Did I really watch the whole thing??

I’ll just come right out and say it: NBC’s summer mystery series Persons Unknown was quite possibly the worst television show I have ever watched. Considering I grew up watching TV in the 70s and 80s, that saying a lot. I mean, I have been known to watch a SyFy Original Movie for Chrissake.

The acting – with one or two exceptions, like Kandyse McClure and Tina Holmes – was consistently poor. I tried to write it off to the big “mystery”, that perhaps it just seemed like poor acting when in fact they were purposely acting weird to throw the viewer off track or something like that; but then it became all too evident that these people just sucked.

I’m not going to describe the story because there was no story, save for the premise – which I admit is what drew me to PU (HA! how apropos!) in the first place – of 7 strangers waking up in a fake, uninhabited town. Absolutely NOTHING happened in 13 episodes and in fact, I think I could have watched the final two episodes right after the first and not noticed that I missed anything. In the end, not only were there no answers provided, not only were the characters right back in the same situation, literally, but what they did show us made no sense at all.

And then there was the Robert Picardo cameo, with him wearing a long white wig and looking like Lucius Malfoy on a really bad day. Completely arbitrary, weird and worse, just plain BAD.

Don’t bother.

Chatter: Formerly ‘TV Talk’

Since this is a blog about TV, I thought it would be redundant to title these posts “TV Talk”, so I had to come up with something else and “Chatter” was all I could think of. Does anyone have any suggestions, something better? I know there are a couple of vocabulary powerhouses out there…

OK, so, is anyone else still watching Persons Unknown? If so, does anyone else agree with me that it’s really not very good? Does anyone else want to kill half of the characters like I do? Perhaps that’s the point, but you would think that, considering the premise, the writers would want us to sympathize with them. I like Moira and McNair (the psych patient and the soldier), but everyone else? Not so much. However, it’s a 13-episode summer series, so I’m in it for the long haul, if only to find out what the heck is going on.

Last night was the episode of Deadliest Catch in which Captain Phil has the stroke that will eventually kill him. I haven’t watched it yet. In fact, I’m a week behind on the DVR. It’s going to be so hard to watch.

Finally, a heads up: Futurama returns tomorrow night on Comedy Central at 10:00! Woohoo! And SyFy’s Warehouse 13 begins its second season on Tuesday, July 6 at 9:00 PM.

Possible new summer show

I hadn’t heard a thing about Persons Unknown, a new show on NBC on Monday nights at 10:00, until I stumbled across it this past Monday. It’s about 7 strangers who wake up in a deserted town that they can’t leave, all the while being observed through not-so-hidden cameras.

I thought it was pretty good. It was an average pilot, with broadly drawn characters and some pretty big plot holes, but the premise is intriguing enough to keep me watching next week.

As far as I know, the series is limited to a 13-week run, sort of a summer mini-series. So even if it isn’t great, it won’t be that way for too long.

Today’s Tweets

Via @televisionary – 19 Reasons To Watch TV This Summer

Via @tomandlorenzo – Tom and Lorenzo review the new series “Persons Unknown” (which I happened to watch last night and had the same reaction to it as they did – definitely interested enough to tune back in again)

Via @sepinwall – Alan feels pretty much the same way about “Persons Unknown”

Via @sepinwall – Dude! Alan is doing a “Firefly” Rewind this summer!! Dust off your DVDs and join in the fun. Shiny!