Kensi Blye - a paradox in development - Part 1

This is a critisism of the character, not the actress Daniela Ruah (whom I like)

Kensi is probably the character I disliked most when I first watched NCIS:LA and have now, after 1 year ended up liking the most. She has developed so much over 3 season that it´s pretty astounding. But it´s also good to see how her character has improved and gotten better and better. Right now, she is one of the better created characters on TV.

In season 1, she is the super-ninja-kick-ass-deadly-agent that can assassinate, kill, destroy, hurt and injure people without ruining a fingernail and look sexy while at it. She is the alpha female, beautiful looking but still deadly. And she manages to put her life in danger over and over again, use her sexuality to get suspects (which is an aspect I have never enjoyed in her character) and shoot and kill dozens of people without blinking an eye. Nothing seems to affect her, except when Don dies (probably the first moment she was genuinely hurt in the series). She is very unrealistic and definitely not someone females can relate to. As a character she has her moments but a lot of the time, she is flat and unemotional. She does her part well but she seems to have no soul, no feelings, no back story. It seems it´s not until the last 4-5 episodes of season 1 she suddenly starts springing out as a real character. And that is great to watch. At least, when watching old episodes, I detect a great change between the earlier and later episodes of season 1.

In season 2 there is a sudden developement in her character straight from the beginning which is very welcomed (where Deeks plays a part). Suddenly as a character she starts to display more feelings and seems much more affected by what she does. She is no longer the unfeeling ninja-assassin agent but someone that´s a kick-ass agent with a healthy dose of feelings. Her back story is explained and it gives her more depth. She starts to relate more to people (such as in the black widow episode) and is affected by what goes on around her. And I can´t help but mention that her humour suddenly explodes. I can´t count all the times I either giggle or laugh heartily at the antics she and Deeks pull off.   Episode 2x17 is a turning point because she is genuinely affected by Deeks being shot and is shown being scared, confused, worried, frustrated and feels the negative aspects of her job. She is someone that really feels, someone that´s human (And Ruah´s performance in this episode was great!).

In episode 2x20 The Job she is at her best in my opinion in season 2 She does pull the ninja-agent-seducing card but she does it with a genuinely human feeling. She is shocked when a man is shot, scared when she needs to meet the thief, tired and off after being hit on the jaw (probably the first time an injury she has sustained has had any lasting damage) and she is for the first time terrified of what might happen. In other words, she goes through a range of emotions that make her seem wonderfully human. This is the episode where I really began to enjoy Kensi as a character and like her. And I have re-watched it several times and each time, enjoyed it as much.

It´s kind of like the writers had a burst of epiphany between season 1 and 2 about how they wanted to develope character and the end result is great!

Next Part will be about season 3 and a little bit more dissecting :)

Deeks - A good character

I just got my first comment! Thank you Edgar Allen :)

The blog post today is dedicated to the character Marty Deeks on NCIS:LA, because he is my favourite character on that show (Kensi is 2nd). He is in my opinion, the best created character and here´s why in bullet points:

-He is not a superpower, ninja agent. He is "just" a cop which incidentally makes him more toned down than the others and more subtle.

-He is uncomfortable with all the killing they have to do (while the other just shoot away) and when he shot an unarmed man he was distressed and worried. He has a motto of shooting only those who intend to harm him or are aiming a gun at him and shooting. Never ever unarmed people or citizens.

-He knows when NOT to shoot (unlike the rest that seem happy to shoot pretty much anyone) and has the glorious quote:"They gave me a gun because I know when not to shoot. If I have lost that edge, I am just another thug with a gun".

-He talks a lot, has an awkward aura about him and makes blundering mistakes. I can so sympathysize with him talking a lot (a bad habit of mine!) and it´s refreshing to see a character that´s not perfect, but is  human and makes mistakes and is a bit blundering.

-He has his issues with sensitivity, chappy lips, dry skin, losing a fingernail and little petty stuff. While it´s little things it´s good to have a character to complains about them and it makes him more human.

-His constant talking and offhand remarks always make me laugh. He is witty, awkward, gloriously unassuming and funny as hell.

-He is incredibly loyal, particularly to Kensi and is always protecting her. It´s a lovely thing to see and it makes their bond that more realistic and nuanced.

-He is uncomfortable with some of things they do. He just doesn´t march on like the rest (well not Kensi) like nothing affects him. He is affected and shows his feelings, both good and bad.

-He displays connection towards other characters and reaches out to them which is always wonderful to see. He is awkward when communicating but he does it sincerely.

-He admits that he has weaknesses and that he had a difficult past. And that yes, he has not moved far aay from the place he grew up in. He admits he isn´t perfect, that things affect him and that he´s still figuring life out. He is human.

