I'm glad I have cable / i wish i had cable

So, I NEEDED to catch the pilot for the new ABC serial thriller drama "Traveler" tonight because I saw that a) it got a Metacritic score of 53 (which is practically genius for Metacritic TV standards). It was the best/worst 10 minutes of TV watching in my life. It starts with two graduate-school aged dudes, one of them Ryan Atwood's brother Trey from "The OC". Cut to quick-moving trendy parties and what not, and then the two dudes and this other dude are all "Let's pull a great prank at the museum in New York!" And their prank is...putting on rollerblades and rollerblading down stairs?! WHAT?!?!? WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? THAT IS NOT A PRANK!!!!!!! In TV life, this is done with Moby-lite techno music, with the two Abercrombie-ready dudes totally high-fiving. In real life, Chris and I pull a prank at a museum by sliding down the hand railing down the stairs, then spraining our collective ankle. Oh "Traveler", you're this close to losing me as a viewer. Oh yeah, and then the building blows up, after the third guy mysteriously cuts out on the phone.

Cut to the CTU-like FBI office, where one representative from each major nationality resides. Yeah, a guy with dreadlocks can totally jive with the stressed-out boss guy. Oh, and the FBI wouldn't be complete without a surveillance video that perfectly captures the two guys looking like they are escaping the crime scene. Now the guy who used to be on The OC is calling his dad, who makes a vague reference to "This wouldn't be the first time the government has screwed us over." Finally, I become way too bored of the forced pacing, humor, and action, and change the channel.

I'm so glad I have cable.

-Qualler

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i wish i had cable.

if i did, i might have not felt compelled to watch the entire series premiere of traveler. qualler did a good job giving you the basic premise for this should-have-been-a-movie-that-makes-$20-million-tops tv show, but really, no words can describe the idiocy that is this new serial drama on abc. so here is a promo for it just so you can see what we got ourselves into (along with paal):



how is this a tv show and not a b-movie combination of the fugitive and conspiracy theory you ask? well basically, it's not a tv show. it is a movie that they would like to turn into an aggravating 20-some episodes simply by not answering very simple plot questions that could be resolved inside one commercial break.

the essential (albeit stupid) questions that the writers will try to stretch out for an indefinite amount of time before answering:

1. who really is will traveler? our track jacket-wearing drinking buddy with a camcorder or a terrorist that faked being our friend just to reel us into his secret anti-american plot to blow up a museum?

2. how is rich kid #1's father part of this anti-american plot and/or why does he not trust the u.s. government and/or why should we care about a rich white guy with one facial expression?

3. will rich kid #1 and rich kid #2 be BFFs/continue their "bromance" no matter who's trying to arrest/kill/kidnap them?

4. how many jack kerouac references can the writers possibly make in a series whose potential audience doesn't care about kerouac and/or doesn't know who kerouac is?

5. how many times will the "wise black man" show up as a deus ex machina for any crappy situation they're in where they're about to get caught before they explain who he is and why he's helping them? or will the only reason he helps them continually be "i ain't no fan of the police"?

other things to look forward to in upcoming episodes: probably some running, some subplot with a plain-looking girl who's totally crushing on one of the rich kids for some reason, some more running and chasing, some hiding out, some escaping, some running really fast, and some "let's-get-the-eff-outta-here" scenes.

-chris

This entry was posted by Unknown, on Thursday, May 10, 2007. You can leave your response.