J. Hamlet's Blog: Scarred Earth: A Serial Novel, page 8

Falling for The Fall (Netflix Binge)

Like a fine wine, she is. 

It doesn't take much to get me to watch a police procedural with Gillian Anderson in it. A certain amount of success is already baked into that cake. But, of course, it's by the Beeb. At a certain point, I just wonder how many victory laps the British are going to do around America to rub in their policy procedural superiority. We get it! But please don't stop. PLEASE DON'T STOP.

First and most importantly, The Fall  is a five episode case study in how realism and moodiness need not get in the way of white-knuckled terror. For all its mumbly talk of departmental politics and Stella Gibson's (Anderson) witty and brutal takedowns of her colleagues apparent and subtle sexism, The Fall packs some sequences that will leave you holding your breath and jacked on adrenaline in a way that most horror movies don't and can't. It is precisely this contrast, doldrums and lulls followed by lightning urgency that make the grisly and creepy scenes so jarringly effective. 

Anderson's character Gibson might start out looking like the misanthropic procedural type we've all come to know and expect (and are usually reserved for male types a la Luther), but she gives the character both a weariness and an aggression that makes it all her own. Dropped into the dysfunctional and leaky Belfast police that makes the Baltimore police in The Wire look like paragons of competence, Gibson is initially doing an Internal Affairs style look at a previous murder. When she quickly realizes it may be connected, a suggestion initially shrugged off by her superiors, the murderer strikes again. Gibson is quickly vindicated and takes over the investigation, hunting a serial killer played by Jamie Dornan. 

Paul Spector (Dornan)'s methods aren't anything particularly flashy. There's none of the gruesome stuff with dismemberment, cannibalism, and the like we've become used to from shows like Hannibal  and Dexter . Instead, his need to stage, clean, and manicure the single women who are his victims occupy a much more chilling and nauseating space. Spector hides in plain sight, of course, as a family man. This is another trope we've gotten used to in stories about serial killers, but Spector is much more unsettling considering that he hides his macabre journals in the ceiling of his young daughter's room. She has nightmares, of course. Who wouldn't? As Gibson closes in on Spector, who is constantly on the search for new victims, the tension ratchets up to nearly unbearable levels. The Fall 's first series ends in a cliffhanger that upset plenty of people when it aired, but is more than justified by the show's attempt to replicate the realistic pace of a police investigation. 

I shouldn't short-change the rest of The Fall's ensemble, though. Niamh McGrady (a haunted beat cop who fails one of the killer's victim's), Sarah Beattie (Olivia Spector, Paul's suspicious wife), John Lynch (Gibson's boss), and Michael McElhatton (a corrupt cop caught by the murder investigation of another corrupt caught) all bring a lot of life and emotion to their parts as well. The Fall  contains all sorts of side-stories that I would normally be upset about in such a limited series like this, but it does a lot of solid world-building about the complex web of interactions in Belfast in the way that shows like The Bridge on FX have been trying to do lately. They feel less like distraction than echoes and contrasts to the main plot. 

Needless to say, if you like police procedurals and/or Gillian Anderson, you'd really be missing out not to see this. It's only five episodes, too, so no excuses!  

Just When You Lose Faith In Humanity, This

I used to really not like Jimmy Fallon. I am finding that deeply hard nowadays. He is doing his damnedest to melt all of our cold hearts.  

Things Fall Apart, Especially Dexter

Once upon a time, I really enjoyed Dexter. I thought it was a bold show. It took normal TV tropes and turn them on their heads. I mean, a serial killer of serial klllers! (Serial serial killer killer?) Eventually successfully created its own series of tropes that became just as tired, but it broke some new and exciting ground on the way. 

Then it ended. The way it ended was really unfortunate. No, scratch that, a disaster. No, scratch that. DEXTER SHIT THE BED with that last episode, and even moreso considering that it simultaneously didn't rescue itself from the downward spiral of this mess that was season 8 and in a weird way reputed the overall plot arc of the season in a way that made it nearly irrelevant. I haven't seen TV writing this bad since Heroes. SO SPOILERS ABOUND BELOW.

First, I actually enjoyed many seasons of Dexter that sane people hated. Dexter delivered three stellar seasons (1, 2, 4), two mediocre seasons (3, 7), one season apparently only I thought was tolerable (5), and two truly horrific ones (6, and 8). It also proved beyond a reasonable doubt that attempting to cast Colin Hanks as a threatening and villainous serial killer for anything other than comic effect is not the most egregious sin a show can make. Let's break it down.

We've Been Here Before 

Season 8 decided (apparently) that one of its central question would be about whether a serial killer can have a real life. We already did that in THE BEST season of Dexter (ahem, John fucking Lithgow), and answered emphatically "no." Maybe they would do it this time but come to a different answer for different reasons? 

