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I'm having a time out until I can learn some manners.I love Canadian TV. Toight was the first episode of the show J_POD based on Couplands book. I really liked the book and the show seems to be very good as well.
I liked the casting. The pacing of the first show went really well and both followed the book quite closely and left on a cliff hanger.
It is not life changing or anything but it is nice fun entertainment. The 2 other shows that have been really pushed this season don't look nearly as good.
The Border is supposed to be like the amazing show from the last 2 years called Intelligence but does not even come close.
Even worse is a Canadian version of "Footballers wives" called MVP. Instead of football it is hockey. I skipped that one.
Still J-Pod looks good and if it does well it is almost garanteed to be picked up on cable for the US.
Besides Intelligence(which apparently got a mention in the back pages of Criminal) another Canadian show worth watching despite the name is
"Trailer park boys" . -
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CommentAuthorwarrenellis
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2008
The problem with TRAILER PARK BOYS, as many have said, is that once you've watched one season you've pretty much watched them all.
I think they probably peaked a couple of years ago, when Jim Lahey went mad and tried to have everyone killed. -
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- CommentAuthorharchangel
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2008
I loved J-Pod, and i live close enough to canada that i should get shows liek this...oh well, guess i'll just have to dig around the good ol internet to see what i can find. -
It'd be interesting if the US networks in desperation for new material due to the writers' strike grabbed the best of English language television from the rest of the world. Though I doubt that'd help the writers.
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I'm curious to see the final product, but the promo had me cringing when every character described themselves as the "such-and-such expert". I work in game development. If I went around calling myself an "expert" to anyone but the HR reps at my interview, I'd get the piss taken out of me daily. J-pod even has a "gore expert". I wasn't aware that that was a specialty anywhere outside of forensics and special-effects makeup. Must be nice.
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Havn't seen it yet, but fellow games industry people I know that have don't seem to like it. I tend to be more open minded, I even managed to sit through that old film 'The Net' without heckling. Much.
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- CommentAuthorKosmopolit
- CommentTimeJan 9th 2008
Little Mosque on the Prairie is quite amusing - if a little too sweet for my tastes. -
I'm having a time out until I can learn some manners.That was a very fair criticism of TPB Warren. The type of people in that show are not the type to do a lot of introspection and growing as a individual
When I lived in a Trailer park in Saskatchewan I could not watch the show because it was to much like the crap I had to deal with in real knife. My neighbour
was like Ricky with brain damage and crappier weed.
It is always hard for people in any trade to watch the TV version. Compared to Cops ,spy's and soldiers I think yoou computer guys have it pretty easy.
Little Mosque is a to sweet for me as well. writer is a lady who did a low budget doc that was excellent. I think you would like it as well Kosmopolit. -
I'm curious to see the final product, but the promo had me cringing when every character described themselves as the "such-and-such expert". I work in game development. If I went around calling myself an "expert" to anyone but the HR reps at my interview, I'd get the piss taken out of me daily. J-pod even has a "gore expert". I wasn't aware that that was a specialty anywhere outside of forensics and special-effects makeup. Must be nice.
I too work in game development and have for about 10 years now. I know it's supposed to be sexy and attractive since it's a TV-show but really, in real life, in production (art & code) you have about one woman for every 20 men. And that's a pretty optimistic number, I've worked at a company with 60 guys and one girl, and she was the office administrator and not in production.
So if there's any game developer around where the ratio of men to attractive women is about what it is in j-Pod then I'm sending you my CV right now. Truly, I wish more women were into games because then I wouldn't have to worry about them going "yeah, but do you have a real job too?" when I tell them what I do for a living. -
In the ten years I've been a gamedev, the most women I've ever known to be on the same team at once was 6. In a team of over a hundred. I did work with a female coder a few years back though, it seems they're as rare as hen's teeth in the games industry. And people wonder why so many videogames are about blowing things up and driving fast.
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CommentAuthorMagicSword!
- CommentTimeJan 10th 2008
Don't know how close the J-Pod TV show is going to reflect the original novel, but really the novel never seemed to be aiming to reflect reality (or the reality of games developers) to me at all. The novel is much more of a mash up of early twentieth century memes and Coupland's romantic tendencies, and is a sort of self referential nexus point for much of his work. It was the latest of his novels in the "Generation X" or "Microserfs" mold, but combined with the flights of fancy and fabulous events of "Girlfriend in a Coma" or "All Families Are Psychotic".
I really loved that book actually, and though I can still remember the characters, some of the jokes and the plot, I had completely forgotten that they were supposed to be games developers. So I don't think it's all that important to the story. But I do understand why anyone in that industry would get ticked about it being shoddily represented. -
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I'm having a time out until I can learn some manners.J-Pod is to a real game development studio what WKRP is to a real radio station.
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I've not read J-Pod, but Microserfs had something real to say about software development that kind of meshed with me as a game developer somewhere at it's heart beneath the layers of idealism, romanticism and "I said Zietgiest" whimsy.
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I'm having a time out until I can learn some manners.I think if you are expecting J-Pod to be a real examination of game developers you are kind of missing the point.
It is supposed to be a comedy that appeals to a more tech savy viewer than the usual TV fare.
The second episode was on tonight and it would have been good except it was completely spoiled by CBC's feed being terrible.
The show itself was excellent but every time there was movement there was an awful strobeing like when your on acid.
The show was quite funny and stayed close to the book which worked very well as a silly comedy.
Not all media should be as intense and thought producing as Warren Ellis or Neal Stephenson ,sometimes it is good to do a little light reading or in this case watching.
Usually lighter fare is aimed at a lowest common denominator audience but in this case it is light reading for the smarter set. -
Oh I know that, but it can be hard to enjoy something when it's about what you do and it's so far off base. I can't imagine many doctors like watching ER, for example. If it ever shows up somewhere I can see it I'll probably give it a try, is it a bit like 'The I.T. Crowd'?
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Well, I admit I've only seen the trailer, not read the book or seen the show, yet. I'm sure it's entertaining, it's just the choice of setting that makes me raise an eyebrow. A generic dilbert-esque IT company wouldn't have caused a reaction, but then again that has been done, repeatedly. I'll know if it ruins the show for me or not once I see it.
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Opening with a someone shooting on a camcorder fake interviews of the team members was a lazy and quite annoying exposition device. And they kept mining in it throughout the episode. Other than that it reminded me of Charlie Brooker's Nathan Barley , albeit with less ummph.
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As a long time Canadian hater of Canadian Television, this show was surprisingly sharp, kept up with the source material and had a few laugh out loud moments. Its officilaly on the DVR series record list!
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Ok, forget about my previous skepticism, I watched the two first episodes and it was absolutely hilarious! It indeed shows an outsider's picture of how game developers work, which is funny in itself since I get that exact picture from people outside the industry all the time in real life. Also, if it made fun of how our industry actually works then the target demographic would be somewhat slim. So yeah, there were a couple of times I laughed out loud and I'm eagerly awaiting the next episode.
As I said I haven't read the book but based on what I've seen so far, the game they're making? The company? Their jobs? One word: Doomed. -
Too bad the CBC's other new series, The Border, is like 24 and CSI Miami mashed together, only worse.