A Love Letter to FNL

Well, at last we've come to the end. Tonight is the season finale of Friday Night Lights.

I've pimped Friday Night Lights on this blog before. And since I first saw that pilot and fell hopelessly in love, this show has never let me down. In 21 episodes, I honestly have not been disappointed once. It is truly quite possibly the best TV program I've ever invested in.

However, FNL is what network programmers call "on the bubble". Critics love it - it just won a Peabody Award - and rave reviews in newspapers and other media sources still glow about it even as the season is winding to a close. Fans of the show are devoted, vocal, heck, might even be called rabid. Since I'm one of those fans, I don't take offense. However, FNL cannot manage to garner the most important ingredient that will ensure it a second season next fall: ratings. What its fans have in quality they cannot manage to offer in quantity.

Apparently, most viewers are not watching this amazing show because:

1. They think it's only about football.
Yes, football does provide the framework on which the story hangs. The characters are all in some way either directly or indirectly involved with the Dillon Panthers football team. But to avoid this show because you expect to watch an hour of intensive on-field action only comprehensible to ESPN groupies is as ridiculous as refusing to watch Grey's Anatomy because it's going to be an hour of nothing but gory surgeries, doctors droning on about patient symptoms, and watching nurses take temperatures. Every single drama on television is based on some high concept idea: police procedural, medical drama, family saga, court room antics. In the end, it's the characters behind the scenes that fascinate us and keep us coming back for more. Otherwise, we'd just tune in to Monday Night Football and get our fix clean and easy.

If that doesn't convince you, know that I do not like football. I barely know the difference between a quarterback and a cornerback. I wouldn't have lasted two episodes if this show was only about football.

2. It's about football in Texas.
I've never been to Texas. I have the stereotypical ideas that all men in Texas wear cowboy boots and Stetsons, eat steaks the size of hubcaps, and slap all their good 'ol boys on the back while they enjoy thick cigars and cases of Longhorn beer. All Texas women, of course, have very big hair and say "y'all" all the time and spend all their time reminiscing about their glory days as varsity cheerleaders. Right? Okay, not so much.

Anyway, yes, fictional Dillon is set in Texas. But the only reason that matters is because the culture in that particular area of the country so intensely loves and supports their high school football teams. This show could have just as easily been set in a small town in Indiana that obsesses over every dribble and shot its varsity basketball team makes. Or in a small Minnesota town where the people poor over their local high school hockey team's stats like they are looking for a winning lottery number. It's not the place that matters. People are people.

3. It's on at the same time as American Idol.
You know, I just don't have a good answer for this one that won't insult, like, pretty much everyone in America. Suffice it to say, anyone who ever - EVER - complains about the poor quality of television today yet tunes in to AI instead of FNL every week deserves an eternity spent in a hell full of bitter rejectees from AI tryouts and a battalion of Simons to criticize their every move.

4. They hate shows with twenty-something actors trying to pull off being high school kids.
If a show can't manage to absorb you into its story so well that all you can think about while watching it is that 16-year old guys generally don't have five-o'clock shadow before the final bell rings, then yes, you have a right to be cynical. Thankfully, the actors in FNL are so utterly amazing that all you can think about as you watch them is how much you are glad you aren't still in high school/how much you wish you were back in high school/how inappropriate it is that you are having those thoughts about a kid who is young enough to...be someone you once babysat for.

5. They hate high-school teeny-bopper soap dramas.
Yeah, so do I. And to be honest, these kids do have their fair share of angst. But at least it's real angst. Take little Matt Saracen, for example (played by the utterly amazing Zach Gilford). Matt had to step up to take the place of superstar quarterback Jason Street when Jason was injured during the first game of the season. He's now got the entire weight of a town's worth of expectations on his sophomore shoulders. Plus, he lives alone with a grandmother who suffers from dementia, holds down a part time job not for beer and gas money but to pay the rent, and tries to raise himself because his mother is MIA and his father is off fighting the war in Iraq. So when the coach's daughter Julie finally agrees to go out with him, your heart soars for Matt's triumph.

