Matador

A correction to my closing comments, I see the rating has stabilized now at a realistic 7 with more voters. However, I still stand by my closing comments regarding IMDb voting!

Just watched the Pilot episode. Very Burn Notice meets Covert Affairs meets Miami Vice, with a Latino DEA Homeboy as the protagonist. In true Hollywood watered down ethnic ambiguity. Our hero is far more Santa Monica or Manhattan Beach than Boyle Heights or City Terrace.

Despite his cover is an auto mechanic in East Los Angeles. Hollywood has Anglicized our hero to make him more palpable to the masses. Despite that El Rey Network targets Hispanic viewers.

Let's call this show "East LA Vice." Very fun and hip, a little too hip. Fast paced and very light fare. This is not a gritty cop drama, it is just entertainment.

This is not a thinking man or woman's show. Predictable and no spoilers here, What You See Is What You Get. Not many surprises will be popping up.

Decent writing, acting and production values, but there ain't gonna be any Emmy Awards. Not for this "Matador." I liked it, it was fun, a little silly and humorous, and the show doesn't take itself seriously at all. They look like they're having fun making the show and it projects through the screen I'll keep watching. I gave it a 6 for quality and an 8 for just making me laugh at some of the silly remarks for an average of 7, which are good marks from a harsh critic.

Now here is what pisses me off on IMDb. As I write this review and the sole reason I did was at this time Matador has a score of 9.4 which is ridiculous. That is Shawshank and Godfather (Highest films on IMDb at 9.2) territory. This is no Game of Thrones (9.5), House M.D. (8.9)or even as good as Burn Notice which has the insanely hot Gabrielle Anwar and totally insane and lovable Bruce Campbell (8.0)

The Wire earned a 9.4, deservedly. Matador is a 7 at best. Good viewing, it does not need to be any better than it is. It is just fun escapist entertainment!

This is nothing more than shill voting by cast and crew to pump up the numbers. Which is BS and just wrong. No sane person would rate this show above an 8 and I think the average viewer would rate it a 5 or maybe 6. I gave it a 7 simply because I love this kind of silly cop stuff.

Movies like Beverly Hills Cop, Freebie and the Bean, Bad Boys, Turner and Hooch, Real Men, etc. are right up my alley.

This is a fun show and worth a look, but never believe the reviews or numbers here, people cheat the system.

The star forward who played for the English national team... Ouch... Terrible English accent... Nobody who has ever played for England has ever spoken like that!

I can see why it wasn't renewed for a second series as a result of poor international ratings / viewing figures..... Football just isn't like that in Europe, for a European audience, it's just wrong in so many ways, something just doesn't ring true about it. So, watching the football part is just a bit annoying, which is a shame as it detracts from what is actually a decent format... Perhaps if it was American football themed it may have worked and appealed to a European audience. 'Soccer' in America is seen as a bit of a joke to Europeans.

The acting is good, the format is okay, the comedic tongue in cheek script is fun and engaging... It's just let down by what America thinks 'soccer' is all about.

I went into this with no expectation, because let's face it an American TV series with soccer in it.

So even without my expectations this was pathetic. 'Soccer is just like poker, every player has his tell' Damn, they couldn't find even a single expert on the game in the whole nation? A dancer being a soccer player because of his dance technique, I almost cried there.

Also soccer players throwing punches, this isn't hockey guys!

And the childish humorist setting in the show feels as if they are ridiculing the sport.

Soccer fans, do not watch this.

If you have recently suffered some form of significant head trauma or you are blind drunk this may be vaguely entertaining. If on the other hand you are not brain damaged or drunk and you watch this you will probably wish you were.

Dim witted, hackneyed plot lines clash with a confusion of genres. This series is not sure if it wants to be an action orientated drama or a comedy and as a result fails miserably at both. Combine this with ugly, often gruesome violence and unnecessary crudity and there you have it.

The characters are predictably of the cardboard cut out variety and the acting whilst not utterly dreadful like the rest of this travesty is nothing special either.

In my estimation this is so awful it should come with a mental health warning or failing that a couple of dozen beers.

This is an update to my original review of Matador:

Now that we are six episodes into the series, I thought I would take a moment to say that I am right about this show being great. "Matador" continues to get get better. What initially appeared fun but shallow has started to deepen with colors and vibrancy that only hint at the deeper mysteries that are beginning to reveal their existences. Now that we are six weeks in, it is apparent that the initial simplicity of the show was a device to lay an easy foundation to understand the primary players in the primary organizations. But the story is a lot more complicated, and as each episode reveals, there are more players with more plots and more origins than have yet been revealed. I am enjoying the unfolding of this complexity because the pace allows for character interaction and relationship development. I really like Matador and where it's going. I like the intensity of the melodrama when drama is happening, and I love that the show isn't afraid to lighten things up with humor.

~~~~~~~~~~~ This is what I originally wrote when I first reviewed Matador:

So, since I don't want to be the guy with a bat up his ass comparing everything in the world to Game of Thrones, as though you could possibly compare summer beer to winter wine, I'm voting in the fashion of trying to keep what I enjoy on television. I find nothing as aggravating as finding out that a show I liked got canceled because a few constipated people decided to compare a Mercedes to a Harley and raced to vote low before they even finished 20 minutes.

"Matador" is straight up fun, and it's nice to have a change of pace from all the cop and spy shows that are totally serious about their serious missions. It is light and action-packed and entertaining and on a scale with "Chuck." It should not be compared to "Burn Notice" or any other smug series with a self-important air.

"Matador" is good action fluff with a sense of humor, predominately black and white (good and evil) characters, and excellent filming quality. I like that comedies are moving away from sitcoms and into action series. Today's sitcoms are almost entirely impossible to watch because of how dumbed-down, shallow and emotionally stunted they are. Every action series does not have to be a melodrama to be entertaining.

So, yes, I am giving this show a 9 for its own merit of keeping me ENTERTAINED! No, it's not "Game of Thrones" and I'm not going to spend hours gossiping at a water cooler about it, but I will enjoy the hour I spend watching it and I will go searching for it again a week later, especially since each episode has gotten progressively better.

I like the main actor Gabriel Luna (who is totally hot) and I like the various members of his family. I like the interplay with the soccer team. I confess that I don't like the two primary CIA operatives, as I kind of feel like the actors were plucked out of a cheesy sitcom somewhere, but I get the feeling I'm either not supposed to like them or that I'm supposed to like their replacements somewhere down the line. Maybe that's just my own wishful thinking.

Either way, when the next episode comes out, I'm going to grab a beer and enjoy the show.