Now, you might have caught the extended preview of the prequel Caprica while watching the series finale. I keep going back and forth, and this preview swung me back to the “I don’t know” category. The show looks like it could be good, but the preview was poorly manufactured and failed to create much excitement. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Or will we?

Watch the first seven video clips from Caprica now:

Honestly, why name a show My Own Worst Enemy? Especially a thriller? It sounds like a sitcom. Thrillers, especially ones about undercover agents or hitmen or whatever Christian Slater played, should have cool one-or-two-word titles, not some cheesy title that immediately will turn audiences off. Think: Alias, Lost, CSI, JAG, Cold Case, NCIS, The Shield and countless others. Regardless of what you think of those individual shows, nice, short, cool names sell. Clever titles that might work as book titles don’t. My Own Worst Enemy was doomed before the marketing ever started.

Of course, the marketing didn’t help. The concept was cool in theory, but the previews prevented it as more of a gimmick than anything else. They needed some slick, action-packed previews, not the stuff that they threw at audiences seemingly every commercial break.

And personally, I almost find that well known actors are often a detractor for new shows. I’d rather see a show based around an idea rather than around an actor, and the fact that Christian Slater hasn’t done anything of significance in ten years was problematic. I have nothing against the guy, but more often then not, if I see previews for a new show led by a truly recognizable actor, I question its quality.

There’s my random blog post today…

No doubt, fans like me are going to protest this like crazy, as Heroes is one of the most refreshing shows on television. It was a risky venture by NBC – after all, even with superheroes being as popular as ever after successful franchises like X-Men and Spider-man, TV audiences can be finicky, and the thought of a television show about “realistic” superheroes was pushing the acceptability factor of people. Nonetheless, it launched with a slam dunk and just went from there, delivering some of the best television we’ve seen in years (OK, not nearly as good as Lost or Battlestar Galactica).

Unfortunately, the second season was a bit weak at times, and the last several episodes were hurried by the writer’s strike, cutting short major season arcs and conveniently wrapping them up in overly ambitious ways. Season Two saw a ridiculously small amount of episodes, and apparently that was more than enough to kill it for audiences. Still, a 25% decrease is pretty shocking, and NBC must have passed the break-even point as I’m sure Heroes is quite pricey (despite having rather crappy special effects by today’s standards).

Anyway, while Heroes did experience a 25% drop with its season premiere, NBC of course is not really canceling one of its most popular shows. Did you really believe that? Did you?

The Office: Season Four starts off where Season Three left off – surprise, surprise – with Pam and Jim bringing their relationship into the public atmosphere of Dundler Mifflin. Engagement is hinted at, but will Jim actually propose? Meanwhile, Dwight is continuing his quest to become head of the office (or at least second-in-charge, now that Jim officially holds that title), while still annoyed by the progressing relationship of Andy and his ex, Angela. And Michael is finding his relationship with Jan strained to the brink. Also, young “Wunderkind” Ryan, who was promoted above Michael last season, is trying to take Dundler Mifflin into the 21st century, further creating tension between him and his former colleagues.

Season Four is a bit weaker than the last two seasons, as NBC introduced several hour-long episodes that didn’t always hit the mark. At half hour increments, the writers are able to shove just the right amount of jokes into each episode; at an hour, while still funny, a few gags seem to overrun their welcome. More importantly, many of the episodes see Michael (Steve Carell) going above and beyond to do stupid, idiotic things; he crosses the line in a few points that stretch the believability factor, even beyond what he normally does. In Season Five, the writers will need to be careful to be funny without making Michael a complete and utter idiotic. I like him better as a dumb, vein and harmless guy, not an absurdly stupid moron.

Nevertheless, The Office: Season Four is still pretty funny and, for the most part, maintains the quality of past seasons. There are some notable highlights of the season, including “Dinner Party” and “Night Out.” It’s been a while since I’ve watched all the episodes, so I can’t remember other highlights.

As far as special features go, the box set is full of deleted scenes. Some are better than others, of course, but you get a nice little extended package with each episode. Beyond that, NBC has included a few random things, including a commercial called “Rabies: The More You Know” and a blooper reel. There are a few other minor featurettes, as well as audio commentaries for each episode. Aside from the deleted scenes, there’s nothing particularly amazing here, but like with most TV box sets, you’ll probably be buying it for the episodes – not the bonus features.

If you’re a fan of The Office, Season Four is a must-buy. Many episodes get funnier the more you watch them, and with only 16 episodes in the season, you can watch the whole thing in a single weekend.

