Fear the Walking Dead

When I first heard AMC was making a prequel series* to The Walking Dead, my response was "ugh." The show is insanely popular so of course we need to milk that teat until it's completely dry.

After giving it some more thought,** I realized there is actually a good story to tell here. The Walking Dead picks up after the the zombie apocalypse has already occurred. We, the viewer, see the show through Rick Grimes' eyes, and his initial confusion and lack of information adds to the feeling of dread and unease we experience. The Walking Dead has never explained the events that led up to the collapse of civilization; we don't know where or how things started, how quickly the world fell apart, how the government responded, when things went to....well, to put it bluntly, went to shit.

So then I was excited for Fear the Walking Dead. I was hoping it would fill in some of the gaps and give some more information about the virus, which to me is the most interesting part of The Walking Dead's story. I was also hoping that the show would learn from some of the elements of TWD that didn't quite work--such as the family drama bullshit with Rick, Lori, and Carl. Oh, I'm sorry. I mean, "Caaaaaaaaaaarl!"

Alas, no. Because the public was definitely crying out for more family drama.

I don't want to say I'm disappointed in FWD exactly. It's great to look at, the acting is top notch (especially from Kim Dickens whom I loved in Deadwood), and it's very effective at building tension. Just like people used to say you had to watch Doctor Who from behind the couch, FWD sometimes makes me want to peek out from behind my fingers because I don't think I can handle what is going to happen next.

And that is what makes it all so monumentally frustrating that almost every single one of these characters is completely and utterly stupid.

Stories like this only work if you like the characters. You have to care what is going to happen to them. And it's hard to have your audience care about people who are TOTAL FUCKING MORONS.

Maybe FWD takes place in a world where George Romero never existed. Where Night of the Living Dead, World War Z, and the whole zombie genre never existed. Maybe these people don't have any reference for the undead shambling around craving brains. But there is nothing in this series (or TWD for that matter) to establish this as an alternate universe following those rules and I am not letting the showrunners off that easy. To leave it to the third episode before even one single person proffers that the infected are actually dead, to have no character even mention the word "zombie," defies belief and makes it seem as if all these people are brain-dead themselves.

I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but the more I think and write about this the madder I get. Seriously. All these characters have already seen the infected stumbling around, appear as if corpses, get shot MULTIPLE TIMES and keep going, feast on the flesh of the living, and they are still standing around asking, "what is going on?" I can't. even. handle. it. Just having one character say, "Hey, maybe it's zombies" and then everyone can shoot him/her down about how that is so implausible, only happens in movies, etc. would placate me. But no. Instead they sit around looking shocked and dismayed and trying to convince each other that we shouldn't destroy the neighbor's brain because there IS STILL A CHANCE HE CAN BE CURED. Even though we just caught him snacking on someone's dog and is actively trying to kill everyone in the house.

Flames. On the sides of my face.

But I guess the sickest part is I still want to see what happens next. At the end of the third episode the National Guard shows up and seems to be doing well with putting down the infection. So I still want to see how it all goes to shit.

But if all these people survive the season I am giving up. Because there is no way people this dumb would survive the zombie apocalypse. Zombies? I have no trouble with that. But these characters all surviving will defy even my ability to suspend belief.

Fear the Walking Dead airs Sunday nights at 9:00PM EST on AMC.

*Oh, excuse me, a COMPANION series. Whatever, AMC.


*I'll have you know I spent a good 10 seconds of brain power on this topic.

The Strain

My friend, GeekNomad, and I are both fans of Guillermo del Toro's The Strain Trilogy of books (though she liked it better than I did). When I heard that FX was turning the books into a television series, I wasn't sure if it was a good idea. Did we really need another series about vampires? The books explored a different and frankly, darker, outcome of the vampirism-as-virus genre, but I wasn't sure how that would translate to a network television series. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem as if it worked out that well. Here to fill you in on the good and bad of FX's newest drama series is our new guest poster, GeekNomad!

A caveat before we begin: I loved the book The Strain. It has that kind of slow, sinister creep that makes you turn on all the lights in your house while you’re reading.

Like his more famous work, Pan’s Labyrinth, Guillermo del Toro’s horror/vampire/we’reallgonnadie trilogy started out with a seemingly straightforward, if depressing premise (plane full of dead people on a JFK tarmac, girl and mother in the clutches of a sadistic fascist) and spun a web to pull you in. Slowly. Carefully.

He let’s you think that everything might turn out ok...and then slowly it unravels. And you learn about the heart. The history. The creeping terror.

