Interesting Article Series

[TV Maven]

About the Success of Smallville. 4-part series. Funny and true. It contains some season 8 spoilers (in part 4) Read it and comment here, or on the Media Morgue Blog itself.

http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-part-i.html (http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-part-i.html)

http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-ii.html (http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-ii.html)

http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-part-iii.html (http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-defense-of-smallville-part-iii.html)

http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/smallville-iv-quest-for-peace.html (http://mediamorgue.blogspot.com/2008/06/smallville-iv-quest-for-peace.html)

Tell me what you think. :)

[Razzle]

good find some interesting stuff some i can agree with some i can disagree with overall nice little review of the show...

[guittarjedi]

Good stuff, but they misspelled Vandervoort damn it!

[AlwaysRight]

you lost me when you said Clark and Lana together is a good thing because.....

[Vergon6]

you lost me when you said Clark and Lana together is a good thing because.....
Yeah they really played out the Lana and Clark thing. They should had the 'real go at it" back in Season 5 and then had them end up as just friends by sometime in the next season.

There were some points I agreed with, some I disagreed with like other people said before.

[smallv17]

It's nice to see that other people agree Smallville deserves more recognition. Also nice to hear all this good and positive points on the series because there's been a lot of complaining lately!

[petitemimi]

Who wrote this? Does that person have a name? TV Maven, did you write this?

And what does that mean :"in what is sometimes the death-knell of any good series, Rosenbaum and Welling directed episodes last season". Well, first, just to get things straight, Rosenbaum directed an episode in S6, which is NOT last season but the season before, and Welling directed 3 episodes overall and John Shneider one. I don't see a problem with this; those were very well directed episodes and very well received by fans.

[Vergon6]

Other shows have actors directing episodes well before the end of the series. Star Trek: The Next Generation is an example of this. But according to the author, TNG is 'pretentious'. I don't see how a Holodeck episode is pretentious, but whatever. It's obvious that the person who wrote it hated TNG, or at least it came off like that.

[petitemimi]

I believe the author means that STNG's actors were pretentious because they wanted holodeck episodes and that Smallville had just a few similar AU episodes like Noir.
I really don't get this argument. I believe writers like writing AU episodes as much as actors like to play them. We have no indication that actors demanded that kind of episodes and I don't see why that would make them pretentious. If it's the case, than AA must be pretentious like hell because 2 AU epis were written for his character: Noir and Sleeper. (Not saying that AA is pretentious of course).

[red_cape_7]

he views the series in a different light in some ways than myself or what seems to be the majority of kryptonsite does, so it was nice to see a different spin. i do think a lot of the points were debatable and in some places he seems not to have a ridiculously intimate knowledge of the show (like us crazies at kryptonsite!), but definitely worth the read.

i've always marveled at smallville continuing to get picked up season after season, especially in the thursday timeslot. given the nature of the show, it tends to cater to a select type of fan - but luckily we seem to be pretty loyal fans. it's kinda gotten to the point where when i meet people and we figure out we both watch smallville, it's an instant bond b/c the show's following has a cult-esque feel to it. as much as i b*tch about certain things on the show, im gonna be really sad when it ends.

thanks for the link.

[TV Maven]

Yes. I wrote the article.

My point on the actors directing episodes had not to do with the quality of the episodes, but the fact that once the actors begin doing this, they tend to start looking to other projects more and more, and lose interest in the series. (witness Rosenbaum's defection)

This is not meant as a criticism of the actors or the episodes, just an observation of trouble on the horizon, as many of these fine actors (and I mean that with no sarcasm) will increasingly seek more creative control in this and other projects. Things tend to get wild once that happens.

Regarding TNG: I don't hate the series. I like it quite a lot, but maintain that the AU episodes were overused. A matter of taste, I suppose.

Thank you all for the feedback.

[moviefan2k4]

I liked the arcticle for the most part. The only major aspect I disagreed with was his views regarding the Clark/Lana sex stuff (which, in my opinion, should never have been presented at all). I did like his tagline about the car explosion, though; it made me laugh. "Welcome to Smallville, *itch!" :lol:

[Vergon6]

Yes. I wrote the article.

My point on the actors directing episodes had not to do with the quality of the episodes, but the fact that once the actors begin doing this, they tend to start looking to other projects more and more, and lose interest in the series. (witness Rosenbaum's defection)

This is not meant as a criticism of the actors or the episodes, just an observation of trouble on the horizon, as many of these fine actors (and I mean that with no sarcasm) will increasingly seek more creative control in this and other projects. Things tend to get wild once that happens.

Regarding TNG: I don't hate the series. I like it quite a lot, but maintain that the AU episodes were overused. A matter of taste, I suppose.

Thank you all for the feedback.
I guess TNG and other Star Trek series never really had that particular problem with their actors after they directed episodes since TNG ended after 7 seasons, rather than extending it longer than that. Jonathan Frakes and Levar Burton even went on to direct more episodes of Star Trek after that. Well Frakes also directed a few feature films (including 2 TNG movies). Roxann Dawson from Voyager directed some Star Trek but also worked on shows like Crossing Jordan, branching out to other genres. But again, her show lasted seven years.

I think Smallville would not have had a problem if they would have restructured their plans to setup the show's trajectory to have everything end at the end of Season 7. That way they would not have have had problems re-signing Allison Mack and they would not have lost Michael Rosenbaum, because their contracts lasted that long.

I admit that the holodeck was a bit overused (but probably not as overused as the Borg on Voyager ;)), but to me that doesn't make the show pretentious. I mean look at an episode like "Hollow Pursuits". Sure it had Three Musketeers, which is a literary reference, but it was just a plain silly episode in general. Not one of my favorite episodes. It was probably born out of the fact that they had around 26 episodes to fill rather than 22. But 'alternate reality' episodes whether holodeck or not were interesting at times too (eg. "Frame of Mind").