The Fall TV Season is Upon Us and I’m Not Ready

Every fall there is a host of new TV shows premiering and even more returning. Usually my husband and I go over summaries and trailers for the new crop and choose three or four to sample.

This year the very idea makes me fatigued.

The problem is that we haven’t caught up on last year’s viewing yet. We still have two episodes of Supergirl, seven episodes of Shield and eight of Twin Peaks to plow through. We’ve all but given up on Outlander season two.

I blame the invention of the PVR (? Perhaps called DVRs in the States?) Once upon a time you had to watch a show on the day that it aired or miss it until summer repeats or possibly forever. Then came the VCR and taping shows that played at an inconvenient time. Which was great. But we never had more than one ‘scratch’ tape so we never fell that far behind. Our PVR has a LOT of memory and so there’s less urgency to finish. (The only one we watch in a timely fashion is Game of Thrones to prevent spoilers.)

We really don’t watch that many shows. However the ones we do watch tend to have an over-arching plotline so we’re fanatical about watching them in order and not missing an episode. It ought to be possible to keep up or at least catch up over the summer. But each year we fall behind.

It’s my fault, really. There are a lot of evenings where we could have watched TV, but I chose to read instead.

Shows We’re Still Watching

1/ Timeless. New last year, this show took a few episodes to really hit its stride and we almost dropped it. I’m so glad we stuck with it and even gladder that it’s been renewed. Cool time travel and good characters with an over-arching plot.

2/ Supergirl. I love that we can watch this as a family. We’re only two shows behind so I’m still hoping to be caught up by the time season three starts.

3/ Big Bang Theory. This is the only sitcom on our list. (I often find sitcom humour hard to take because I hate watching characters I like do stupid things.) However, it’s much easier to block off time to watch a half-hour show, so we are caught up on this one.

4/ Shield. This one is on the bubble. I’m still enjoying most of the episodes, but we’re hopelessly behind. Not only that but it’s spinning off a new show The Inhumans, which sounds cool, but I don’t know that we have time for.

5/ Twin Peaks. We loved the original series but this one mostly has us shaking our heads. We’re eight episodes in and Lynch keeps introducing new characters and plotlines--and ignoring earlier plotlines. We watched ‘Gotta Light’ last night and only the very first scene had anything to do with the plot. Sigh. I’m not quite ready to give up yet, but I may watch the next one with the fast forward button in hand.

New Shows to Try:

1/ Star Trek: Discovery

2/ The Orville

3/ The Inhumans

4/ The Dark Crystal

5/ Krypton

There are also dozens of older shows I would love to try: The Librarians, The Flash, Jessica Jones, Stranger Things, but there’s just no time. Not without cutting into my reading time and that, my friend, isn’t happening.

Three reasons why I love Supergirl

Here's a thing about being a writer that I daresay all my fellow writers can appreciate, and which readers may not know:

If you've got to work on your own creative output, this often means you don't have as much time for anybody else's.

You get behind on your reading, on going to movies, and on television shows. Particularly if you also have a full-time day job, or if you're also a parent needing to take care of children, or all of the above. In my case I've got the full-time day job, which means I spend a good bit of my evenings and weekends trying to muster enough brain to put words into manuscripts. So my available bandwidth for watching television is limited.

But every so often I'll make an exception. Historically my exceptions have been Doctor Who (albeit with a somewhat fractious relationship, last couple of seasons) and Castle (on which I've fallen significantly behind, enough that I'm still well over a season behind just in time for the show getting cancelled).

Much more recently, though, I've been delighted to jump on watching Supergirl. I haven't been able to watch it as it's aired, but I did buy a Season Pass to season 1, and have been actively working to catch up. And since the news went around yesterday that the show has been officially renewed, I wanted to talk a bit about why exactly this show has delighted me, how it ties in with what I like to read and write about, and why I'll definitely be on board for Season 2.

1. Supergirl demonstrates that superhero stories do not have to be so unremittingly dark.

I've been hugely disappointed with reports that the recent DC movies have been so grim and unpleasant. But thankfully, they're not extending that to their television properties. My household has very much appreciated the brighter, more upbeat tone of The Flash--and I've very, very much appreciated that Supergirl in particular is a burst of sunshine. There's action, serious plot threads, and high emotion, absolutely--but there's a difference between "intense action" and "a world so bleak and grim that it's decidedly unpleasant to watch".

