I really liked the premise of Awake (starring Jason Isaacs, who you may know better as Lucius Malfoy). A detective is in a car accident that kills either his wife or his son. After he wakes up after the accident, he doesn’t have a subjective experience of sleeping. His world has bifurcated into two parallel worlds: one in which his wife is alive and one in which his son is. The two different psychologists he’s been assigned to in the different worlds have different strategies for convincing him the other world is a delusion.
It’s a cancelled tv series, and it’s variable. The crimes he solves as a detective are boring, but his interaction with the two shrinks was interesting the whole way through and I found some of their proposed experiments very inventive. The solution isn’t great, but the approach to problem solving was. And Isaacs is great.
Excellent question; I have dropped both “Alcatraz” and “Person of Interest” after a couple of episodes because of this problem.
Three hypothesis: a) The procedural formula is easier to pull off successfully with limited writing talent. b) Having a handful of permanent characters and the rest be one-offs is cheaper in terms of casting than a complex plot with many, layered recurring characters. c) We are atypical, and most people prefer the comforting, predictable procedural formula. (In particular, it allows for tuning in and out of a show missing episodes here and there with no great loss.)
Independent of Alejandro1′s good suggestions I have a thought about the pacing and lastability of premises for TV shows.
I suspect it would be very difficult for an exploration of just that premise to be stretched out into a full length tv series and would likely be more suited to a standalone novel or movie. Similar for a lot of other tv show premises that are attached to more generic shows.* If the main characters devoted their sole attention to resolving the premise it would be implausible for them not to resolve it within a few episodes, meaning they can’t play with it anymore or have to resolve some of the interesting ambiguity of it.
Other examples of the top of my head would be Life on Mars, Tru Calling, contrast to say Primer where the premise is the entirety of the plot, but its over much quicker.
Why they want shows that last a long time rather than one shots probably comes down to the economics of the television industry, which I don’t know much about.
I watched a few episodes and found it enjoyable but not enthralling. Each episode was good in a self contained way but didn’t get far enough in to see if they resolved the longer term threads well.
A Clockwork Orange: are an accidental error during therapy (the choice of music) and a poor post-release follow-up supposed to be taken as some kind of a morality message?
I don’t want to be too hard on Burgess here, because he is a little better at being fair to both sides than some of his counterparts. But let’s face it: the only reason there even are two sides is because he made his anti-violence conditioning also remove ability to enjoy classical music. Which in terms of subtlety, is only one step above “as a side effect, using science gives you an overwhelming urge to drown kittens”.
The Imposter) is a recent documentary about a French man who convinces a Texas family he is their missing teen. Great case study in rationalization, hypothesis-privileging, and psychopathy. The question of what actually happened to Nicholas, the missing teen, looks like a good place to practice the use of Bayes.
Movies and Television Thread
I really liked the premise of Awake (starring Jason Isaacs, who you may know better as Lucius Malfoy). A detective is in a car accident that kills either his wife or his son. After he wakes up after the accident, he doesn’t have a subjective experience of sleeping. His world has bifurcated into two parallel worlds: one in which his wife is alive and one in which his son is. The two different psychologists he’s been assigned to in the different worlds have different strategies for convincing him the other world is a delusion.
That sounds like a cool premise, but how is the actual movie?
It’s a cancelled tv series, and it’s variable. The crimes he solves as a detective are boring, but his interaction with the two shrinks was interesting the whole way through and I found some of their proposed experiments very inventive. The solution isn’t great, but the approach to problem solving was. And Isaacs is great.
Why can’t people make TV shows about cool characters and premises without attaching them to annoying procedurals?
Excellent question; I have dropped both “Alcatraz” and “Person of Interest” after a couple of episodes because of this problem.
Three hypothesis: a) The procedural formula is easier to pull off successfully with limited writing talent. b) Having a handful of permanent characters and the rest be one-offs is cheaper in terms of casting than a complex plot with many, layered recurring characters. c) We are atypical, and most people prefer the comforting, predictable procedural formula. (In particular, it allows for tuning in and out of a show missing episodes here and there with no great loss.)
To be fair, using information from alternate worlds is an interesting spin on procedural, if you do it right.
Independent of Alejandro1′s good suggestions I have a thought about the pacing and lastability of premises for TV shows.
I suspect it would be very difficult for an exploration of just that premise to be stretched out into a full length tv series and would likely be more suited to a standalone novel or movie. Similar for a lot of other tv show premises that are attached to more generic shows.* If the main characters devoted their sole attention to resolving the premise it would be implausible for them not to resolve it within a few episodes, meaning they can’t play with it anymore or have to resolve some of the interesting ambiguity of it.
Other examples of the top of my head would be Life on Mars, Tru Calling, contrast to say Primer where the premise is the entirety of the plot, but its over much quicker.
Why they want shows that last a long time rather than one shots probably comes down to the economics of the television industry, which I don’t know much about.
There should be more miniserieses anyway. (Tru Calling’s on my to-watch list; would you recommend it?)
I watched a few episodes and found it enjoyable but not enthralling. Each episode was good in a self contained way but didn’t get far enough in to see if they resolved the longer term threads well.
Tempted to rewatch it myself now.
That’s pretty much what I would say. The second season had more of an arc, but it doesn’t get resolved.
A Clockwork Orange: are an accidental error during therapy (the choice of music) and a poor post-release follow-up supposed to be taken as some kind of a morality message?
Our very own Yvain, Against dystopias, pt 1
The Imposter) is a recent documentary about a French man who convinces a Texas family he is their missing teen. Great case study in rationalization, hypothesis-privileging, and psychopathy. The question of what actually happened to Nicholas, the missing teen, looks like a good place to practice the use of Bayes.