sally trashed Danny's apartment, and that the engagement ring at the center of the clearly deliberate swirl was satisfying AND aesthetically pleasing.  I also enjoyed the tripartate storm of each of our heroes taking full advantage of his/her curse to make a point, to take control by losing control.  A side benefit of cutting back and forth between the three scenes was that we were distracted away from the lack of anything actually interesting going on between the werewolves.  That half-transformation was so disappointing.  Really, they both started transforming at the same time but for some reason stopped at fangs and yelling while they fought?  Again, though, that becomes more obvious during a second watch, because the three scenes were nicely edited with enough movement to distract away from the lack of werewolf effects.  Sally's storm, however, was lovely.

The dinner was a nice little denouement.  Prepared by Josh, because he's had some closure and sees potential for moving on.  Aidan must know that it's not over with Bishop, and Sally hasn't seen a door so she's clearly not resolved.   So we're left as always with three cursed broken people trying to "hang on to the rituals of normalcy" by sharing dinner, and by simply being together.

Funniest bits this episode - Aidan to Sally: "You're poltergeisting your own house" and Ray walking out onto the stoop in his shortie robe and workboots.  I also loved "Ain't Misbehavin'" playing while the priest was teaching the new vamp how to feed, and the cheery "Let's Get Away" playing in the background during Bishop's beatdown of Aidan.  Those will be the songs I'll download from http://www.syfy.com/beinghuman/playlist when they add the playlist from this episode.

@Loster21's Tweets O' the Week from January 28 - February 4, 2011

 DharmaScientist I feel like I won an award when I get on @loster21‘s tweets o the week..but you can keep your trophy, I just want to bring everyone back.. 30 Jan

Me too, Rob, me too.  It was a big week for US LOSTies as we had the one year anniversary of the start of season 6!  Plenty of other LOST-related tweets from fans and from former cast and production, so let’s get going!

The standard stuff: THIS IS NOT A SPOILER FREE ZONE so if you’ve not watched LOST from beginning to end, do so and then come back.  Tweets from LOST cast and production are in red, and a list of their Twitter names along with their positions with LOST and current gigs can be found here.


LOST Production and Cast:

 DamonLindelof Fringe pwns Friday Night, yo! Mulder and Scully would be proud. 29 Jan

 mjgoldman @carltoncuse "In network TV when a show ends, it disappears from sight as quickly as Vladimir Putin’s political rivals." OH, SNAP!! 30 Jan  Quoting Carlton in last weekend’s NY Times article.  It WAS a great line…

Review - Syfy's Being Human, Season 1 Episode 4 "Wouldn't It Be Nice (If We Were Human)"

Photo courtesy of NBC Universal


Being Human airs Mondays at 9pm ET on SyFy.
Exclusive content and downloads at http://www.SyFy.com/BeingHuman

BH veterans, you need to try to forget what you've seen, partly to not be spoiled, but partly because some parts are, and other parts may be, different.  More than that I'll not say, lest newbies be spoiled.  Moving on…

An interesting theme this week, that of Together and Apart.  The opening monologue was once again given by Josh, but this time it was about himself, and his difficulty in trying to be alone - truly alone - during his time as a wolf.  He

Primeval Series 4 Episode 7 Finale Review

What a great finale!  Well, if you watched series 3.  If not, all of the impact of Danny's return and Ethan's identity was lost on you and, well, I'm sorry.  It was brave, or at least an interesting choice, of the showrunners to take that tack - did they not care about new viewers, or was this a lovely gift for the faithful?  As a faithful who was fairly disappointed with series 3, I was nevertheless taken completely by surprise and was delighted to see Danny return through the anomaly.  And WOW what a great twist to have Ethan be his long lost brother!  I frankly don't remember how often it came up in the third series that Danny's missing brother was the reason he joined the police force, beyond the introductory episode, but hopefully I wasn't the only one to have an great "OMG!" moment when Ethan's identity was revealed.

So, Helen is definitely dead, according to Danny.  Given his reappearance, it's nice to have her literally and figuratively laid to rest.  But the memory of her character will apparently live on, since she had several documents in her hand (excuse me?) and Phillip's name was on every one… Okay, that could be interesting.  Phillip was wonderfully creepy with his "Danny seemed erratic to me" line.  It was very reminiscent of Doctor Who's "Doesn't she look tired" line about Harriet Jones, eventually causing her downfall.  Danny was lucky, if you can call it that, that he decided to follow and protect his brother, and protect others from him, thereby sparing himself from whatever devious plans Phillip may have had for him.  If Primeval gets picked up again, Danny and Ethan/Patrick could certainly return, but if it doesn't, it was nice to have that storyline tied up so nicely.

Interesting setting, the retired prison.  So convenient that the anomalies seem to always appear in remote locations.  Regardless, it was a nice and creepy, multilevel classic-for-hunt/chase site.  As for the anomalies themselves, Connor's toy was a solid upgrade to the ARC's anomaly tracking abilities.  Loved his line when he found that an anomaly had a date from the 1800s and that they therefore shouldn't be worried -  expecting no creatures except maybe an "Oliver Twistasaurus."  The anomalies occurring more frequently and developing twins was a neat effect, especially as it made some of them undetectable, another cool revision.  More to build on is always good news for this type of show.

Was anyone really surprised that Matt is from the future?  No more than I was surprised, meaning not, that the mystery man was Matt's father.  Honestly, we've seen this already, not only in movies like "Terminator 2" but in this very show, with the extremely scary creatures from the future that we saw during the last series.  Yes, yes, the future will be horrible, all because of one man, blah blah blah.  Could be Phillip, could be Connor, we'll just have to see.

Or not.  The strength of the Danny/Ethan reveal and the changes in the anomalies outweighed the "meh" response I had to the Matt part of the story, and I therefore hope that we will see a return of this show.  Overall, a very well done series finale, and a return to the level of series 1.  Here's hoping for more of the same.

First published by Simply Television on 2/5/11