I thought about doing a live-blogging thing for the Emmy ceremony last evening, but then realized that meant I'd have to tune in for every last second of the Emmys and decided against it. And given that my Emmy-winners guessing skills was a big, giant dud, (I correctly picked two of the big categories, though I was happy to see
24 take home the top award), I figured my time might be better spent watching the seasons (and in one case possibly series) finale of the two USA Sunday evenings shows.
First up, we had
The 4400, which ended its third season with a lot of the bubbling plotlines coming to a boil. Or at least that was how it was supposed to seem. In the past few weeks, Jordan Collier has returned from the dead, stolen a big batch of promycin (a drug that will give mere mortals 4400 abilities) and begun a war of some type with the normals among us. Meanwhile, Dennis Ryland has recruited Isabelle, had her betray Shaun and is building up an army of his own to battle the 4400. As if that weren't enough, over at the home of Tom and Diana, Diana stole her sister's boyfriend and has put Maya in school at the 4400 Institute.
Then we got the season finale where a whole lot happened to manuever characters into precarious positions. As the season ended, Diana has left NTAC to move to Spain with her new boyfriend, the sister is gets some promycin from Collier's handing it out on the street, Shaun and Isabelle are both in comas and Ryland is, well, he's still Ryland. Oh and I forgot--Tom's girlfriend vanishes, swallowed up in a great ball of light. It wasn't so much one of those huge cliffhangers where it has to pick up five seconds after it left off becuase all of our heroes are in mortal peril. Instead, it's one of those
DS9-like cliffhangers or
BSG season two, where some events have happened to change the status quo and it should be intersting to see where the series goes with these changes. Will it follow-up on them or will it work hard to get things back to status quo? (The biggest change being Diana's leaving NTAC and pursuing her own life).
I do wonder if when
The 4400 returns, we'll pick up a few months after all this with Tom more alone than ever and the world reacting to the fact that the odds are 50/50 the injections of the drug to give a person 4400-like powers that you could die. I guess we'll find out next summer..
Meanwhile, over on
The Dead Zone, we get what could be the series finale with "The Hunting Party." Now, I was a big
Dead Zone fan when it first started but have found that with each passing year my interest has waned (about the only thing that registered on my radar this year was the return of Kirsten Dalton). Part of it is that show has become very tied to the mythology of Johnny has to stop Stillson from becoming pure evil and bringing about Armageddon. Which, I have to admit, got kind of old because it felt like we were going over the same ground over and over again each time Stillson came on screen. Johnny is obsessed, has this vision and no one but Bruce believes him.
Well, this time we get more Stillson stuff, but yet they manage to end it on a note that if this is the end, I'm going to be disappointed. Stillson's right hand man manipulates Johnny and his visions to get Johnny to join the fight for a better world or be descredited and humilated. I loved the way every step of the journey was manipulated to lead Johnny to this point and the final five or so minutes were really interesting. It almost made up for the story leading up to it where I called early on that Stillson was using the events to take another step toward the White House. This time by being in on the assignation of the vice-president (the irony is this episode was written and filmed last year, long before the whole Chaney goes hunting incident) on a hunting trip and apparently stopping the assasin, Stillson has put himself into national promimence and could become the vice-president.
And his camp is using Johnny to get there, or at least get Johnny on their side. Now here comes a great dilemma for Johnny--if he's hell-bent on stopping armageddon (and who wouldn't be, right?) could he not join this group and try to make changes from within or gather enough evidence while there to bring Stillson down?
I'm almost intrigued enough by this development to demand a sixth season for the show. Provided they stick to the storyline and don't just churn our crappy Johnny has a vision and wakcy fun ensues episodes as filler week in and week out, like that horrifically dull one in the traffic jam earlier this season.
posted by Michael Hickerson at 8/28/2006 07:28:00 AM |
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