It's the Beat of Her Heart: The Promise of Smash and The Failure of Glee

It started out small. A breath, a tiny little line that struck a chord with a few hundred people in this world:

"Being a part of something special makes you special, right?"

When nearly four years ago, Rachel Berry earnestly said those words to Will Schuester, we all exhaled. It was here. It had been threatening for so long, the re-mainstreaming of musicals. We'd been hoping since Chicago, living through Camp, and High School Musical, and Dreamgirls and You're the One That I Want, and a dozen other misfires. But this, this little show, about a glee club in Ohio, this was the one we were waiting for.

How quickly we were proved wrong. Yes, Glee was plenty mainstream. And yes, some of it's elements do musicals proud, but it lost focus somewhere along the line and became instead of telling a coherent story aided by song and dance (and sometimes told through them) a convoluted mess of unresolved plots, inconsistent characters and uninspired pop covers.

Three seasons later I'm still watching, but I don't know why. I rarely enjoy it anymore, and end each Tuesday night at 9, frustrated that this promising baby, born of two genres I love, musicals and teen dramadey never delivered on it's promises.

Glee was a false savior. But I think it did a more important job, which was to provide television a platform for Smash.

If you haven't been watching, Smash is a brilliant new show on NBC about putting on a Broadway musical, starring among others, Debra Messing, Angelica Houston, the guy that played the Commodore in The Pirates of The Caribbean, and a stable of Broadway actors (Will Chase & Christian Borle to name two of them.)

But that's not the main event. The main event is the two female leads, played by American Idol runner up Katherine McPhee and Broadway vet Megan Hilty. They play two girls vying for the coveted role of Marilyn Monroe in Marilyn: The Musical. The two couldn't be more different. Hilty is a veteran chorus girl named Ivy Lynne, who has been working Broadway for ten years, and McPhee plays Karen Cartright, a fresh face new comer from Iowa who is seriously talented. You probably saw the endless promos featuring her singing Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful." That was a great moment but there have been endless amazing musical moments since then. I even don't hate Nick Jonas anymore because he was totally endearing singing "I Just Haven't Met You Yet" in episode 3.

All of the characters are compelling, the plot lines a wonderful and soapy, and apparently the logistics are absurdly realistic (if slightly heightened for dramatic effect.) Smash is doing amazing things, and I can't wait to see where it goes. Of course, six episodes in, there was still a lot of hope for Glee too.

But Glee didn't open their sixth episode with Bernadette Peters singing "Everything's Coming Up Roses." So point, Smash.

Familiar Faces make V worth a watch

I was really excited about the new pilot for V. As a casual science fiction fan, I was vaguely aware of the 80's mini series, although I've never seen it (I swear one of these days I'm going to get a Netflix!) and I think the concept of the not quite what they seem alien visitors is always compelling.

To that end the pilot for V was good, but didn't blow me away. The most thrilling moments came as I recognized actors (mostly from other SciFi shows.)

"Hey! That's Juliet from Lost!"

"Wait, isn't that Wash from Firefly!" or more recently "Hey, it's Alpha from Dollhouse!" or more mainstream. "YAR! It be Steve the Pirate from Dodgeball!" This is all just euphemism for "ALAN THUDYK IS THE MAN!" btw

"OMG! It's Inara from Firefly! Is the rest of the crew of Serenity going to show up too now?" (As long as Mal is not too busy solving murders in NYC)

"Hey! That's Supergirl! Or I guess we call her Cara-El, since they haven't yet adopted their 'Super' identities on Smallville."

"That's the other dude from Party of Five!"

I think you get the point. That being said it shows a lot of promise and Juliet was my favorite on Lost so even though she's gone from their I'm interested in what Elizabeth Mitchell does here. And oh right ALAN THUDYK IS THE MAN!

What's new and why I'm into it

OK, so I know I've been MIA for the past week. It was a busy school week, followed by two more busy school weeks coming up, (although I'm hitting Springsteen at Giant's stadium tomorrow night! Expect pictures and a set list! He's playing the entire Darkness On The Edge of Town album, it should be legen...wait for it...) But I figured to get caught up was a lost cause at this point. I barely had time to watch all of my shows, let alone write about them. So, to cover the Season and Series premiere stuff, I'm writing about what I liked best and least. This post? What I like in new TV, what I think is going to stick around. (dary! See what I did there?)

