Kyle XY

[sqbr]

I just watched season one (only 10 episodes) of Kyle XY. It's a weird show, kind of a mix between The OC and..something else. The premise is you have a teenage boy (Kyle) turn up with no memory (as in none, he doesn't know how to talk or even eat) in a forest near Seattle, where he is taken in by a child psychologist and her family. As the show progresses it becomes clear that he has an amazing mind (he's pretty much fluent in english by the end of episode 2) and we learn more about his past and the Mysterious Forces tracking him. At the same time there's lots of typical teen shenanigans with his foster siblings and their friends and schoolmates etc, to the extent that it's often more teen soap opera than scifi. I have mixed feelings about the show, but overall enjoyed it.

In a lot of ways, it's B-grade and crap, with that mix of schmaltz and unwitty snark americans produce like breathing. I and Cam discussed it, and agreed it feels like they were in a rush and so filed in all the gaps with lazy, stereotypical scriptwriting. The main characters feel like real people a lot of the time and are fairly engaging (Kyle especially is quite convincing as being both very bright and very ignorant, reminiscent of the behaviour of small children, people with autism etc while still definitely being a different thing) but the minor characters are often amazingly one dimensional. And even the main plot descends into blatant cliche here and there, especially the archetypical "snarky teenage brother". Cam was curious to know how I'd react as a feminist, but to be honest I'm more annoyed as someone who doesn't like cliches, since given that they're so cliched they're not too bad, the two main female characters have their own motivations and agency, and the central relationship of the show is the mother and her foster son (the father likes Kyle, but they're not super bonded) I could do with less random hot girls throwing themselves at the male characters entirely for reasons of plot(*), but we also had a hot male character come up and say "Hi, you seem like a nice girl who needs someone to offload her problems on. Let me listen to you for several hours and then never see you again", it's that kind of show.

But..I still enjoyed it. I'm a sucker for a combination of engaging ensemble cast soap opera type stuff with a scifi overarching plot as backbone and to create drama (plain soap opera has to invent things like unexpected house fires etc and it gets annoying) The gaps may be filled in with cliche but the picture they're filling in and the bits they bothered to pay attention to are pretty good. According to Cam there's less cliche and lazy writing in season 2. And since it knows it's a bit B-grade it doesn't try for Deep Arty Pain like a Joss Whedon show (though I got a disturbing spoiler while looking for the image below :( )

Oh, speaking of the OC: One of the distinctive things about Kyle is he has no bellybutton (for spoilery reasons I will not explain). Now Photoshop disasters has a lot of shots of people with missing belly buttons (eg Mischa Barton), the assumption being that they've been photoshopped out. But perhaps, they really don't have belly buttons, and for once the photographer forgot to photoshop them in.

(*)I'm not exaggerating, they really pretty much do just wander up out of nowhere and say "You're cute. Sex?"

Comments

[black-samvara.livejournal.com]

*g* I liked the show! I like the mother and Kyle and I think it modelled slightly more healthy relationship behaviour than a lot of shows (I pay the cliches and gawd, the little brother...)

[alias_sqbr]

Yes, the relationships are on the whole surprisingly decent, I quite like the arc with Lori and Declan so far (I mean they're not 100% healthy, but they're aware of that and both trying to fix it)

[black-samvara.livejournal.com]

Yeah they have problems, I put that down to the need to generate dramatic tension. I do like the way they resolve problems, very not crazy.

[alias_sqbr]

People talk to each other, it's bizarre!

Also I just say the episode whose moral is "Girls will like you if and only if you're not homophobic" which is a moral more teen soap operas should have :)

[nico-wolfwood.livejournal.com]

Ok, thanks for the review since EE & I are currently debating as to whether to watch this.

[alias_sqbr]

I'd say it's worth giving a go if you have nothing better to do :)

[(Anonymous)]

See, that's my attitude - "It has (insert sci-fi/fantasy element here)! Let's watch a season and see if it's crap!" However EE rules out anything with teenagers in it unless he's really desperate for something to watch. On th other hand he *loves* high school drama Anime. I assume it's a matter of medium.

[alias_sqbr]

American highschool drama really is a very different beast to anime highschool drama. I'm a bit sick of them both, but in different ways :)

[black-samvara.livejournal.com]

*g* I liked the show! I like the mother and Kyle and I think it modelled slightly more healthy relationship behaviour than a lot of shows (I pay the cliches and gawd, the little brother...)

[alias_sqbr]

Yes, the relationships are on the whole surprisingly decent, I quite like the arc with Lori and Declan so far (I mean they're not 100% healthy, but they're aware of that and both trying to fix it)

[black-samvara.livejournal.com]

Yeah they have problems, I put that down to the need to generate dramatic tension. I do like the way they resolve problems, very not crazy.

[alias_sqbr]

People talk to each other, it's bizarre!

Also I just say the episode whose moral is "Girls will like you if and only if you're not homophobic" which is a moral more teen soap operas should have :)

[nico-wolfwood.livejournal.com]

Ok, thanks for the review since EE & I are currently debating as to whether to watch this.

[alias_sqbr]

I'd say it's worth giving a go if you have nothing better to do :)

[(Anonymous)]

See, that's my attitude - "It has (insert sci-fi/fantasy element here)! Let's watch a season and see if it's crap!" However EE rules out anything with teenagers in it unless he's really desperate for something to watch. On th other hand he *loves* high school drama Anime. I assume it's a matter of medium.

[alias_sqbr]

American highschool drama really is a very different beast to anime highschool drama. I'm a bit sick of them both, but in different ways :)