Thursday, August 11, 2005

I've been renting more Northern Exposures. The series has a real indie feel, and it fools around with its template. There are episodes where Joel, the lead, doesn't have his own story, he's just a character in other characters' stories. You often see what would be obvious setups in another show, but which (because the show is trying for something more like real life) don't necessarily pay off. E.g. in a standard tv plot, if Joel tells a lie in Act One, he'll get caught in it in Act Three and have to straighten it out in Act Four. In NX, he might tell a lie that has no consequences, and is only there to reveal his character. Nice.

I like NX. I'm glad it's out on DVD.

10:30 AM

1 Comments:

So few shows have ever made me make time to sit down in front of the the TV. "Northern Exposure" was one. In fact, the very first dramatic writing I did was a teleplay for the show, and my e-mail sig has a quote from it, a dozen years later: "All we are, basically, are monkeys with car keys." (Grandma Woody, the film critic)

This gang loved the medium, loved their work, and it showed. Well, until the last season or two, it did....

By  Webs, at 12:39 AM  

Post a Comment

Back to Complications Ensue main blog page.