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What is "My Two Bits?" My Two Bits is the official editorial page for the editor of Techtite.com. Techtite will accept reader submissions, for reviews as well as any editorials deemed well written and pertinent to this web site's audience. ----------------- A Sampling Of Past Editorials: ---DEATH to pop-up window commercials! ---This Editorial Can Be Closed By Clicking This TINY LITTLE DOT! ---Paranoia, Box Office Destroy-a... ---Why Lara Croft Won't Do Playboy(!). ---What's in Your Wallet Brain? ---Baby, If You Ever Wondered What 'ART' Is... ---Season Finale Reactions: '07 ---Big Brother 8: Edited for Sanity ------------------ Sidebar: -------------------- No sidebar comments for this review. Yet. |
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My latest Two Bits to share: Another Season,Many More Finales------------------------------------------------------------------- There's this moment in classic Simpsons lore when Lisa and Bart have a calamity of some sort, and Bart says: "Well...the important thing is, we survived!" When considering the Writer's strike, that is the best summary of this "season" to a capital "S." The surprising thing is: not only did many seasons end with a bang this season; they proved that even in the most dire of times, the best series stay on top. As always, be forewarned: I try to be as cryptic as possible with spoilers on this editorial each year, though keep in mind it's hard to comment on finales of the season without spoiling anything at all. If you're the type who waits for the DVD sets (and, dude!...can I move in with you if you can afford a whole network worth of DVD season sets?), you might want to avoid reading any further if you don't want any spoilers at all. Otherwise, we can just move on... Let's start with the biggest shock: CSI. Gossip columns were talking for awhile about Gary Dourdan (who plays Warrick Brown) deciding to leave the series. However; who knew his departure would be so extreme? It was a shocking season cliffhanger on many levels, especially so soon after the episode when Jorja Fox (aka "Sara Sidle") left the series, just a few episodes earlier. The saddest part of her character leaving the series is how it was only emotional because of how much her fans miss her. The way Sara Sidle left CSI forever was pretty lackluster otherwise. Warrick...? That was a scene that will be imbedded in fans minds for years to come. I hear that the villain of this scene will be the "big bad" for most of next season. I hope not. Kick his butt to the curb no later than November sweeps, please. After all...Warrick left CSI thanks to him! The biggest finale, overall? Lost. Regardless of nearly having to be a half-season because of the strike, the series came through with a "full" story this season, ending with the planned final moments of their return (so to speak) to safety. Another great season finale...and another cool cliffhanger. It was revealed on the following morning show that they filmed three completely different "who is in the casket?" reveals, to avoid spoilers too early. Well...I am shocked. Nobody expected his departure (literally), so what's going on here? Desmond can time travel and Walt is back, so maybe he isn't really dead. Speaking of Walt: how brilliant is the explanation of his quick growth? The time is now three years in the future. That means Walt is back, as well as a whole slew of cool flackbacks telling us what happened since the castaways got home, as well as why they need to return. I also hear we'll see more Dharma Stations on the island. I hope so. That "Orchid" Station looked cool! Speaking of Lost for a bit longer: how will this pan out? Mind you; I asked the same thing last season. I didn't believe that Lost could feasibly jump from a flashback style show, to a flash-forward style show. It succeeded beyond all expectations. This next season will be quite more challenging, however. The entire cast is split in two, with half the cast "home" and half the cast on the island. My advice: jump the action to when they return to the island, then show flashbacks as to how they got back. It just wouldn't pan out, if you ask me, to have alternating episodes "on the island" and "off the island." Then again, what do I know? They made this season work regardless of mostly flash-forwards...and after the failure of The Nine, that surprised me. That show failed because everything exciting in the show already happened. Yet Lost kept the thrills coming regardless of it being clear that in the "present," the "Losties" were home safe and sound. Let's hope they can make similar magic with the next "half on and half off the island" season. This "jump ahead" formula might not work for, say, Desperate Housewives. What are they thinking? No sooner than the final 2 minutes of the finale, the show is now "five years" into the future. This makes no sense. For one thing they'll have to recast the teens and kids on the show. This means goodbye to Andrea Bowen, for example, who's played Susan (Teri Hatcher) Mayer's daughter for four seasons. My guess; they want to jump the story ahead to when Tom Scavo's seemingly psychotic daughter is grown up enough to