Post by shmeep on Jan 18, 2006 17:46:28 GMT -5
Second Sight
by shmeep
It’s no Blind Justice, but Second Sight is a pretty decent show…if you like that kind of thing. By “that,” I mean, specifically, shows of the British variety. Yes, it’s British in a wordy droll sort of way that makes the language so convoluted that American viewers often mistake much of it for wit and good storytelling. Second Sight is occasionally witty and it does contain a laugh or two (heck, Clive Owen even smiles—once or twice), but it is a serious and overly-artsy piece of work, somehow managing to keep the issue of blindness subtle while beating us over the head with it incessantly.
But any excuse to watch Clive Owen, right?
So, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to recap the Second Sight series, only not all at once. I don’t have access to the script or to the audio of the show, so this is all off the top of my head for now.
Okay. I’ll admit it. I just came across the screencaps online and I can’t resist using them. They’re so pretty. That’s why I’m doing this.
Here we go.
Detective Chief Inspector Ross Tanner and his team are at a mall, trying to find out where a suspected bomber has left the bomb. Ross is heading the whole thing up from a security room full of television monitors showing him everything as it unfolds, and we are treated to several close-up of him as he barks out commands.
His trusty friend, Cigarette, seems a permanent fixture.
And then WHOA! There’s a really close shot of his eye!
Yes, we get it, BBC! That’s his eye and it will prove to be very important in this series. Both of them will. He’s a detective and he kind of needs those.
Thanks to Ross spotting something a roomful of people have somehow missed, they get the bomb and then their bomber and then they go to a very noisy pub to celebrate.
This entire scene is there to illustrate two things.
1.) Ross is a bad father.
See, it was his weekend to take the kid and he would rather be out playing and drinking so he calls the ex-wife, leaving a message on her machine (clearly calling from a pub) telling her he’s stuck at work and won’t be able to take Sam. He then asks her to “make it up to him. Whatever he wants.”
2.) Ross is a cool boss.
Just look at how he mixes with his crew, going into some kind of Full Montyesque routine, minus the stripping (as far as we know).
He flirts with the bartender, takes her home (making out with her disturbingly on the railing of the stairs leading to his apartment—probably just so we can get an artsy shot from several floors down), and then wakes up with her in the morning.
As punishment for his debauchery (I can only assume), he starts to notice his vision going a bit wonky as he holds up his watch to check out the time.
So he does penance, going to his ex-wife’s house to pick up Sam, apparently disguising himself as a delivery boy in order to sneak the boy out.
They hang out, doing boy stuff.
I’m grateful for this scene with Sam early on. Had I not seen Detective Chief Inspector Ross Tanner with his adorable boy, I wouldn’t have found any redeeming qualities in him. He’s pretty damn unpleasant. But the boy brings out his humanity and shows that this asshole really does have a heart in there somewhere.
Ross spends the weekend in bed, playing one-handed peek-a-boo (that came out unintentionally dirty!), trying to figure out what’s going on with his eyes. They keep blurring out and then clearing up again.
On his way to the scene of a homicide, the detective’s vision blurs and he crashes into a parked car.
He takes a cab to the scene and, as punishment, is forced to wear a water-proof jumpsuit along with all the other people who were late.
He looks around, able to see a large home and yard, before his vision goes wonky again. He does his best not to react to it so the others won’t guess anything odd is going on.
Enter Detective Inspector Catherine Tully, possibly the most irksome love interest ever to appear on my television screen. She seems to be in charge, telling Ross that the body belongs to Matthew Bendrix, who lived in the beautiful home. He had been beaten to death while apparently out taking a puff on the QT (whatever that means—although I’m sure it involves smoking pot). She rambles on in her strident way until Ross can’t listen to her voice any longer (I know I’m reaching my limit) and cuts her off, demanding to know why she’s there instead of Detective Inspector Skinner. Skinner, it appears, is tied up in another case so Ross is stuck with Tully. He asks if this is her first time out with a major incident team. “Is that a concern?” she asks. “Is that a ‘yes’?” he quips back. Blah blah blah lots of wordy stuff and then, “Just trying to cover the ground in your absence, sir” she says, effectively shutting him up.