Let’s all face it: Heroes: Season Two wasn’t as good as series one. Writer’s strike aside, it was still a tad rushed, a little weak in the writing department at times, and so on and so forth. Some characters were taken down some strange paths (Mohinder), and others were introduced that just weren’t very interesting (like the New Orleans girl who can learn anything). The writer’s strike made the last several episodes even more accelerated than the earlier ones, leading to rough transitions, undeveloped stories and a resolution to the season-wide story arc that should have come 13 episodes later. All that being said, Heroes is still one of the best shows on television.

But that’s not what I’m here to review. There are plenty of websites devoted to just how good (or bad) Heroes is, so I’m focusing the rest of this review on the bonus features. As is typical with TV releases these days, the bonus features are annoyingly spread across multiple discs, which is probably fine for most – except for when you’re trying to review the bonus features and have to swap the disc out every fifteen minutes, damn it.

Anyway, the highlight of the box set is the deleted scenes, of which there are plenty. Practically every episode has a couple of deleted scenes, some of which are quite revealing. As always, you won’t miss too much if you never see these, but as far as deleted scenes go, they’re pretty good. The highlight… of the highlights… is an alternate ending, which truly is an alternate ending. SPOILER ALERT. Whereas in the actual final episode of the season, Peter, Nathan and Hiro stop the virus from being unleashed – only to have Nathan get shot while attempting to announce that he has special powers. In the alternate ending, the writers take the darker approach by letting the virus get released, causing Odessa, Texas to go into quarantine. Ultimately, the actual ending is tighter and more effective, but it would have been pretty cool had Peter not caught the vial at the end of Season Two.

Beyond the alternate ending and deleted scenes, Heroes: Season Two comes with some pretty good “Genetics of a Scene” clips, which are pretty entertaining and slightly insightful. I’d recommend these. There are also some NBC featurettes, which I didn’t watch, and a series of “Untold Episodes,” which are pretty good. There are also audio commentaries for the episodes.

Unfortunately, the rest of the bonus features aren’t all that good. There’s a ridiculously cheesy “documentary” about Takezo Kensei, which is so bad I could only watch a minute of it. I mean, it’s about as bad as faux documentaries can get. A “news reel” about Richard Drucker is also quite terrible, and rather pointless unless I completely missed something. The “Season 2: A New Beginning” featurette is just a promotional, “you’re going to see things you’ve never seen before” kind of featurette, and the Season 3 preview is, as expected, nothing special.

Heroes: Season Two is worth the purchase because, yes, it contains all of the episodes from season 2. The deleted scenes, alternate endings and “Genetics of a Scene” bonus features are well worth it; at the same time, NBC would have done well to save themselves some money and not include their “original” bonus features, as they are downright terrible and just a waste of money. Still, recommended for the overall value of the show.

Unfortunately, it’s hard to review only half of a movie/mini-series, especially when the first half is the uninteresting part. It’s been a while since I’ve read the book or watched the original movie, but I’m pretty sure a lot of the stuff in the first part of A&E’s version is made up to serve as filler. The added material, which expands the search in the quarantined town and shows more of how the infection came to be, is not that bad in its own right. The expanded plot works naturally in terms of the story’s progression.

Unfortunately, by the time the first half of The Andromeda Strain comes to an end, the movie still hasn’t dived into the exciting part, which, needless to say, is the part based directly on the book. If you’re unaware of what The Andromeda Strain is about, the story follows a group of scientists in a high-tech, underground facility who are trying to discover a cure to an alien virus that kills quickly and mutates just as fast. The facility, designed to safeguard against contamination of the outside world, becomes a trap when the virus is unleashed. The scientists have to move from one floor to the next to save themselves and stop the facility’s nuclear core from self destructing, which, contrary to the intended purpose, would cause the virus to become even stronger.

When Part One ends, the scientists have yet to be put in danger. This is a major problem. Nothing particularly interesting occurs in the first half, even though it contains a lot of deaths, a possible nuclear strike and more. The power of The Andromeda Strain is its claustrophobic, breakneck suspense, and the A&E series doesn’t reveal any of that in its first half. What does this tell me? Either people will lose interest after the first half, or, as I would recommend, just watch the second half on Tuesday, May 27th. I’m sure they’ll have a nice little recap at the beginning.

Unfortunately, I can’t comment on the second half of the series. From a production point of view, the first half is good but not great. The mini-series stars Benjamin Bratt, and in general the acting is pretty good for a TV movie. Neither Bratt nor the rest of the cast will blow you away, but they pull things off well enough. The production seems to have a fairly decent budget, though it definitely feels like a TV movie at times. Oddly enough, with so many added minutes, the setup to the infection could have been done better. Some of the characters who die make some really weird decisions (if a satellite crashed right next to you, wouldn’t you call the police rather than load it into the back of your truck and then proceed to open up its shell?). TV movies always seem to focus on elements that shouldn’t be focused on, while neglecting normal storytelling techniques that could really enhance even the most basic of screenplays.

