TV Draft - Final Round [drafts]

Grimbil: There were several shows I was thinking of taking here in the last round, although I won’t list them. Dexter was mentioned by N8 earlier as a possibility, and I’m still hoping it makes the list, because that show is fantastic. I won’t mention any more until after the draft, so as not to steal anyone’s thunder, but I’ve got a few more rounds in me. So to start the last round, I’m going to pick a polie drama. I generally don’t like police dramas, but this show grabbed me by the throat and I watched the first 2 seasons in a single week.25) The Shield. As E pointed out in a recent post, we seem to be in a period that could be described as the “rise of the anti-hero”. I think that’s what makes this show so great…..there aren’t any real good guys. Everyone’s crooked to one degree or another, tho certainly Macky is the protagonist and the one you’re probably rooting for throughout the show. However, he’s far from your typical good guy. For example, the show starts with he and his team shooting a team member in the head during a drug bust b/c they thought he was a mole from Internal Affairs. Everyone is corrupt, it’s only a matter of degrees. It’s shown on FX, and they certainly seem to have a lot of leeway with doing whatever the hell they want. Sex, drugs, violence, you name it….there’s even a graphic scene of a cop being forced at gunpoint to give another man a blowjob. It’s pretty sick and twisted, which makes for a great cop show.

SN: That leaves me with the 26th pick, a crucial one in nearly any draft ever held. Like Grimbil, I still have several picks in me, but due to the laws of the sometimes unjust society we live in, I can only take one show at the moment. Both of the selections I’m contemplating also keep in lines with the anti-hero theme. Alright, it’s go time.26) The Venture Brothers. Yeah, it’s the last round (as far as I can gather) and I need to select an animated show. This is my favorite one available. Watching Brock Samson go apeshit on people alone makes this a great show, but it also really makes fun of the cartoon action genre pretty nicely. I realized while trying to introduce this show to some of my friends that you really need to watch all of it to understand what’s going on, as there are a lot of characters for a half-hour cartoon.

The first couple seasons were amazing. I’m not sure what to make of the Guild plot twist this season, but it’s still highly entertaining. It leaves everyone eagerly anticipating the return of the Monarch-Venture feud. Plus, what other show features a man dressed as a butterfly boning a robot? None that I’m aware of.

Grimbil: I was skeptical until the second to last sentence. How could a cartoon with a butterfuly shagging a robot possibly be bad? I’m adding it to my torrents….I mean iTunes. Or something….

E: caught a few eps of Venture Bros., and I laughed pretty hard. I need to get more into this show.

LD: 27) Doctor Who.

This is a really strange pick for me. I love Doctor Who, a LOT. It’s everything you don’t get from American science fiction: real optimism, actors who love playing their character, and prime-time placement on a major network.

At the same time, there are a few episodes every season that are awful. Not just bad, but like…appalingly bad. I remember talking it up to my dad one summer, and finally making him sit down to watch an episode with me. The previous three weeks worth of episodes had been brilliant, and the episode we sat down to watch was probably the worst hour of scripted television I’ve ever seen, outside of Heroes’ first season finale.

But, still…when it’s good, it’s transcendent. The structure of the show is extremely malleable, so you can pull off a comedy, horror (and really effective horror, at that), or action. Even as it tackles genres, the show always retains a fundamentally dramatic heart, and that’s the true strength of it. You never lose your investment in the characters. Plus, every once in a while, you’ll catch a major British celeb in a guest role (hello Simon Pegg!).

Also, the best part about this pick is that the show is only going to get better, as it’s now in the hands of Steven Moffat. He’s the man who created and wrote every episode of Coupling, all the best Doctor Who episodes, and was initially charged with writing Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson’s Tintin trilogy (he left the job after writing the first film due to his Doctor Who obligations). Things are looking up.

Y: God, Doctor Who. My undiscovered country. E and I both want to get into this show, but our obsessive need to complete things means we’d be trying to see every episode ever made.

E: Do I? I actually don’t have much interest in Doctor Who. Now Battlestar Galactica. I need to start

Y: I know we’ve had a conversation about Doctor Who, that followed this logic. Damn “off the record” chats.

E: Maybe I expressed an interest in wanting to see it, but I have to admit, I don’t know much about it. Though, it’s pretty well established that I trust LD’s judgment on all things (not hip hop) and he is a freak for that show.

