Thursday, February 26, 2009

30 Rock

I watched the first 2 episodes of this show when it first debuted. I didn't care for it.

Recently I watched several episodes via Netflix when I was home sick, and now I'm hooked. The rhythm and wit and strong characters have endeared me to them. I think the show is a great show, and it's just the sort of thing that works better week-to-week rather than in a pilot.

When you write weekly TV, even novelic stuff like this where the characters grow and build and change, the stories leave off each week with the world basically the same, this week's struggle ended with victory or defeat. In a pilot, you create that world for the first time, with your heroine coming to a new town to take her first job since the war and her father dying. Or whatever. The rhythm of creating that world is much different than the rhythm of living in it. And it takes a cast time to create a rapport and awesomeness.

Which is why it's a shame that good shows too often aren't given the time to build to the awesome. So people like me can't come back later in their run and discover them. I wish me, and everyone else, had watched Firefly and given it the ratings to survive. But I didn't even realize it existed until it was dead. At least some good shows, like 30 Rock, survive.

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