You like these people. You know them. You feel bad for them when they hurt not because you've been manipulated but because you can relate to them. Every single emotion in this show - from laugh-out-loud moments to sobbing despair - is earned. Nothing is gratuitous. Nothing is done the easy way.

I personally didn't know a single kid like the ones portrayed in Beverly Hills, 90210 or Dawson's Creek. And I didn't watch either of those two shows because of that fact. Somehow I just couldn't get worked up when Tiffany-Brenda-Amber-Kelly couldn't find a way out of her tw0-dates-for-the-prom but neither one of them dreamboat Dylan-Brandon-Jeremy-Ethan problem. But my high school came fully equipped with a Matt Saracen and a Julie Taylor and a Jason Street. Sadly, we were missing a Tim Riggins.

6. The camera is all shaky and stuff.
FNL is filmed using only hand-held cameras. It's got this up-close, documentary style that makes you feel like you are sitting in the room with these people. Cuts and close-ups are not traditional. It takes some getting used to, but before you know it, you are so absorbed in the story you forget all about cameras. Too, they calmed things down significantly from the Pilot. I tend to get sick if I find the camera movement to be too jittery (I hate those 360 degree spinning shots you find on so many ensemble shows these days - I get nauseated). If this is what keeps you from watching, well, whatever. I'm sure American Idol sticks with nice, quiet camera work.

7. They haven't been watching since Episode 1, so they won't know who's who or what's going on.
To this, I have to actually kind of agree and disagree. Disagree because the show and its premise are not that complicated that you can't easily figure out who is who or what, generally, is happening. You don't need to tune in next week to find out who the father of So and So's baby really is, nor are there any Big Secrets that only those of us True Fans From The Beginning are privy to. In fact, I would wager one episode is all that it would take for a person to get well and truly hooked because each episode is so well crafted that all characters are covered in some way.

However, this show builds on the past episodes. Not so much because the plots and relationships are tangled and complicated. More, with each week, we learn more about each character that deepens our reactions to what happens to them next. If you would have asked me during the Pilot if I would have ever shed a single tear for bad-girl sex-kitten Tyra Collette (played by Adrianne Palicki, stellar!), I would have scoffed. And I would have been wrong, oh so wrong. I've gotten to know her over twenty-one episodes, and that makes all the difference.

But...there is a solution to this problem. NBC has all episodes on its website, free for the watching. iTunes has all episodes available to download for a teeny, tiny fee. Bravo keeps running FNL marathons, although they don't always start with the Pilot and work through all 21 episodes. There are ways to start at the beginning.

I've heard rumors there will be a DVD. I became an avid Firefly fan long after the series had ended when I picked up the DVD and was blown away by the show. Too bad I was too late to help save it...

8. They have clearly never seen the genius that is Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton.
This show is worthy of a second season based on the chemistry between married-on-tv couple Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton alone. They play Coach Eric Taylor and his long-suffering wife, Tami, to sheer perfection. They squabble like real married people. They show affection like real married people. They have the same kinds of problems and arguments and solutions as real married people. But because they are more beautiful and far less boring than real married people, they are a joy to behold. We can all only wish that we had it that good.

And I defy anyone to watch Connie Britton's performance in the episode "I Think We Should Have Sex" and deny her right to an Emmy nomination. It's inconceivable.

Anyway, I'm most likely preaching to the choir by this point, because if you've read through all of this, you are probably already a fan. I've done my best to let NBC know how much I appreciate its support of this amazing show and how much I'm hoping that it will ignore the dollars and cents part of the equation and bring FNL back for a second season. Gems like this don't come around very often. We won't know until mid-May or so if NBC will take the high road (although news has come out that it has ordered six new scripts - a good sign).

Meanwhile, I'll send a love letter to all of those involved in this perfect season. To the actors who become real people that I care about every week due to their amazing talents. To the writers for never taking the cliched or easy way out and moving me to tears on multiple occasions. To the creators and directors for giving us something different and worthwhile to watch every week. To the producers and programmers who keep giving it a chance even when the ratings don't live up to their expectations, especially when they could offer up more of the same reality drivel so many others rely on. To the critics who keeping giving FNL such great press, which surely has to go far to convince TPTB that they have a winner on their hands.

