Cybored: The New "Bionic Woman"

OK, so after three episodes, I think I've finally reached my fill of the new Bionic Woman. The first episode was fairly good, so I gave it chance. The second episode, however, was like having a root canal while listening to an infomercial...while being shot through the head. If it'd been a bear trap, I would've gnawed off my own leg to escape (and then would've needed bionics of my own...oh, the irony, Alanis).

So before last night's episode, I told myself I'd give it one more chance, and I have to say it blew it, big time. No, it wasn't quite as bad as episode #2, but it wasn't anything I'd want to endure on a weekly basis, either. As I see it, here are the show's main problems:

(1) Most of the characters are dreadfully dull. It's not a good sign when the show's titular (look it up, you perve) character doesn't have enough charisma to keep the viewer interested, but it's true in this case. Jaime Sommers is not someone with whom I'd want to get stuck in an elevator (I'm not even sure she'd be on the ball enough to get us out). I want to like Miguel Ferrer (since I've liked him in pretty much everything he's ever done), but they sabotage him with bad dialog (on last night's show, he referred to a character as going "scorched earth"; who the @#$% talks like that?). The only semi-interesting character is Sarah, the "evil" bionic woman; Lea suggested they should spin her off into her own show, and that might be the only way of salvaging anything from this mess.

(2) The action. Hey, folks, it's an ACTION show, so that might be somewhat important, j'think? The first episode's action was pretty good. The second was crappy and nearly non-existent. Last night's show had a big fight scene in a manicure salon (!), and it made me want to ram my head into the TV set. Not only was it contrived, not only was the "fight dialog" stupid and pointless, but Jaime Sommers was UNABLE to take out three normal thugs without Sarah's help. I think they're going for some kind of a "grrrrrl" persona for Jaime, but if that's the best she can do, she's more Blanche Dubois than Emma Peel.

(3) The emo. Oh, sweet sassy molassey, does every show these days have to be Smallville? Look, the single best bet for saving this show would be to drop the continuing soap opera aspects, and do what the original Bionic Woman did: feature self-contained episodes. I really don't give a rat's rosy red ass about Jaime's relationship with her sister. I want to see her dish out some hard justice to bad guys with her bionic bag o' tricks. Remember the X-Files? Sure you do. Well, do you remember that the best episodes of the X-Files were the ones that featured self-contained stories and had nothing to do with the overall "alien abduction" megaplot? Remember how you prayed that each new episode would feature Tooms or the Flukeman or Jose Chung's "From Outer Space", rather than Mulder's never-ending search for "the truth"?

Well, maybe you didn't, but I sure as hell did. And that's what this show needs to do.

(4). Three episodes in, and no Bigfoot. I'm just saying...

I seriously doubt I'll watch the show from this point on. It just seems like the waste of an hour, during which I could be doing something more productive...like writing a blog entry about how craptastic the show is...

Just Say No-Magnon

ABC's new show, Cavemen? A total and utter piece of excrement. What the hell were they thinking? Yes, the Geico ads are cool, but that's because they're freakin' thirty seconds long, and they have a point! A thirty minute sitcom, however? Bleeearrrrgh!

The show doesn't know what it wants to be. Basically all they've done is take a very lame, exceptionally badly written sitcom, and thrown in a few cavemen who act in a way almost indistinguishable from anyone else. There's nothing to capitalize on the caveman idea except (A) the occasional mention that they're...gasp...cavemen, and (B) the caveman make-up.

And let's talk about that make-up. They're guys with long hair and beards! Criminently, by that criteria, I'M a @#$% caveman! The only other distinguishing features are a sometimes-wider-nose and a slight cranial ridge (which means they're about half as "different" from normal humans as the average character on one of the latter-day Star Trek shows).

Pretty much everything I wanted to see done with this premise was already done (and better) by either the Geico commercials, or by Phil Hartman as the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.

I can only hope that this is pulled mid-season, along with the turgid and unfunny Carpoolers (is there any way we could have the carpoolers run over the cavemen, and then commit seppuku from the shame?).

There are plenty of great shows on TV at the moment, including Friday Night Lights, House, Heroes, Prison Break, Life, The Office, My Name is Earl, 30 Rock, and others. What we don't need is more high-concept, low-quality filler like Cavemen making television the vast wasteland it's sometimes accused of being.

Me no like Cavemen! Urrrrggghh!