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matt_zimmerAlso reviews for the latest episodes of Teen Titans Go!, and Star Wars: The Bad Batch, the short Myth: A Frozen Tale, and the latest episodes of Muppet Babies, Marvel Bend & Flex, The Barbarian And The Troll, Transformers: Rescue Bots Academy, Clarice, and The Blacklist.
Mr. Mercedes "No Good Deed"
This was not as bad as I feared (the David E Kelley courtroom stuff, while obnoxious, was not most of the episode) but I have to say the premise of the season is much lesser than the book Finders Keepers. I know why they simplified it. It's an established show, and to do the proper flashbacks and set-up for Morris, they'd practically have to do an entire episode or two without the Hodges characters. King has that luxury in a book. A producer doesn't have that for a TV show.
But the subtext of the second book is MUCH richer than this. The idea that Morris killed Rothstein as a young man and spent decades in prison waiting to unbury that trunk of buried treasure in a park as an old man, only to find it missing is such a great premise, that a suitcase left behind in a crashed van a couple of days after the murder simply does NOT resonate as much.
Mostly because I don't find Morris' obsessions and agitation as relatable as the book. I find him coming to the wrong conclusions stupid instead. I get the logic of old man Morris unraveling after discovering the thing he has spent decades dreaming about has slipped through his fingers. As far as this show's Morris is concerned, it's been two days. It makes every reckless and violent thing he does stupid instead of frightening.
I like the portrayal of Rothstein on the show and thought they did a better job of making him a cantankerous character than the book did. The idea that he leaves his door unlocked because he's waiting to be murdered for a great ending to his personal story is a pretty good one (even if it was written by as a hack like Kelley).
Speaking of hacky Kelley writing, I already know the courtroom stuff is going to try my patience on a good day and infuriate me on a bad one. How do I know? Kelley gave the judge a stupid catchphrase ("I am not satisfied,") which was a hallmark of his worst excesses on Picket Fences, Ally McBeal, and The Practice. What's especially annoying about the potential quirky lawyer nonsense is that there is not a single scene set in the Bill Hodges Trilogy that actually takes place in court. I fear that Kelley will turn the franchise into something it isn't about to showcase his new kooky judge. I'm already infuriated thinking about it.
But I don't have much to object about in the episode itself other than it's not as good as the book. But it's being adapted on an established TV show. Some allowances need to be made for that. ***.
Mr. Mercedes "Madness"
Unnerving last scene.
The court stuff is trying my patience, especially the clownish judge.
It's interesting that when court is not is session the show doesn't actually suck, even though Kelley is now writing every episode this season. I particularly like Jerome saying he found Rothstein's writing unnecessarily angry, and the kind of thing that triggers younger loner males to do bad things. And he questions whether maybe a lot of Bill's anger was shaped by that mindset. I like that Bill doesn't brush back on that simply because he trusts Jerome so much. He's flabbergasted but doesn't push for a sense of "My God, could this kid be right?" And he probably is. Note: Kelley himself would never have created a black character like Jerome. He's fine on the show because Stephen King gifted him to Kelley and Kelley simply hasn't screwed the gift up (yet).
Seriously shocking sex scene with Kate Mulgrew. Honestly? It made me cringe a bit.
I like the new main title.
I am frustrated that Kelley is so hands-on this season, and I sense a LOT of his bad tropes are percolating and about to destroy the show. I thought last year's finale was the shark jump, and this season is basically Fonzie waterskiing minus his legs. Bloody and painful to watch. ***.
Mr. Mercedes "Love Lost"
I am mad at Alma killing Danielle because I really like Danielle. I like how she tells Morris his thing is more than she can handle and that she didn't sign up for it. Really, him asking her to stay was unreasonable. Although I admittedly would have been a LOT more cautious in Alma's presence than she was, and never would have let my guard down. The woman is clearly crazy.
They clearly wanted to bring back Harry Treadaway but couldn't contract him because he was playing a Romulan on Star Trek: Picard. He was better off. Picard is awesome and this show is the hottest of messes.
Brendan Gleesan does not have a good singing voice which is why it sounds nice. There is a lot of vulnerability and lack of vanity in singing when your voice isn't good. I am unsurprised it moved Ida to tears. I think Holland Taylor's performance in that scene was excellent.
I like that Jerome is getting a little tired of Hodges defending Rothstein. After what I learned the last episode, Rothstein was a scumbag and Bill is an excuser of scumbags. It's especially disheartening to hear how he used Ida and how Bill's "hero" actually negatively effected people he cared about. Hopefully he'll think twice of his hero worship of this turd going forward.
No court stuff, so I liked it. Holland Taylor also brought her A-game. ****.
Mr. Mercedes "Trial And Error"
Perhaps people who have never seen a David E Kelley show wonder why I repeatedly call him the worst writer on television, and say that his winning multiple Emmys in the 1990's is as obscene as if Joe Eszterhas routinely won Oscars. Here's Exhibit A. This episode is all the proof I need for that statement.
Kelley can write a serviceable normal scene when the situation calls for it, but it is unusual for him because he refuses the idea that serviceable, normal scenes have value, and he believes that people only respond to outrageous antics. To be fair, he is not ENTIRELY wrong. I like the characters on Twin Peaks precisely because they are unrealistic and nuts. The thing is that while David Lynch is doing that, he's not exploring controversial political topics and pushing people's buttons for Agent Cooper being a weirdo. Instead Kelley's weird characters means he isn't taking the gravity of what he's showing seriously. Which is something only the worst of writers would do when exploring these specific topics. The scene at the end of Lou with Finkelstein made me say, "I gave up on this cretin 20 year ago, and pretty much have not watched a David E Kelley series since. This says age and time has not improved his writing any." I admit, I like the quiet discussions between Bill and Ida whenever they have them. But they clearly bore Kelley. And he's managed to turn a franchise without a single scene in all three books set in court into a courtroom drama. They say "Write what you know," but even if he used to be a lawyer, Kelly does not understand the law very well.
The opening statement from the District Attorney made me roll my eyes and say, "This speech was written by the worst writer on television." Prosecutors do not speak like that. And it's a good thing too because she came off as unhinged. Granted so did Finklestein in his opening remarks, but the two main things I noticed about his rebuttal is that his debunking of her ridiculous argument of Lou robbing people of closure was correct, and also that that kind of showboating is not outside of what a defense attorney is known for.
And who names a dog Boogers, anyways? For the record, NOT Stephen King.
This show was all right when Kelly was not writing most episodes. Now that he's gotten "involved" I can tell the rest of the run is gonna majorly suck. This episode certainly did. 0.
Mr. Mercedes "Great Balls Of Fire"
That wasn't actually terrible but I am not a fan of the legal turn this show has taken. At all. **.
Mr. Mercedes "Bad To Worse"
That was pretty good, mostly due to Justine Lupe's great performance on the stand. I think Kelley's writing of the D.A. is still beyond bad, but I think a LOT of times, the actors in Kelley's show make his writing seem better than it actually is. That would probably explain the Emmys despite the terrible scripts.
Here's my problem with Morris and Peter: Morris' deal is TOO good. Peter is now unreasonable for not taking it. One of the defining things about Morris in the book is that he is UNREASONABLE and never uses his head. They are trying to pit his merely being the messenger against Alma as the mastermind, but that's inconsistent with how the character was intended.
Speaking of Alma, it is very clear she has no clue how to properly remove a bullet from a wound. There's a right way to do it, and a wrong way. And then there is Alma's way, which is about ten clicks beyond the wrong way until it ventures all the way to "more painful and damaging to the leg than actually being shot". This is partly why I don't buy Alma as the criminal mastermind. This scene shows she's actually super dumb.
That was all right. ***1/2.
Mr. Mercedes "The End Of The Beginning"
I am angry. We will get to some good stuff at the very end of the review, but for right now I am going to talk about some things that make me very unhappy and angry.
What this episode review is going to be about is bad television. What constitutes that? Why does it seem that for a lot of the time, I have much different views of what it is compared to many other fans or even professional critics? What is my specific metric for bad television?