Grimbil: I’ve seen a few of the Dr. Who episodes, and they’re ok….kinda campy scifi, but generally well written and the Doctor is good.

Y: I thought for sure LD would’ve drafted Weeds in this draft.

LD: It’s odd…2 seasons of Frisky Dingo is enough to get me to draft it. Two seasons of Weeds feels like it’s too soon.

SN: Weeds is on season 4, I almost took it this round. But then I thought, dammit, Dr. venture had a conjoined twin living inside of him for 40 years (Unlike Dr. who) and has cloned his kids back to life 13 times, so who am I not to draft him?

E: How was Weeds season 3? I only saw first two seasons and like 5 eps of season 3. I heard it went downhill later that season.

Season 2 is amazing (I guess in this case, season one was so short that it hardly counts in terms of big story arcs).

LD: NO SEASON 3 SPOILERS. I have it on dvd, but I have yet to watch it.

E: Season 3 spoiler: Nancy is a Cylon.

SN: I liked season 3 a lot. The current season started slow but is picking up steam. Thats all I can say for now because of LD.

Grimbil: Big fan of weeds, I enjoyed the 3rd season. I’m a sucker for anything with Guillermo Diaz in it! “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, you - you’re cool, fuck you, I’m out!”

SN: They should totally bring Chapelle on the show too. (ed. note - this concludes our unofficial Weeds pick, where everyone says “I like Weeds.”).

E: I take Mad Men.When it’s all said and done (and creator Matt Weiner says it’s going to go 5-6 seasons until the year 1970), I truly believe this show may stand as one of the best tv shows of all time. THe only reason I don’t pick it higher is because it only has 14 eps to its name. The show is so unbelievably well written, using advertising as a way to look into the cultural aspects of the 60’s, and how those aspects slowly changed into what they are today.

Jon Hamm is a revelation, Elizabeth Moss (west wing bitches!) is great, but it’s Vincent Kartheiser who absolutely steals the show as the slimy, pathetic, and desperate Pete Campbell. It’s full of misogyny and overindulgence, and its characters kind of, but not REALLY learn their lessons in the end. I could write a thesis on why this show succeeds, but really, it’s just goddamn enjoyable to see the stories play out in a pulpy, kinda melodramatic way.

Plus it’s got this quote: “The only thing I can take from that story is that Hitler didn’t smoke, and I do.”

Y: Mad Men is a fantastic show. I encourage everyone to watch it. I can’t wait for season 2 to start (Now I just need to finish up season 1).

SN: Dude! Is everyone watching Greatest American Dog right now? If not, kill yourself!

N8: Dexter. For premise alone (i.e. serial killer of serial killers), Dexter is a cut above the rest. (no pun) I admit, as someone who has often been accused of sociopathic tendencies, I might enjoy seeing my ilk living such a hilarious and internally consistent double life. But I also think there’s a bit of Dexter in all of us, and this show gives that part a bit of room to roam. It’s a feature series on naked but controlled aggression, and, despite the fact that it’s plots revolve around murder and dismemberment, the show — if not the protagonist — has a great sense of humor about its subject matter and invites a little more introspection than you would realize, tweaking the good/bad and passion/reason dicotomies with style.

Y: And we’ve arrived. I’ll conclude this draft with the first reality show selection:30) Top Chef
Consistently and surprisingly entertaining, I think Top Chef is heads above all the other standard contestant/vote off reality shows. It’s difficult to explain what separates it from these other shows, as the format (attractive yet useless host, grueling episodic challenges, somebody gets voted off) is fairly typical. But there’s something that sets it apart.

Tom Colicchio is funny, straightforward, and commands respect. Tom Allen and Gail are good complements, and the guest judges are almost always legends in the field (including the best guest judge - Anthony Bourdain). When the cheftestants (zing!) fuck up, they have 3 respected chefs and critics telling them their food sucks.

I think the real reason I like it is that there is a small margin of error. The best chef can easily cook something that tastes shitty with a misstep or two. Plus they are all really assholes at the end of the day, which makes for good TV.

There you go folks.

Let us know in the comments what you thought - do you like the one shot posts where we have 3 or so rounds and it’s over, or do you like the extended daily draft if the topic can support it?