Likewise, this is something I try to accomplish in my writing. At the end of the day, even if I put my characters through the wringer during the course of a plot, I want them to come out the other side with something to be hopeful about. I want there to be brightness in their world.

2. Supergirl shows us that having superpowers is pretty freggin' amazing.

I've seen more than one movie review and more than one pop culture article talk about "superhero fatigue". With that kind of a reaction out there, it's very easy to become jaded about "oh look yawn another superhero television show". One of the things I've really loved about this show, though, is how much simple, outright joy Kara has in her abilities. Ability to fly? Ability to catch bullets with your bare hands? Ability to shoot lasers out of your eyes? Awesome.

And even more importantly, Kara takes immense joy in being able to use her abilities to help others. Seeing how splendidly Melissa Benoist portrays Kara's emotional investment in her powers goes a long, long way to getting me emotionally invested in what she's doing with them.

When I write, whether it's my girl Kendis going holy crap I can do magic or Faanshi finding that for her, the correct course of action is to heal and protect rather than harm and kill, I try to give my characters a similar emotional investment. If I want my readers to have a sense of wonder about what I'm writing, my thought is, I need to have my characters have a sense of wonder about what they're experiencing, too.

3. Supergirl has multiple excellent female characters.

Quite a bit has already been written about how feminist a show Supergirl is. For me as a viewer, what establishes this is not only that it's a female-led show, but that it's also got so many excellent female characters in varying positions of power and with various types of relationships with each other. Kara has a beautiful relationship with her adoptive sister Alex, and an interesting, complex relationship with Cat Grant as well. (Sidebar: how very, very awesome is Cat? She gets all the very best lines.)

We also get interesting female supporting characters. Lucy Lane initially came in as romantic rival, sure--but I've very much appreciated how this season has given her more depth than that, showing us her relationship with James from her point of view as well as eventually resolving the triangle in a way that didn't demean her as a character. We've also gotten a good solid political figure in Senator Crane, who initially showed up on the "GRR ALIENS" bandwagon, but who turns out to be more sympathetic than that.

And of course there's also Alura, Kara's aunt, whose backstory with Kara plays off dramatically against her plans for the earth. Her presence in this plotline not only sets off conflict for Kara herself, but also conflict between Kara and the rest of the cast.

Plus, it has not escaped my notice that this show puts multiple female characters into positions of power. Kara and Cat are the two main obvious power players, Kara with her actual superpowers and Cat by virtue of being the splendid media power figure that she is. But Alex and Lucy both have their shots at leading the DEO. The aforementioned Senator Crane is another woman in a position of power, and Alura serves as the primary protagonist through much of the season. Additionally, we get a couple of fun supervillains in Livewire and Silver Banshee.

And if all of that weren't enough, I've also seen some very tasty talk about the show courting Lynda Carter to play the President in Season 2. President Wonder Woman, you guys. <3 She'd certainly get my vote.

Why is this important to me? Because I am a woman--and because we're still living in a world where women have to fight to defend their place in the SF/F genre in general and in superhero stories in particular.

In my own writing, I try for having a similar breadth of female character representation--and yeah, I'm prone to putting women in positions of power as well. There are reasons that the major magical power figures in the Free Court books, the Warder First of Seattle and the Queens of the Seelie and Unseelie Courts, are female. Likewise, the major magic users and the major political power figures in the Rebels books are women.

And in closing...

I could say a lot more about why I've loved this show to bits so far, and why I'll definitely be on board for Season 2, even as the show moves over to the CW and to filming in Vancouver. Suffice to say, though, it's just been a joy to see a story that not only tries to go to places I do myself as a writer--but which also is a sheer pleasure to experience.

And c'mon, how can I not love a girl who loves ice cream?

How about you? Are you watching Supergirl? Are you on board for Season 2? Talk to me in the comments!

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Angela writes the Free Court of Seattle urban fantasy series as Angela Korra'ti, and the Rebels of Adalonia high fantasy trilogy as Angela Highland. Come say hi to her at angelahighland.com, or on Facebook or Twitter!

