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Featured, Podcast

TV eh B Cs podcast 13 – Tim Southam is Omnidirectional

TimSoutham

Tim Southam has directed dramas, comedies and documentaries exploring life on the land, life in politics and life in the arts. He has also worked as a director on several of the world’s most-watched series.

His films include The Bay of Love and Sorrows, Drowning in Dreams, Trudeau: Maverick in the Making, The Tale of Teeka, Perreault Dancer, Satie and Suzanne and One Dead Indian. Recent series include Bates Motel, Bones and House.

He is developing his third feature, Hey 45 with writer Morwyn Brebner and producer Anna Stratton.

In addition to regular successes with audiences and critics, awards for his work include three best directing Geminis, two best program Geminis and nominations for the Genie, Jutra and Grammy.

Listen or download below, or subscribe via iTunes or any other podcast catcher with the TV, eh? podcast feed.

Want to become a Patron of the Podcast? We’ve got a Patreon page where you can donate a small amount per podcast and get a sneak peek of each release.

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Featured, Helix

Review: A Helix of legacies

I doubt “Densho,” the title of this week’s Helix, was referring only to Hatake passing on his legacy via the katana to Julia. As Sarah lay bleeding and gasping about her baby and Peter and Alan continued to feel the aftershocks of their troubled childhood, that Julia’s last resort when confronted with her imminent death was to sing Hatake’s song was just the final scene of an episode that really delved into what it meant to pass something on to the next generation.

And while Hatake’s dreamy break with reality got played up more for the twisted humour of the show—through an amazing, revert-to-childhood fishing trip—it also showed how Hatake was still trying to sort out his ties to his children: one of his flesh, as the series put it, and the one he’d raised and who died for a sister he didn’t even like. Considering everything about Hatake in Season 1 revolved around revealing himself to Julia and making her immortal, it’s fitting that his final preoccupation was whether or not what he’d passed on was actually as lucky as he thought it was. And that despite this—and the troubled times the father and daughter alluded to while sparring in the woods—Hatake’s last breaths were spent getting himself back to the table so he, Jane and Daniel could be together forever.

That same paternal discord could be felt between Peter and Alan as they struggled to work together despite years of mistrust. Except this time around, Alan’s only playing the trusting brother to Peter’s lies, knowing full well that it wasn’t a random blow to the head that brought him to that field. Although I doubt even this new, killer Alan could have expected Balleseros to be the person on the other end of that phone exchange.

As Hatake weighed his legacy—and then passed it onto Julia—it doesn’t entirely feel like a coincidence that Balleseros is involved with the island too. It’s another community where parental ties are dissolved at a young age and smacks of Hatake’s own kidnappings. Is Balleseros still on the hunt for Anana’s orphans, or is he back in Ilaria’s pocket? Either way, he’s looking less like the organization’s Doberman and more like a man in charge—though who between he and Peter is the least trustworthy one is still a hard call. But for all the answers that were dished out tonight, the pull the island has for immortals remains a mystery.

One thing that is starting to come together are Michael’s “girls,” as mother, daughter and grandmother faced a grilling over Soren’s fate. Michael seems to be just as in the dark as the CDC when it comes to the generations of women who have clearly been involved in protecting him and the island. If nothing else, it dropped a couple of hints about what Michael’s actual secret might be—and I don’t think it’s the one Kyle was alluding to when the doting cult leader stopped by to check on his bruises.

Still, whatever legacy the women are passing on, it’s growing more corrupt with each generation as Amy took matters into her own hands last week, leaving Anne and Agnes to try to reign her in this week. Despite appearances, Anne seems to be weakest of the three—making me slightly nervous about Michael’s habit of resting his hands tightly around her throat. But while she’s still trying to maintain the isolation of their colony in a way that’s putting her at odds with Michael, I suspect she just might be the only one in that family that’s still playing by the same rules he is. Whatever Amy is trying to accomplish with Landry’s help seems darker than anything her mother could dream of cooking up.

For a man who clearly can’t handle losing a smidge of power, Michael seems oblivious to the fact that he’s already lost control of the situation. And I’ve got a feeling that while Michael and the CDC play their little games with each other the real danger was standing right beneath him in that hall, awaiting her own legacy.

Other goo-dness:

  • Between Michael’s comments about grafting and humans and Mischa’s remark about her pregnancy, does anyone else suspect the cult of practicing eugenics?
  • Do Sarah and Kyle know Peter has a working phone? Because when your vectors go murder-y on each other being able to call for backup might be a good option to have.
  • The fact that Jordan Hayes is only listed as a guest star might make it a bit of a giveaway, but Sarah’s behaviour this season has me thinking she’s not going to immortal her way out of this one.
  • Again, that fishing montage was the series’ sick humour at its best. They need to find a way to keep Meegwun Fairbrother around again (like putting Tulok with Balleseros).