To anyone who's had anything to do with this show, thanks. Really.

It's been an amazing season. Go Panthers!

Number of Days Absent: Too Many

I don't presume to have a big readership that is disappointed at my lack of posting over the past months. However, I know how I feel when I show up at a blog I enjoy reading only to find the blogger has disappeared without a trace. Disappointed.

So, to explain. I started this blog with the intention that I would use it as a writing exercise, a way to ensure that come Hell or high water, I would at least write something every day. And in the beginning, this was fairly easy to do. I seemed to have a lot to blab about. Plus, the whole blogosphere was a new playground for me. I'd spend hours above and beyond the time I spent blogging just cruising from blog to blog. Yes, hours.

Now, two years and some months later, I'm finding that I don't have so much to say. Since I'm not a published writer, my commentary on writing seems kind of...well, premature might be the best word for it. Sure, I can share my own experiences. But to be honest, I don't personally enjoy blogs wherein the blogger is just offering me a daily snapshot of where he or she stands in the writing/revisions/editing process. Reading that Writer X finished her 4,500 word quota for the day and is 50% through her editor's revisions for her latest opus kind of depresses me. I'm sure as heck not going to do that here, just for lack of anything better.

Instead, I'm cutting back. I've already cut back on my blog hopping. I just couldn't afford the time suck of it. I wish that I were one of those amazingly disciplined folks, gals who get up at 5 a.m., spend exactly 1/2 hour on e-mail and internet stuff, then buckle down to work, taking a 45 minute break at precisely 12:32 to eat lunch and answer more e-mail, then back to writing. I'm too much of a slacker. My schedule ends up looking something more like, sit down to write but decide to check e-mail first. Then hop on over to televisionwithoutpity.com to see if the recap of my favorite show is up, instead cruise the message boards for an hour, jump over to see if AAR has any new reviews I might be interested in, rinse and repeat until all of the sudden, it's 3:00 and the kiddies are walking in the door from school. Day wasted as far as writing goes. I console myself by saying that I do my best work after it's dark anyway, but dang, wouldn't you know that by 9:00 I'm feeling the urge more to watch a movie than write. And then it's time for a bit of reading before bedtime...

Are you getting the picture?

Anyway, I've cut back on blog hopping and internet cruising, and it's like breaking a bad habit. I find that after I've gone awhile without it, I don't really mind. I don't miss it too much. In fact, I feel kind of liberated.

Except for this blog. Which always kind of nags the guilty corner of my mind. So I'm saying here and now that I'm cutting back. I might not post every other day or every week. I might only show up every other week, when I actually have something of value to say. That makes more sense to me than to try to think up a page of blather just so I can say I posted something daily. I'd rather spend that energy working on my writing.

You know, trying to gain some of that discipline stuff I so clearly lack.

My Suit's at the Cleaners

I just finished reading J.R. Ward's Lover Revealed. It was good. Very good. I'm not going to review it right now, though. Except, it got me to thinking about men in suits.

See, Ward tends to dress some of her characters in a lot of high-end clothing brands which she name drops ad nauseum. As much as I love the Black Dagger Brotherhood series, this is the one nitpick that pulls me out of the story, full stop, and I'm kind of wishing she'd knock it off. We get the point. Butch and Phury are snappy dressers. Got. It.

But the thing is, I'm not so sure how I feel about a man in a suit. Maybe it's the backlash of the metrosexual fad, in which men spent entirely too much time contemplating the merits of various hair products and not enough time taking out the garbage. Or maybe it's the fact that business casual started to take serious root just as I was entering the work force and anyone showing up in the office in a suit was suspected of job interviewing. But for some reason, I just don't find men in well tailored suits to be the epitome of The Sexy.

Sure, I can dig a great tuxedo on a totally hot guy any day.


