cactuswatcher (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cactuswatcher) wrote2005-01-24 09:25 am
cactuswatcher) wrote2005-01-24 09:25 am
Meanwhile, on the other channel
I wonder how many people saw the new series "NUMB3RS' at its regular time. I certainly didn't. But, the concept sounded interesting enough that I did tape it. It had some good points and some weak ones. Chances are it won't last long in this time slot of death (Sunday Evening, and up against Desperate Housewives), but in case anyone else is interested in what kind of a show it is I'll give some of my impressions.
Essentially, it's a cop show in the mold of Quincy, Crossing Jordan and Medium. In this case the person outside the police establishment who helps solve crime is a young male professor of mathematics. The twists of the story are that his older brother is an upper level investigator for the FBI, and the professor lives with his father. Judd Hirsch's role is familar to those who've seen the movie Independance Day, ie the dad who doesn't fit in his sons' world, but is clever enough to give sage advice at the critical moments. The brother in the FBI (Rob Morrow) actually gets top billing in the credits and probably will see more air time, but it's pretty clear the younger brother (David Krumholtz) is the real focus of the show.
Good points
The writers do seem to have some senstivity toward intelligence. The math genius isn't a socal basket case. He's no idiot-savant, who can't function at all outside of mathematics. The father isn't a babbling idiot. He does seem capable of having been the biological father of two very intelligent sons.
One of the characters, the professor's friend from the academic world is there to bring up the very real problem, that genius can get distracted, and that there is only so much time in a person's life to accomplish things, whether it be of an academic or crime fighting nature.
The only 'regular' who doesn't appear in the opening credits seems like she'd could be a lot more important to the story than two of the FBI man's crime fighting buddies who are in the credits. It's a young woman who is obviously in love with the young math professor. When you first see her on screen you'd swear she was the department secretary. But, later we learn she is a grad student, and the professor is her thesis advisor. If the business about the department secretary sounds a little patronizing, it's not. It's clear from the first moment you see her that she very sharp and part of what she does is watch the professor's back in small ways, when he's distracted with whatever he's working on.
The math element of the show does seem to have some relevance to what's going on. The writers are not trying to bore the audience with details although there is some necessity of suggesting what he's working on and why. Using the sprinklers as a diagram was sort of neat. I hope the average viewer would appreciate it.
Bad Points.
Okay, it's a pilot and pilots tend to be a bit rough. On the FBI side the subordinate people seem a bit 2-dimensional and colorless. It's CSI/Law and Order with no personality. That's probably fixable.
It's too much like other crime shows. When the first episode deals with a murderer-serial-rapist, you have the ask yourself where they are going to go from there.
The 'bad guy' supervisor in the office, who is there solely to question the usefulness of consulting the math professor, is set apart front his colleagues by having a fussy, yet strikingly ugly hairdo. Um, the show is telling us nerds are fine, but watch out for folks with bad hair?
Compared to the FBI on this show, "Big Brother is watching" is more like "Lil' Sis is playing dollies." These folks have infinite money, infinite resources, infinite manpower to do surveillance and I suspect an infinite lack of respect for individual civil liberties. You'd like to tell the producers that some pretty fine shows have been made with the police not having any of those.
Silly Points
We first see the math professor flashing down hill in ---cough, cough, -- a soap box derby car. The point is supposed to be the professor is interested in all kinds of things including in this case aerodynamics. The bad point is that clearly the writers are hoping the audience doesn't know the difference between what a mathemetician does and what an engineer does. Not that the math professor couldn't have perfectly valid interests in engineering, but chances are it will never be called that on the show.
It doesn't take a math professor to realize that the first solution the professor came up with is a fairly straight forward statics problem that wouldn't take a lot of inventiveness on the part of the math professor. In fact the FBI could and would probably have come up with the same conclusions with a little intuitive geometry; in other words if they'd just looked at the map of the locations of the crimes a little more intently. The final solution would have required someone with some serious math skills, but the precision of the answer is pretty comical if you understand the problem. Well, it's TV and perhaps that kind of faithfulness to detail shouldn't be expected..
The grad student lovingly caresses the mathematical expression the professor has left on the chalk board. OK, it could happen in real life, and there is a certain economy of means, showing both it's a worthy piece of work and that she loves the guy. But, I wish folks on the lit side of academics would learn how folks on the math/science side of things usually express themselves, whether or not anyone is looking. What they showed wasn't typical of the real thing.
Pet peeves -
The relationship between the professor and grad student is clearly set up to have a conflict between what they feel about each other and proper professional behavior between a professor and his advisee. If the show had plenty of time, I'd have to say I'd rather see this relationship develop than have it dumped on us full blown when we enter the story. As it is the solution is too easy. She just needs to finish her thesis. If she's a doctoral candidate the problem goes away as soon as she gets her degree. If she's a masters candidate who wants to go on, it's still easy. This is Los Angeles not Yankton, SD. There are other universities in town where she could finish her grad student career if that was necessary. The professor should tell her to hurry up and finish her thesis so she can move on academically and into his place on a personal level. I'm sure his dad wouldn't mind. ;o)
This would have been a terrific movie. I have doubts about the long term viability of a series with this premise, even if it was in a good time slot.
