Kings Revisited
Posted on June 29th, 2009
by Daniel Larison |
|
After its late spring hiatus, NBC’s Kings returned earlier this month, and I remain a regular viewer and fan of the unusual, doomed series that has been adapting the story of Saul and David. Naturally, the show has already been cancelled, as its early, abysmally low ratings all but guaranteed, and NBC made every effort to sabotage the show by putting on the television equivalent of Death Row–primetime on the weekend. Once the show had been moved to Saturday, execution was not far away. There are just a handful of episodes left out of the thirteen that had been made, and it is unlikely that there will be much satisfactory resolution of the story with what little time is left. Like another brilliant, doomed show cancelled before its time, Firefly, Kings will shortly disappear, but before it does I recommend that you all start watching it if you haven’t already. If I’m right about this, I think it will win a larger, loyal following in the years to come, and on this trivial question you will be able to say that you saw the value in it before most people had ever heard of it.
Filed under: miscellaneous
I have been watching Kings from the onset and I have to agree that it was an absolutely amazing show! I feel that it has been done a disservice by the NBC Corporation, which no longer seems willing to take risks putting out material of genuine quality though it might not have commercial appeal. The West Wing’s first season was just as badly rated as Kings.
The imagination of the modern “monarchy” in Kings is really something and the Biblical parallels are wonderful. It’s strange -I could have seen a large potential market for this show in Christian Americans who are constantly complaining about the lack of Judeo-Christian broadcasting, and though this is not explicitly such, it does show a reverence for Judeo-Christian tradition that, if nothing else, makes for great references, philosophical musings, and parallels.
It is indeed a very creative and imaginative work that I have been following on Hulu.com. There’s a special drama to palace intrigue and it takes talent to portray an absolute monarchy in a democratic age.
I deeply regret that Kings violated my personal “Don’t like it? Turn it off” standard through its depiction of homosexual kissing in the episode with the blackout. (Was that part broadcast on the airwaves?) I’m eager for new high quality work with the themes Kings treats, but not at the cost of decency. Many Christians couldn’t even have tolerated the sympathetic allusions to the prince’s off-screen vices.
Seriously?
I too had high hopes for Kings, but couldn’t watch past the fourth episode because the plotting was so terrible. Can anyone really believe in any of the actions the characters take or the society they inhabit? The entire premise of the war with Gath is grotesque, and the villainy of Cross is ridiculous. (Apparently absolute monarchs build treasuries like consumer banks, with all assets in the form of a deposit account). And David is about as sympathetic a character as Mickey Mouse, and about as cartoonish.
Ian McShane is the one redeeming grace, and some of the dialogue written for him is not bad. But that, unfortunately, is not enough to save the show from itself.
‘Like another brilliant, doomed show cancelled before its time, Firefly, ‘
Since you brought it up I have to ask a question that popped into my head watching Serenity for the One millionth time this weekend.
Was Shepherd Book an Operative before he joined the seminary? Listening to the operative speak at the end of Serenity gave me a ‘young Book’ vibe.