When Good Programs Go Bad: A Requiem For Ally McBeal

I have just watched the last episode of the last series of Ally McBeal. To be honest, it's a relief that it's over and done with. It used to be one of my favourite programs and I kept on watching it to the end, even though it should have been put out of it's misery a long time ago. It was such a pity that Larry had to leave in the previous series, it threw the whole program out of kilter.

1) Is that any way to run a firm ?
Hire loads of new lawyers at the start of the season, then sack two of them because the firm is losing money. Then later in the season hire loads more people, without any mention of how the firm can now afford it.

2) Use of new characters
Jenny & 'the boy' - So who thought that introducing an even wetter version of Ally was a good idea? Did they think that it would show that Ally had matured and was no longer quite such a pathetic character? Well it didn't work - she was too irritating for words and I was pleased when she and 'the boy' (you see I can't even remember his name!) were sacked from Cage & Fish and left the show.
Raymond - since Jenny & 'the boy' left we have hardly heard a peep out of him.
Maddie (Ally's child) - another bad idea, as it meant that Ally has spent too much time away from the office and courtroom, where all the interesting things happen.
Claire Otoms (Dame Edna) - Quite amusing when being used as Richard Fish's sidekick, I suppose.
Liza (Christina Ricci) - Really weird. Made up to look pop-eyed and feverish the whole time, and her courtroom tricks are so obviously fake, that I can hardly believe that a jury would ever fall for it, even in the not exactly realistic context of this show!
Victor (Jon Bon Jovi) - Eye-candy (need I say more?).
Nasty new male lawyer - Yuck. Why did they bother introducing him so near the end of the series. It added nothing of any value.

3) Use of Existing Characters
Corretta - I like Corretta, but to start with they gave her Elaine-type things to do, such as the muscle-suit for John Cage, and recently she hasn't had anything to do at all.
Elaine - One of my favourite characters has been totally side-lined. She should have created the muscle-suit! Apart from the episode where she auditioned for 'A Chorus Line', she has had nothing to do except show visitors in and run errands for Ally.
Lawyer-turned-therapist - C-wite a good idea, but seems to have dropped out of the series a while back.

4) The Last Episode
A very abrupt ending, everything fine in the previous episode, then suddenly "I'm resigning and moving to New York - goodbye". But it was nice to see Renee, Georgia & Billy's ghost coming back to saytheir farewells.

Books Read & Films Watched During October

Books Read

Homestead - Rosina Lippi
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie - Muriel Spark
Memento Mori - Muriel Spark
Aberysywyth Mon Amour - Malcolm Pryce

Two re-reads this month (the Muriel Sparks), but I also managed to release three novels onto my bookshelves from the unread books crates.

'Homestead' is not the sort of book I usually read, but I found it interesting, as it was set in a remote community with a distinctive culture that I knew nothing about. It is a set of short stories about the lives of women living in an isolated village in the Austrian Alps between the 1900's and the 1970's.

'Aberystwyth Mon Amour' is a a spoof of a hard-boiled Philip Marlow-type detective story, set in the mean streets of Aberystwyth. I really enjoyed it, but I suspect that it is especially amusing if you know Aber (as I do, having been to university there).

Cinema Trips

Lantana
xXx
Donnie Darko

Triple X is just a Bond movie without James Bond, so naturally it was fun to watch. It even had the clichéd Bond ending, with Triple X and 'the girl' on holiday together in an idyllic setting while the boss spied on them via satellite.

I really enjoyed Lantana. It is an Australian film that pretends to be a murder mystery, but is really about the tangled releationships between five couples. Apparently lanata is the name of the tangled shrubs that appear in the film. So it is symbolic of the relationships in the film as well as being where the dead body and a major clue were hidden.

I saw Donnie Darko this evening and it was fantastic, very unpredictable. The use of music was interesting (and I don't often notice film music!) especially in the school scene near the beginning, and the photography of the sky and scenery was beautiful. The imaginary giant rabbit was very scary, not in the least like Harvey; its metal mask brought skulls, myxamatosis and Herne the Hunter (because the rabbits ears were solid metal, looking more like horns than furry bunny ears) to mind. As the film ended, I was reminded of 'Carnival of Souls'.