Tag Archives: This Life

Featured, This Life

Comments and queries for the week of December 18

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This Life closes out stellar first season

Is the CBC paying for this site? The show was painfully boring and poorly produced. Our standards for television are higher now, and a show with stylistic sensibilities in line with early ’90s television is not acceptable or even watchable. This Life is abysmal, nobody watched it, the opening scene is offensive to anyone who’s actually experienced illness, and it should never come back. —Tim

I disagree with Tim.

I live with illness. Both parents died of cancer, both were rare complicated cancers, and one involved a clinical trial. I have a rare illness classified the same as cancer, open to many, many clinical trials, of which I’ve had to decide whether to participate.

My siblings were five in total (similar to this show) and as dysfunctional (more probably) as portrayed in this series.

This is very real and done very well. It’s not easy to have a show about cancer or life and death issues involving kids, adults, families, lives going on at the same time, and what it does to everyone. This show does it all very well. Maybe not perfect but pretty close from my experience.

And if you’re not interested in cancer or illness and prefer a good drama that has a nice balance of life, comedy, drama, sadness, ease, with good acting, watch it. The cancer angle is light in the first season and so many other stories in life are handled well, very interesting modern day life stories both for the kids and the adults. —Carrie

My wife and I are very much enjoying this series. A very refreshing take on a non-vanilla family. I hope we get a Season 2. —Dave

The Top 10 Most Irritating Canadians of 2015 (TV-related)

Why does John Doyle always have to focus on the negative? Why didn’t he count down the Top 10 Canadian people or institutions that did great things in Canadian TV? Here is a list that I can come up with off the top of my head:

1. Murdoch Mysteries for surviving and becoming a cult-like show.

2. CBC for continuing to survive the tax cuts and still delivering quality shows like This Life and X Company.

3. Bell Media (yes, Bell Media) for at least trying to offer some sort of Canadian content. Out of all of the private companies, Bell offers at least one CanCon program every season.

4. The creators and cast of Sunnyside on City. One very funny show. Give it a chance to survive.

5. The Marilyn Denis Show for not trying to disguise itself as an American show. Any show that doesn’t try to disguise itself as an American show.

6. The Degrassi franchise (although I haven’t seen it in years) for constantly reinventing itself and living so long.

7. The new Dragons on Dragons’ Den. They have reinvigorated that show.

8. The cast and writers of 22 Minutes. It seems funnier this season. The Christmas episode was great!

9. Every actor doing corny commercials trying to make a living as an actor in Canada. It ain’t easy.

10. TV, eh? for giving Canadians a place to go to see what’s new in CanCon. —Denis

 

Got a question or comment about Canadian TV? greg@tv-eh.com or @tv_eh.

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19-2, Amazing Race Canada, Industry News, Killjoys, Orphan Black, Rookie Blue, Schitt's Creek, This Life, Vikings, X Company

Link: Critics Vote: Top 10 Canadian Shows of 2015

From The TV Junkies:

Critics Vote: Top 10 Canadian Shows of 2015
In this time of Peak TV there are countless viewing options out there for television fans. With so many choices it’s harder than ever to prioritize what to watch, let alone narrow down the Top 10 Canadian Shows of 2015. But that’s exactly what we’ve tried to do here with the help of 15 television critics and writers from across Canada. We asked them to put together a list of their top 10 Canadian television shows from the past year. We gave 10 points for No. 1, 9 points for No. 2, 8 points for No. 3 and so on. The overall list was then determined by the cumulative point total for each show. Continue reading.

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Bitten, Featured, Podcast, This Life

TV, eh? podcast episode 195 – Purveyor of Nog

With the end of 2015 in sight, Diane, Anthony and Greg remark on the shows ending their seasons over the next few weeks, including the season finales of This Life and The Romeo Section and the series finales of Blackstone and Haven.

We then switch gears to chat about CBC’s latest in-development project, Jeff Lemire’s Essex County, the end of Bitten and the results of the Favourite Canadian TV Shows of 2015 poll. Finally, we discuss the sweeping changes happening over at CHCH, where hundreds were let go and deep programming cuts took place. For more details, read Steve Faguy’s post from Dec. 11.

Want to contribute to the discussion? Post links and discussion topics on our Reddit page.

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

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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Featured, This Life

This Life closes out stellar first season

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When I first tuned to This Life, I imagined a series much like a homegrown version of The Big C. Natalie Lawson would find out her cancer was back and then make a Bucket List of items she’d plow through as tumours ravaged her body. It would be entertaining, I thought, but not groundbreaking in the least.

How wrong I was. Not only was This Life totally different from what I’d assumed, but it’s held me in thrall every week. And while Natalie’s journey has certainly been front and centre every week, This Life has been as much about the supporting characters as it has about its lead. As I’d hoped/expected, Natalie decided to join the drug trial in the belief the cocktail she’ll take will perform better than what she’s currently on. By announcing her decision to Romy and Emma over cupcakes on the front steps, Natalie was showing her conviction and including the girls in her all-important next steps. This wasn’t exactly closure in Natalie’s tale, but it was a satisfying conclusion.

Also satisfying as heck? Emma crossing the finish line of her first triathlon. She didn’t come in last, and her whole family (save Caleb) was there to embrace Emma at the end.

Aside from that, the rest of the Lawson clan are still battling. And, frankly, that’s OK with me. There are too many series that spend time neatly wrapping up storylines for the end of a season, and I respect showrunner Joseph Kay for not doing it. Instead, everyone has balls in the air and are fallible. Maggie wants to take over as the kids’ legal guardian, but Natalie fears her sister will become bored of that task and want to move on. David refuses to sign off on having the kids become anyone’s responsibility, so there’s no closure there. Oliver is adapting to life back in Montreal and is plotting a business deal (which I’m sure is an art gallery) and Romy seems to be responding to Natalie’s honesty. (Her “It all just looks broken to me,” comment at the hospital broke my heart.)

Meanwhile, Matthew—who was so strong at the beginning of the season—has suffered a major fall from grace. The dude who appeared to be the most stable of the Lawson brood aside from Natalie saw his world crumble after Julian’s existence was brought to light. Any chance of saving his marriage was blown to smithereens, and I can’t imagine there’s an easy way back from this.

Again, that’s OK. Life isn’t easy, and I like and admire television shows that portray that in a realistic manner. Like This Life has done all season.

What did you think of Season 1 of This Life? Comment below.

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This Life

Link: This Life finale Preview: Natalie’s future is in doubt

From Bridget Liszewski of The TV Junkies:

This Life finale Preview: Natalie’s future is in doubt
“She’s been on this journey where she was told she was dying and she’s had this emotional journey of trying to make sense of her life before it’s too late. She makes some progress in that regard in the first season, especially in her ability to accept the things that are out of her control, and the effects of this drug trial are one of them. Physically this is a big risk for her, will it help her or will it even hurt her? So it puts this really precarious choice on her plate and she has to decide how much of a fighter she really is.” Continue reading.

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