Favorite New Show: Glee. Without a doubt. This might be the best show I've seen on TV in a really long time. It doesn't hurt that I'm a mondo theater geek and this show has everything that I love, plus a really spot on showing of what my high school experience was like. Oh Mercedes! How I relate to you and you curvy fabulousness, and your incurable crush on a gay guy! Oh Rachel, how is it that you are exactly like those girls I hung out with even though I thought they were horrible? Oh Finn, how are you the guy I dreamed up and never found in high school, the hunky football player who also loves to sing and is OK with waiting until marriage to have sex! (Such boys do not really exist, btw. Hunky football players, even if they like to sing, never notice nerdy uptight theater geeks. SIGH) Plus last night Kristin Chenoweth sang both "Maybe this time," from Cabaret and Carrie Underwood's "Last Name." Hi, BEST SHOW EVER!

Best New Show (Drama): The Good Wife. True, I'm not picking up too many new dramas, but lets face it, you can't get much better than this. The pilot was pitch perfect, and the second episode on Tuesday set up a nice little path for the show to take, and showed Alicia as a strong, confident and independent woman. Plus Chris Noth is sooo good at playing skeez.

Best New Show (Comedy): Modern Family. Ed O'Neil leads this perfectly executed little show. Centering around an extended family and three of its units. One, the nuclear family, Mom, Dad and three kids, the other her father and his second wife and her son, the third, her brother, his life partner and their newly adopted daughter. O'Neil is playing off of Al Bundy for sure, but underneath it he's showing a sensitive super dad side that we've never seen before. Plus Julie Bowen, who I've had a soft spot for since Happy Gilmore.

Other things I've liked: The Vampire Diaries (dur), NCIS: Los Angeles and Cougar Town. I haven't gotten to Flash Forward yet, maybe this weekend, and V is still a few weeks away, but we're getting there.

A Drama is Born

Last night brought the premiere of CBS's new drama The Good Wife. The premise of the show is one of the best I've seen in a while, the wife of the disgraced politician tries to put her life together in the months after the scandal.

The Good Wife is more than just a concept, probably because of it's exceptional cast. Julianna Margulies is Alicia, the wife of the title, Chris Noth is her politician husband who was caught with a group of prostitutes and a tape of it was leaked to the press. To make ends meet while he's in prison Alicia has gone back to her legal career which she abandoned to take care of her children, while her mother in law, played by Mary Beth Piel (Grams from Dawson's Creek.) keeps the house going.

At the law firm, Alicia has to compete with another junior associate, Cary (Gilmore Girls' Matt Czurchy) and deal with the disapproval of her new "mentor" Diane, (Christine Barinski)

See what I mean about the cast. The concept is good, the performances were better, and I'm interested in seeing the direction they take it in. What I like the most though is that even I, with my severe CSD (character separation disorder) was able to accept these new characters. It might have helped that Matt Czurchy doesn't have his Logan hair anymore.

And who else thinks its odd that all three of Rory's boyfriends have their own shows and the best she's done is a B chick flick and a guest spot on ER?

Like a new born WBaby

Tonight was the premiere of The Vampire Diaries on The CW.

The CW used to be The WB. The WB as we knew it, and therefore the CW as we know it wouldn't exist without two shows, Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Dawson's Creek.

If Dawson and Buffy had a baby (the shows, not the characters God, could you imagine the brooding that that kid would do?) it would be The Vampire Diaries.

It's a standard girl meets vamp story. She's got a lot going on, Elena, (that's the girl), her parents have died recently, her brother's not doing well, she's doing slightly better. He's recently come back to a place that has significance to him. Stefan (that's the vamp) has decided he wants to be a good vampire.

They both keep diaries. Get it? That's the title.

OK, so it's all a little formulaic, but I dug it. Kevin Williamson's wit was clearly there, and they keep to standard vampire lore. A refreshing Twilight reprive. Stefan can't enter homes without permission, he can go out in the daytime because of an enchanted ring (BUFFY SO DID THAT OMG!) and he's really fast. Plus hot. And broody. He's like someone wrapped Angel, Edward Cullen and Bill Compton up in a neat little bundle for us.

And his evil brother Damon isn't bad either.

So sick of the suck...and yet...

OK, so does any one else just want to scream if they see one more damn vampire story?

And this is coming from me, I love the vampire stuff. I'm all about Buffy, and Twilight, and True Blood, and Anne Rice.

I was completely horrified when The CW started advertising The Vampire Diaries, even if it does star Nina Dolohov from Degrassi. (Mia=love) And I watched a few TV spots and sighed thinking, well, she does make a really nice Diet Bella.

Anyway, I was definitely not going to watch the show. No way. I've had my fill of vamps, with New Moon coming out, and season two of True Blood, and everything.

Then I read an EW writeup, which mentioned that the show was executive produced and the pilot written by Kevin Williamson.

It's over.

This means that the show will be smart, witty, relevant to young people, and OH, WRITTEN BY KEVIN WILLIAMSON. Williamson, best know for his screen triology Scream, and oh right a little show about four kids and a river and sex and friendship or something.

So now I have to watch it.

Damnit!