-He is Norwegian-American. As a Norwegian, it makes me very happy :)

I love watching Deeks on NCIS:LA and I am a subtle fangirl.

And next up for dissection is Kensi as a character.

A new TV season is beginning

Finally it´s September and my favorite shows are about to start again. And lately, I have been thinking about what TV shows I want to watch this year and what shows I will skip. And it´s fairly obvious, that I´ll do some tweaking.

I will cut out The Mentalist, Bones and Criminal Minds.
The 4th season of the Mentalist was the worst I have ever seen. The story lines became more and more unrealistic and badly written, the characters became more one dimensional and as a whole, the show deteriorated fast. I loved the first 3 season but I saw none of what I like so much about the show in the 4th season. Not the offhand humor, wonderful character interactions and exciting story lines. I honestly became very bored every time I watched the 4th season so I won´t continue.

Bones has become to much of a ridicule. The 7th season had it´s moments but on the whole, the show has deteriorated so much from it´s incredible start and it´s just a shadow it it´s former glory. It´s become tired and dry and I don´t enjoy watching it anymore.

Criminal Minds 7th season was horrid. Minus Reed and Garcia. Ever since the sixth season, the show has been spiralling downwards and watching it trying again and again to be the best crime show on TV and become worse with every attempt is not something I want to spend my TV time on.

But I will continue to watch NCIS, Castle and NCIS:Los Angeles. NCIS continues to be brilliant, Castle is going to wonderful this season and blow my mind and NCIS:Los Angeles has improved so much and become so good that I just have to continue watching it. Not to mention the fact that Deeks and Kensi are just too funny to resist.

So I am excited for this year´s TV season.

Sexualising TV characters

One of the things I´ve noticed about my favorite TV shows is the fact that all the female leads are stunning. . Most of the time, when in character, those actresses look absolutely gorgeous and natural. The make-up is not too much and the clothes are generally nice (I seriously want Kensi´s wardrobe in NCIS:LA!). They just look natural, stunning of course but still natural.

But sometimes the shows overstep some boundaries in my opinion when it comes to sexualising those characters. Yes, they are beautiful but I see absolutely no need to strip their clothes off and have entire scenes with the characters in nothing but their underwear/swimsuits/ a towel.

I can name several instances on NCIS:LA. In one episode Kensi did a surveilance on a beach dressed in nothing but her bikini, a simple wrap and a beach hat. Yet, she still ran around with a gun, intimidated and shot people and kicked ass.
In another episode she stripped off all her clothes expect her underwear in order to fit through a small hole.
And I can´t count all the times she has gone undercover as a "model" or someone that´s supposed to be stunningly sexy. It seems that everytime Kensi goes undercover it´s essential that there´s a "sexy" angle to her work. And I don´t see the reason why.

I have come to highly enjoy the character of Kensi. She has become much more realistic and nuanced since the 1st season and now has a nice feel to her. When I watch NCIS:LA I do it because of the charaters and their interactions. I enjoy Kensi´s character so much that I see no need to "sexualise" her in order to make her appealing. She stands on firm ground already as a well-rounded and nuanced character with a good backstory, excellent humor and some kick-ass skills. I see no need to strip her off her clothes when the charaters and the actor playing her are both so good.

I don´t need Kensi to be sexy to enjoy and appreciate her character and I hope most fans of the shows agree with me. I enjoy the character because of her personality and great wit, not because of her looks or her "sexyness".

And to be clear. I appreciate Ruah´s work as an actress and I higly enjoy her performance on NCIS:LA.

Cringing at foreign languages on TV

As a European that does NOT have English as my native tongue and a fluent speaker of 3 languages and have practical knowledge of 3 more I am always intrigued when I see actors trying to speak other languages that English on TV shows. And most of the time, they speak it not too well.

In NCIS:Los Angeles, Callen is supposed to speak Russian and he does that, although it´s with a dreadful American accent. Hanna speaks Japanese but the one time he spoke it, I was cringing the entire time. It´s not many times I have heard such a well rehearsed speech in foreign language with such a dreadful accent. But I also gladly acknowledge that Japanese is a very hard language to speak and Russian too. More importantaly, the actors make up for their language ability by being very funny!

So when I heard Kensi was supposed to use French to communicate with a couple of Vietnamese people I was ready to squirm but was pleasantly surprised. The actress actually had a really good accent, scrolled the R´s very well (something I can do too) and it was a delight to listen to her (the actress grew up in Portugal so she probably studied French in school). So kudos to Daniela Ruah for pulling off French!

