Reign (S01E01) - 10/17/13

I'm already at my limit of CW shows.

 

It almost feels like they're trying to capture the tone of Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette, which would be a bit of an odd choice given the thud with which that film landed.

Then again, that tone is probably more appropriate for a CW show than a big-studio movie...

 

Great production values?!?! They literally (and there are articles where the costumer SAYS this, so literally here literally means literally) shopped at trendy vintage clothing shops for their "historical costume". I've seen sitcoms on the Disney channel that managed to capture the "feel" of 16th century attire better than this one (or at least, they were able to restrain themselves enough to only have clothing from one century at a time on the screen and not say, a swathe of five centuries all lined up in a row).

Also, I imagine them going to the (hot, young) Nostradamus and saying, "We've got your lines scripted for the rest of the show. Each time we give you the cue to speak, shake this ball and read what appears in the little window here."

 

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I thought it was ok considering it's the CW and I'm (mid-forties, male) probably not their target demographic. I watched with my wife, who loves the CW shows.

I kind of just took it with a grain of salt regarding the costumes. Maybe they were trying to have the feel of the 1500's, but with a bit of modern style? Don't know.

The dialogue was spot on CW as well. Remember A Knight's Tale with Heath Ledger?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0183790/

I felt like this was trying to channel that in a way.

 

I *liked* A Knight's Tale.

This so bafflingly misses the mark once can't help but wonder why they wanted to do a show about a 16th century historical figure at all. I mean, if they're going to throw out every bit of the history AND every bit of the correct look of the period (the Victorian sofa and 20th century clawfoot bathtub? Plastic carpet that looked like the sort you lay down in your pricey castle before letting the tourists walk all over it?), why not just either set it in a real, modern place (has San Francisco been done on the CW?) or make it a complete fantasy a la Disney's Sophia the First or any old miniseries from the Sci-fi channel back when they'd do the occasional epic fantasy knock-off?

 

I think within 5 minutes it was obvious this was bad and wasn't going to get better.

 

I watched the first episode with high hopes, but was severely disappointed by the modern soundtrack. There is absolutely no feel of authenticity to this show. I watched the first 15 minutes or so of the 2nd episode and simply couldn't take it anymore. In scenes where there is obviously music playing in the background, the soundtrack drowns it out with modern guitars and piano music. Actually, there is nothing to drown out because they neglected to play any music other than the soundtrack. The Renaissance dancing being performed in the background just doesn't match up well with contemporary music. It's like watching someone trying to Jitterbug to Mozart.

Deleted from my recording list. Too bad, because I really wanted to like this one. Instead, we get another teenage angst series from The CW with kids in Halloween costumes bought from Toys R Us.

The irony is that they'll probably renew it for another season.

 

I finally got around to watching this. It wasn't very good.

But I still liked it.

 

We watched the first episode and were not impressed, but we didn't cancel the SP. A couple episodes built up and we didn't have anything else to watch so we gave it another try. We ended up watching both episodes one after the other.

It's certainly not great TV, but there's something holding our attention. We'll keep watching to see where it goes.