They go over the scene and then into the house, where a creepy scowling nanny wanders around with a baby and the parents are in a stupor. “My boy,” his mother, Judith Bendrix whimpers. “My son.” Ross vows to get whoever did this and goes off into Matthew’s room to look around—and call a doctor about his eyes. He manages to get an appointment, but he has to leave right away in order to keep it. Tully enters and starts in on how Matthew’s bedroom doesn’t look very homey, which is odd since it would be his base when he comes home from college. Ross doesn’t find much logic in this assessment.
“Given a choice, Catherine,” he says, “focus on the facts. There’s time for the psychobabble when we’ve got the big picture.”
“Ah, left brain approach,” she labels. “I know it well.”
“It gets results.”
They each dismiss each other’s opinions, because obviously men and women aren’t meant to communicate, and Ross leaves for his round of eye tests.
First, they make him wear silly goggles and talk on a cell phone.
Then they subject him to some kind of torturous procedure, long since banned by the UN.
Eventually he is released and told by two doctors that he has AZOOR (Acute Zonal Occult Outer Retinopathy)—which seems to have something to do with his retinas.
Oh, and it is possibly caused by a virus that lay dormant in his body until triggered by something unknown.
I know. That’s what I thought. It sounds a bit batty, but I’m sure it’s all well-researched and all. Bottom line is that he could either lose all his vision, or it might stay as it is. All they know for sure is that it won’t be improving. It will just conveniently come and go.
Ross finds this most upsetting and insists on getting more tests with a different doctor. He storms out of the office and does what anyone would do. He sits alone in a bar, smoking a cigarette.
Some girls nearby giggle over his manly beauty and it makes him self-conscious so he puts on a pair of dorky sunglasses that make him look oddly like Harry Connick Jr. for a moment.
But that’s no good. He catches a reflection of himself and realizes the sunglasses make him look stereotypically “blind” (I can only assume) so he whips them off and does another thing that is perfectly natural. He enters a bathroom stall.
Once inside, he throws a temper tantrum and trashes it until the door is off its hinges and so is the toilet seat. Then his cell phone rings so he sits on what’s left of the toilet (gross) and listens to Tully as she updates him on the boring details of the case.
Okay, maybe not boring, but I just can’t remember them at the moment.
And that’s all for this installment!
TO BE CONTINUED……
by shmeep
It’s no Blind Justice, but Second Sight is a pretty decent show…if you like that kind of thing. By “that,” I mean, specifically, shows of the British variety. Yes, it’s British in a wordy droll sort of way that makes the language so convoluted that American viewers often mistake much of it for wit and good storytelling. Second Sight is occasionally witty and it does contain a laugh or two (heck, Clive Owen even smiles—once or twice), but it is a serious and overly-artsy piece of work, somehow managing to keep the issue of blindness subtle while beating us over the head with it incessantly.
But any excuse to watch Clive Owen, right?
So, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to recap the Second Sight series, only not all at once. I don’t have access to the script or to the audio of the show, so this is all off the top of my head for now.
Okay. I’ll admit it. I just came across the screencaps online and I can’t resist using them. They’re so pretty. That’s why I’m doing this.
Here we go.
Detective Chief Inspector Ross Tanner and his team are at a mall, trying to find out where a suspected bomber has left the bomb. Ross is heading the whole thing up from a security room full of television monitors showing him everything as it unfolds, and we are treated to several close-up of him as he barks out commands.
His trusty friend, Cigarette, seems a permanent fixture.
And then WHOA! There’s a really close shot of his eye!
Yes, we get it, BBC! That’s his eye and it will prove to be very important in this series. Both of them will. He’s a detective and he kind of needs those.
Thanks to Ross spotting something a roomful of people have somehow missed, they get the bomb and then their bomber and then they go to a very noisy pub to celebrate.
This entire scene is there to illustrate two things.
1.) Ross is a bad father.
See, it was his weekend to take the kid and he would rather be out playing and drinking so he calls the ex-wife, leaving a message on her machine (clearly calling from a pub) telling her he’s stuck at work and won’t be able to take Sam. He then asks her to “make it up to him. Whatever he wants.”
2.) Ross is a cool boss.
Just look at how he mixes with his crew, going into some kind of Full Montyesque routine, minus the stripping (as far as we know).
He flirts with the bartender, takes her home (making out with her disturbingly on the railing of the stairs leading to his apartment—probably just so we can get an artsy shot from several floors down), and then wakes up with her in the morning.
