Monday, August 15, 2005

Oh hell no.

If it is true about Jennifer Garner wanting to leave Alias after the next season, then Bad Robot and Touchstone may as well shut up shop.

I have nothing against Rachel "best thing about The Amityvile Horror" Nichols, who's coming on board to take up some of the Garner-pregnancy-created slack (though that may be because no UK channel has The Inside yet, so far as I know); and while the fourth season isn't the best ever - coughNadiacough - this has yet to become Stargate SG-1 level missable. But every show has its people who, if they leave, for all intents and purposes take the show with them (unless they never leave, like Joss Whedon with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or leave behind people who know what they're doing, like The Wonder Years and The Simpsons did). Sliders didn't really become unwatchable until Jerry O'Connell jumped ship; Charmed will go to hell for good if Holly Marie Combs leaves; and Alias has Ron Rifkin, Victor Garber and J.J. Abrams. But most of all, it has Jennifer Garner.

For four years the premises may get increasingly untenable and the episodes sometimes dreary, but she never does; an episode revolving around Sydney asleep would probably be more compelling than any storyline focusing on Vaughn (and in fact, this was proven conclusively in the third season). Her sidelining from the action - and yes, the abbreviated attire - because of her being with child is a pisser-in-the-distance, but a pregnant Garner is better than no Garner at all.

Imagine The Simpsons with Rod and Todd as the stars. Get the idea?

1 comment:

Butch Rosser said...

Charmed would be great without Holly because in their grief Paige and Phoebe would turn to lesbian incest.

Right?