The Rook Review

Imagine you wake up in the rain surrounded by bodies all wearing latex gloves with no idea how you got there or even who you are. In your pockets you find a letter that claims it was written by who you were, telling you what to do. This is how The Rook, by Daniel O’Malley begins. What follows is a supernatural thriller and part detective story as Myfanwy Thomas (pronounced Miffany), the heroine of the story, tries to find out who she was (is) and who wants her dead.

The backdrop of The Rook is a secret government agency, called the Checquy, which deals with supernatural disturbances and threats to the United Kingdom.  Along the way we find many super-powered agents, uber-villians and a girl struggling to figure out who she is.

One of the things that really worked about this book was the device used throughout for Myfanwy’s former self to communicate to her via letters. This made info dumps more interesting while still pertaining to the rest of the story. As the book goes on you really begin to feel for former Myfanwy.

The book gets a little far out there at times with some of the strange powers and wild threats floating around the UK that the Checquy have to deal with. Overall, though, it is a fun ride and well worth checking out. The first draft of the sequel was recently completed and if you read The Rook, I am sure you will be waiting for it just like I am. The Rook gets 3.5 Mick Happies. Here is a link to the first four chapters of The Rook (oh and a trailer for the book as well).

Lost Girl Season 2 Review

Lost Girl is an urban fantasy television show created by Michelle Lovretta and airing on Canada's Showcase (and Syfy in the US). It is the story of a Succubus, a Fae that lives off sexual energy, named Bo who grew up not knowing that she was Fae. Bo, played by Anna Silk, learns in Season 1 that there are Light and Dark Fae and that she must choose a side. Instead Bo chooses neither and along with her human best friend, Kenzi played by Ksenia Solo, she becomes a sort of private investigator helping those Fae (and humans) who can't get the help they need from the leaders of the Light and Dark Fae.

Season 2, which is available on demand from Netflix along with Season 1, finds Bo and friends dealing with the effects of the end of the last Season. I won't spoil plot details, but relationships change, new ones form and under it all there are big problems coming for Bo and her friends. Through it all, the show is interesting and doesn't get stale with just a Fae problem of the week rut.

The characters in Lost Girl are smart and witty. The show has two strong female leads in Bo and Kenzi especially with Kenzi being a human who has to rely on her street smarts to keep up in the world of the Fae. They are joined by the Fae cops, Dyson and Hale, who are a wolf-shifter and siren respectively. Add in a human doctor, a bartender who is not all he seems to be and a bunch of light and dark Fae politics and you have the ingredients for an interesting show.

I like that the writers of Lost Girl don't make you wait all season to get to the meat of problems. Issues are encountered and dealt with fairly swiftly in the show with a couple of overarching plot lines moving throughout the season. There are also nice hooks to setup what will be an eventful Season 3. The show also does well with character development from Season 1 through Season 2. Throw in a few steamy sex scenes, some kick-butt action and Kenzi's snappy dialogue and there is something for everyone (including a Fae Tony Stark inventor to spice things up). The writers also don't mind poking fun at the actors themselves such as when they have Bo mention that Dyson, played by Kris Holden-Ried, has hair like Chris Martin from Coldplay (which my wife has said has been distracting her since Season 1 but she was finally able to get past it).

If you like shows like Supernatural (first 3-4 seasons) and Grimm Season 1 then you should check out Lost Girl. We just picked up our Season 3 pass on iTunes. This show is what True Blood should have been. Lost Girl gets 4 Mick Happies. On to Season 3.

Fall 2012 TV Review

My family and I don’t have regular TV in our house. We watch all of our TV online, through Netflix (DVDs or on-demand) or by purchasing the shows through iTunes. Surprisingly, that doesn’t keep us from missing out too much on what comes out each year. We have also found it cheaper to buy Season Passes than to have cable TV for more than a year now. What it does make us do is choose what we want to watch more carefully and not waste our time on crappy shows just because they are on. In this post, I will cover all of the shows we are watching and those that we have stopped.

