this tuesday night, as the first snow of the season fell outside my apartment, i sat warm watching the third season finales of two of my favorite picture stories--heroes and dexter. there's that good old saying, "third time's a charm," that is actually not really all that good, and relative to history, not really all that old of a saying...but it is a lot less gay sounding than the british version--"third time lucky."
"third time lucky, smithers?"
"indeed. three card monte."
"splendid."
"third time lucky, indeed. tally ho."
in this case, for these two shawn parow-endorsed picture stories, the third seasons have been slightly flawed at times, subject to doubt, imperfect chapters in the shows' histories. both are already scheduled to return in 2009 for a fourth chapter, with heroes coming back in february with a new chapter,"fugitives," that is technically the second half of the third season for those of you who still care. dexter is already scheduled for at least two more seasons. showtime knows better than to let go of michael c hall...spoilers until the snack break...
heroes season finale
there have been numerous occasions during this 3rd season of heroes where i've wanted to fill my ear canals with fire & splash piranhas toward my eye sockets to avoid the horrendous dialogue & painful exposition that has filled this season. as a complete season, it works fine. i was most pleased by the appearances by actors who used to be on other shows i like, actors like bubbles & marlo stanfield from the wire. both survived the streets of baltimore, but not the third season of heroes...nor did chad faust's character, a marine who, in the second-to-last episode of the third season, becomes the first person injected with the formula for abilities & then is quickly killed in the next & final episode. chad faust was also in the 4400, where he plays a person who injects himself with promicin, the thing on that show that gives people abilities. talk about being typecast.
the third season had its flaws. one of the first things i learned in my intro to screenwriting class was "show, don't tell" and the 3rd season of heroes has so many thousands of storylines going on that there are an abundance of occasions where characters blatantly tell & are all like "gee that must feel really bad to see that happen to your father" so that an ADHD-inflicted fourth grader can follow along with the story...& stupid plot points. elle, the character with the power of electricity is having trouble controlling her power, so what does she do? she gets on a plane. obviously. because there is no chance that that could go wrong...& then there are the abundant lame love stories. overall though, i'm still looking forward to the fourth chapter. i mean, not every pearl jam album is ten. sometimes it's a no code, but you deal with it & pick out the good parts & hope the next one's better.
dexter season finale
early on during the 3rd season of dexter, before things turned around, i was all "you need to start killing bad guys ASAP dexter." things were slow. he was totally not killing any killers. at times i'd secretly hope that rita would turn out to be a child pornographer or have fed elderly folks fatal dosages of meds or something so dexter would have to kill her blatantly one-dimensionally exposition-laden character off, but no such luck. luckily, by the season finale, the killing picked up enough to satisfy me.
& by the season finale, dexter marries rita...& finds out that she is lying to him. she has been married three times, but only says she's been married twice. doesn't talk about the first one, when she was 16. mildly mysterious. he doesn't seem to care though, since he has a secret too, what with the whole being a serial killer thing & she doesn't even know that he used to be gay & work in a funeral home. it's totally like that madonna song. mmm mmm. something's coming over. mmm mmm...so next season, rita will give birth to their kid & there'll likely be whole mess of "new life. taking life." subway ads plugging season 4 of dexter come late summer.
#46 - fin.
snack: pringles select jalapeno ranch potato crisps
drink: archer farms blood orange italian soda
with my finales, i'm enjoying a bag of pringles select jalapeno ranch potato crisps. they don't come in a cardboard cylinder like your everyday peasant pringles. these pringles are S-E-L-E-C-T. i really like them. the texture's crunchier than your average pringle, closer to a tato skin-like texture. the flavor's also stronger than what you get from an average pringle. i found myself licking the flavor powder off, just like i used to do when regular pringles used to have a ton more flavor. in my day! turns out that, according to the back of the bag, these jalapeno ranch potato crisps are designed to "kick my taste buds up a notch." i'm not sure how much more they can be kicked up at this point, if you know what i mean, but i ain't letting that stop me.
to wash down these extraordinary chips, i'm going with a cool glass of archer farms blood orange italian soda. i know what you're thinking, but stop right there. i'm no sicko. it doesn't actually have blood in it, just blood oranges & those are completely legal, at least in italy, which is where this particular soda comes from. italian soda. product of italy. it comes in a bottle that just makes me want to open the window wide & store it in a basket on the sill with a pellegrino & a couple tomatoes. it tastes like if fresca was a little more appealing & also didn't have that disgusting aspartame flavor. this blood orange italian soda has black carrot juice in it. wha? i had no idea such a thing existed, but it does. amazing. black carrots...now that's change you can believe in.