I am curious if I am in the minority and I could very well be. First, I am going to do my best to keep this short as I can type forever and I know people do not like reading long posts, yet prefer getting to the point asap. I am hoping to get answers from hard core fans who have been watching since the very beginning.
I don't mind long posts, but please learn to use line breaks and paragraphs. Walls of text are hard on the eyes when they are on a screen. You need more visual breaks than you do when reading from paper text.
Let me begin and say that I understand a lot of the thinking that a show like this one must grow and evolve. Examples maybe the computer evolving to have a mind of its own and to make its own decisions in order to protect itself. They say it must keep pushing the envelope by going to new places and create "fuzzy dice" to keep as many bodies coming back for more because of the "neat stuff". I would argue that you do not need fancy things nor gimmicks as we the audience are intelligent enough and will end up caring for the characters if done so properly, i.e. great writing/character development. They new this after season 1 with a perfect cast with great writing.
"Intelligent people" get bored of repetition. Shows like Law & Order stay on the air for 20 years because the idiot masses are mesmerized and comforted by the same thing every week.
While some repetition is OK, if you really want a show to stand out, it needs to evolve.
So true fans, season 1 and probably season 2 were my favorite hands down. I could have went on with that setup without the computer doing all that crazy stuff for as long as the show aired. I enjoyed Reese and Finch working the numbers in NYC with the computer doing minimal. Along side those 2 were Fusco and Carter doing their part and making the show complete for me.
I could probably have put up with that for a couple more years, but not because it was repetitious but because they actually did have evolving undercurrents from one episode to the next. HR needed to go, that story line was played out and dragging. While they maybe didn't need to go as extreme as they did with season 3, it still needed some kind of shake up.
But if I'm being honest, I would have been tolerating the stretch if they had tried to make that carry on for too much longer without a change. And tolerating a shows repetition is not the same as really enjoying it. I was definitely hoping for the show to get something new; and it did.
Yet, Nolan and company felt that it was necessary for the audience/fans alike to see a large involvement of the computer system (The Machine)
It's definitely what I wanted more of. The team was great, but here's this AI which is supposed to be ground breaking. If it's not capable of evolving, then I'm sorry but it wouldn't really be all that impressive of an AI. They could have held back on it a couple more seasons before I got bored of it, but it did need to evolve or it would have gotten stale at some point.
One thing to realize is that in TV, ratings are everything. The producers and directors are not the ones paying for the series to be made. So you sometimes have to preemptively jump forward and try new things in an effort to capture more ratings or you risk losing your show entirely. Unless you can self finance (and almost no film maker can) you are at the mercy of the studios.
And one thing I can say about the writers, they knew the axe was coming, they did their best to make sure the show got its main story arcs done and found a way to pull off a finale. Had they gone in the direction you suggest they very likely would never have found a valid emotional ending to the show. It would have just been a routine murder of the week and the series ended without conclusions to anything.
and add some lesbo action to the mix. I want to emphasis that I did not want that and was disappointed the minute they went down that road.
Grow up bigot. The show needed some romance; and who cares which genders were involved in it?
Without introducing a bunch of new characters there wasn't a lot of in-team options that felt like they should work. Root-Shaw was awkward, but so were the characters. Here's two broken, damaged human beings coming together at a time in their life where they are both finally finding themselves and who they are.
Shaw has spent her entire life believing shes a sociopath and here she is learning how to be something more than just a killer following orders. Her redemption comes from finding something bigger than herself. A machine that can tell her right from wrong where she can't feel it on her own.
Roots a blinded cult follower who thinks the machine is a god, and becomes the voice of the machine in the real world.
Is Shaw even attracted to Root? Or is she just fragile and vulnerable and open for the first time now that she's found a purpose in the machine? And Root is the closest thing to the machine in the real world that she can touch and feel.
And what does Root see in Shaw? An extension of her own belief. Where as the other agents working for the machine are finding redemption their own way, they still treat the machine as a tool and not a god.
Shaw's the closest thing to a follower that the machine has aside from Root. that's a dynamic no one else shares.
Also realize, they never actually got to act on any of this beyond flirting. The one potential scene where they might have was only a dream. Which implies the foundation for a relationship was starting to grow, but they never had a chance to act on it and we don't know that they ever would. Emotional availability is not something that springs up over night in a sociopath.
The other characters all had their own versions of emotional and relationship story arcs showing they were broken in their own ways, so I won't dissect those here.
So, are there any fans out there who would have liked what I would have liked, more of the first 2 seasons into season 3 and on? More or less a continuation of Season 1 and probably season 2. Or do you think you would have gotten bored with Reese and Finch chasing the usual 1 number down? I loved them in the library with the dog and staying local in NYC. Reese always had some good moves to show off every week and Finch being there to get him the info and whatever support needed. Please let me know what you think:)
I think I could have watched season 1 & 2 style for a couple more years, but only if they branched out a new under current than HR. I was sick of HR by the end of season 1, and season 2 was really getting on my nerves with it.
But yes the Harold in the Library with the dog and sending Reese out on missions was a nice routine. But I must say I really liked Shaw. I'm a sucker for redemption stories about sociopaths. And also the evolution of someone like Root felt like it was inevitable. At some point it makes sense that someone would take the machine too seriously and label it a god. Whether that could have waited a couple more seasons or not comes down to whether they could find the budget to be allowed to stay on the air long enough to get there.
As it stands with CBS constantly threatening to shut them down. I'm glad they stretched out and tried new things. It let them find an ending and not just get cancelled on a useless cliffhanger after another murder of the week like most shows that fade into nothing.
POI will have an enduring legacy and be worth recommending to people. It wouldn't have that long lasting value if it never grew beyond it's original routine.
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xfphile-1
8 years ago
>>>Grow up bigot. The show needed some romance; and who cares which genders were involved in it?<<<
Grow up, bigot. The show did NOT need 'some romance,' and if it had, gay 'romance' wasn't what it needed. I know that people like you are incapable of accepting differing viewpoints, but I'll try anyway: not everyone wants to see gay anything on their TV screens (or books, for that matter) and you know what? THAT'S OKAY!!!!!!!!!
This is called 'life,' which is the state of being wherein each person has their own personal moral code, belief system, and preferences, and nowhere in the world is any one person guaranteed that everyone else will agree with them.
If you can't handle that, either move to Antarctica so you don't have to deal with other people, or die.
I'm also in the no-gay crowd, because to me it's wrong and perverted ... and, quite frankly, I find it sad that gays are so selfish that they cannot allow two people of the same sex to just be friends, because they don't understand or value that kind of relationship. For them -- at least, what we hear from the vocal whiners -- sexual attraction is the only thing that exists between 2 women or men.
Frankly, it's pathetic, but that's how they roll, so whatever. That's their opinion and more power to them. What we're sick of is constantly having their opinion and wishes shoved down our throats because somebody decided that 1% of the population is more important than the other 99%, and when we object, we're called a stupid name and told our opinions don't count (see: your post).
And I'm also with the OP in that the lesbo crap killed S5 for me, because it was a) fabricated out of whole cloth to shut the whining gays up and b) so far beyond necessary to the story as to be in another dimension. If people want to watch gay TV, go watch LOGO and leave the sane people alone.
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