Posted on October 6, 2008 | |
In the US: Fridays, 10pm ET/PT, CBS
In the UK: Five, Five US, ITV1 and ITV3 in some sort of rota system, some time next year
Think CBS and if you know your US networks, you'll probably think 'procedural' immediately afterwards. If it's not existing stalwarts like the entire CSI stable, NCIS and The Unit filling the airwaves, we've The Eleventh Hour and The Mentalist this season as well.
Then there's Numb3rs, which seems to exist simply to add yet another procedural to the CBS body count - and to win family programming prizes. A sub-exciting series in which the FBI seem incapable of solving even the basic crimes without recourse to a genius mathematician and his nerdy friends, it's been lurking on Friday nights for years and has now reached season five.
And I'm still watching it. I have no idea why.
Continue reading "Review: Numb3rs 5x1"
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Posted on July 24, 2008 | |
Doctor Who
- Sweet FA to play lawyer on Law & Order: London
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Posted on July 8, 2008 | |
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Posted on May 23, 2008 | |
Normally, around this time of year, I'd be putting out copious reviews of all the US season finales. This year, I haven't, although a few escaped earlier in the year and at the end of last year. There's a list of reasons why I haven't done so many this time around:
- With the writers' strike messing with everything, most of the series haven't been at their best, so it might be wrong to judge them too harshly
- I didn't realise some series had ended
- Some series had ended permanently so there was no point
- There's a great big backlog of episodes that we haven't watched yet
- I've been busy
So no Scrubs, My Name is Earl, House, Moonlight, Aliens in America, Eli Stone, et al, coverage this year, I'm afraid. Lost is still to come next week, I think. But, after the break, I'll give abbreviated rundowns on 30 Rock, Smallville, CSI, CSI: Miami, Numb3rs, Gossip Girl and Supernatural.
Continue reading "Season finales 2008"
Posted on September 29, 2007 | |
In the US: Fridays, 10pm et/pt, CBS
In the UK: One of the ITVs at a point determined by some stochastic process
Characters re-cast: 0
Major characters gotten rid of: -1
Major new characters: 0
Format change percentage: 0%
Beards grown: 2
What a difference a decent director and script make. As I have remarked before, Numb3rs is often quite a formulaic show. When it's good, it's very good; but most of the time, it's just average - not utterly dumb, just mundane and unsurprising.
This season opener carries on directly, in terms of plot rather than chronologically, from the third season's finale, in which Dylon Bruno's hardcore ex-army FBI agent was revealed to be an agent for the Chinese. It was surprisingly surprising for Numb3rs, not least because it was written by the usually rubbish Ken Sanzel.
Although it soon becomes clear that yes, a magic reset button will probably reverse that one innovation the show has produced, the episode does have two even more surprising surprises: firstly, Ken Sanzel can write really good scripts - he's even getting the hang of this maths thing to the extent that it's actually relevant, rather than slammed in with a crowbar; secondly, exec producer Tony Scott, who's been sitting on his hands doing not much to earn that title for three seasons, has finally gotten off his backside to direct this episode, the first time he's directed an episode of a television show.
In true Tony Scott style, he's brought along one of his favourite actors, Val Kilmer, who's busily resurrecting his acting career after a long time in the wilderness. Before even a minute's gone by, it's clear that whatever you think of Scott as a film director with his somewhat bombastic style, as a television director he's really first rate. Taken together, the script and direction turn this Numb3rs episode in something pretty good.
Continue reading "Review: Numb3rs 4.1"
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Posted on July 27, 2007 | |
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Posted on June 22, 2007 | |
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- ABC remaking the UK's Mile High for Lifetime. Plus they seem to want to do something with Channel 4's classic Ultraviolet
- Peter MacNicol back as a regular on Numb3rs next season
- A female president for 24?
- Who's back in Heroes next year after their world tour. Plus Heroes: Origins will start in April
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Posted on May 23, 2007 | |
Woah. Where did all the news go?
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Posted on May 21, 2007 | |
Finales are typically times for surprises. Numb3rs was no different and was practically bursting with them. But the biggest surprise was to see Martin “Rings on their Fingers” Jarvis going hardcore on the FBI's arses. Man he can get nasty with a mobile phone holster.
The second big surprise was that there were any surprises. The third season of Numb3rs has been - dare I say it? – formulaic. It's drifted here, it's drifted there. Pretty much every episode the story has been the same, with no real character development, no real characterisation, simply maths technique of the week and a bit of shooting. Even the occasional bit of new blood hasn't helped and the old blood have had negligible time devoted to making you actually care about them. It's never been awful, but it's never been great. So to have an episode in which everything gets shaken up is really quite amazing.
The third big surprise is that Ken Sanzel can write. Responsible for most of the series' worst episodes, he's co-written the finale and despite its somewhat derivative and convoluted nature, it does at least keep the tension ratcheted up.
By the end of the episode, there have been major twists for at least three characters. If you're a big Numb3rs fan, at least one development will have you asking plenty of questions - mostly how, why, who, when, and where, since it does come somewhat out of left field without much foreshadowing - and maybe we'll get some explanations for it next season, although I doubt it. What they'll do to build on it and other developments, I don't know, but it does at least demonstrate that even in the most tired of shows, the occasional dramatic twist can occur.
Tension: 8/10
PS Does MI6 do its own code-breaking and code-creation still or is that a GCHQ thing now? Anyone know?
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Posted on February 26, 2007 | |
24: Never give jessie-wuss girls a gun because they'll never use it, even when it could shorten a whole season and save the US
30 Rock: Is getting seriously cerebral. I thought Numb3rs was the only show on tele that could talk about "transitive properties"
Battlestar Galactica: James Callis can do a pretty good Yorkshire accent (he did go to the University of York, apparently); the class war will continue in space
The Class: Adultery is perfectly acceptable if your husband mixes you up with one of his ex-wives.
CSI: William Petersen's beards can be used as plot development
Heroes: Is just so cool
Lost: Some flashbacks can be amazingly tedious and pointless and should be best left forgotten
Numb3rs: Just occasionally, Ken Sanzel can write a good episode. It's still not great, though, not even though it's ripping off 24
Studio 60: If you're going to go, go out on a bang or your chances of ever coming back are scuppered.
The Unit: It's possible to make the LA metro look like the Berlin underground system. A bit.
Read more on Review: Sanctuary 1x1