I am not sure I could definitely itemize a specific list for why bad television is bad, and why I give the negative reviews I do. Mostly because bad television can suck in many different ways and almost always does. There is no one-size-fits-all explanation for bad writing. So how do I recognize the fact that Riverdale, and Titans, and The Blacklist, are all terrible series, and they earn nothing but my scorn despite perhaps resonating with other people? I think a large bit of credit for my negative reviews for ANY bad TV show is actually due to David E Kelley. He is the cautionary tale of bad TV producers and writers, and everything a bad show that I currently hate does, he did it first. Every episode of Riverdale I've ever hated is sort of like an episode of Picket Fences. House? Lots of Chicago Hope in there. The Office after Michael left? Ally McBeal with more credible (and horrible) characters. So I recognize these programs as utterly offensive failures because I've seen their types before. From Kelley. And while I would have a tough time offering a definitive explanation of what bad television is, if you asked me what is the thing I hate most about television, and the thing I hate most about Kelley (and the thing he does most often) I'd give you the same answer.
He doesn't play fair with his viewers.
In my mind this is the greatest sin a writer can ever commit, and he does it constantly. With either the drama, the characters, or the mysteries, we the audience are basically the dumb losers he's insulting with his masturbative legal fantasies. He thinks we are all stupid and that we suck and he punishes us for it. I read an interview with him from TV Guide or some other disreputable publication around 25 years ago (Do NOT get me started on TV Guide) and they asked him the logical question about why Elaine (played by a pre-30 Rock Jane Krakowski) was on Ally McBeal. Why create this specific character that everybody in the audience hates? And he said that he created her to annoy the audience. We are toys to Kelley to be manipulated and talked down to, because we are not worthy of the brilliance of a genius writer who creates annoying characters for the specific purpose of annoying us.
And no matter what the legal drama, Kelley will set up iron-clad rules about the stakes of what is about to happen. And then he'll not merely violate them. That would be too easy. He'll violate them using unfair cop-outs he didn't bother setting up. He thinks to himself "They'll never see this coming!" to each completely crappy bit of writing he does. Of course I didn't see Lou being convicted of second degree murder coming! Because it wasn't set-up! The stakes of the trial were first degree or nothing. That's the precise reason she had a shot to begin with. And Bill's all, "How could you let the judge instruct the jury that Murder 2 was okay?" Do you know who could have benefited from hearing the judge's instruction of that? The viewer! But see then some viewers might understand and know that that guilty verdict is coming, because it was properly set up. But no. That's not okay for Kelley. He needs to feel smarter and superior to us filthy rabble, and make us surprised by something that doesn't make a lick of sense out of context, and with no set-up. Just to make things even crappier, the judge nullifies the sentence, meaning Kelley is screwing us around for no good reason at all. We are not people to Kelley. We are marks to amuse himself over. He thinks we suck. As far as my opinion of him goes, the feeling is MORE than mutual.
I read another article, like 20 years ago. I THINK it was by Stephen King, but I could be wrong. The reason I think it was King is because it sounds like something he'd say. And the fact that the article resonated so much with me sort of makes me hope it wasn't King after all, because I would think a heck of a lot less of him for teaming up with Kelley after writing this, because Kelley is actually what the article was about.
The article was about the fact that there are a few different solid story ideas out there, and people repeatedly tell the same variations. But as far as writers of fiction go, there are only two types of writers: Storytellers and liars. The example of a storyteller is if they are writing a story about a child murderer who has just escaped (or even been released) from a mental institution. The first thing the murderer does in this story example is see a little girl on the sidewalk bouncing a ball. This happens on the first or second page of the story, so this is how the writer sets up the world and the characters. The murderer holds his breath and his mind clouds. Now, one of the writers will have the murderer walk up to the child and start an ambiguous conversation with her. And his eyes will get wider and wider, and the child will start to get nervous. But in the end, either because the child's mother calls her in, or somebody else comes along, or even if the child murderer restrains himself, it remains, thankfully an unfulfilled tension. The other writer will have the murderer's mind cloud and then detail the gruesome ways in which the murderer kills, dismembers, and violates the child right then and there on the third flipping page of the book.
The first writer is a storyteller (although perhaps a pedestrian one). The second writer is a liar. Full stop. The second writer is not your friend. The second writer thinks you are stupid and will fall for anything. He'll sell you the Brooklyn Bridge while wearing a MAGA hat. What's especially soul-crushing about the writer who is a liar, and who thinks you are the dumbest f word on planet, is that he's not actually all that smart himself. He's a dullard and simpleton for thinking that's effective writing. And if you live in a popular culture as bad as ours was in the 1980's and 1990's, the liar will win Emmys from Academy members who ARE dumb enough to fall for it when actual quality like Twin Peaks scares them off.
When I read that article, David E Kelley immediately popped into my head, and I knew that King, or whoever wrote that, was absolutely 100% right. And I realized that if I ever decided to fully go for it and start writing stories, I needed to make sure to play fair with the reader, and not lie to them or give them twist endings that aren't set up, or don't fit the stakes described. This is actually basic stuff any storyteller should know. But liars like Kelley and Joe Eszterhas have gotten far in Hollywood despite violating that covenant with the viewer. Eszterhas was punished for it, and became a pariah and a cautionary tale. Kelley was praised and rewarded for it instead and went on to infect other writers with his exact toxic sensibility decades later. Riverdale would not exist in its current form if Kelley did not exist. I firmly believe that. A show as toxic, unfair, stupid, and badly written as that had to have come from somewhere. And if the writers of that mess didn't inherit their lack of skills from the master of masturbative writing, I would be shocked. You think the courtroom stuff on Riverdale and every other Berlanti show is appalling? I am positive it is because those specific writers grew up with Kelley's lawyer shows. The fact that that is the specific worst aspect of the current worst shows on television means that somebody has been watching Kelley and taking all the wrong notes.
Oh, and the book dealer is a pedophile? Since when? How can they set that up after the fact and expect the audience to be remotely satisfied with that? It's infuriating, as is the cheap fake-out dream sequence at the end. And fake dream sequences ALSO infect a lot of current stuff. What is ironic is that they can infect otherwise good stuff too. But it is not lost on me that it was Kelley who was one of the pioneers of that specific hated trope. You hate dream sequences that trick you into thinking you are seeing something you aren't really seeing? You think they make it so that when a character actually dies you won't believe it, and look for an escape hatch instead rather than the drama landing as its supposed to? All of that is true, and that's mostly down to Kelley (although Chris Carter is not blameless there).
For the record, it is totally on-brand for the type of vicious racist Kelley is to use Kate Mulgrew to misappropriate Native American culture, but have the thing she pays tribute to be about how savage that group of people were able to torture others back in the day. Cultural misappropriation for Native American stuff is VERY problematic already, but you don't often see current writers using white characters to demonstrate why Native Americans are brutal savages nowadays. That's certainly an unusual viewpoint for a white writer to give a white actress in 2020, but Kelley is a very virulent and disgusting racist.
I said there was a good thing to note. The courtroom drama looks to be done. Kelley's worst subject matter is off the table for the final three episodes. Now Chicago Hope was a bad show and that didn't really revolve around a ton of lawyer stuff either (although there was far more than a hospital show credibly could have) but I'm optimistic the stuff with Peter and Morris will be the focus from this point forward.
Speaking of Peter and Morris, I don't like this version of Peter. When Morris laments that the manuscripts should be out in the world and not hoarded on the black market, that's supposed to be Peter's perspective from the book. The only reason he goes to Andrew at all in the book is to find a way to unload the manuscripts so that he can be rid of them, but for them to have a chance to be released to the world. And him going to Andrew was a mistake because he didn't share that goal. Instead here it's Peter's greed for money that guides his decisions, and how he deals with both Morris and Andrew. I understand that things from books change in adaptations of works. But while Kelley is ruining the show elsewhere, I'm not inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt when he does so. He doesn't deserve it.
That was some epically bad and unfair lying I just saw. Hopefully things can get back on track with the lawyer stuff seemingly out (for now). But it's Kelley. That's not a sure thing. 0.
Mr. Mercedes "Mommy Deadest"
I do not like what they are doing with Lou.