Go On – This NBC comedy starring Matthew Perry as Ryan King is one of our favorite new shows and about the only comedy we are still watching besides the Big Bang Theory. I have watched a lot of failed Matthew Perry shows since Friends and this one finally seems to get it right. We get a sarcastic and self-centered character for Perry to play. We also get an ensemble cast of likeable weird people who are part of the grief support group that Ryan King joins when dealing with the loss of his wife. There is some out there quirkiness going on in the show, but it is consistently fun and funny. Four Mick Happies.

Elementary – The Sherlock Holmes in New York with a lady Watson show. This new procedural drama has the right mix of smart insight by Holmes (Jonny Lee Miller), banter with Dr. Watson (Lucy Liu) and everything is wrapped up in ~42 minutes. I am a big fan of the BBC Sherlock show and this is not it and is good all on its own. There is definitely room in my viewing world for both. Besides, Elementary’s Holmes seems way more edgy and at risk of drug relapse (and associated problems) than the BBC version Holmes. If you want to buy it like we do, iTunes has the Season Pass in SD for only $24.99 (about a dollar an episode). Also Four Mick Happies.

Malibu Country – Reba McEntire’s new comedy about a recently divorced woman making it on her own with her kids. We gave this one two episodes and stopped in the middle of the second. It isn’t as good and the cast isn’t as interesting as her former Reba show. Lily Tomlin is good as her mother, but that isn’t enough to carry any show or we wouldn’t be waiting for The New Normal to come out on DVD (Ellen Barkin ruled that show in the pilot). Malibu Country gets two Mick Happies.

Suburgatory – This little comedic look at up-scale suburban living us by surprise last year and we really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, the delay between seasons has left us feeling that the best was behind for this show. The jokes seem the same, the characters also seem the same, but it just wasn’t as funny this time around in the first two episodes we watched. Don’t think we will be giving Suburgatory a full season pick up in our house. Two to three Mick Happies.

Revolution – The post-apocalyptic show from Eric Kripke on NBC. The show is set in a future where all forms of electricity have stopped and looks at how things might be eleven years after that event. Some of this show really scratches my dystopian future genre itch and the writers are trying to have reason behind how it happened and (if) it can be fixed, but the stories and situations are pretty far fetched. I have been watching this online from NBC.com and will probably keep watching though I find I have to really work up to finding the 45 minutes to tune in. At best three Mick Happies.

Big Bang Theory – The king of all comedies right now. We have all of the seasons on DVD or in iTunes and have been watching this one as a family. It is too bad that this season seems to be going downhill for us. We are not as amused by the typical jokes. My wife and I discussed it and where the show is losing us is:

·      Leonard and Penny – these two need to break up.

·      Penny – she needs something other than drinking and back and forth relationship with Leonard.

·      Howard – needs to grow up a bit. C’mon, man, you’re married to Bernadette (one of the more interesting characters on the show).

One of the few bright points, besides Sheldon (as always), has been the budding “bromance” between Stuart and Raj. The other is Alex, Sheldon’s new assistant. More of that, less of the 3 bullets above please. We are still watching, but just less amused. Three Mick Happies.

Grimm – This is one of our favorite shows right now. It is based on the premise that all of the Fairy Tales creatures are real and hiding amongst us. The Grimm are people who are descended from the Brothers Grimm who can see the creatures for what the really are and have traditionally hunted them. Grimm is a procedural cop show with a supernatural element and season one was good and season two (this year) is as well. We are about eight episodes in (out of 12 aired to date) and liking it. The only nit to pick here is the storyline about Juliette’s memory – if you are watching you know how annoying it is. This show has supplanted Supernatural as our supernatural weekly fix – Four Mick Happies.

Other mentions of shows we liked but aren’t watching this year:

Supernatural – The wife has seen everything up to the end of last season and I have watched most of them as well. The end of last season was a let down with where the characters ended up. Felt too much like that time when Dean went to Hell and Sam was left on Earth. Maybe we will catch this season when it hits Netflix next fall. Certainly didn’t seem worth us paying to see the week they air – we can wait if we watch at all.

Raising Hope – We have been big fans of Raising Hope since it started, but gave up after last season when they killed the pig (the new version of Jump the Shark) and brought back Hope’s mom. Haven’t watched and probably won’t until a far future date when it is the only thing available on Netflix on demand.