Are female superheroes finally getting their due?

A reader who recently discovered my books has posted several reviews noting that she’ll now read anything I write because I write strong heroines who aren’t stupid. That’s great feedback to hear and also highlights the fact strong women in fiction are a trend that is still growing, not weaning.

That is probably highlighted best these days by the emergence of female superheroes in film and TV, and not just as secondary characters to male superheroes or in a team ensemble.

Anyone who knows me knows I’m a total geek for superheroes. Superman has always been my favorite for reasons I won’t get into here (but you can read more about that on my personal blog if you wish). Growing up with three older brothers, I was only exposed to comic books with male superheroes unless my brother Steven happened to have a book featuring the Trinity of Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. 

When I was a little girl, “Wonder Woman” was on TV in the form of Linda Carter, so in my little girl world, Wonder Woman was everything. I totally dug the idea a woman could kick a man’s hiney same as Superman or Batman. I loved Wonder Woman even more because I was gangly and tall, and Wonder Woman was tall, too. 

That's right. Wonder Woman is my spirit animal. 

For a while I even liked the godawful movie “Supergirl” with Helen Slater until I got old enough to understand it was utter garbage — not Supergirl herself, just the atrocious script that got turned into a movie.

It wasn’t until I got older and superhero movies became all the rage in the early 90s that I realized there were plenty of other female superheroes out there. After the first X-Men movie, I discovered the comics and became all about Rogue for a while. I loved the WB TV show “Birds of Prey,” which featured the Huntress, Black Canary, and Oracle as a trio of female crime-fighting heroes, but it was prematurely canceled back in the 90s. They made a movie about "Elektra" but it flopped at the box office. Let's not even talk about "Catwoman" starring Halle Berry. Female superheroes in TV and film were finding some ground, but they couldn't quite keep their grasp. I'm convinced this is because they were handled by male executives who didn't understand the characters or their fans.

Flash forward to now, and I’m feeling all kinds of giddy because of two female superheroes in particular — Jessica Jones and Supergirl. That's right. Someone hold the presses because there are not one but two female superhero-led TV shows on TV now. Not only that, but I like them and, gasp, their ratings have been good!

First, let’s look at “Jessica Jones.” I had no idea who she was before I watched the Netflix show, but it’s a great show with some outstanding writing behind it. Jessica is more of an anti-hero than a traditional superhero, and that’s incredible in and of itself. As much as I like strong heroines, personally, I do question the ones who don’t have many flaws because, hello, reality. Jessica Jones tackles so many female-relevant topics in a refreshingly honest way, I’m convinced it deserves an Emmy or something. I love her relationship with her best friend, Trish Walker. If you haven’t binge-watched it yet, do yourself a favor and go watch the first episode right now.

Second, “Supergirl.” Whereas Jessica Jones is dark, Kara Zor El is light. For the record, yes, I think it's fine to like them both (I lean toward DC, but I like Marvel, too!). 

I really, really wanted to love "Supergirl" as soon as I heard it was coming. I enjoyed the pilot, but something about this one has felt off to me. Some episodes are great. Some are meh. That said, it has gotten better and I now absolutely adore it. I really like the fact Kara is also flawed, but in an awkward, trying-to-fit-in kind of way. This show also belly-punches you every week with a feminist statement, usually delivered by Cat Grant verbally and through its three strong female leads and their relationships with one another. Plus, can I say how much I love the relationship between Kara and her adopted sister, Alex, who is human but still a strong character in her own right?

Now, “Wonder Woman” is finally getting her own movie, but first she’ll appear in “Batman v. Superman” out in March. To be honest, I dislike the director of “Man of Steel” so much I really don’t have high hopes for that one, but I remain cautiously optimistic and will be at the first showing anyway. I hope they don’t screw up Wonder Woman because she, out of all the superheroes, really deserves some fair treatment. Plus, her solo movie is being directed by a female director and will hopefully do her justice. Fingers crossed.

Have you watched "Supergirl" or "Jessica Jones"? Do you plan to see "Batman v. Superman"? Let me know who your favorite female superhero is.

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Angela Campbell is the author of the psychic detectives series from Harper Impulse. Learn more about her and her books at www.AngelaCampbellOnline.com.