I also strongly resent what David E Kelley is doing with Holly. Stephen King is not known for writing strong female characters, but Holly Gibney is the closest character he's created that fits that bill. Holly in the books would be afraid to date too. It's speculated by Jerome and Barbara in the novella If It Bleeds, that's she's a virgin. But in the books, Bill and Jerome would just accept her decision to keep men at arm's length for whatever reason she has. They wouldn't be calling her a dope for it. I thought the romance was ill-advised to begin with, but what really bothers me is that Holly makes a speech here about why she doesn't want to date Finklestein, which is credible to how she feels in the books. And Kelley instead of respecting her decision and autonomy as a woman, needs to proves her wrong instead, and say that there is nothing wrong inside her pretty little mixed-up head that a good man can't fix.
In my recent reviews, I've been doing nothing but talking smack about Joss Whedon failing every one of his feminist ideals, and I totally forgot that the creator of one of the most recognizable women characters of the 1990's (Ally McBeal) totally hates and doesn't respect women too. Forget Whedon, Kelley is the white, male liberal failing feminist ideals before Joss Whedon made being a white, male liberal failing feminist ideals trendy. (I was gonna say cool, but there is nothing cool about these dirtbags). There are so many reasons I have hated David E Kelley over the years, I've forgotten quite a few of them. The fact that women are not allowed to be content with being without a man is one of them. And I totally forgot about it. Aren't I the worst type of feminist ally ever? I am deeply shamed.
Again, if I remember that essay about storytellers and liars correctly coming from Stephen King, King also has a LOT of blood on his hands for handing off his proudest female creation to somebody like David E Kelley. King's portrayal of Holly is not perfect there (too many lines about Bill thinking she's prettier when she smiles) but King always allowed Holly to do what she told King to let her do. Which is the mark of a storyteller who listens to the characters. Kelley is a liar who makes the characters do what he wants them to do. There is a difference there and it's huge.
Interestingly, the episode itself is merely so-so. But David E Kelley exists to prove Holly is wrong for not liking men and sex. Which describes everything wrong with Kelley in a nutshell, and why he was the wrong person to handle this specific franchise. **.
Mr. Mercedes "Crunch Time"
Finally! I can complain about the normal failures involved in adapting a book for television instead of the specific failures of Kelley being the worst TV writer who ever lived! Progress.
Finders Keepers always struck me as sort of a personal novel for Stephen King, and certainly the one of the Bill Hodges Trilogy that spoke most to his philosophies and experiences as a writer with cranky and obsessive (and often unhappy) fans. It was sort of the other side of the coin for Misery, with the opposite ending of the beloved manuscripts being destroyed by a fire, instead of being saved by Paul Sheldon. And I was never crazy about the Reverse Misery ending. However, I understand one of its subtexts. One of Morris' biggest wishes is to finally understand Rothstein and what he was trying to say. And he's spent decades itching for this (and this is another reason the shortened timespan hurts the resonance of the show). I think it was all right for Peter to hint to him about things that were in the manuscript to distract him in the book. I don't think there should be a level of the King Multiverse Tower in which he is allowed to read one, even if he might not finish it in the next episode. King's moral is that it is foolish and hubris to ever believe you can get inside the head of the creator of great fiction, and Morris's karmic punishment is to never actually get any satisfaction in that regard. Regardless of whether or not King had the manuscripts destroyed at the end of the book or not, that's the right moral, and the entire point of the book. Which this show doesn't really understand is actually King's real message. King's an executive producer on the show? He must be very hands-off if he's not giving notes about this specific thing. It's very weird.
I'll tell you what moment I liked: Bill venomously exploding at Lou for talking up Brady's good qualities. That has been done entirely too much this season and the last. Brady was an absolute irredeemable monster in the books, and King never had any of the characters (least of all Lou) making excuses for him. His relationship with his mother was not portrayed as loving, but rather as sick as incest should be portrayed as. I liked Bill getting angry because I've been getting angry. I would never call Lou the c-word for the nonsense she's always saying, but really, enough is enough.
I am glad I was able to criticize this episode on the substance and its understandable failures, rather than failures that only occur if the writer is a secret sociopath. Baby steps. **1/2.
Mr. Mercedes "Burning Man"
This season and this series have been very instructive to me. In this episode I learned something about David E Kelley I didn't know. I've been mainly fed up with him for how badly he treats the audience, his casts of actors, and his characters, and how he creates stupid scenarios and asks us to find them and the characters that caused them credible. These have been my complaints going back decades. I have called him the worst writer on television.
It turns out I was underselling that. I am not going to give the series finale a grade of 0. There were some nice things in it. What it did however is told me something I had no idea about: Kelley is unable to properly construct an actual story and pay-off. And I don't just mean of an arc (which is understandable because that's hard), I mean of an entire episode (which should be basic for any writer)! I can't state for certain this problem didn't effect his earlier stuff, but I saw that stuff before I started writing in earnest, and even if it occurred, I might not have recognized it as that specific thing. But the man is seriously untalented in spinning a yarn. Even liars can usually pull that off. It takes a special level of incompetence and ignorance to write something in which nothing actually occurs and declare it your grand finale. Heroes, the series, did that a couple of times, but this strikes me as far worse because the ending doesn't suck for budgetary concerns (the fire effects are in fact quite spiffy). The problem is Kelley made the characters too unlike the characters in the book, so making the resolutions similar meant the episode spun its wheels entirely.
Morris is not effing around, so Peter needs to give him the manuscripts. Here is a novel idea, Peter: Give him the manuscripts! Peter never planned to keep them (unlike the novel) so what difference does it make to give the man waving a gun at your mother what he wants instead of screwing around simply to worry the audience? The police knows he has them so he can't sell them himself. So his only goal from this point forward is saving his mother's life. And he's not doing anything remotely helpful to that goal. Bill is also noticeably absent in the actual resolution, and barely has anything to do with it. Granted, there's an argument to be made that's true of the book too, but Bill was very much involved in the investigation there, and befriended Peter, and sort of had a personal stake in helping the kid. The only contact he makes with Peter in the entire season is Peter hanging up on him in this episode.
But Kelley got it into his head, "It's the last episode of the season, better makes its runtime an extended 58 minutes," and all he could do was stretch and stretch and STREEEETCH. What's amazing about this storytelling failing is that is usually only effects writers coming up with original works (like Heroes)! For it to happen in a book adaptation is practically unthinkable. I have never seen that before, at least not that I can remember. The writer HAS the blueprint of how things go down right there in front of him! And Kelley wrote every episode! And he couldn't structure it any better than this? I'm no longer simply offended by the Emmys because Kelley's writing is offensive on every level. It's because his writing is actually incompetent. And while I didn't have the skills to recognize that specific thing 20 years ago, if he's pulling this crap now, it obviously effected his earlier stuff too. What's troubling is that even the worst and hackiest of writers improve and mature over time. And this kind of thing has apparently been a part of his entire career and he's never course-adjusted for it even decades later. It's amazing how BAD he is at this.
Another bad thing is that we get no resolution for the Saubers at the end of the episode, which is nuts considering how much the actual episode spun its wheels on nonsense. It's made very clear during the episode that Peter might be in serious legal trouble, and his mother has just been violated in the worst possible ways too. We can't take 30 seconds to see the family reunited, them forgiving their son, and maybe the D.A. declining to press charges after all that? It's inexcusable. I would have liked the ending from the book where Peter is destined for minor celebrity for being the only person who knows how the Jimmy Gold saga went down, and being paid to detail that in a tell-all book. Even knowing Peter and his family were okay and escaping legal troubles at the end here would have been enough. Now it feels like the loosest of ends not tied up.
Have I mentioned I am troubled by how vulgar and profane the characters are on the show? It's the last episode ever so I might as well. David E Kelley finally has license to drop f bombs and he's abusing the privilege. I'm saying this is too vulgar of an adaptation of a freaking Stephen King book! Let that sink in. I know what I just said. It's true.
There are three things I really liked in the episode. I liked that when Bill says that Allie wanted a dog or a Pet Rock as a kid, Fred was the compromise. I also REALLY love that when Allie announces she's pregnant (as an unmarried teenage mother, no less) both Bill and Ida congratulate her and are happy for her. Bill has definite mixed feelings, but it's refreshing the outward face he shows his daughter in the moment that matters is support. I not only wish Kelley did more stuff like that, I wish ALL TV writers did more stuff like that. It doesn't stop Kelley from being the worst writer on television. But I have to give a person their due if they write a cool thing. That was a cool thing.
