L'île de l'étrange

I wasn't even going to watch this show, until I found myself one Wendsday night with nothing to watch, flipping channels. I fell onto the premiere of Glory Days, and after watching 10 minutes of the show I Was hooked. Wow! Amazing show. I don't know what it is, but somehow the writers, the cast and everyone made this show so good. I like the suspense in the show, and also the times of comic relief. The WB should not do a thing to change it, only let it grow. Wonderful!

Take one part "Picket Fences", add a dash of "Twin Peaks", stir in kids who are fluent in "Dawson's" speak, and throw it in a Kevin Williamson blender powered by Weinstein. The result?

The series debut of "Glory Days".

Welcome, kiddies, to the WB's first attempt at a *gasp* suspense series. Mind you, I entered viewing with a severe case of unenthusiastic trepidation. When I first heard of "Glory Days" last spring, my heart was all aflutter at the thought of fresh material from one of my favorite scribes, Kevin Williamson. The show's original premise revolved around a one-hit wonder whose severe case of writer's block rendered him unable to write a follow-up to his best-selling debut novel "Glory Days." It sounded just like something we'd expect from the WB: a "Dawson's Creek"-type show focusing on romantic relationships and light situations.

Enter the squelchers of all things creative, aka Network Executives, and pretty much in came the official Big Rewrite. When all was said and strewn on the cutting room floor, there lay a show that still followed the original premise of runaway novelist who must face his demons upon his homecoming. Only no "Dawson's", no romantic relationships, and no light situations.

Welcome, instead, to Bizzaroland.

Let's review the players (at least the ones I care about so far):

Mike Dolan (Eddie Cahill) – The Prodigal Son, who wrote a book using most of his family and close friends as characters, returns. Said loved ones are, of course, less than thrilled with his depiction of them.

Ellie (Poppy Montgomery) – Town coroner and a close dead-ringer for Julie Benz (the original female lead) who partially buries dead bodies in her garden to study decomposition rates. Quirky in that sense, yet needs to be flushed out.

Rudy Dunlop (Jay R. Ferguson) – Deputy Doug, er, I mean Sheriff Doug, er, I mean Rudy. Mike's former best friend who was falsely characterized as a Card Carrying Friend of Dorothy in Mike's novel, "Glory Days."

Sara Dolan (Amy Stewart) – Older, slightly neurotic sister who inherited the editor-in-chief title at the family-owned newspaper when Mr. Dolan died.

Sam Dolan (Emily Vancamp) – Little sister who missed her older brother terribly. Her relationship and interactions with Mike remind me of the Claudia/Bailey dynamic on Party of Five.

Zane (Ben Crowley) – Sidekick to Sam.

Mitzi Dolan (Frances Fisher) – Kind of crazy mom to Mike, Sara, Sam and Mike. Let me just lay this out on the table from Day One: I LOVE HER. How could you not with lines like, "Sara, he's your brother first, jackass second." *snarf*

If you've read my other analyses, you'll know I hold a certain bar to "Party of Five" because of the well-written details and moments from that show. I'm seeing glimmers of PO5 in this show, and that gives me hope. Finally, another series comes along that concentrates on developing characters.

THE CORONER'S REPORT (my high points and low points for the episode):

• Mike and Rudy playing Hardy Boys amused me to no end, though the interrogation of the boy felt forced. - Gee, hmmm, saw a few Miramax and Dimension commercials. Do ya think Harvey and Bob got a cut on ad rates? - Wow, an actual laugh out loud moment when Rudy said, "It's ‘cause I cried when Goose died in Top Gun, isn't it?" in reference to why Mike thought he was gay. - The ferryman's widow is a pretty sharp shooter for a drama queen with a penchant for wearing bad wigs. - Did they take their stock shots from the same bin as Dawson's Creek and ILM mountains into the background? I was this close to hearing "I don't want to wait…" on the opening credits when the camera panned from marina to shore.

So I did it. I made it through the hour, and am actually looking forward to next week's installment. "Grim Ferrytale" (oh, Kevin, clichés should be beneath you by now) pleasantly surprised me. Between all the rewrites, lead character changes, and dire predictions from the trade magazines, I thought this one was DOA. I really, truly thought I was not going to be able to physically sit through the entire episode.

Kudos to you Kevin, for crafting a well-written tale that concentrates on characters, I say, "Welcome back, we missed you." You're not so up the Creek as I thought you'd be.

Kara ScoopMe.com "Glory Days" reviewer

The premise of "Glory Days," an actual suspense- thriller television show, was one that I'm sure filled many people with hope and interest. What they've seen, over the past three weeks, has probably crushed those hopes fairly effectively....