The TV version has opted to forego the slow descent into horror for the tried and true approach - gore and noise. And a really daft voiceover on the intro and finale. Rather than let the audience lean forward slowly in their seats as they’re sucked into the story, the director grabs us and tries to force us to pay attention, to care. It doesn’t necessarily work, which is a great disappointment.

From FX:

The Strain is a high concept thriller that tells the story of "Dr. Ephraim Goodweather," the head of the Center for Disease Control Canary Team in New York City. He and his team are called upon to investigate a mysterious viral outbreak with hallmarks of an ancient and evil strain of vampirism. As the strain spreads, Eph, his team, and an assembly of everyday New Yorkers, wage war for the fate of humanity itself.

The TV version opens onto the interior of the doomed plane. Following a distracting and hokey voiceover regarding the power of love, we follow a nice, capable flight attendant (she talks to a child and speaks French, naturally) to the back of the plane, where her hysterical colleague tells her there’s something living in the plane (of course there is, you’re in a horror show). Disbelief, followed by loud screaming ensues as something makes its way out from the storage by force. Yelling, screaming, and cut.

Boring.

The book starts differently, with a horror story told to Setrakian ("Professor Abraham Setrakian is a dedicated (and perhaps fanatical) vampire hunter for over six decades. He is an expert on vampire biology and destruction, and recruits Eph to his cause." --Maggie Cats) by his grandmother, and a snippet of the black box recording. No screams. No loud bangs. Just a quiet, sinister creep. Why the show couldn’t have started there, with the next scene, of the air traffic controllers realizing something is horribly wrong, is beyond me. To borrow from the book, “...she had a fleeting yet palpable sensation of standing in the presence of a dragon-like beast. A sleeping dragon only pretending to be asleep, yet capable, at any moment of opening its eyes and its terrible mouth...And she understood it then, unequivocally: something in there was going to eat her...” Suspense, not violence.

It would have worked.

And then the scene with Setrakian and the thugs, followed by Setrakian and his weak heart. The thugs, yes, and necessary for later. But the heart? Why take all the mystery out of it? Putting that out in the first episode is like laying your cards on the table in Las Vegas. The book waited, before drawing us in to Setrakian’s hidden world behind the storefront. Let him keep a little mystery for goodness’ sake.

Some of the scenes are good - Dr. Goodweather pwning the other acronym agencies and securing first rights onto the plane, Setrakian pwning the thugs... But it just feels a little rushed, like the director wanted to hurry us to the next scene where they spoil things for the rest of the book. Hurry up and get to the power hungry guy with the dialysis machine. Hurry up and get to the ATC guy getting eaten/pounded by the Dementor. No suspense. Shock, not horror.

No seriously, the vampire is THIS big.

But all that said, I’ll keep watching. I feel like I owe it to the books. The story itself is good. The acting is spot on. Corey Stoll does a fantastic job, with hair this time, of the good but flawed guy trying to do his best in a bad situation.

Thankfully, unlike his House of Cards character, you think he might have a chance at it. Sean Astin/Samwise Gamgee, proves to be a bit less trustworthy than his Hobbity past, which is refreshing, though, again, draw it out a little, damnit. I keep expecting Setrakian to carry around a red-eyed cat instead of a cane sword, but that’s hardly his fault. The acting by the lead women has been good, if limited, and I could do without the tropes of the naughty librarian/scientist (glasses on = work, glasses off = let’s talk about our relationship) and the unfeeling/distant wife.

I’m just hoping that the director will drink less coffee, give his audience a bit more credit, and slow the heck down. Give me suspense. Give me horror. Give me nightmares.

The Strain airs Sundays at 10:00PM EST on FX.  The first episode is available for viewing on the FX website.

You'll see a lot of similarities between these vampires and those of del Toro's Blade 2. Mostly that they are really really gross.

HBO Round-Up

 **Spoilers for the season finale of Game of Thrones and season premiere of True Blood*

It seems to defy belief that the fourth season of Game of Thrones would end and nobody here at TV Sluts would comment on it. I mean, we commented on it to other people in our daily lives, but just not to you guys. Not because we don't love you, but because you would be surprised how hard it is to coordinate the schedules of several working adults to figure out a time when an online chat can take place.

So instead of a patented TV Sluts GOT chat, you'll just have to make do with little old me, sharing some thoughts.

First thought: WOW.

This season has been my favorite by far, and not just because we are into some real meaty plot stuff, but because it is also the season that has deviated the most from the books. Not in any real substantive way, but in some amazing character moments and relationships and yes, even some minor changes in the plot.

