The Fredösphere

A while back I started noticing that a lot of seemingly intelligent, even hip people were admitting a devotion to a TV show.  TV?  I haven't watched TV regularly since Malcolm in the Middle jumped the shark, I said to myself.  Yet when hip, even groovy people like Alex Ross are watching Alias, well, that must mean I should too.

I reserved the library's copies of the DVDs from the first season and waited.  Waited a long time.  Wow.  This show is popular.  Finally, I got my hands on them, just in time for the Christmas break.  Perfect timing.

Now the wifeösphere and I are hooked.  We are slaves to this show.  Alex Ross, you did this to us.  I hope you're happy.

A typical episode goes like this:

Sidney Bristow's boss in SD6 sends her on a mission to steal an ancient device, invented by Leonardo da Vinci, that turns lead into gold Sidney celebrates Arbor Day by having dinner with her father, but he never shows Sidney infiltrates a fancy party filled with diplomats and spies She breaks into secret lab in the basement Sidney beats up a guard; he's wearing body armor; she's wearing a blue cocktail dress; she administers 35 severe head traumas and receives only 20 herself, so she wins A colleague interrupts what they are doing to let her know how great he thinks she is; this leads directly to... Her colleague dies horribly She is seen by another guard; she walks slinky, talks stupid, asks where the bathroom is; the guard lets her pass She returns home, exhausted yet unbruised, but her best friend's latest emotional crisis leaves her no time for herself Her handsome reporter friend signals for the 1000th time his love, but if she marries him death with follow (ratings death) Her graduate degree is in jeopardy when she gets a D [sic] on a paper; she asks for leniency; what she doesn't ask is "what the heck am I doing going to school when I'm getting shot at, playing a deadly game of cat and mouse with three different international spy agencies, trying to understand the deaths of my mother and fiance, stringing along a half dozen guys who are in love with me, and trying to figure out why my father hasn't smiled once in the last 40 years" Sidney discovers a 666 tattoo on her scalp, bringing her closer to the day she learns her long-dead mother was really a jackal. She has an awkward conversation with her father which accomplishes some healing in their relationship, "healing" here being defined within the sick, dysfunctional context of the Bristow family.

Is that a winning formula or what?!  Works for me, anyway.

I don't pay attention to soundtracks as much as I should, but there was a moment in episode 6 (we're talking first season) that caught my attention.  During a funeral scene, a pop singer belts out the hymn "Be Still My Soul" with string accompaniment.  The harmonization was simplified (it was not an improvement over Sibelius' original, and this kind of thing I always find infuriating; chord progressions are important, people) but the choice still stunned me.  Thank goodness someone in Hollywood knows there are other hymns beside Amazing Grace.

Have you ever noticed how content-free Amazing Grace can be?  Remove just one verse, the only one that mentions God directly, and suddenly you've got a hymn that worships "grace."  Unlike this:

Be still my soul, The Lord is on thy side.

The Lord?  Aren't we getting uncomfortably specific?  That sounds too much like the patriarch of a monotheistic religion.  Can't we go back to "Grace," whoever she is?

Hey, Amazing Grace is loved by millions, and that's great, but it's too easily appropriated by all kinds of people who want some music to give a scene an ambiance of vague, yet old tyme religiosity.  And when those people include the kilt-wearing star ship chief engineer with an improbable accent, who plays the bagpipes at the funeral of a pointy-eared hobgoblin, well, I think that's our signal to retire Amazing Grace as a staple of Hollywood entertainment.