*swoon*

But for the most part, I like my men clad casually. Give me a pair of faded Levi's and a white tee shirt and I'm good to go.


(Besides, I'm pretty sure that Daniel Craig would look amazing in a clown suit, thus my theory that it is 100% the man inside the suit and not the suit itself that pulls off the look.)

Maybe it's just my rube-ishness at work. See, I wouldn't know an RL Black Label from a JC Penney special unless someone was standing next to me and pointed out the differences. Therefore, I don't get that tingle that must come in knowing that one man's suit cost $5,000 while another's only $249.99, thus missing the whole power-as-desirable-trait aspect. Yes, I can appreciate when a suit is well-tailored and fits a man nicely. But I think most men look uncomfortable in suits, and people in discomfort are very rarely sexy. I suppose I need to head downtown more often and hang out at the Chicago Board of Trade where the men wear suits like underwear.

My husband wears a suit whenever he has to go to visit a client. He looks nice enough, but I think he looks just as good or better in his jeans and hockey jersey. He certainly feels better in the latter.

I won't go into the disaster that the wrong tie can wreak on the well-suited man. Are ties ever sexy?

Mental Accents

I once created a character from Australia, and I had an utter blast writing him. In my head, I could hear his voice as clear as day. I could imagine him saying all sorts of things, and coloring his speech with Australian slang was so easy to do. To this day, he's one of my favorite characters.

Now, I'm working on a character - a boy - who grew up in England. And for the life of me, I cannot hear his voice with an accent. I can't imagine how he sounds, or in what ways he's unique among the other characters he's sharing the stage with. I really - really - want him to have an accent. I want British slang to roll off his tongue. This is key to who he is and to his story, because this is a story about feeling apart from things, and his very language serves to distance him from his peers. Too, when I write from his point of view, I want to use this as a way to give him a distinct voice.

So why is this that I can't hear him when my man from down under came so easily? I suppose I could invest a few days in Dr. Who, hoping that I pick up the eb and flow of their speech. Or just hang out on the BBC America channel and hope some of it wears off. Maybe check out some books-on-tape narrated by British actors, play them in my sleep and it will just kind of leech into my subconscious and come out in my character's voice.

This is driving me mad.

Random Nothings

A few random musings to get me back in the swing of blogging after a two-week break.

Book pimping: If you haven't read it yet, check out Lynn Truss's Talk to the Hand. Not only is this book hilarious and extremely well written, Truss's observations about the almost epidemic levels of complete self-absorption mankind has slipped into are so spot on I spend most of my time nodding as I read. Anyone who has ever wanted to reach over to the person talking on their cell while simultaneously checking out at the grocery store, pluck the thing out of her hand and beat her senseless with it will appreciate this book endlessly.

Sympathy: Last night I watched Troy on DVD, and my one lingering thought is how utterly bad I feel for Jennifer Aniston. Because no matter how much times passes, she'll never escape the cinematic reminders of the bod that once slept next to her. Sure, Brad Pitt might have been a cad who cheated on her, might have left dirty socks laying all over the floor or the toilet seat up at night, heck might even have had B.O. or halitosis. But all that is a piffle if this is how you spend your nights, right? Jen is gorgeous and she'll find a good man yet, no doubt. But dang, that's got to be tough. I wonder if she actively avoids his movies? I suppose her best hope is that he won't age well, and she'll be glad she had him during his glory years.

Computer problems: I'm still working on making the switch from Mac to PC. You wouldn't think it would be a big deal, but right now I'm tearing my hair out because Firefox is giving me grief. I can't seem to close the application. How is that possible, that you can't close an application? Does anyone else have Firefox problems on a Mac? I did, however, discover where the "forced quit" function lies on my machine.