The third thing I loved is not something I can convey to you properly unless you have suffered through as much David E Kelley as I have. On Picket Fences, Chicago Hope, Ally McBeal, The Practice, ALL of his shows no matter what they were or where they were set, whenever the jury read the verdict, the judge always used the words "What say you?" to the jury foreman. That drove me nuts, not simply because I have never heard a judge EVER use those words either in real life, or any other courtroom drama. It's because every judge on every show said it every time, no matter where it was set and no matter who the judge was. I couldn't stand the fact that when it came to asking the jury for it's verdict, the judges on ALL the shows recited the question as uniformly as the Power Rangers do when they call their superpowers. It was a cutesy Kelley "quirk" that I found insufferable. I haven't seen a Kelley show in 20 years, so I can't speak as to whether this has happened before or not, but this is the first time I have never heard a judge say that stupid unrealistic phrase in an episode written by Kelley. It actually meant a lot to me, which will sound crazy to people who have never watched either Picket Fences or Ally McBeal. Trust me. It was refreshing.
This episode was travesty otherwise, and the season and ultimately the series turned out to be a mess, simply because Kelley increased his involvement. What concerns me the most is that Joe Eszterhas was basically run out of town on a rail for his various writing failures, and Uwe Boll is a similar level of joke as far as directors are concerned. Why is Kelley still getting work? Why is he still allowed to write and produce major TV shows? He has a new show on Disney+! Why? After spending his entire career being unable to deliver the goods in any way, why does he keep getting 32nd chances, when there are actual talented writers toiling away on lesser known shows on basic cable or streaming? It doesn't make sense to me. Somebody this bad at his job should no longer have it. If the Emmy wins didn't infuriate me enough, at least it comforts me to know he'll never win another one. The Emmy voters have matured and changed, and so has the TV landscape (the awful Murphy Brown would never win an Emmy today either). What I can't reconcile is why he still gets works. Why after his repeated TV failures is he still allowed to write and produce television?
Frankly, if I had had clout in Hollywood back in the day (and was not in gradeschool at the time) I would have made him an absolute pariah and persona non grata for Rosalind Hayes falling down the elevator shaft on L.A. Law. Then we would never be in this mess. Instead he's rewarded Emmys for it. I never understood Hollywood way back in the 1980's and 90's, and I still don't decades later. My teenage self was right to find it utterly messed up. How bad was Hollywood in the 1990's? The awful film Forrest Gump beat out both Pulp Fiction and The Shawshank Redemption for Best Picture. What am I actually mad about the era of TV and movies I grew up with? How much time have you got? (How bad, manipulative, and unfair to the viewer was Forrest Gump? If I had seen Kelley's name on the screenplay credit I wouldn't have been surprised at all. It's that bad.)
Look at John Waters. His films aren't great, but they are super low budget, and some of them are memorable. But he made three bad movies in a row, and it killed his career, and now he's not allowed to make any more. And this is for a guy whose movies cost practically nothing to make. Why is Kelley trusted with the high-profile actors and TV budgets he is? It makes no sense.
Whatever the future holds for my writing, whether I finish my unpublishable-seeming comic book or not, and whether or not an online publisher and artist DO bite after seeing how it all comes out, I'm disillusioned. Kelley makes me realize writing is not a meritocracy. I think my story is fantastic, and it doesn't matter because people like Kelley are given repeated chances to fail after supposedly succeeding once or twice. And I know that's true of comic book creators too. Maybe the answer is to marry Michelle Pfeiffer so people can make jokes about that on Emmy night. Because David E Kelley repeatedly falling up despite failing every TV show he's ever created and overseen, and them all crashing and burning creatively tells me the writing game is kind of for suckers. And I don't see the prestige in it anymore. I would like to share my stuff, but Lord, I don't think any profession that repeatedly give David E Kelley work is remotely qualified to judge actual quality. And maybe that's not something I realized until I saw this episode. That revelation is by turns soul-crushing and freeing, depending on how you look at it. My gut reaction to seeing a big-budget Stephen King-based series end THAT incompetently is major disgust. I can't believe things are this bad in Hollywood. But they are.
I suspected this season was going to be bad. But I had no idea just HOW bad. It surprised me. In the worst way. *.
Teen Titan Go! "Pig In A Poke"
A speaking role for the Joker? The old show never would have been allowed to do that.
Beast Boy's Mark Hamill impression is the one that does the trick because the show can probably afford him down the road (although Eric Bauza gets the actual honors this time).
Speaking of which, I don't think that was just a slam on Robin's lame Jared Leto impression. It seemed to be a slam on Leto's interpretation itself. And you know what? Seeing those lines makes me think that was all wrong for the Joker. What's weird is seeing Heath Ledger's lines make me think HE was wrong for the Joker too.
I like the still Joker image at the beginning being from Batman: The Animated Series.
Robin does an Israeli accent for his Wonder Woman. I wonder if that's now how her character is gonna be officially portrayed through all adaptations. It's not as poor of a new sticking-around trend as the Bat-Growl, but it also doesn't strike me as remotely necessary, which is a thing it and the Bat-Growl have in common. It's like DC has randomly decided this is now a part of the character. Which frankly strikes me as a bit weird, especially after like 80 years.
Interesting episode in general. ***1/2.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Cut And Run"
That was nice. People will call it sappy, but I like sappy.
Dirt is awesome. I'll fight anybody who says it isn't.
Good to see Cut again. Wondering what had happened to him.
The Narrator is entirely absent! Looks like last week was a one-off and the show getting The Clone Wars out of its system.
Fun to see an evil R2 Unit. Even funner to see it brutally damaged by Wrecker. That's what Threepio always wanted to do.
I'm liking what I've seen of this show so far. ****.
Myth: A Frozen Tale
Visually dazzling and magnificent animation. It must have been stunning to see in a VR headset.
Interestingly, this uses none of the characters from Frozen, and it being set in Arendelle is implied solely due to the title. Which is something I like. It makes the mythology of the world seem bigger than we imagined whenever we see people in the same setting we don't know.
The story was a little dry but the images were a feast for the eyes. I loved it. ****1/2.
Muppet Babies "It's Not Easy Being Greeny / Dueling Harmonicas"
It's Not Easy Being Greeny:
This was Freddy the Leaf! An episode about death!. Very sensitively handled if you ask me.
I think if the Babies ever went to Miss Nanny straight away, they wouldn't have these problems. But Miss Nanny can't fix this. What she CAN do is explain it in a reassuring and gentle voice. Which is great. Especially since it's Jenny Slate of all people.
Not often this show impresses me. This did. *****.
Dueling Harmonicas:
When it comes right down to it, Fozzie is kind of a heel.
Liked the Muppet Show music cue in the theater.
But that was annoying, especially compared to the first lovely cartoon. **.
Episode Overall: ****.
Marvel Bend & Flex "Western Sunset"
Is that a Taskmaster figure? Mommy, Mommy I want that!
I predicted these shorts would get neater and neater the more waves this toyline has. I was right. ****.
The Barbarian And The Troll "Parent Just Don't Understand"
I love that Evan's mom keeps trying to eat him.
I also love "Troll before tolls".
Biff is NOT gonna work. Ya think?
Evan's dad eats his lute like Cookie Monster.
To be blunt, this was a weak week. But it was still cute. ***1/2.
Transformers: Rescue Bots Academy "Dino-mite Duo"
Do you know what's weird (and frustrating)? For once, the moral of the show in the episode is actually sound: Never attempt a rescue if you have no training or aren't prepared for it. But then the Dinobots here succeed anyways because there is no level on which this specific show is not an utter failure. *.
Transformers: Rescue Bots Academy "The Lonely Titan"
Am I utterly crazy or was that actually kinda sweet? I must be utterly crazy. ****1/2.
Clarice "Add-A-Bead"
I like the last scene but I feel like Grigoryan should have been a part of it. Too bad Kal Penn took the week off.
I like Krendler enjoying the fast food with his son. That was a fun moment especially because his son thinks he's totally lame for it.
Hannibal Lecter is mentioned, but not directly by name. Must be a rights issue.
Solid. ***1/2.
The Blacklist "Nicolas Obenrader"
I'll admit it: The Croissant scene was actually fun.
I agree with Townsend that Liz's phone call with the FBI was NOT incriminating of her being against him in the least. I'm not saying she isn't. I'm saying that specific phone call gave the opposite impression.