cause major havoc. That's the only reason to jump the story ahead however, so it makes little sense. Likewise for...no "Mike" in Susan's life? What a horrible cliffhanger this was. I'd almost accept a "it was all a dream" cliché as opposed to the season this will lead to. Say it isn't so, Housewives! Many shows are in limbo until their return this fall, so they weren't given legitimate finales. Let's consider two of the biggest. For one: let's hope Heroes can get back to the excitement it had with season one, and its writers had enough time to think of a season story that isn't "Hiro lost in time while Sylar is a boring regular dude." I'm glad that Chuck is returning, though I'm unsure of how that series will pan out for the next season. For one thing a year has passed. How much of Chuck's knowledge is pertinent anymore, after a full year? It's like his brain was once the "Playstation 2" of the party, and now that doesn't mean as much anymore. I love the series though, so I hope the writers can solve this. Bones had a surprising, albeit peculiar cliffhanger. I doubt anyone really believed the promos that implied Booth was killed. The first minutes of the season finale were pretty "killer," though! Booth uses his "death" as a ruse to catch a bad guy...and doesn't tell Bones. She then sees he's still alive, and punches him in the face. Even agnostic TV fans, who never watched an episode of Bones, can imagine the romantic tension of that scene. Too bad the rest of the finale wasn't as stellar. The "big reveal" of who was helping the creepy skeleton-cannibal-guy was someone in Bones' lab...and who knew? Well, let's presume Scooby Doo knew, because not a single clue all season led to this revelation. It was like, "Okay; this actor wants to leave the show; let's make his character insane!" Whatever. Compare this final reveal, to the cliffhanger of NCIS. It was rumored for weeks that a major character was leaving. Who was it? Lauren Holly. Didn't see that one coming. For one thing she's rarely out of her office on the show. Then she's suddenly tying up loose ends of an old spy mission she had with Gibbs (Mark Harmon), and...bang. What's worse; some jerk is now head of NCIS, and he's sent the whole cast of characters to the four winds. That's the kind of cliffhanger you want to see, because you know it will be solved in the season premiere alone. Nobody expects the cast to work while miles apart! So the series premiere has the team get back together and get this guy. That's the sort of series premiere I look forward to. Other shows aren't returning, yet left with their own decent swan songs. Journeyman ended perfectly, with not only his wife coming to terms with his time travelling; she sees him "jump" in time for the first time. Seeing the look on her face in that scene was a perfect final moment to the series, even if it would've been even better if Sci-Fi channel or the like kept the series afloat. I also feel the not-returning Kelsey Grammar sitcom Back To You ended well, with his and Patricia Heaton's characters revealing their secret child together, so the secrets out and they can live their lives normally now. That was a good ending to the series, even if, again, it's a shame the series didn't live up to its potential, and is not coming back. Now let's look at the reality shows. I'm glad that The Amazing Race is coming back (its probably done filming its next season by the time you read this). The past season of the series was great, and ended perfectly well, with some likeable people winning the game, for once. Yay! That's more than I can say for Survivor: Fans Versus Favorites, when some totally good for nothing women won against some admittedly foolish, arrogant alpha males, who didn't see they were being "Pagonged" until it was too late. Pagonged, for the unaware, is the slang term used when Survivor has a seemingly worthless alliance win against a more likeable team (a la team "Pagong," in season one), and nobody can do anything about it (nor the home audience, really). This season's best returning favorites were Yau-Man, James, Ozzy; all eliminated by the idiots of the "stir the pot" alliance. To make matters worse; the ladies of this alliance were so cocky and arrogant about it. Sure, it makes sense that a weakling would be gleeful when winning a game against a jock, against seemingly impossible odds, though think of the home audience, ladies. Think of how this alliance of do-nothings booted the likeable Yau-Man, as early as the third episode. Then ask me how exciting this season was. Answer: It wasn't. It was just plain awful. In conclusion: this was quite a surprising season of television. Regardless of the writer's strike, the best shows stayed on top, against all expectations. As for the other shows like, say Bionic Woman; hey, few shows could survive a writer's strike. It's nice to see, however, that the shows that were always good stayed on top regardless of the challenge. Shows like Lost could've easily cruise controlled their way through the season, and they didn't. That's why these shows are on top, and that's why this season rocked. As Always: I'm Techtite,
and these are My Two Bits...
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