Remember this guy from the book? YEAH, ME NEITHER.

So despite having read all the books several times, I was still on the edge of my seat throughout the finale. Scenes like the Hound. vs. Brienne throw-down (not in the book) had me filled with anxiety because I had no idea what was going to happen! That must be how watching the entire show is for others. How do y'all take the pressure??

Even when I knew what was going to happen, such as the Tyrion--Shae--Tywin scene, everything was so well done and acted that I was peeking through my fingers because of the tension. Tywin Lannister, the most powerful person in Westeros, killed by his son on the shitter....oh, excuse me, the privy. Classic.

"Lord Tywin Lannister, did not, in the end, shit gold."

I don't want to go through and just rehash the finale with comments like "wasn't that cool?!?" because the whole thing was cool. This show just keeps getting better and better, and despite all the horror, death, and pain of the fourth season, they even managed to end on a hopeful note with Arya sailing off to a new life across the sea.

*cue "awwwwws" from the crowd*

....and as they say, out with the old and in with the new! With the conclusion of Game of Throne's most recent season, we get the premiere of True Blood's seventh and final season.

It seems like I might have been the only person who was excited for the True Blood premiere. Everybody I would ask "are you watching True Blood???" would look at me weird and respond with something along the lines of, "oh, I stopped watching X number of years ago." This saddens me, because I still find the show wildly entertaining. Silly, no doubt, but still entertaining.

The season premiere last Sunday followed a typical True Blood pattern. We started off with a bang, checked in with all the characters, laid the groundwork for the season to come, and had to make due with some meh plots.

There was no waiting for the action in the premiere; we opened the show right where we left off, with a horde of hepatitis V infested vampires attacking (and kidnapping and killing) many of the poor citizens of Bon Temps.

And then....we flash over to Tara's gross mother, who, in an astounding act of grace in last season's finale, finally "fed" and "nourished" her daughter by allowing Tara to drink her blood. And Tara's mother is weeping over a big pile of vampire goo that is....Tara. Yep, apparently Tara died. And off screen!

Clean up in aisle 3. 

Of course, I immediately call bullshit. No way True Blood is going to kill a major character without some more fanfare. But then I read this article by my favorite tv author, Jacob (who used to write amazing recaps for Television Without Pity). Jacob raises the most excellent point that the show has basically shit all over Tara's character since the second season, so Tara's potential death feels more likely. Sadly. Despite Tara's kind of...I dunno, uselessness? to the overall plot aside from being the person who wanders off and gets in trouble or yells at everyone a lot, I've always liked the character. Probably because the actress does such a great job, but still. Tara deserved better. 

Though like I said...if she ends up coming back in some fashion, I definitely won't be surprised.

The episode set things up nicely for the season: all the show's most annoying characters are locked in the Fangtasia basement getting eaten one by one by the infected vampires. Sookie is still making stupid decisions (wandering off in a huff when she KNOWS there is a pack of evil vampires close by) but somehow still being awesome and banging Alcide so at least girlfriend has made one good choice. Jessica is quickly becoming one of my favorites through her bravery in protecting half-fairy Adilyn, Andy has shown some of the best character development in the last seven years of any character I can think of, Bill is....well nobody really cares about Bill, right? Except his book does sound like something I would TOTALLY read.

This is totally my next book club pick. My Mom is gonna love it.

There are more characters and subplots then you can shake a stick at, but it seems like this year True Blood has finally hit upon a main story that affects everyone on the show and is driving everyone towards related goals. Except for one notable exception.

Pam spent the premiere wandering around "exotic foreign" backlot sets in her search for Erik. We haven't seen hide (and what a nice hide it is) nor hair of him since he burst into flames on the side of a Swedish mountain last year. I love that Pam is looking for him, especially after he released her from the maker bond, but dear god, I am already bored with this plot.

Bring Erik back. NOW.

But that one flaw aside, I am very excited for what the final season holds. I haven't read the Sookie Stackhouse books so have no idea how things end up there and no expectations or hopes for how things end up on the tv show. As always with True Blood, the best strategy is just to enjoy the ride. Silly as it may be.

Erik is always starting fires. IN MY PANTS.

Helix

I have a poor track record with Syfy original drama series. Sure, I like their Canadian imports (like Lost Girl), and there have been some winners (Battlestar Galactica), but for the most part I find their shows like Warehouse 13, Eureka, and Haven barely tolerable.

