AltWeeklies Wire
'Californication': So Freaky David Duchovny Had to Go to Rehabnew
Perception is a strange thing. Despite his narration of Showtime's softcore Red Shoe Diaries series, his recurring roll as a transvestite in Twin Peaks, and his recent time in rehab for sex addiction, I've never been able to disconnect Duchovny from his thoroughly asexual character Fox Mulder, whom he played on the X-Files for 10 seasons, two movies, and at least one video game.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
10-22-2008 |
TV
'90210' and 'Gossip Girl': A High-School Rivalrynew
The similarities between the two shows end with the setup, though, and the differences are illustrative of how subtle variations in tone can mean the difference between a melodramatic primetime mess and light (really light) cultural critique
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
10-08-2008 |
Movies
'Sons of Anarchy' is Not the New 'Sopranos'new
Sons of Anarchy is the antithesis of The Sopranos. Well, no. The antithesis of The Sopranos is something like The 700 Club. As far as crime family dramas go, though, these two are fire and ice. Sopranos was good. This is not.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
09-24-2008 |
TV
Tags: FX, Sons of Anarchy
'In Plain Sight' is Just Plain Badnew
After a half-decade of success as a station of lovable neurotics — Tony Shaloub's eponymous Monk; the idiosyncratic spies of Burn Notice, etc. — USA's thrown a curveball in the character of Mary Shannon, a neurotic who is quite the opposite of lovable.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
08-13-2008 |
TV
It's a (Mad) Man's Worldnew
Mad Men is about a segment of society so drunk on its power and influence that the better part of a decade passes before it realizes its time has come and gone.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
07-09-2008 |
TV
'The Venture Brothers': A Satire with Consistencynew
The brothers thumbs its nose at the absurdity of the Hardy Boys and Johnny Quest, showing the tremendous folly of seriously engaging in the rhetoric of Good vs. Evil. The world isn't black-and-white.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
06-25-2008 |
TV
'Battlestar Galactica' Goes for the Godnew
As the series gears up for its conclusion, it's becoming more contemplative, agonizing over how there can be faith without tests of that faith, and thus how real prophets can exist without fake ones -- how humans, tortured beasts that we are, can have certainty in anything without uncertainty about most everything else.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
04-09-2008 |
TV
Let Us Cast the First Stonenew
For a show so tied to the possibility of a demonstrative God, Eli Stone has curiously little magic.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
02-20-2008 |
TV
How the Mighty Have Fallennew
Though it gets its name from a Roman blood sport, American Gladiators takes most of its cues from Greek mythology.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
01-23-2008 |
TV
Transform and Roll Eyesnew
Tranformers Animated is bittersweet for people who grew up on the original series (me), especially if they have kids of Transformers age (definitely not me). Some really annoying liberties have been taken with the characters.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
01-09-2008 |
TV
Fashion Nightmarenew
Reality shows inevitably begin to suck. It's like a law of the universe. No matter how great they are to begin with, they all suck by season four or five. Like Project Runway.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
12-12-2007 |
TV
Tags: TV
Quarterlife Crisisnew
A portrait of contemporary twentysomethings (and an orgy of self-reference), quarterlife is a failed network pilot that found new life on the internet as not just a web-ivision show, but also a real-life social-networking website (quarterlife.com).
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
11-28-2007 |
TV
Tags: TV
The Worst of the Fall Seasonnew
Early fall is an exciting, disappointing time to be a TV fan. The best new shows won't show their true luster for weeks, but the worst are already totally obvious in their horribleness.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
10-31-2007 |
TV
Tags: TV
'Dexter' Killsnew
The show isn't perfect, but it's damn good, and the paradox of the citizen serial killer is executed with enough zest to keep me happy for another season or two.
San Antonio Current |
Luke Baumgarten |
10-10-2007 |
TV
Tags: TV