We know the answer to that now. Just like Season 4 was all about proving that Dexter was toxic to everyone around him and got Rita killed, the same thing happens again! Yes, there are subtle differences. The plot is nonsensical, the villain toothless, and the character motivations a tornado of idiocy. So there's that. Either way,  after literally building an entire season suggesting that Dexter might actually live a normal life and conquer his addiction, the show 180s and the rug is pulled out from under him in the most abrupt and jarring way possible. What does he decide to do? Walk away and give up on everything. Like we all should have with this show long ago. 

 Mommy?

 Dr. Vogel offered a compelling new point of departure this season. A surrogate mother and hidden element of Dexter's backstory that puts him in a new light. She helped Harry construct the code and believes psychopaths like Dexter are the next stage in human evolution or some such. She helps Dexter see himself in a new light. She convinces Dexter to help teach others the code, even convincing Deb to go along with her plans. This all seems like it might be going somewhere interesting, with this woman building an entire micro-society of killers with her as some sort of surrogate mother. This could go all sorts of fun places, especially if Vogel began bending Dexter and his new protege to sinister purposes. Would Vogel be the villain? Would Dexter in the end realize he'd been manipulated and have to off her, confronting the fact that the root of his entire code was evil? It has all the makings of a fascinating exploration of Dexter's psyche and roots. 

Of course we can't have that, though. This is Dexter! Instead the Brain Surgeon who's been stalking Vogel turns out to be her son. As soon as this becomes obvious, Vogel's character flips. You see, she has a blind spot for her son. A once compelling and coldly rational character turns into pure sentimentality out of the blue, changes her entire personality, and is killed by one of the blandest antagonists Dexter has ever faced. At least Colin Hanks spouted religious nonsense and hallucinated Admiral Adama. He had that going for him. This guy just had mommy issues. 

Deb 

Oh, Deb. This is the part that makes me saddest. Not because I'm sad about the fact that she would die. That was telegraphed a million miles away. Getting her life together? Getting back together with Quinn? This is Deb we're talking about. She's not allowed to have nice things. 

Deb's death is nonsensical, a ploy to get an emotional response from the audience and a chance to provoke some last-minute change of heart from Dexter himself that itself is senseless. She risks everything to give Dexter an opportunity to have the getaway and the family he wants in Argentina. But what does Dexter do after this sacrifice? He walks away. Again, like we all should have ages ago with this show. 

Deb sets her own destruction in motion when she unwittingly summons that U.S. Marshal to pursue Hannah, the same Marshal who lets Blandy McBlanderson the Brain Surgeon out of his restraints.  I don't get what the writers were trying to stay there. Don't do what Dexter wants and you get killed? Get close to Dexter and you get killed? Everyone dies? Nevermind, The only thing they end up saying is that they don't know what to do with Deb as a character.  

Deb was the best character on the show. Many times, a better character than Dexter himself. Her weird and dramatically inert death isn't climactic or emotionally affecting the way it should be. It's inept.  

Enough 180s and You End Up Back Where You Were 

So in the end, all of the efforts Dexter took over the entirety of Season 8, to get away, to leave his Dark Passenger behind, he suddenly abandons in one moment. Dexter rides off into the hurricane. Oh, except when he resurfaces as a lumberjack. I don't even want to ask what the fuck that was about, because in the end I don't even want to know. 

Congratulations, Dexter. Just like Dexter himself pretended to be a normal person for so long while murdering people for so long, you pretended to be a real television show. One that murdered hours and hours of our lives we'll never have back.  

 

 

In Praise and Horror of You Kids and Your "Super Selfies"

I don't know whether to be terrified or amazed by this man. I don't know whether he's a genius or trolling us. Quite possibly both. Either way, I am changed forever. 

#superselfiesaturday

#superselfiesaturday

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Warning: Sudden Bouncy Castles

They're everywhere!

Nick Offerman, Jon Hamm, AND Werner Herzog on Doug Loves Movies

I will joy-scream my way to an aneurysm now.  Really. 

I Can Hook You Up with Some Hootie and the Blowfish . . .

REMINDER: Key and Peele is back tonight, everyone. Never forget. 

 

What Adults Look Like

How adults handle disagreements, act honest, and still manage to bring the funny. Good discussion about roasts in general, aging, and where Sarah Silverman feels she's at right now. It's interesting that she manages to be both thick and thin-skinned at the same time, and real with herself about that contradiction. 

Speakeasy: PFT and Mike Ehrmantraut

This combines two things I love: Mike (Jonathan Banks from Breaking Bad) and Paul F. Tompkins. Also, I had no idea Jonathan Banks grew up in the DC area. Weird! Also, when is someone going to give Paul F. Tompkins a talk show? I mean, you know, another talk show. Since that whole Best Week Ever thing didn't end so well.  

Edge of the Solar System

Voyager has broken through, and this is what it recorded. Eerie. 

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