Lost is Rich, The Riches are Lost, and Battlestar Galactica Barely Is

I just watched Monday’s episode of The Riches and I’m still not sure how I feel about the show. Everything about it screams “this is good TV,” at least everything except for the way the story is unfolding. I’m sorry, it just doesn’t capture me, I’m sure that it does for some, but not for me. I think that maybe that’s because I don’t feel like the story arc of each episode really holds together very well on its own. Both episodes that have aired thus far just seem to be building towards an end of the season climax with the rest of the Travellers. But, as stand-alone episodes I don’t think they really work. No? Do you? Great, Eddie Izzard got a job working for a nut, and Minnie Driver has started fighting with the neighbors. But her story didn’t really get past the opening salvos before the episode was over, and his was pretty obvious from the beginning. 

And, as someone who struggles to play golf, there’s no way that Wayne (Izzard) is that good picking up the clubs for the first time. Sure, he’s a con man, but you don’t con your way to actually being a good golfer your first time picking up clubs. 

Am I wrong? No, sadly, I’m not.

I don’t mind being wrong, I don’t mind being surprised. Battlestar Galactica always finds ways to surprise me, even on the episodes I don’t particularly enjoy. It happened with this week’s episode, just as I was getting used to their promo-ing deleted scenes that will air at the end of the episode I’m watching, Sci-Fi went out and interrupted BSG with Quentin Tarantino telling me all about Grindhouse during every commercial break. First off, I don’t understand why I need deleted scenes from the episode I’m watching to air after the episode. 

Scenes are generally deleted for two reasons: they don’t work or they don’t fit into the time allotted for the show. Clearly with Sci-Fi showing deleted scenes without having the episodes of BSG run over, the second scenario isn’t in play here. That leaves us with the scene being deleted because it didn’t work. Why then do they not fix it, or make something that does work slightly longer, or add a couple shots of the fleet as a whole coming back from commercial breaks? Why must I be subjected to cut-rate DVD content on the air? 

And second (you thought I wasn’t going to get back there, didn’t you), did I really need these snippets to appear so regularly? Couldn’t they all have been thrown together to make one decent sized segment instead of all these mini-segments? I think so. But, here’s what I’d really like to see: a full episode of Battlestar Galactica that isn’t cut short in order to air deleted scenes or repeatedly promo-ing a movie. 

Of course, I was also surprised on Lost. How can you not be surprised watching that show? Frankly though, I’m loving it. I’m just loving it. They’re getting really, really weird with all the backstories now: Claire and Jack last week and Locke and his dad this week, and I think it’s great. No, seriously, it’s fantastic. I can only be so happy with it though because I have faith that the producers actually know where they’re going. I believe that they have a great reason for having all these weird things on the island happen. If they don’t, if they start wandering aimlessly, The X-Files-style, it’ll all fall apart, but I don’t think it’ll happen. If it does go that way, I’m throwing them all in a hatch and not even airlifting in Dharma Project food. 

Call me naïve, call me crazy, call me kooky, just don’t call me Ben. What a sick and twisted fellow he is, but Locke wanted to blow the submarine anyway, so I can’t really put that on Ben manipulating him, it was Locke’s idea before he went to see Ben. 

To sum up: The Riches could be better, Battlestar Galactica could have a full show’s worth of content, and Lost better have a plan.