So I didn't have high hopes for the new series, Helix. But the preview looked intriguing--kind of like that episode of The X-Files, Ice, where Mulder and Scully travel to the arctic to investigate a parasitic worm alien thing that was dug out of the ice.

And it turns out Helix is actually better than intriguing: it's tense, creepy, and the plot goes way past what I saw in the previews. Think of it as The Thing + Contagion + The Walking Dead = AWESOME.

From the Syfy show page:

Helix is an intense thriller about a team of scientists from the Centers for Disease Control who travel to a high-tech research facility in the Arctic to investigate a possible disease outbreak, only to find themselves pulled into a terrifying life-and-death struggle that holds the key to mankind's salvation...or total annihilation. Helix is the product of some of the biggest names in genre television, starting with Executive Producer Ronald D. Moore (Battlestar Galactica). 

The show takes what has become a standard genre plot (weird viral/parasitic outbreak in the arctic), and adds some cool twists by teasing out details of larger mysteries. What is the real purpose behind the experiments at the research facility? Why is the head honcho creepily obsessed with one of the CDC scientists? Who is the military engineer really working for? I'm invested in finding the answers which is more than I can say for most drama series these days.

Two other things that really make the show work. A certain percentage of the infected people become what the CDC calls "vectors." Meaning they seek to the spread the infection to as many people as possible....which in the Helix world means they become crazy feral monsters who run you down and vomit black goo into your mouth. Think fast zombies, but with less brain munching and more black fluid expulsion. Not only are the current survivors fearful of invisible microbes, they also have to watch out for their friends and colleagues.

This will certainly end well for us all.

The nature of the assaults (the vomiting of the black goo into the victim's mouth) is almost sexual in nature which only adds to the terrifying atmosphere. It's frightening in the same way the Alien moves are frightening--the assault is invasive and violating and all the scarier for it.

Helix is not for the faint of heart--while there isn't a lot of typical gun/knife/punching violence, as mentioned above there's lots of fluid spewing and claustrophobic tense scenes. But there's also a complex and interesting plot which moves the show beyond the typical Syfy series. I definitely recommend checking it out.

Helix airs on the Syfy channel Fridays at 10:00 pm EST and the pilot episode is available for viewing online on the show's home page.

Oh, great--more vampires.

Back in September 2012 (a younger, gentler time), I told you that FX was developing a new vampire television series based on the The Strain trilogy of novels, by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan.

Guess what? FX has ordered a 13 episode first season of the series which will air on FX in July 2014.

Call me crazy, but there's nothing particularly scary about this title art--it could just be normal NYC subway graffiti.

Some interesting things about the show: del Toro and Hogan wrote the pilot episode (promising) and del Toro directed the pilot (very promising). Carlton Cruse of LOST fame will act as the show-runner. This last piece of news doesn't have me quite as excited--sure, Cruse's current work over on Bates Motel is great, but we all know LOST went off the rails there at the end. And with his fingers in so many pies (Cruse is also working with ABC to create a series called Point of Honor set in Civil War-era Virginia and ANOTHER vampire series, The Returned, with A&E), does he really have the time to run another show?

But, whatever. The big question here is do we really need or want another vampire-themed television show? Y'all know I am a vampire fan, but even I am starting to get a burned out with True Blood, The Vampire Diaries, The Originals, and Dracula (and those are just off the top of my head). I read The Strain book series and enjoyed it--though they weren't without their problems. So the concept doesn't exactly light me on fire with eager anticipation. For those not in the know, here is a plot intro:

A plane lands at John F. Kennedy International Airport with lights off and doors sealed. Epidemiologist Dr. Ephraim Goodweather and his team are sent to investigate. On board they find two hundred corpses and four survivors. The situation deteriorates when the bodies begin disappearing from morgues. Goodweather and a small group of helpers find themselves battling to protect not only their own loved ones, but the entire city, from an ancient threat to humanity.

On a positive note, the novels don't shy away from the likely realities of a vampire outbreak (let's just say things get dark pretty quickly and go really bad for the humans), but the whole vampirism as a virus isn't anything new. And I think I read somewhere that del Toro has come out and said that The Strain was basically an attempt to rehash the ideas and themes he had for Blade 2 that were crushed down by the movie studios.

Much like the vampires in Blade 2 (pictured), The Stain vampires have mandibles and a stinger that transmits "the vampire virus." There's also lots more gross stuff about how you make a vampire, but I will let you discover that on your own.

I am going to do my best to withhold judgment until you show actually airs. I am sure I'll be first in line to watch it...but I remain skeptical that it will actually bring anything new to the genre.