Red looks genuinely devastated at the end. I felt bad for him.
Unusually solid episode. ****.
Mr. Mercedes "No Good Deed"
This was not as bad as I feared (the David E Kelley courtroom stuff, while obnoxious, was not most of the episode) but I have to say the premise of the season is much lesser than the book Finders Keepers. I know why they simplified it. It's an established show, and to do the proper flashbacks and set-up for Morris, they'd practically have to do an entire episode or two without the Hodges characters. King has that luxury in a book. A producer doesn't have that for a TV show.
But the subtext of the second book is MUCH richer than this. The idea that Morris killed Rothstein as a young man and spent decades in prison waiting to unbury that trunk of buried treasure in a park as an old man, only to find it missing is such a great premise, that a suitcase left behind in a crashed van a couple of days after the murder simply does NOT resonate as much.
Mostly because I don't find Morris' obsessions and agitation as relatable as the book. I find him coming to the wrong conclusions stupid instead. I get the logic of old man Morris unraveling after discovering the thing he has spent decades dreaming about has slipped through his fingers. As far as this show's Morris is concerned, it's been two days. It makes every reckless and violent thing he does stupid instead of frightening.
I like the portrayal of Rothstein on the show and thought they did a better job of making him a cantankerous character than the book did. The idea that he leaves his door unlocked because he's waiting to be murdered for a great ending to his personal story is a pretty good one (even if it was written by as a hack like Kelley).
Speaking of hacky Kelley writing, I already know the courtroom stuff is going to try my patience on a good day and infuriate me on a bad one. How do I know? Kelley gave the judge a stupid catchphrase ("I am not satisfied,") which was a hallmark of his worst excesses on Picket Fences, Ally McBeal, and The Practice. What's especially annoying about the potential quirky lawyer nonsense is that there is not a single scene set in the Bill Hodges Trilogy that actually takes place in court. I fear that Kelley will turn the franchise into something it isn't about to showcase his new kooky judge. I'm already infuriated thinking about it.
But I don't have much to object about in the episode itself other than it's not as good as the book. But it's being adapted on an established TV show. Some allowances need to be made for that. ***.
Mr. Mercedes "Madness"
Unnerving last scene.
The court stuff is trying my patience, especially the clownish judge.
It's interesting that when court is not is session the show doesn't actually suck, even though Kelley is now writing every episode this season. I particularly like Jerome saying he found Rothstein's writing unnecessarily angry, and the kind of thing that triggers younger loner males to do bad things. And he questions whether maybe a lot of Bill's anger was shaped by that mindset. I like that Bill doesn't brush back on that simply because he trusts Jerome so much. He's flabbergasted but doesn't push for a sense of "My God, could this kid be right?" And he probably is. Note: Kelley himself would never have created a black character like Jerome. He's fine on the show because Stephen King gifted him to Kelley and Kelley simply hasn't screwed the gift up (yet).
Seriously shocking sex scene with Kate Mulgrew. Honestly? It made me cringe a bit.
I like the new main title.
I am frustrated that Kelley is so hands-on this season, and I sense a LOT of his bad tropes are percolating and about to destroy the show. I thought last year's finale was the shark jump, and this season is basically Fonzie waterskiing minus his legs. Bloody and painful to watch. ***.
Mr. Mercedes "Love Lost"
I am mad at Alma killing Danielle because I really like Danielle. I like how she tells Morris his thing is more than she can handle and that she didn't sign up for it. Really, him asking her to stay was unreasonable. Although I admittedly would have been a LOT more cautious in Alma's presence than she was, and never would have let my guard down. The woman is clearly crazy.
They clearly wanted to bring back Harry Treadaway but couldn't contract him because he was playing a Romulan on Star Trek: Picard. He was better off. Picard is awesome and this show is the hottest of messes.
Brendan Gleesan does not have a good singing voice which is why it sounds nice. There is a lot of vulnerability and lack of vanity in singing when your voice isn't good. I am unsurprised it moved Ida to tears. I think Holland Taylor's performance in that scene was excellent.
I like that Jerome is getting a little tired of Hodges defending Rothstein. After what I learned the last episode, Rothstein was a scumbag and Bill is an excuser of scumbags. It's especially disheartening to hear how he used Ida and how Bill's "hero" actually negatively effected people he cared about. Hopefully he'll think twice of his hero worship of this turd going forward.
No court stuff, so I liked it. Holland Taylor also brought her A-game. ****.
Mr. Mercedes "Trial And Error"
Perhaps people who have never seen a David E Kelley show wonder why I repeatedly call him the worst writer on television, and say that his winning multiple Emmys in the 1990's is as obscene as if Joe Eszterhas routinely won Oscars. Here's Exhibit A. This episode is all the proof I need for that statement.
Kelley can write a serviceable normal scene when the situation calls for it, but it is unusual for him because he refuses the idea that serviceable, normal scenes have value, and he believes that people only respond to outrageous antics. To be fair, he is not ENTIRELY wrong. I like the characters on Twin Peaks precisely because they are unrealistic and nuts. The thing is that while David Lynch is doing that, he's not exploring controversial political topics and pushing people's buttons for Agent Cooper being a weirdo. Instead Kelley's weird characters means he isn't taking the gravity of what he's showing seriously. Which is something only the worst of writers would do when exploring these specific topics. The scene at the end of Lou with Finkelstein made me say, "I gave up on this cretin 20 year ago, and pretty much have not watched a David E Kelley series since. This says age and time has not improved his writing any." I admit, I like the quiet discussions between Bill and Ida whenever they have them. But they clearly bore Kelley. And he's managed to turn a franchise without a single scene in all three books set in court into a courtroom drama. They say "Write what you know," but even if he used to be a lawyer, Kelly does not understand the law very well.
The opening statement from the District Attorney made me roll my eyes and say, "This speech was written by the worst writer on television." Prosecutors do not speak like that. And it's a good thing too because she came off as unhinged. Granted so did Finklestein in his opening remarks, but the two main things I noticed about his rebuttal is that his debunking of her ridiculous argument of Lou robbing people of closure was correct, and also that that kind of showboating is not outside of what a defense attorney is known for.
And who names a dog Boogers, anyways? For the record, NOT Stephen King.
This show was all right when Kelly was not writing most episodes. Now that he's gotten "involved" I can tell the rest of the run is gonna majorly suck. This episode certainly did. 0.
Mr. Mercedes "Great Balls Of Fire"
That wasn't actually terrible but I am not a fan of the legal turn this show has taken. At all. **.
Mr. Mercedes "Bad To Worse"
That was pretty good, mostly due to Justine Lupe's great performance on the stand. I think Kelley's writing of the D.A. is still beyond bad, but I think a LOT of times, the actors in Kelley's show make his writing seem better than it actually is. That would probably explain the Emmys despite the terrible scripts.
Here's my problem with Morris and Peter: Morris' deal is TOO good. Peter is now unreasonable for not taking it. One of the defining things about Morris in the book is that he is UNREASONABLE and never uses his head. They are trying to pit his merely being the messenger against Alma as the mastermind, but that's inconsistent with how the character was intended.
Speaking of Alma, it is very clear she has no clue how to properly remove a bullet from a wound. There's a right way to do it, and a wrong way. And then there is Alma's way, which is about ten clicks beyond the wrong way until it ventures all the way to "more painful and damaging to the leg than actually being shot". This is partly why I don't buy Alma as the criminal mastermind. This scene shows she's actually super dumb.
That was all right. ***1/2.
Mr. Mercedes "The End Of The Beginning"
I am angry. We will get to some good stuff at the very end of the review, but for right now I am going to talk about some things that make me very unhappy and angry.
What this episode review is going to be about is bad television. What constitutes that? Why does it seem that for a lot of the time, I have much different views of what it is compared to many other fans or even professional critics? What is my specific metric for bad television?