I got the same delight when I heard Ziva on NCIS pull off Spanish for the first time. Since the actress, Cote de Pablo, is a fluent speaker of Spanish it was awesome to hear the way it sounded (much much better than Emily Prentiss on Criminal Minds!). Ziva is supposed to speak like 5 languages fluently (which is entirely possible in the real world) and in my opinion the actress generally pulls it off well when she speaks other languages than English (although I do wish she spoke more Hebrew).

But my most favorite thing would have to be Ziva messing up English idioms. I just love to hear the way she messed up idioms again and again and mixes them up and it´s always believable. As an EFL I can vouch for the difficulty of English idioms and listening to Ziva mess up and then being corrected has even helped teach me some (such as "look who´s calling the pot black").

So watching American actors mess up foreign languages continues to entertain me and I keep on learning.

Castle - In short

I can tell the exact I began watching Castle. I was at my grandpa´s house with my aunt and we turned on the TV. They were showing Castle 1x02 and the episode was almost at the end. I watched the final scenes and the episode intrigued me. So much I decided to go home and google it, then finding out it was receiving positive reviews on IMDB I decided to give it a try. I watched the pilot and was hooked. I loved that series the moment I started watching it and saw every single episode in less than a week. It´s been two years since I first saw Castle and I adore this series. It´s TV show heaven for me. I watch every new episode religiously and follow all updates closely.

It has everything I require from a good TV show and more. 

-The actors are wonderful and give outstanding performances each week

-The storylines are genuinely interesting and intriguing 

-The script always has plenty of humor but is dramatic and heart wrenching when it needs to be

-The characters are wonderfully nuanced and realistic

-The series feels realistic

-There is a great amount of respect in it towards a lot of things which I value

-It´s now showy or flashy 

-It makes the viewer think and doesn´t expect the viewer to have no brain

-It´s not dumbed down - instead it´s incredibly smart

-The actors and producers are wonderful with communicating with the fandom. Terri Edda has even tweeted me twice! They are honestly wonderful about it

-I can watch it over and over again

All in all - it´s the best show on TV right now. 

Proud Castle fangirl.

NCIS:LA I just keep on coming back to it

Note: This post is a criticism of NCIS:LA as an episode, NOT of the actors which I respect.

Last year after falling in love with NCIS I decided to give NCIS:LA a try. It seemed interesting and as a spinoff of NCIS it simply had to be good. I watched the first few episodes and liked them at first but my liking very quickly developed into annoyance. The characters seemed so unreal, there were at least 10 people killed in every episode, the banter felt forced, the technic doo-dah was way too much, the action sequences were way too rehearsed, the storylines were way too unreal and the episodes didn´t leave anything behind.
Every time I watch an NCIS episode it leaves something behind, it keeps me wondering. I can watch NCIS over and over again but never NCIS:LA. Yet I decided to go through with the entire 1st season and I lived it through (in TV terms that is). I should have stopped watching but there was something about it as an TV show that kept me coming back.

I gave 2nd season a go and was pleasantly surprised to note that they had improved drastically. The banter was now fun to watch, the storylines were often intriguing and the characters were getting more nuanced and developed. I "fell in love" with Deeks the second he hit the screen and he´s now my favorite character. As a series it had spectacular cinematography and I love being able to get a view of LA. However, what pulled me to the series again was the fact that finally the characters were emerging on their own. Kensi finally stopped being only like a Superwoman and instead turned out to be a realistic woman with her own personality and  stories to tell. She finally became interesting as a human being. Hanna and Callen toned down their Superman duo and became individual characters that had distinctive personalities. Deeks emerged as the glorious, incredibly human cop and kept my giggling with his offhand comments and felt genuinely interesting as a person. Hetty also turned out to be human (big surprise to me!). And Eric and Nell were still as human and relate able as ever.

The storylines were getting more and more interesting. The whole deal with the black book was curious and had me guessing. But the icing on the cake was the Deeks storyline where he gets shot. That episode was the first one that genuinely affected me and showed the character´s human side, especially Kensi whom I started to enjoy a lot more after that episode. And I started to love the humor in the series, it´s sparse but they definitely have their moments of great wit.

Right now the show is in it´s 3rd series, I am still following it and will continue to do so. The vast improvement that happened in season 2 has continued and now the series is genuinely enjoyable. It´s not deep, it´s not realistic but it´s enjoyable and infinitely better that most of the crap shown on TV these days (CSI f.ex.). And as a series, it keeps me guessing and keeps me entertained.

So dear NCIS:LA. I am here to stay :)

And just to be clear - I respect the actors and enjoy their work. They do good with what they get.