Helix airs Mondays at 10 p.m. ET on Showcase.

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19-2, Featured

Review: Brawls, paintball and break-ups on 19-2

I honestly hope that’s not the last we see of Vince. By the end of “Tribes,” 19’s rookie cop was packing up his things, transferred out of the neighbourhood because the gal he’d had sex with in the bathroom filed a complaint when he started ignoring her. I may not have agreed with what he did, but Vince’s fresh-faced approach—and great repartee with J.M.—made for countless memorable moments, whether it be on the beat or during the paintball fight.

Oh, that paintball battle. Seeing all of those A-type personalities running around in the forest was a treat to see and pulled back the curtain on why Tyler’s been in such a good mood lately. After taking a break in an old truck, Tyler swallowed a palm of pills (likely uppers or painkillers) to keep him happy. But even when 19-2 was revealing dark secrets, there were still scenes of laughter on Monday. The ongoing feud between Ben, Nick and a squad of firefighters culminated in an all-out brawl at the paintball complex after drunk Vince set fire to one of the wooden shelters. Punches and paint balls rained down before the firefighters doused everyone with their hoses.

Ben, meanwhile, threw water on his marriage by telling Catherine he’s in love with someone else. The last we saw of Catherine, she was packing her bags. Unfortunately for Ben, he failed to consider the fact Amelie might not want him; a fact she was only too happy to fill him in on when Ben showed up to profess his love.

As for Nick, the mystery as to where his father ended up seems to be solved. After helping Kaz clear Rita of assault charges, Kaz took his cousin to a bridge pillar and explained Nick’s dad was encased in the structure. (I guess I should have seen the foreshadowing when Tyler and Bear made jokes about corruption surrounding Montreal’s construction jobs.)

Notes and quotes

  • “Sarge, it’s two for one!” You can’t pass up two for one paintball!
  • “Everyone loves firemen. We do not punch firemen.” Laughed out loud at Sgt. Houle’s line.
  • “I just shot you in the chest. You’re dead, retard.” Oh J.M. Always classy.
  • I’m glad Tyler is back, but I’ll miss Bear and Audrey as partners.
  • Who else thought Audrey and Nick were going to rekindle an old flame in the back of that school bus?

19-2 airs Mondays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo.

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Featured, Murdoch Mysteries

Interview: Murdoch Mysteries gets crazy

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Murdoch Mysteries’ showrunner Peter Mitchell says he likes to put out a scary episode every so often, and Monday’s instalment certainly fit the bill. “The Incurables” found Dr. Ogden trapped among several of the show’s most notable female criminals, including Mrs. Lynd, Rose, Eva Pearce and Charlotte, the girl with multiple personalities.

Marked with darkness, violence and revenge, the episode was noteworthy for being as much a character-driven plot as much as a murder mystery. We spoke to Mitchell about Monday’s latest episode and got him to tease next week’s “Toronto’s Girl Problem.”

“The Incurables” is a great twist on the locked room mystery. Did you come up with the idea, or was that pitched in the writers’ room?
Peter Mitchell: I wanted to do a big Julia story this year and one of my favourite characters on the show has been Charlotte, the girl with the multiple personalities. We liked the crazy old lady, Mrs. Lynd, we liked the axe murderer Rose and the Eva Pearce character … we wanted to bring all of those female characters back and make a real female-centric episode with Ogden at the centre of it. We thought it would be a lot of fun.

It reminded me of Batman visiting Arkham Asylum and being surrounded by super villains.
Yeah. It reminded me of those psychological horror movies that take place in asylums. Normally the reporter goes into the asylum and gets amnesia and has to try and get out. We wanted to do that locked room, asylum, murder mystery and try and feature Julia a little bit more. And we just hammered out a mystery. I didn’t know who the killer was until we finally got to it.

I actually thought it was going to be Mrs. Lynd.
And, without getting all preachy, we wanted to touch on how horrendous turn-of-the-century asylums were. None of them are really, truly bad guys. They’ve all been mistreated in there and the ultimate bad guys are, theoretically, the protectors. We wanted to play that card a little bit too.

What was Hélène’s reaction when she found out she’d be the focal point of the episode?
She was excited about it until she broke her arm. Then she was a little concerned about whether she’d be able to do the physicality of it. We shifted stuff around a little bit to accommodate a busted arm, but a busted arm is a busted arm and once she was far enough along in the healing process … Hélène is up for anything. She’s up to do any physical stuff that is demanded of her and it was just an unfortunate bit of timing that we had to be little bit more concerned than we usually are that she didn’t get hurt.