In Conclusion -
I sort of like it, despite the fact the writers are in over their heads with the math. The grad student is really sexy like a cross between someone I knew way back when and Kristen Kreuk; mostly KK's looks and the other woman's brains. That's a great combination!
I don't expect NUMB3RS to last, but I think I'll tape it again next time just to see where the show will head.
Essentially, it's a cop show in the mold of Quincy, Crossing Jordan and Medium. In this case the person outside the police establishment who helps solve crime is a young male professor of mathematics. The twists of the story are that his older brother is an upper level investigator for the FBI, and the professor lives with his father. Judd Hirsch's role is familar to those who've seen the movie Independance Day, ie the dad who doesn't fit in his sons' world, but is clever enough to give sage advice at the critical moments. The brother in the FBI (Rob Morrow) actually gets top billing in the credits and probably will see more air time, but it's pretty clear the younger brother (David Krumholtz) is the real focus of the show.
Good points
The writers do seem to have some senstivity toward intelligence. The math genius isn't a socal basket case. He's no idiot-savant, who can't function at all outside of mathematics. The father isn't a babbling idiot. He does seem capable of having been the biological father of two very intelligent sons.
One of the characters, the professor's friend from the academic world is there to bring up the very real problem, that genius can get distracted, and that there is only so much time in a person's life to accomplish things, whether it be of an academic or crime fighting nature.
The only 'regular' who doesn't appear in the opening credits seems like she'd could be a lot more important to the story than two of the FBI man's crime fighting buddies who are in the credits. It's a young woman who is obviously in love with the young math professor. When you first see her on screen you'd swear she was the department secretary. But, later we learn she is a grad student, and the professor is her thesis advisor. If the business about the department secretary sounds a little patronizing, it's not. It's clear from the first moment you see her that she very sharp and part of what she does is watch the professor's back in small ways, when he's distracted with whatever he's working on.
The math element of the show does seem to have some relevance to what's going on. The writers are not trying to bore the audience with details although there is some necessity of suggesting what he's working on and why. Using the sprinklers as a diagram was sort of neat. I hope the average viewer would appreciate it.
Bad Points.
Okay, it's a pilot and pilots tend to be a bit rough. On the FBI side the subordinate people seem a bit 2-dimensional and colorless. It's CSI/Law and Order with no personality. That's probably fixable.
It's too much like other crime shows. When the first episode deals with a murderer-serial-rapist, you have the ask yourself where they are going to go from there.
The 'bad guy' supervisor in the office, who is there solely to question the usefulness of consulting the math professor, is set apart front his colleagues by having a fussy, yet strikingly ugly hairdo. Um, the show is telling us nerds are fine, but watch out for folks with bad hair?
Compared to the FBI on this show, "Big Brother is watching" is more like "Lil' Sis is playing dollies." These folks have infinite money, infinite resources, infinite manpower to do surveillance and I suspect an infinite lack of respect for individual civil liberties. You'd like to tell the producers that some pretty fine shows have been made with the police not having any of those.
Silly Points
We first see the math professor flashing down hill in ---cough, cough, -- a soap box derby car. The point is supposed to be the professor is interested in all kinds of things including in this case aerodynamics. The bad point is that clearly the writers are hoping the audience doesn't know the difference between what a mathemetician does and what an engineer does. Not that the math professor couldn't have perfectly valid interests in engineering, but chances are it will never be called that on the show.
It doesn't take a math professor to realize that the first solution the professor came up with is a fairly straight forward statics problem that wouldn't take a lot of inventiveness on the part of the math professor. In fact the FBI could and would probably have come up with the same conclusions with a little intuitive geometry; in other words if they'd just looked at the map of the locations of the crimes a little more intently. The final solution would have required someone with some serious math skills, but the precision of the answer is pretty comical if you understand the problem. Well, it's TV and perhaps that kind of faithfulness to detail shouldn't be expected..
The grad student lovingly caresses the mathematical expression the professor has left on the chalk board. OK, it could happen in real life, and there is a certain economy of means, showing both it's a worthy piece of work and that she loves the guy. But, I wish folks on the lit side of academics would learn how folks on the math/science side of things usually express themselves, whether or not anyone is looking. What they showed wasn't typical of the real thing.
Pet peeves -
The relationship between the professor and grad student is clearly set up to have a conflict between what they feel about each other and proper professional behavior between a professor and his advisee. If the show had plenty of time, I'd have to say I'd rather see this relationship develop than have it dumped on us full blown when we enter the story. As it is the solution is too easy. She just needs to finish her thesis. If she's a doctoral candidate the problem goes away as soon as she gets her degree. If she's a masters candidate who wants to go on, it's still easy. This is Los Angeles not Yankton, SD. There are other universities in town where she could finish her grad student career if that was necessary. The professor should tell her to hurry up and finish her thesis so she can move on academically and into his place on a personal level. I'm sure his dad wouldn't mind. ;o)
This would have been a terrific movie. I have doubts about the long term viability of a series with this premise, even if it was in a good time slot.
In Conclusion -
I sort of like it, despite the fact the writers are in over their heads with the math. The grad student is really sexy like a cross between someone I knew way back when and Kristen Kreuk; mostly KK's looks and the other woman's brains. That's a great combination!
I don't expect NUMB3RS to last, but I think I'll tape it again next time just to see where the show will head.
no subject
;o)
no subject
no subject
But enjoyable, and more pretty boys to watch! ;)