Welcome to the volume one of my reviews of the new shows that have come out this year. I’m a big television and movie fan if you haven’t noticed. I’m just gonna cover two comedy’s and one drama in this post.
If you haven’t heard of this show yet then you must not pay attention to magazines, online ads, and all around every outlet of media. New Girl focus’s on the life of an elementary school teacher who is down on her luck. Her boyfriend cheated on her and has found a strange grouping of guys who happened to need a roommate. It stars Zooey Deschanel (500 days of Summer, Yes Man), who has taken most comedies by storm in the last few years.
After all the press this show got, I really wasn’t expecting much. I thought it wouldn’t be funny, it would have a laugh track, and that it would just fall flat with Zooey being the lead. I was surprisingly wrong on every count. The show thankfully has no laugh track. I end up laughing a lot throughout each episode. And Zooey isn’t the only one carrying the show. The roommates I find incredibly funny. I almost prefer when they are the focus more than her story line. Nick (Jake M. Johnson) is a stand out! The connection he has with the guys and now with Jess (Zooey’s character) is heartwarming and natural.
Overall: A
If you haven’t seen it yet it’s worth your time. It’s just a half hour show and easy to get into. And your ears will thank you for a comedy without a laugh track.
Another girl power comedy from CBS is 2 Broke Girls. It stars Kat Dennings (Max), a personal favorite of mine, as the dark, witty, rude, and delightfully disgusting main character. And also a new actress, Beth Behrs (Caroline), as the not so rich anymore business savvy blonde.
Normally, I wouldn’t have bothered to watch this show but because of Kat Dennings (Thor, Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist) I gave the first episode a try. The laugh track is painful I admit. But I’m still holding in hoping the jokes won’t keep feeling quite as forced and that Caroline’s character will grow with some more substance. But I do have a gut feeling the show won’t get a pick up.
Overall: C+
If you don’t mind seeing a show that is really just about two girls trying to raise money to open a cupcake store then this is worth watching. I don’t think it’s for everyone though but it does have a few good laughs per episode it’s just a bit rehearsed at the moment.
Terra Nova is the latest “deserted island, who’s good and who’s bad, action family drama” of the moment. It also has gotten an insane amount of hype because Steven Spielberg was the executive producer of the 1st two part episode. I didn’t have high hopes again because often the shows that get so much hype don’t live up to it in their first season.
The story line in a paragraph is that way in the future the earth is dying from pollution. Scientists found a type of vortex and sent a probe not sure where it might fall in our history. They never found it in the future and determined that it must have been on a different timeline. That way whoever would go into the past wouldn’t affect that future because it’s a completely different line of history. So it centers around a family who were incredibly lucky and got picked to be in one of many large batches of humans that were sent back into the past millions of years ago. The family isn’t perfect and neither are the people who have already been there for quite awhile. There are dinosaurs everywhere and a new civilization working out the kinks.
I have a few big fears for this show.
- That it will fall into the Lost trap of who is the good group and who is the bad group. (We can’t take that anymore. Lost ruined that for us with it’s terrible ending.)
- That it will focus too much on the dinosaur of the week scenarios. They need to have a good complex story of their own. We’ll get very bored of the dinosaur story lines.
- That the story will focus way too much on just the family. Please expand. We will get tired of this family soon.
Overall: B
It’s not the worst thing to spend your time watching. It’s too soon to write the show off I think. I’m gonna hang in til at least half season and see where it’s headed. It has so much potential to be a very intricate time travel drama. Also you don’t seem to miss a lot from one episode to next yet so it’s still easy to catch on. Unlike Lost where if you missed one episode you might as well just wait for the DVD release.