Music: I'm a woman nearly of a certain age, so I'm certainly too old to be as intrigued as I am by the alternative rock group 30 Seconds to Mars. I was up late the other night, with one of those lame countdown shows on MTV as background noise. The show ended and the late night video plays kicked in. First up was this mind-blowing video by 30STM for their song, From Yesterday. I was completely captivated, and I have no idea why. Could be Jared Leto's eyes. You know, you read eyes described in books - especially in romance novels - that simply defy the possibility of physical reality because they are so blue or so light or so intense. Most people have blue-ish eyes, with a lot of green or gray or other stuff in them. Or the intensity is fleeting at best, because no one can maintain a constantly intense look without getting a migraine. So you chalk such fancy up to creative license on the part of the writer. Then you see someone like Jared Leto and begin to believe.

Great in theory, poor in execution: Rented and watched The Covenant, despite the fact the movie got a grand total of 3% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. The premise is stellar - four boys who inherit magical powers via their warlock ancestors. The execution was weak. The director mistook dim lighting for darkness as a theme, making things just too hard to see rather than scary or intense. I'm wishing now someone would do the idea justice. Because, oh, the pretty boys.

Yes, as a matter of fact I am feeling kind of perverted today.

Mind the Gap - The Sequel

Tomorrow night, Lost finally returns with new episodes. This after it aired six epis, then took a three-month hiatus leaving us viewers high and dry. To say I was annoyed when TPTB began Lost's long break with some supremely intense moments is an understatement. Back in November, I wasn't sure how I could stand to wait until February to get my resolution.

Funny thing is, though, I'd almost forgotten all about it until I caught a couple of teasers on ABC that reminded me that Lost had been gone for a long while. Which leads me to ask, how long of a gap can be sustained and still keep viewers/readers/fans interested?

Quite possibly the worst wait I've ever had to endure - although by far not the longest - was the gap between the season 1 cliff hanger of Queer As Folk and the season 2 premier. The six months or so between June 24, 2001 and January 6, 2002 were pure torture because the fate of two of my favorite characters was held in the balance. I scrambled for every scrap of spoiler I could find, trying to feed my addiction to this show.

I've held my breath over other season breaks; several The West Wing seasons, one Smallville season, at least two other Queer As Folks. But these waits are cake walks compared to what I endure between releases of highly anticipated movies and books, where we are talking years rather than months between installments.

Oddly enough, it's the internet that has caused me more angst than I experienced in the past as far as waiting is concerned. Before I could research, I never knew when something was coming up. By the time an event was announced, the space of time I had to endure was usually fairly small. But now I know things year(s) in advance and have to tick off every bloody second.

For example, I had no idea that there would be a gap of almost three years between Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I read Book 4 and then patiently waited for Book 5, never thinking to haunt the internet to find out when it might arrive. Now I'm tempted to download the countdown widget so I know to the second how long I have to wait for Book 6.

Same thing with books by favorite writers. I know to the day when J.R. Ward's next BDB book will hit the shelves, and the one after that for that matter. I know the next title in Suzanne Brockmann's Troubleshooters series will be around by end of the summer. And I'm anxiously awaiting May 1st when I can get my hands on Lynn Viehl's Night Lost. I've already mentioned that little event coming this July which I've already put on the calendar...

Plus, movies. My anticipation starts in January, when I check out all the must-see movies coming for the summer. This year I don't know which has me most excited: Spider-Man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean 3, or Harry Potter 5. I'm already lining up babysitters and I still have three months left!

In researching the last three links, I see Harry Potter 6 is slated for release some time in 2008, which I'm going to guess means around Thanksgiving or so based on previous releases. And, yes, I'm already excited!

I feel like I spend too much of my life waiting in expectation. Nothing beats the thrill of having something I've anticipated for so long finally in my grasp. And nothing - nothing! - is more of a let down than when I've finished it and realize I now have to start the waiting clock ticking all over again.

I guess this answers my question. If you do it right, no wait is too long to keep true fans interested.

Yes! About Time

Amen!

and Alleluia!!

Except, I will be on vacation that week. In Sandusky, Ohio, at Cedar Point. Cool thing is that I will be with my nieces and nephews of a particular age that they might just be as excited as I am. I'm going to plan a Friday night expedition to the nearest bookstore party.

I. Can't. Wait!!!