I am not sure I could definitely itemize a specific list for why bad television is bad, and why I give the negative reviews I do. Mostly because bad television can suck in many different ways and almost always does. There is no one-size-fits-all explanation for bad writing. So how do I recognize the fact that Riverdale, and Titans, and The Blacklist, are all terrible series, and they earn nothing but my scorn despite perhaps resonating with other people? I think a large bit of credit for my negative reviews for ANY bad TV show is actually due to David E Kelley. He is the cautionary tale of bad TV producers and writers, and everything a bad show that I currently hate does, he did it first. Every episode of Riverdale I've ever hated is sort of like an episode of Picket Fences. House? Lots of Chicago Hope in there. The Office after Michael left? Ally McBeal with more credible (and horrible) characters. So I recognize these programs as utterly offensive failures because I've seen their types before. From Kelley. And while I would have a tough time offering a definitive explanation of what bad television is, if you asked me what is the thing I hate most about television, and the thing I hate most about Kelley (and the thing he does most often) I'd give you the same answer.
He doesn't play fair with his viewers.
In my mind this is the greatest sin a writer can ever commit, and he does it constantly. With either the drama, the characters, or the mysteries, we the audience are basically the dumb losers he's insulting with his masturbative legal fantasies. He thinks we are all stupid and that we suck and he punishes us for it. I read an interview with him from TV Guide or some other disreputable publication around 25 years ago (Do NOT get me started on TV Guide) and they asked him the logical question about why Elaine (played by a pre-30 Rock Jane Krakowski) was on Ally McBeal. Why create this specific character that everybody in the audience hates? And he said that he created her to annoy the audience. We are toys to Kelley to be manipulated and talked down to, because we are not worthy of the brilliance of a genius writer who creates annoying characters for the specific purpose of annoying us.
And no matter what the legal drama, Kelley will set up iron-clad rules about the stakes of what is about to happen. And then he'll not merely violate them. That would be too easy. He'll violate them using unfair cop-outs he didn't bother setting up. He thinks to himself "They'll never see this coming!" to each completely crappy bit of writing he does. Of course I didn't see Lou being convicted of second degree murder coming! Because it wasn't set-up! The stakes of the trial were first degree or nothing. That's the precise reason she had a shot to begin with. And Bill's all, "How could you let the judge instruct the jury that Murder 2 was okay?" Do you know who could have benefited from hearing the judge's instruction of that? The viewer! But see then some viewers might understand and know that that guilty verdict is coming, because it was properly set up. But no. That's not okay for Kelley. He needs to feel smarter and superior to us filthy rabble, and make us surprised by something that doesn't make a lick of sense out of context, and with no set-up. Just to make things even crappier, the judge nullifies the sentence, meaning Kelley is screwing us around for no good reason at all. We are not people to Kelley. We are marks to amuse himself over. He thinks we suck. As far as my opinion of him goes, the feeling is MORE than mutual.
I read another article, like 20 years ago. I THINK it was by Stephen King, but I could be wrong. The reason I think it was King is because it sounds like something he'd say. And the fact that the article resonated so much with me sort of makes me hope it wasn't King after all, because I would think a heck of a lot less of him for teaming up with Kelley after writing this, because Kelley is actually what the article was about.
The article was about the fact that there are a few different solid story ideas out there, and people repeatedly tell the same variations. But as far as writers of fiction go, there are only two types of writers: Storytellers and liars. The example of a storyteller is if they are writing a story about a child murderer who has just escaped (or even been released) from a mental institution. The first thing the murderer does in this story example is see a little girl on the sidewalk bouncing a ball. This happens on the first or second page of the story, so this is how the writer sets up the world and the characters. The murderer holds his breath and his mind clouds. Now, one of the writers will have the murderer walk up to the child and start an ambiguous conversation with her. And his eyes will get wider and wider, and the child will start to get nervous. But in the end, either because the child's mother calls her in, or somebody else comes along, or even if the child murderer restrains himself, it remains, thankfully an unfulfilled tension. The other writer will have the murderer's mind cloud and then detail the gruesome ways in which the murderer kills, dismembers, and violates the child right then and there on the third flipping page of the book.
The first writer is a storyteller (although perhaps a pedestrian one). The second writer is a liar. Full stop. The second writer is not your friend. The second writer thinks you are stupid and will fall for anything. He'll sell you the Brooklyn Bridge while wearing a MAGA hat. What's especially soul-crushing about the writer who is a liar, and who thinks you are the dumbest f word on planet, is that he's not actually all that smart himself. He's a dullard and simpleton for thinking that's effective writing. And if you live in a popular culture as bad as ours was in the 1980's and 1990's, the liar will win Emmys from Academy members who ARE dumb enough to fall for it when actual quality like Twin Peaks scares them off.
When I read that article, David E Kelley immediately popped into my head, and I knew that King, or whoever wrote that, was absolutely 100% right. And I realized that if I ever decided to fully go for it and start writing stories, I needed to make sure to play fair with the reader, and not lie to them or give them twist endings that aren't set up, or don't fit the stakes described. This is actually basic stuff any storyteller should know. But liars like Kelley and Joe Eszterhas have gotten far in Hollywood despite violating that covenant with the viewer. Eszterhas was punished for it, and became a pariah and a cautionary tale. Kelley was praised and rewarded for it instead and went on to infect other writers with his exact toxic sensibility decades later. Riverdale would not exist in its current form if Kelley did not exist. I firmly believe that. A show as toxic, unfair, stupid, and badly written as that had to have come from somewhere. And if the writers of that mess didn't inherit their lack of skills from the master of masturbative writing, I would be shocked. You think the courtroom stuff on Riverdale and every other Berlanti show is appalling? I am positive it is because those specific writers grew up with Kelley's lawyer shows. The fact that that is the specific worst aspect of the current worst shows on television means that somebody has been watching Kelley and taking all the wrong notes.
Oh, and the book dealer is a pedophile? Since when? How can they set that up after the fact and expect the audience to be remotely satisfied with that? It's infuriating, as is the cheap fake-out dream sequence at the end. And fake dream sequences ALSO infect a lot of current stuff. What is ironic is that they can infect otherwise good stuff too. But it is not lost on me that it was Kelley who was one of the pioneers of that specific hated trope. You hate dream sequences that trick you into thinking you are seeing something you aren't really seeing? You think they make it so that when a character actually dies you won't believe it, and look for an escape hatch instead rather than the drama landing as its supposed to? All of that is true, and that's mostly down to Kelley (although Chris Carter is not blameless there).
For the record, it is totally on-brand for the type of vicious racist Kelley is to use Kate Mulgrew to misappropriate Native American culture, but have the thing she pays tribute to be about how savage that group of people were able to torture others back in the day. Cultural misappropriation for Native American stuff is VERY problematic already, but you don't often see current writers using white characters to demonstrate why Native Americans are brutal savages nowadays. That's certainly an unusual viewpoint for a white writer to give a white actress in 2020, but Kelley is a very virulent and disgusting racist.
I said there was a good thing to note. The courtroom drama looks to be done. Kelley's worst subject matter is off the table for the final three episodes. Now Chicago Hope was a bad show and that didn't really revolve around a ton of lawyer stuff either (although there was far more than a hospital show credibly could have) but I'm optimistic the stuff with Peter and Morris will be the focus from this point forward.
Speaking of Peter and Morris, I don't like this version of Peter. When Morris laments that the manuscripts should be out in the world and not hoarded on the black market, that's supposed to be Peter's perspective from the book. The only reason he goes to Andrew at all in the book is to find a way to unload the manuscripts so that he can be rid of them, but for them to have a chance to be released to the world. And him going to Andrew was a mistake because he didn't share that goal. Instead here it's Peter's greed for money that guides his decisions, and how he deals with both Morris and Andrew. I understand that things from books change in adaptations of works. But while Kelley is ruining the show elsewhere, I'm not inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt when he does so. He doesn't deserve it.
That was some epically bad and unfair lying I just saw. Hopefully things can get back on track with the lawyer stuff seemingly out (for now). But it's Kelley. That's not a sure thing. 0.
Mr. Mercedes "Mommy Deadest"
I do not like what they are doing with Lou.
I also strongly resent what David E Kelley is doing with Holly. Stephen King is not known for writing strong female characters, but Holly Gibney is the closest character he's created that fits that bill. Holly in the books would be afraid to date too. It's speculated by Jerome and Barbara in the novella If It Bleeds, that's she's a virgin. But in the books, Bill and Jerome would just accept her decision to keep men at arm's length for whatever reason she has. They wouldn't be calling her a dope for it. I thought the romance was ill-advised to begin with, but what really bothers me is that Holly makes a speech here about why she doesn't want to date Finklestein, which is credible to how she feels in the books. And Kelley instead of respecting her decision and autonomy as a woman, needs to proves her wrong instead, and say that there is nothing wrong inside her pretty little mixed-up head that a good man can't fix.