I do believe The Andromeda Strain could really become something in the second half if it sticks true to the novel, but the first half isn’t particularly memorable.

Also, don’t forget to enter my Andromeda Strain contest – I’m giving away a prize pack that contains the original 1971 DVD, the 2008 A&E DVD (not yet released), the Crichton novel and more.

Anyway, the preview for Lost: Season 4 is now online, and I must say it’s quite impressive. After not liking the season three finale all that much, I’ve grown to appreciate it a lot more over the last few months. Obviously the writers have something clever up their sleeves, and, as it is quite clear, the rescuers aren’t Heaven-sent as the survivors think they are.

Here’s the preview:

The Wire Trailer

The Wire Behind-the-Scenes Footage

Some fans weren’t overly crazy about the first eight episodes of the show, which focus exclusively on Jack, Kate and Sawyer and just about ignore the rest of the cast. This was a major departure from the past two seasons, where each episode focused on a different character, but these episode still do a lot: they set the stage for what is to come, they introduce us to The Others and give us some insight into the truth about the island. The series starts off great, with a shockingly suburban scene, and the first half of the season ends great as well, with the amazingly tense scene where Jack holds Ben hostage and orders Kate to run. From there, the show returns to its more ordinary format, focusing on different characters as it sees fit to develop the story. Still, there are a lot more of The Others, and now, instead of making them an elusive shadow people, they are themselves people and characters who just happen to have twisted morals. The introduction of Jacob (if you can call it that) is terrific, and there are plenty of other highlights in the series as well. While there are a few stumbles (Hurley’s van episode), but hey, no one’s perfect.

The DVD, as you might imagine, has a lot of little bonus features, all of which are gathered onto Disc 7. Much like with Lost itself, you have to work to find the features, as the DVD lacks labels for the most part. While I normally don’t like this approach, it fits in with the theme of the show, and also gives you a chance to explore for easter eggs, of which there are several. Some of these easter eggs are pretty lame (one where various cast and crew members talk with sentiment to everyone who has made the experience so great), but there are a few that are entertaining.

The real meat of the special features are these:

• The World of the The Others
  A look at different aspects of the revelations about the bitter enemies of the survivors. Fans will be delighted that the cast and crew reveal a lot of little tidbits you may not have thought about.
• Lost Flashbacks
  Nothing too spectacular here. There are a couple additional flashbacks that provide a little more detail into certain stories, but there’s nothing that wasn’t removed without a purpose.
• Lost On Location
  This is an entertaining featurette that explores several episodes from behind-the-scenes. There are a lot of cast and crew interviews and looks at how sequences were filmed. The most interesting part is where we see how the original crash scene is reconstructed to add in new actors that weren’t around in the first season.
• The Lost Book Club
  Watch this one. The writers reveal that every book shown in the show has significance, and they let slip a few details about what’s to come. There are definitely a few things in here that had me wanting the fourth season to come along right now.
• Lost in a day
  This is a look at 24 hours in the day of the production. I honestly can’t remember if I found this one insightful or not, but I think I did.
• Deleted Scenes
  There are a few decent deleted scenes, but, of course, there’s nothing too spectacular to be found here.
• Bloopers
  Hey, who doesn’t like bloopers?

I’m not quite sure where this is on the DVD – it may be an easter egg – but the best part of the features is a brief instructional video a la the Dharma Initiative. Does this explain the truth behind Lost? Read more here.

However, the video is quickly disrupted – and by that I mean that the scientists begin to freak out – when a second bunny rabbit appears. What’s so strange or notable about these events are these:

• The bunny rabbit that the scientist is holding has a “15″ branded on its side. When the other bunny appears, it too has “15″ on its side.
• The scientist shouts in desperation, “Keep them away from each other!”
• The scientist then asks an assistance how far “the shift was set?” She responds, “Minus twenty.”

Um… so what the hell does this mean? Cloning? That would explain the “15″ on both bunnies. But “keep them away from each other”? Does that mean alternate realities? Time travel? This instructional video definitely raises some questions and possibly answers them, but of course we won’t know for sure. Near the end of Season 3, it is revealed that rescuers found an airplane they believed to be the survivor’s flight at the bottom of a deep underwater chasm, with all bodies on board. If this airplane is indeed the correct flight, then how are the survivors still alive? Are they alternate versions of themselves? What the heck?

Anyway, I’m intrigued.