Much of the episode was spent in darkness in the asylum with just flashlights highlighting things. It was pretty darned spooky. Was that on location or was that a set?
There’s a studio in Toronto that we’ve occasionally filmed in. I directed a prison episode there when Julia was going to be executed. They have the bones to put together an asylum. And some of it was recreated on our stage. For the most part it was shot on location at that studio.

Anastasia Phillips was fantastic playing Charlotte and Girlie and the rest of her characters.
She’s great. Obviously Janet Laine-Green is great and Daiva Johnston is great and Hélène is great. So it was like, ‘Go to town!’

Eva Pearce is now on the loose. Will that storyline wrap up this season?
I won’t tell you. [Laughs.] She’s been a fun femme fatale to have on the show. Having her escape and having Murdoch make this choice in letting her go in order to save Ogden but then he didn’t really have to because she saved herself … she’s still in the game.

Let’s go back a couple of weeks to “All That Glitters.” Where did the idea to write about the Colbalt Silver Rush come from?
I think it came about when we found out there was a Cobalt Silver Rush. Who the hell knew they dragged more money out of Cobalt, Ont., than they did out of the Klondike? I learned that two years ago and it was hanging around in my head. We had a few incarnations of it kicking around, sort of a locked room mystery at a prospecting camp, and then we looked at an Indigenous person story that wasn’t typical … it just sort of coalesced.

I think maybe Colbalt was the main reason the Ontario Provincial Police came into being. There started to be a sort of labour dispute up there. It wasn’t really the Wild West up there, it was mining companies underpaying their workers and strikes and industrial action that I think lead to the formation of the OPP. That is a little past our period, so we didn’t really get into that.

Let’s talk a bit about next week’s episode, “Toronto’s Girl Problem.” What can you tease about that?
We learned about this girl gang in London, England, that existed during this period. They would swarm department stores and live the high life and we thought, ‘Who knows? Maybe they have a branch in Toronto.’ Dr. Grace and her friend Lillian go undercover in this girl gang. It’s another female-centred story and a big Dr. Grace story. It’s a nice, fun caper-type of episode.

Murdoch Mysteries airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on CBC.

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Featured, Strange Empire

He Said/She Said: Stand-alone or Serialized?

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Join Greg and Diane on Mondays as we debate a TV-related issue that’s on our minds. This week: the merits of stand-alone episodes versus serialized shows.

Diane said: 

Though I loved sinking my teeth into it, reviewing Strange Empire was a challenge because each episode was a slice of a 13-hour story. It was a little like reviewing each chapter of a book as I was reading. (Which is even more descriptive of reviewing The Book of Negroes). So when I heard that if there’s a second season of Strange Empire the episodes will be more stand-alone, I was relieved.

But at least neither CBC show used contrived cliffhanger endings that resolved in the first few minutes of the next, like the episodes of 24 and Alias I’ve seen. That’s cheating. When I love a show, I watch it every week. I hate feeling forced to watch every week. The first show I ever reviewed regularly was early season House, which some dismissed as formulaic. But the way it twisted the formula and overlaid character development on top of it were what intrigued me.

My ideal television show has episodes that are satisfyingly complete unto themselves, with continuing arcs for long-term interest that don’t gobble up all 44-ish minutes and aren’t all about the “will they or won’t they.” So yay The Good Wife and boo late-era X-Files.

Greg said:

I totally agree with Diane. Since she just referenced The X-Files, let me go off on a little rant. Those first and second season episodes tracking Agents Mulder and Scully were my favourites because—for the most part—they were monsters of the week (that frigging Fluke gave me nightmares) accented with the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Mulder’s sister. The black goo and conspiracy theories bogged down the show in latter seasons.

It’s a trend that has hamstrung Supernatural in recent years. Gone are the tales of the wendigo, the phantom traveler and Bloody Mary in favour of angels and demons. I love me some Castiel, but not every darned week.

On the other hand, serialized works very well for Vikings. There is, admittedly, no other way to tell the historical tale of Ragnar Lothbrok without it, but creator Michael Hirst manages to entertain with episodic plot points while staying true to the long-term journey the Viking king and his mates are on.

The same is true of Murdoch Mysteries and the relationships between its main characters. The folks on that series successfully combine a Canadian history lesson (social mores, technology and beliefs) with a murder of the week while tossing in a healthy dose of humour and character development. To me, that’s the mark of a truly great TV tale.

Do you agree with Diane and I? What do you want to hear our thoughts on? Comment below or @tv_eh.

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