Speak Up Saturday

[feurioo]

Welcome to the weekly roundup post! What are you watching this week? What are you excited about?

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[queer_scribbling]

Most of our fall shows are back from their winter breaks, so my family's picked back up with Ghosts (US), S.W.A.T. (the final final season), Fire Country (S3), and Tracker (S2).

Ghosts S4

Most of my grumbling about this season have been around virgin jokes for Sasappis (Sass). It's not even like he's the one making some sort of joke, and the humor is about how he died before he had sex with anyone, he hasn't had ghost sex, and he's a 500 year old virgin. The process of Sam doing ghost therapy also took a humorous swing at the idea a woman could be married and a virgin and not-weird for that which comes across like there's no awareness of ace people from TPTB.

Fire Country

It felt like Gabriela was finding new ways to spiral down in the first half [before winter break], but she's finally not caught in that downward spiral. A part of me is relieved that TPTB have stopped trying to get Gabriela and Bode together, and I'm side-eyeing the relationship they're trying to start between Audrey and Bode carefully. (I'm not torn up on Jake still being single, even if this past episode made it seem like he's unfortunately still holding onto Cara after her death.) Eve and Francine don't have half the drama that the writers devoted to Gabriela and Bode, which I don't mind.

For all that I've grumbled about Sharon suddenly being magically cured of any post-kidney transplant realities, the show has moved on to a new medical thing to focus on: Walter, Vince's father, has the early stages of dementia. He actually initiated a discussion about seeing a doctor because he was worried (which isn't something to scoff at when this character is the epitome of 'crochety old man who refuses to see a doctor'), and we're hearing more about Riley from him.

Tracker

Woven throughout the case-of-the-week plots, Colter has spent quite a bit of the first half of this season trying to solve an old case where he never found the person he was asked to find (the sister of his then-girlfriend). I haven't found that quite as compelling as I suspect TPTB wanted it to be. He engaged in anniversary-of-disappearance harassment, his gut instinct was sorta right (which seems to justify the harassment), he got a retired cop to help go over the case who physically tortured someone for info, and it was only satisfying that the case was finally finished so all this could stop. It probably wasn't supposed to come across like an escalation of lines being crossed, but I just didn't get this 'how nice that he'll stop at nothing to help someone' reaction.

In terms of shorter PBS Masterpiece shows, we're almost done with All Creatures Great & Small (US airing of S5) and have finished Vienna Blood.

All Creatures Great & Small

It's been a bit interesting to see how a show that caught on in popularity partially due to cosy, countryside vet cases has handled WWII. The franchise wasn't ever supposed to be strictly autobiographical of the original author, but this James Herriot gets brucellosis and is declared unfit to fly before finishing his training due to unpredictable bouts of fever/delirium. Tristan also has a bit of an argument with Siegfried about 'not experiencing enough suffering' in E6, and while this isn't locked in for the rest of the war, some of this does appear to be that Tristan is getting more of the 'not great but also not directly life-changing' depiction of service.

Vienna Blood
Instead of tackling one case per episode, this season focused on one large case for four episodes. Due to a surgery for a gunshot wound, Max spent like half the season communicating with Oskar in this sort of dreamy mind-space, and Oskar and others got more of a chance to show off their crime solving skills instead of relying on Max's deductions. This show hasn't used this mind-space tactic before, so it was tolerable in a small amount, but I'm glad it wasn't used previously.

It felt like the season was wrapped up in such a way that the show could easily come back for a future season at some point, but it also worked as the current series finale. I thought I'd heard that another book in the original book series was in the works, but at this point, I don't think anyone's expecting that soon. It does feel like like something has ended when a show that doesn't flinch away from historical antisemitism or apologise for humanising this Jewish family is no longer airing. Mr and Mrs Liebermann have a moment where they propose the idea of returning to London instead of trying to remain in Vienna, and this feels like a time where I can understand. (The quote from an actor about this timeliness is in the post-season section.)

We're also giving two recently started shows a try: Watson and The Hunting Party.

Watson

My family's reaction has very much been: Huh, what an unusual case... That's the actor for Nichelle; no wonder she hasn't been on S.W.A.T. as much lately. Wait, is that a Sherlock Holmes reference we didn't get?

The Hunting Party

This feels like the premise says more about a societal level worry than being super realistic, really. A secret prison for serial killers where the military has been trying different therapy "fixes" experiences an explosion, some prisoners escape, and now the main lead needs to help re-capture a different serial killer each week. Most of each episode is the weekly serial killer capture which isn't too far off from other killer capture shows with a slight tweak of knowing the identity from the start (and some of these prisoners have officially been put to death), but it's possible that uncovering a particular military secret and/or coverup [of something other than the prison's existence] will be a larger side plot.

(I'm not holding my breath that we'll see anyone from this prison actually be 'fixed' or not be a stereotypical danger to those they encounter. It could be possible that someone will want a fresh start to life and won't go on killing spree, but the premise just isn't forewarning that possibility.)

[yourlibrarian]

Oh, I hadn't heard that we might have just seen the end of Vienna Blood. That would be too bad, but I could see how it might work as a series finale.

[queer_scribbling]

I didn't hear about this until recently, but as of June 2024, Endor Productions announced it will close and "will focus exclusively on the completion of current productions". I'm not familiar with the books, but I thought S4 covered the last book (with the author not currently talking about publishing more). Neither of these rule out a different production company/network picking the show up or original material taking the place of a book adaption in possible future seasons, but I haven't heard of anyone specifically talking about a rescue.