Guides for watching TV series

There are many great TV series out there, but some of them take a while to become watchable (“Star Trek: The Next Generation” comes to mind) or have some awful episodes in them. Thankfully, there are people out there who are willing to protect the general public. For example, “How to get into 20 classic science fiction shows” helps with

1. Star Trek: The Original Series


2. Star Trek: The Next Generation


3. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine


4. Star Trek: Voyager


5. Star Trek: Enterprise


6. Doctor Who


7. Torchwood


8. Red Dwarf


9. The Prisoner


10. The Twilight Zone


11. Mystery Science Theater 3000


12. The X-Files


13. Buffy the Vampire Slayer


14. Angel


15. Dollhouse


16. Babylon 5


17. Highlander: The Series


18. Battlestar Galactica


19. Lost


20. The Stargate Franchise

Now, I’d really appreciate it if someone did the same for “Fringe” which has some weak episodes, but also some great ones (and more great ones the more it progresses).



Update 2011-04-17:

• 20 Can’t-Miss Episodes Of Star Trek [TOS]

The internetification of TV

The LA times has an article titled “Google TV plan is causing jitters in Hollywood”. I don’t envy Hollywood. They can either turn to the control freak Apple or the lazy curator Google (for example, in the Android market place, someone was recently able to upload and charge for an application that was actually someone else’s). The added competition is certainly good for the consumer. It is also currently far from clear who will make this race. Other options include Hulu and Netflix. Because all the necessary technology is so readily available, there is little lock-in and start-up costs are relatively low. Ironically, Google’s plans might also be good for Apple, whose TV-related project is rumored to be faced with difficult negotiations. If Hollywood is scared of Google, things might go smoother.

Great TV: Friday night lights

I don’t understand American football and usually don’t like sports-themed movies. But Friday night lights (FNL) is different, because it offers a compelling portrayal of the people involved in football and how it affects them and their relationships. Furthermore, many other topics are also covered, in a manner typical of good American TV: while the “classics” are there (doping, alcohol, first sex), FNL stays fresh, avoids preachiness, takes its time to tell its story and does so with well-developed characters. Recommended and currently relatively cheap on Amazon UK.

Fan-financed TV series

The idea is brilliant: Find enough people willing to pay for your TV series pilot, distribute it via BitTorrent and hope that that will get more people to pay for a complete season. Considering to what lengths fans go to prevent TV networks from canceling “their” show, this seems like a viable option. In fact, VODO has already been able to create the pilot episode of “Pioneer One” this way.

New York City in an alternate universe (photo)

Source: “Other Roads Taken”, click to enlarge

The TV show “Fringe” partly takes place in an alternate universe. One thing that is intriguing about that universe is how the skyline of New York City looks. The still-present Twin Towers are an obvious choice, but the domed skyscraper is especially intriguing. Turns out that this building had been planned for NYC in 1908 by Gaudi. Imagine that. It is called the Grand American Hotel. Fringepedia lists more differences between the universes. Amusing: Alternate universes tend to have Zeppelins in them.



Update 2011-02-22: All posts on Fringe.

Clip shows

Every now and then when following a TV series, an awkward kind of episode comes along: a frame story is used—rather heavy-handedly—as an excuse to sum up recent story lines by showing clips from past episodes. After just having watched one too many of those, I googled and found out that this kind of episode has a name, it’s called a “clip show”. The rationale for clip shows is as an introduction for newcomers to a series and to save production costs. A wikipedia article has more on this topic, including some history.