As punishment for his debauchery (I can only assume), he starts to notice his vision going a bit wonky as he holds up his watch to check out the time.
So he does penance, going to his ex-wife’s house to pick up Sam, apparently disguising himself as a delivery boy in order to sneak the boy out.
They hang out, doing boy stuff.
I’m grateful for this scene with Sam early on. Had I not seen Detective Chief Inspector Ross Tanner with his adorable boy, I wouldn’t have found any redeeming qualities in him. He’s pretty damn unpleasant. But the boy brings out his humanity and shows that this asshole really does have a heart in there somewhere.
Ross spends the weekend in bed, playing one-handed peek-a-boo (that came out unintentionally dirty!), trying to figure out what’s going on with his eyes. They keep blurring out and then clearing up again.
On his way to the scene of a homicide, the detective’s vision blurs and he crashes into a parked car.
He takes a cab to the scene and, as punishment, is forced to wear a water-proof jumpsuit along with all the other people who were late.
He looks around, able to see a large home and yard, before his vision goes wonky again. He does his best not to react to it so the others won’t guess anything odd is going on.
Enter Detective Inspector Catherine Tully, possibly the most irksome love interest ever to appear on my television screen. She seems to be in charge, telling Ross that the body belongs to Matthew Bendrix, who lived in the beautiful home. He had been beaten to death while apparently out taking a puff on the QT (whatever that means—although I’m sure it involves smoking pot). She rambles on in her strident way until Ross can’t listen to her voice any longer (I know I’m reaching my limit) and cuts her off, demanding to know why she’s there instead of Detective Inspector Skinner. Skinner, it appears, is tied up in another case so Ross is stuck with Tully. He asks if this is her first time out with a major incident team. “Is that a concern?” she asks. “Is that a ‘yes’?” he quips back. Blah blah blah lots of wordy stuff and then, “Just trying to cover the ground in your absence, sir” she says, effectively shutting him up.
They go over the scene and then into the house, where a creepy scowling nanny wanders around with a baby and the parents are in a stupor. “My boy,” his mother, Judith Bendrix whimpers. “My son.” Ross vows to get whoever did this and goes off into Matthew’s room to look around—and call a doctor about his eyes. He manages to get an appointment, but he has to leave right away in order to keep it. Tully enters and starts in on how Matthew’s bedroom doesn’t look very homey, which is odd since it would be his base when he comes home from college. Ross doesn’t find much logic in this assessment.
“Given a choice, Catherine,” he says, “focus on the facts. There’s time for the psychobabble when we’ve got the big picture.”
“Ah, left brain approach,” she labels. “I know it well.”
“It gets results.”
They each dismiss each other’s opinions, because obviously men and women aren’t meant to communicate, and Ross leaves for his round of eye tests.
First, they make him wear silly goggles and talk on a cell phone.
Then they subject him to some kind of torturous procedure, long since banned by the UN.
Eventually he is released and told by two doctors that he has AZOOR (Acute Zonal Occult Outer Retinopathy)—which seems to have something to do with his retinas.
Oh, and it is possibly caused by a virus that lay dormant in his body until triggered by something unknown.
I know. That’s what I thought. It sounds a bit batty, but I’m sure it’s all well-researched and all. Bottom line is that he could either lose all his vision, or it might stay as it is. All they know for sure is that it won’t be improving. It will just conveniently come and go.
Ross finds this most upsetting and insists on getting more tests with a different doctor. He storms out of the office and does what anyone would do. He sits alone in a bar, smoking a cigarette.
Some girls nearby giggle over his manly beauty and it makes him self-conscious so he puts on a pair of dorky sunglasses that make him look oddly like Harry Connick Jr. for a moment.
But that’s no good. He catches a reflection of himself and realizes the sunglasses make him look stereotypically “blind” (I can only assume) so he whips them off and does another thing that is perfectly natural. He enters a bathroom stall.
Once inside, he throws a temper tantrum and trashes it until the door is off its hinges and so is the toilet seat. Then his cell phone rings so he sits on what’s left of the toilet (gross) and listens to Tully as she updates him on the boring details of the case.
Okay, maybe not boring, but I just can’t remember them at the moment.
And that’s all for this installment!
TO BE CONTINUED……