In the first episode, we are given several creepy elements; a seemingly random murder, a mysterious letter, an entire town where we're told odd behavior is commonplace, with a population who strongly dislike the returning prodigal son (some of whom are his own family), and a disturbingly- designed board game, just to name a few. Any one of these elements, handled correctly, could carry a show for several episodes. "Glory Days" disposes of them all by the end of the very first episode, explaining away every element in precise detail, wrapping up every possible loose end.

This pattern, alas, was repeated with the second and third episodes as well. Each individual story sewn up nice and tight, with nothing left to gnaw at our minds or make us wonder at work the next day. Each episode ends exactly as it began, with only superficial changes to the characters lives, and no change at all to the world they live in.

Answering every question mere minutes after it's asked hardly builds suspense, and a mystery that's solved in less than an hour isn't much of a mystery. The most effective element of mystery and suspense, the part that gets people hooked, is not knowing, not having the answers. To paraphrase Neil Gaiman, people forget the stories, but they always remember the mysteries.

There are no mysteries on Glory Island. Simply put, instead of stepping into the shoes of "Twin Peaks" or "The X-Files," or possibly bringing something new to the small- screen, "Glory Days" is merely a hip, teen- oriented version of "Matlock" or "Murder She Wrote"

A shame, because the cast, and the audience, all deserve something better....

After a moderately successful novel, Mike returns to the small town he grew up in only to find that the locals are unhappy with him using them as the "inspiration" for said book. He joins the newspaper there, and stays around... you know, I'm not entirely certain why. Because this did manage more than one 40-ish minute episode, I suppose? Yes, a whopping nine total, and seven of them were released on DVD(together with with three trailers, one for this, the other two for Asian Vision and Shaun of the Dead) edited into three feature-length combos(in an utterly random order, leading to something being solved early on, only to suddenly be an issue later) under the titles of DemonTown I, II and III. The relative lack of continuity actually makes them run awkwardly together... more than once, I mistook the opening sequence of one bit for part of the ending of the previous one. Anyway, the young male journalist of course has a penchant for figuring things out, and he aids the sheriff(his child-hood friend) Rudy and the coroner/obvious love interest Ellie(pre-Without A Trace Poppy Montgomery) in determining the truth behind the seemingly supernatural murders and abductions. They encounter vampires, decapitating clowns(!), possession by the devil and The Silence of The Lambs(hey, they make that reference, as well). The conflict is too often soap-opera-ish, the mystery comes off as Scooby-Doo level(albeit they do keep you guessing(after a while, it gets annoying with all the red herrings), and mostly holds up, if one or two explanations don't make sense), and the quirky characters just aren't that compelling(not to mention that they seem to change drastically on occasion, when the writers got a new idea; they are easily forgotten about). The acting is fine. This can be funny, but it tends to have a goofy tone, and it's pretty paint-by-numbers. I'd say this could have been better, it had potential, it simply didn't get around to realizing it. Would it have, had it gotten more time to try? Meh. Maybe. I don't think the viewers would have stuck around to find out(as a matter of fact, I suppose that is exactly what did happen... too many of us gave up on it, understandably enough). The dialog can be clever. I enjoyed seeing Emily VanCamp of Everwood(evidently she likes being the charming hottie in a little, forgotten village) fame. The production values are decent. Kevin Williamson swung and missed, with this one(maybe he got too much credit from us for Scream). This can be tense and scary, if ultimately it feels unsatisfying and doesn't leave any kind of lasting impression on you. If you ask me what this was in a few weeks, it may take me a while to recall. There is some bloody, gory, violent and disturbing content in this. I recommend this to fans of crime-dramedy, who the "lightness" of this appeals to. 6/10

I was excited to hear that the WB was airing this new, creative series created by Kevin Williamson, and I have seen the majority of the episodes and I am absolutely hooked on this show, it's incredible! The setting is a small island town called Glory and the main character is a writer named Mike who along with the town sheriff, Rudy, and the medical examiner, Ellie, attempts to solve eerie mysteries dealing with murders, kidnappings, supernatural occurrences and other strange events which plague the town. This show is scary, fun and I really like the characters because there is always something interesting going on between them. I am hoping this show gets picked up again because only about 10 episodes have aired, as some sort of mid-season replacement I guess, and I have not heard whether or not it is being picked up again. Hopefully it will be, this is a promising new show that is very enjoyable and fun to watch every week, I know I always look forward to new episodes.