Small Screen Surfin'
Created | Updated Jan 20, 2005
I never thought I'd see it, a programme that has been robbed of its soul...
Change of plan for what was intended for this week which I'm sure will annoy Shazz greatly. What was intended was a 'review' of documentary series Tribe but that will be put back till next week (or the week after judging my rate). And unfortunately for those bored enough to read this, this week is a history programme (of sorts) and to add injury it's in some sort of list format like a fortnight ago...
Now, how can a programme lose its soul? Well it can't because it doesn't have one but it can lose almost everything that made it what it was, and with Time Commanders 2, it seems to have become an empty shell.
For those that don't know, Time Commanders1 is a show where four members of the public lead an army and fight a historical battle trying to either alter history or better the then leaders through the use of a computer game engine. More can be found here on what TC is because now I'm going to go into what it has become. Nearly everything in the first series was done right.
Nu Attitude
Someone devising series 2 has for some reason decided that priding itself on being taken seriously as a historical programme should be lost to make room for more game showisms. Series 2's set is now darker and most annoyingly it now features a red flashing light with 'awooga' sound when something important happens...
Eddie Mair, the previous presenter is gone and his replacement in Richard Hammond2 is now the spritely optimist where Mair's deadpan wit - something which I got used to rather than liked - once lived. And quite frankly, ol' Rick is not exactly riveting in his presenting which is funny because the whole thing has a new format. Funnily enough now that the team are introduced through 'talking-head' clips his role is near obsolite. Thankfully resident history experts Dr Ayreh Nusbacher and Mark Urban are still around but their role has altered as well. They now tell the players about what they're going into where previously they were asked to watch a screen where the narrator once spoke. That narrator is gone as well. It seems as if the experts are now trying to be - and I regret saying this - hip. Nusbacher informing us on the balcony of what the team needs to do while walking toward the camera. And, oh, how that camera loves to pan now even around Urban as he's telling it things.
As said earlier this has now just become about the game style. Nusbacher and Urban now select which two players will be Generals (those who direct the battle) and those who are Captains (who control the soldiers as it were). That's right, in the most unneccessary of changes the Lieutenants have been promoted to Captains. Most infuriating of all is that they've made it easier to play. I'm presuming this is because the game Rome: Total War, from which TC's gaming engine is taken, has been released between the making of the two series. Thus they expect a load of viewers consisting of PC gamers and have decided that they are imbeciles, dumbing down the presentation. The Generals may now ask the experts two questions before battle. Then they are given a practice of how the battle will begin! The Skirmish. Yes many of these battles may have began with a skirmish as Hammond tells us but, in this context, it's a practice mode. The AI enemy is kind enough to begin both battles in the same way. Even better, the battle is paused to get the players to plan some more. Twice.
Very little of the original series has survived intact. Though more of the actual game is shown it's usually amidst questionable editing. Two shots - moving around at intervals to have the experts and the game on at the same time - give a feeling of emptiness. The narrator's voice over the gaming while cutting to either the experts or the players was much more preferable and easier to digest, at least for me. The experts point at a pc screen to a shot that is at a different angle from the one viewers see. Nothing seems to be on the whole battle anymore and the experts no longer feel like they're casually explaining things to colleagues or us but remaining close knit and pointing to dots on the screen.
One positive aspect is that now the gaming map has more features. The forest is a forest is a forest. The soldiers can conceal themselves, now, unlike the plains and desert upon which they once fought.
It's a shame to see a really interesting and different approach to history (and, secretly, education) now become what feels like a patronising session in which both viewer and player alike are presented with flashing lights in the hope we're going to like it because it's had a major face lift. It really is an empty shell. The stuff that made TC what it was has been mutated into something Time Commanders shaped. Maybe if this was the product of six series of gradually increasing new ideas I might be saying something different. I seriously doubt it. Hopefully, if chances of a series 3 haven't been killed by this one, it'll revert to its former glory: a programme that works on more of the same.
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You see? I almost did a proper review because of this!
And now the Small Screen Supplement...
Dungeons and Dragons3 was also a game... see the link? This theme is awful though... It's strange how the easiest themes to find are from the 1980s. Anyway, there's also the Super Mario Super Show for your deafening pleasure. And if you don't know how Mario links to games...
Keep Surfin'!4
