Mari Ness

So since a number of you have been urging me to start watching Dead Like Me like, two years ago already, I naturally picked up Six Feet Under at the library this weekend instead. I'm sure I had an excellent reason for this, beyond the fact that, let's face it, both the titles are kinda deathlike. (I am assuming that if I attempt to say that a large army of trained attack chimpanzees armed with flamethrowing Barbie dolls suddenly invaded the library and….yeah. As excuses go, that lacks something.) Let's just chalk up my inability to remember said excuse to chimp distractions.

But three episodes into this show, I can see why none of you have been urging me to watch Six Feet Under. I can see that it's a good show, with its good moments, but the chief thought engendered by these three episodes is, "They kept this on for five seasons, and cancelled Carnivale and Rome after only two seasons each?"

Then again, I remain completely baffled by television decisions, on both cable and network TV, because if I had my way, Firefly and Wonderfalls would still be on, and 7th Heaven and Temptation Island and whatever that trainwreck that was the Britney/whoever he was vehicle would never, but never, have even had a camera rolling. But that's just me.

For those who have missed Six Feet Under, it has the usual HBO Fun With Sex and Nekkidity, this time enlivened by caskets and the occasional ghost and a nice interracial gay relationship and a bus and some sly humour and some genuinely good acting on the part of nearly everybody. But it hasn't caught me and drawn me in the way that Carnivale and Rome did, where I finished an episode only to find myself pining for the next one. Of course, I never got into The Sopranos, either.

Next trip: Dead Like Me. Definitely.