In my recent reviews, I've been doing nothing but talking smack about Joss Whedon failing every one of his feminist ideals, and I totally forgot that the creator of one of the most recognizable women characters of the 1990's (Ally McBeal) totally hates and doesn't respect women too. Forget Whedon, Kelley is the white, male liberal failing feminist ideals before Joss Whedon made being a white, male liberal failing feminist ideals trendy. (I was gonna say cool, but there is nothing cool about these dirtbags). There are so many reasons I have hated David E Kelley over the years, I've forgotten quite a few of them. The fact that women are not allowed to be content with being without a man is one of them. And I totally forgot about it. Aren't I the worst type of feminist ally ever? I am deeply shamed.
Again, if I remember that essay about storytellers and liars correctly coming from Stephen King, King also has a LOT of blood on his hands for handing off his proudest female creation to somebody like David E Kelley. King's portrayal of Holly is not perfect there (too many lines about Bill thinking she's prettier when she smiles) but King always allowed Holly to do what she told King to let her do. Which is the mark of a storyteller who listens to the characters. Kelley is a liar who makes the characters do what he wants them to do. There is a difference there and it's huge.
Interestingly, the episode itself is merely so-so. But David E Kelley exists to prove Holly is wrong for not liking men and sex. Which describes everything wrong with Kelley in a nutshell, and why he was the wrong person to handle this specific franchise. **.
Mr. Mercedes "Crunch Time"
Finally! I can complain about the normal failures involved in adapting a book for television instead of the specific failures of Kelley being the worst TV writer who ever lived! Progress.
Finders Keepers always struck me as sort of a personal novel for Stephen King, and certainly the one of the Bill Hodges Trilogy that spoke most to his philosophies and experiences as a writer with cranky and obsessive (and often unhappy) fans. It was sort of the other side of the coin for Misery, with the opposite ending of the beloved manuscripts being destroyed by a fire, instead of being saved by Paul Sheldon. And I was never crazy about the Reverse Misery ending. However, I understand one of its subtexts. One of Morris' biggest wishes is to finally understand Rothstein and what he was trying to say. And he's spent decades itching for this (and this is another reason the shortened timespan hurts the resonance of the show). I think it was all right for Peter to hint to him about things that were in the manuscript to distract him in the book. I don't think there should be a level of the King Multiverse Tower in which he is allowed to read one, even if he might not finish it in the next episode. King's moral is that it is foolish and hubris to ever believe you can get inside the head of the creator of great fiction, and Morris's karmic punishment is to never actually get any satisfaction in that regard. Regardless of whether or not King had the manuscripts destroyed at the end of the book or not, that's the right moral, and the entire point of the book. Which this show doesn't really understand is actually King's real message. King's an executive producer on the show? He must be very hands-off if he's not giving notes about this specific thing. It's very weird.
I'll tell you what moment I liked: Bill venomously exploding at Lou for talking up Brady's good qualities. That has been done entirely too much this season and the last. Brady was an absolute irredeemable monster in the books, and King never had any of the characters (least of all Lou) making excuses for him. His relationship with his mother was not portrayed as loving, but rather as sick as incest should be portrayed as. I liked Bill getting angry because I've been getting angry. I would never call Lou the c-word for the nonsense she's always saying, but really, enough is enough.
I am glad I was able to criticize this episode on the substance and its understandable failures, rather than failures that only occur if the writer is a secret sociopath. Baby steps. **1/2.
Mr. Mercedes "Burning Man"
This season and this series have been very instructive to me. In this episode I learned something about David E Kelley I didn't know. I've been mainly fed up with him for how badly he treats the audience, his casts of actors, and his characters, and how he creates stupid scenarios and asks us to find them and the characters that caused them credible. These have been my complaints going back decades. I have called him the worst writer on television.
It turns out I was underselling that. I am not going to give the series finale a grade of 0. There were some nice things in it. What it did however is told me something I had no idea about: Kelley is unable to properly construct an actual story and pay-off. And I don't just mean of an arc (which is understandable because that's hard), I mean of an entire episode (which should be basic for any writer)! I can't state for certain this problem didn't effect his earlier stuff, but I saw that stuff before I started writing in earnest, and even if it occurred, I might not have recognized it as that specific thing. But the man is seriously untalented in spinning a yarn. Even liars can usually pull that off. It takes a special level of incompetence and ignorance to write something in which nothing actually occurs and declare it your grand finale. Heroes, the series, did that a couple of times, but this strikes me as far worse because the ending doesn't suck for budgetary concerns (the fire effects are in fact quite spiffy). The problem is Kelley made the characters too unlike the characters in the book, so making the resolutions similar meant the episode spun its wheels entirely.
Morris is not effing around, so Peter needs to give him the manuscripts. Here is a novel idea, Peter: Give him the manuscripts! Peter never planned to keep them (unlike the novel) so what difference does it make to give the man waving a gun at your mother what he wants instead of screwing around simply to worry the audience? The police knows he has them so he can't sell them himself. So his only goal from this point forward is saving his mother's life. And he's not doing anything remotely helpful to that goal. Bill is also noticeably absent in the actual resolution, and barely has anything to do with it. Granted, there's an argument to be made that's true of the book too, but Bill was very much involved in the investigation there, and befriended Peter, and sort of had a personal stake in helping the kid. The only contact he makes with Peter in the entire season is Peter hanging up on him in this episode.
But Kelley got it into his head, "It's the last episode of the season, better makes its runtime an extended 58 minutes," and all he could do was stretch and stretch and STREEEETCH. What's amazing about this storytelling failing is that is usually only effects writers coming up with original works (like Heroes)! For it to happen in a book adaptation is practically unthinkable. I have never seen that before, at least not that I can remember. The writer HAS the blueprint of how things go down right there in front of him! And Kelley wrote every episode! And he couldn't structure it any better than this? I'm no longer simply offended by the Emmys because Kelley's writing is offensive on every level. It's because his writing is actually incompetent. And while I didn't have the skills to recognize that specific thing 20 years ago, if he's pulling this crap now, it obviously effected his earlier stuff too. What's troubling is that even the worst and hackiest of writers improve and mature over time. And this kind of thing has apparently been a part of his entire career and he's never course-adjusted for it even decades later. It's amazing how BAD he is at this.
Another bad thing is that we get no resolution for the Saubers at the end of the episode, which is nuts considering how much the actual episode spun its wheels on nonsense. It's made very clear during the episode that Peter might be in serious legal trouble, and his mother has just been violated in the worst possible ways too. We can't take 30 seconds to see the family reunited, them forgiving their son, and maybe the D.A. declining to press charges after all that? It's inexcusable. I would have liked the ending from the book where Peter is destined for minor celebrity for being the only person who knows how the Jimmy Gold saga went down, and being paid to detail that in a tell-all book. Even knowing Peter and his family were okay and escaping legal troubles at the end here would have been enough. Now it feels like the loosest of ends not tied up.
Have I mentioned I am troubled by how vulgar and profane the characters are on the show? It's the last episode ever so I might as well. David E Kelley finally has license to drop f bombs and he's abusing the privilege. I'm saying this is too vulgar of an adaptation of a freaking Stephen King book! Let that sink in. I know what I just said. It's true.
There are three things I really liked in the episode. I liked that when Bill says that Allie wanted a dog or a Pet Rock as a kid, Fred was the compromise. I also REALLY love that when Allie announces she's pregnant (as an unmarried teenage mother, no less) both Bill and Ida congratulate her and are happy for her. Bill has definite mixed feelings, but it's refreshing the outward face he shows his daughter in the moment that matters is support. I not only wish Kelley did more stuff like that, I wish ALL TV writers did more stuff like that. It doesn't stop Kelley from being the worst writer on television. But I have to give a person their due if they write a cool thing. That was a cool thing.
The third thing I loved is not something I can convey to you properly unless you have suffered through as much David E Kelley as I have. On Picket Fences, Chicago Hope, Ally McBeal, The Practice, ALL of his shows no matter what they were or where they were set, whenever the jury read the verdict, the judge always used the words "What say you?" to the jury foreman. That drove me nuts, not simply because I have never heard a judge EVER use those words either in real life, or any other courtroom drama. It's because every judge on every show said it every time, no matter where it was set and no matter who the judge was. I couldn't stand the fact that when it came to asking the jury for it's verdict, the judges on ALL the shows recited the question as uniformly as the Power Rangers do when they call their superpowers. It was a cutesy Kelley "quirk" that I found insufferable. I haven't seen a Kelley show in 20 years, so I can't speak as to whether this has happened before or not, but this is the first time I have never heard a judge say that stupid unrealistic phrase in an episode written by Kelley. It actually meant a lot to me, which will sound crazy to people who have never watched either Picket Fences or Ally McBeal. Trust me. It was refreshing.
This episode was travesty otherwise, and the season and ultimately the series turned out to be a mess, simply because Kelley increased his involvement. What concerns me the most is that Joe Eszterhas was basically run out of town on a rail for his various writing failures, and Uwe Boll is a similar level of joke as far as directors are concerned. Why is Kelley still getting work? Why is he still allowed to write and produce major TV shows? He has a new show on Disney+! Why? After spending his entire career being unable to deliver the goods in any way, why does he keep getting 32nd chances, when there are actual talented writers toiling away on lesser known shows on basic cable or streaming? It doesn't make sense to me. Somebody this bad at his job should no longer have it. If the Emmy wins didn't infuriate me enough, at least it comforts me to know he'll never win another one. The Emmy voters have matured and changed, and so has the TV landscape (the awful Murphy Brown would never win an Emmy today either). What I can't reconcile is why he still gets works. Why after his repeated TV failures is he still allowed to write and produce television?
Frankly, if I had had clout in Hollywood back in the day (and was not in gradeschool at the time) I would have made him an absolute pariah and persona non grata for Rosalind Hayes falling down the elevator shaft on L.A. Law. Then we would never be in this mess. Instead he's rewarded Emmys for it. I never understood Hollywood way back in the 1980's and 90's, and I still don't decades later. My teenage self was right to find it utterly messed up. How bad was Hollywood in the 1990's? The awful film Forrest Gump beat out both Pulp Fiction and The Shawshank Redemption for Best Picture. What am I actually mad about the era of TV and movies I grew up with? How much time have you got? (How bad, manipulative, and unfair to the viewer was Forrest Gump? If I had seen Kelley's name on the screenplay credit I wouldn't have been surprised at all. It's that bad.)
Look at John Waters. His films aren't great, but they are super low budget, and some of them are memorable. But he made three bad movies in a row, and it killed his career, and now he's not allowed to make any more. And this is for a guy whose movies cost practically nothing to make. Why is Kelley trusted with the high-profile actors and TV budgets he is? It makes no sense.
Whatever the future holds for my writing, whether I finish my unpublishable-seeming comic book or not, and whether or not an online publisher and artist DO bite after seeing how it all comes out, I'm disillusioned. Kelley makes me realize writing is not a meritocracy. I think my story is fantastic, and it doesn't matter because people like Kelley are given repeated chances to fail after supposedly succeeding once or twice. And I know that's true of comic book creators too. Maybe the answer is to marry Michelle Pfeiffer so people can make jokes about that on Emmy night. Because David E Kelley repeatedly falling up despite failing every TV show he's ever created and overseen, and them all crashing and burning creatively tells me the writing game is kind of for suckers. And I don't see the prestige in it anymore. I would like to share my stuff, but Lord, I don't think any profession that repeatedly give David E Kelley work is remotely qualified to judge actual quality. And maybe that's not something I realized until I saw this episode. That revelation is by turns soul-crushing and freeing, depending on how you look at it. My gut reaction to seeing a big-budget Stephen King-based series end THAT incompetently is major disgust. I can't believe things are this bad in Hollywood. But they are.
I suspected this season was going to be bad. But I had no idea just HOW bad. It surprised me. In the worst way. *.
Teen Titan Go! "Pig In A Poke"
A speaking role for the Joker? The old show never would have been allowed to do that.
Beast Boy's Mark Hamill impression is the one that does the trick because the show can probably afford him down the road (although Eric Bauza gets the actual honors this time).
Speaking of which, I don't think that was just a slam on Robin's lame Jared Leto impression. It seemed to be a slam on Leto's interpretation itself. And you know what? Seeing those lines makes me think that was all wrong for the Joker. What's weird is seeing Heath Ledger's lines make me think HE was wrong for the Joker too.
I like the still Joker image at the beginning being from Batman: The Animated Series.
Robin does an Israeli accent for his Wonder Woman. I wonder if that's now how her character is gonna be officially portrayed through all adaptations. It's not as poor of a new sticking-around trend as the Bat-Growl, but it also doesn't strike me as remotely necessary, which is a thing it and the Bat-Growl have in common. It's like DC has randomly decided this is now a part of the character. Which frankly strikes me as a bit weird, especially after like 80 years.
Interesting episode in general. ***1/2.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Cut And Run"
That was nice. People will call it sappy, but I like sappy.
Dirt is awesome. I'll fight anybody who says it isn't.
Good to see Cut again. Wondering what had happened to him.
The Narrator is entirely absent! Looks like last week was a one-off and the show getting The Clone Wars out of its system.
Fun to see an evil R2 Unit. Even funner to see it brutally damaged by Wrecker. That's what Threepio always wanted to do.
I'm liking what I've seen of this show so far. ****.
Myth: A Frozen Tale
Visually dazzling and magnificent animation. It must have been stunning to see in a VR headset.
Interestingly, this uses none of the characters from Frozen, and it being set in Arendelle is implied solely due to the title. Which is something I like. It makes the mythology of the world seem bigger than we imagined whenever we see people in the same setting we don't know.
The story was a little dry but the images were a feast for the eyes. I loved it. ****1/2.
Muppet Babies "It's Not Easy Being Greeny / Dueling Harmonicas"
It's Not Easy Being Greeny:
This was Freddy the Leaf! An episode about death!. Very sensitively handled if you ask me.
I think if the Babies ever went to Miss Nanny straight away, they wouldn't have these problems. But Miss Nanny can't fix this. What she CAN do is explain it in a reassuring and gentle voice. Which is great. Especially since it's Jenny Slate of all people.
Not often this show impresses me. This did. *****.
Dueling Harmonicas:
When it comes right down to it, Fozzie is kind of a heel.
Liked the Muppet Show music cue in the theater.
But that was annoying, especially compared to the first lovely cartoon. **.
Episode Overall: ****.
Marvel Bend & Flex "Western Sunset"
Is that a Taskmaster figure? Mommy, Mommy I want that!
I predicted these shorts would get neater and neater the more waves this toyline has. I was right. ****.
The Barbarian And The Troll "Parent Just Don't Understand"
I love that Evan's mom keeps trying to eat him.
I also love "Troll before tolls".
Biff is NOT gonna work. Ya think?
Evan's dad eats his lute like Cookie Monster.
To be blunt, this was a weak week. But it was still cute. ***1/2.
Transformers: Rescue Bots Academy "Dino-mite Duo"
Do you know what's weird (and frustrating)? For once, the moral of the show in the episode is actually sound: Never attempt a rescue if you have no training or aren't prepared for it. But then the Dinobots here succeed anyways because there is no level on which this specific show is not an utter failure. *.
Transformers: Rescue Bots Academy "The Lonely Titan"
Am I utterly crazy or was that actually kinda sweet? I must be utterly crazy. ****1/2.
Clarice "Add-A-Bead"
I like the last scene but I feel like Grigoryan should have been a part of it. Too bad Kal Penn took the week off.
I like Krendler enjoying the fast food with his son. That was a fun moment especially because his son thinks he's totally lame for it.
Hannibal Lecter is mentioned, but not directly by name. Must be a rights issue.
Solid. ***1/2.
The Blacklist "Nicolas Obenrader"
I'll admit it: The Croissant scene was actually fun.
I agree with Townsend that Liz's phone call with the FBI was NOT incriminating of her being against him in the least. I'm not saying she isn't. I'm saying that specific phone call gave the opposite impression.
Red looks genuinely devastated at the end. I felt bad for him.
Unusually solid episode. ****.
