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WARREN ELLIS (!!) Reviews Bochco's NYPD 2069!!
SPOILER ALERT !!
Warren Ellis (“Stormwatch,” “The Authority,” “Planetary,” “Global Frequency,” “MEK,” “Orbiter,” “Transmetropolitan,” “Ministry of Space,” “Strange Kiss,” “Stranger Kisses,” “Strange Killings”), the most talented writer not named Alan Moore working in comics today, has reviewed Steven Bochco’s multimillion-dollar pilot to “NYPD 2069,” which Fox apparently did not pick up as a series.
The review is actually an installment of the absurdly prolific Mr. Ellis’ “bad signal” column, which he distributes via mailing list. Since the column is not posted to any Web page, we screwed up enough courage to ask this revered literary hero of ours if we could post it here. Here’s his reply:
Hercules, old son:
You're perfectly welcome to it. Here's a corrected version, in fact.
All I ask is that you run it in its entirety without editing, you credit me,
add a copyright tag to me and note you're using it with permission, and
run a link to http://www.warrenellis.com.
Do all that, and I'm glad to help out.
Here you go.
-- Warren
Deal!!
bad signal
WARREN ELLIS
To join: badsignal-subscribe@lists.flirble.org
I had the opportunity last night to watch a "screener" copy of the pilot
episode of the new Steven Bochco sf policier series, NYPD 2069.
It's hard to be prolific in TV as a writer-producer, because the
undertaking is so huge. The CV of a TV creator is always going to be
spotty. And some projects have their own awful momentum that
defeat the one upside of committee-creativity in Hollywood, which is
that you have many minds assessing the viability of a concept.
COPROCK, one of the most wrong-headed concepts in mainstream
American television of the last twenty years, must've seemed like an
asteroid flying towards Earth to many of the people involved. So
when you get a new Steven Bochco show, there's a weird mix in your
anticipation. Is it HILL STREET BLUES or is it COPROCK?
When you first saw HILL STREET BLUES... the crump-crump of the
crappy old stationhouse garage doors folding up and the police
cars moving out, the slow downbeat piano picking out the refrain as the
cop car moves through a blasted urban cityscape, the hopeful misery
of early-70s US film brought to early-80s US tv... you knew you were
getting something with a little meat. The grime and grain of it, the
jostled camerawork, the cacophony of overlapping dialogue, the sudden
wild bursts of black humour and moments of absolute chill.
And NYPD BLUE; the tribal clatter of drums that opens it up. That
first series had meat. The christ-like John Kelly on his confused downward
spiral, and the depraved Andy Sipowicz trying to claw his way back
up into the light.
NYPD 2069 opens up with a toppy 1983 synth that'd make Harold
Faltermayer blush, full of whizzy sci-fi noises and a breathing sample
that was old before you'd heard of "electronica". It's horrible. The
display lettering is all plastic white and slanted, probably because
someone decided it looked sci-fi. The credit-sequence visuals are
just a pan around the protagonist in the chamber where he's reclaimed
from cryogenic freeze, sleeping. Pure adrenaline, obviously.
In 2003, NYPD detective Alex Franco is run over at the behest of a rich
murder suspect. His wife is told that he can't be brought out of his
coma, but that there is a secret option; an experimental program
offered to police and fire services where he can be frozen until such
time as his injuries can be repaired. They estimate ten years.
Sixty-six years later...
That was the first time I smiled. We're about twenty minutes in.
Alex is given a spook handler to explain the new world to him. His
wife's dead, his son is 77 and senile. The guy who had him killed is 99,
super-rich and looks 50 thanks to gene therapy. Yes, his arch-enemy
is still alive. His grandson is a detective in the NYPD. Spook guy
says, we're here to reintegrate you into the world, do everything
we can etc etc. Alex says he wants to be a cop again, and he wants to
work with his grandson. For this, spook has to create him a whole
new identity, For No-one Must Know etc etc. And he is Warned, the job
has changed, it's been a hard sixty years for America but it's a Brave
New World now.
Alex, now Alex Bolander, is assigned to work with his grandson, whom of
course he can't tell anything to. This had me groaning, but to their
credit they turned this around. Alex has been deeply instructed in
How Things Are Done Now, but of course he's still all Buck Rogers,
Doing Things The Way They Ought To Be Done, Like In The Good Old
Days. The detective squad breaks down to the No-Nonsense Black
Boss, The Asshole, The Pretty Woman and The Other One. They
all have to wear glasses on the street that project head-up displays
on the inside. There's a degree of good futurism in this, but I think it
was an aesthetic miscalculation. Cops in spectacles don't project
authority. Their vehicles have a cute little siren that goes zow-zow,
which kind of defeats the object of sirens, which are supposed to
SCREAM to command your attention. The show is full of aesthetic misfires
like these.
I'm reminded of something Harlan Ellison once wrote. It was a bit
precious, and I'm paraphrasing heavily, but it goes a bit like this:
people who haven't spent any time with sf think it's easy. With no study
of how the genre works, and with no deep reading of it, a lot of people
come to sf for the first time, stick together all the obvious ideas that
everyone had fifty years ago, and expect to be lauded to the skies
for Having Done Sci-Fi Right.
That's what this reeks of.
The retrieval of a kidnapping victim, a combination of 2003 police skills
and 2069 data-rich environment, works pretty well. The squad give
chase to the perp, who has a microwave gun. They're wearing
protective suits and helmets. Alex' grandson falls over, gets mud on
his visor. Naturally enough, since it's the only thing protecting his
head from incineration, he lifts the visor. And gets his head
incinerated.
Dumb way to do it, but, yes, nice reversal.
There follows a JUDGE DREDD-like sequence where a judge and two
attorneys are raised on videophone to pronounce summary sentence
of death on the perp, and so Alex learns how different the job is today.
Alex goes to deliver the news to the grandson's family and, Christ,
this had me squirming. Meet the family requiring Alex to make it
good and wholesome and nuclear. The son, going through his dad's
possessions, even finds a photo of Alex from 2003, looks at Alex and
makes the connection.
You can hear someone in the back saying, "yes, but how can we say
it *emotionally*?"
After an awful scene where Alex stalks and assaults the Arch-Enemy,
he goes into a church, listens to a bunch of old people singing old
gospel, and weeps.
Is it COPROCK? No. You can just about sit through this. Is it any
good? Well, I didn't think so. Your mileage may well vary. It's all down
to personal tastes, and every piece of art finds a different audience.
My personal feeling is that this is a huge misfire; sets that MUTANT X
would sneer at, a colourless protagonist, an empty depiction of
the future, no standout performances. If it makes a second season, I'll be
surprised.
It airs in September in the US, I think.
-- W
© Copyright Warren Ellis. Used by permission.
And thanks to Robogeek for the heads up!
I am – Hercules!!
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+ Expand All
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Doin' my initial dance, dance dance, doin' my posting first dance, yeah yeah.
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Jun 19, 2003 2:33:32 AM CDT
Best future cop stuff is and probably will always be bladerunner
by thematarife
I dunno why they bother trying stuff like this. Bocho has never done scifi I believe, and this concept sounds way expensive.
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I mean- he gets PAID for this stuff? Meanwhile, there are so many talented writers (like myself) who are starving? If THIS is what passes for a paying gig, then I should be rich by now. Who is Bochco fucking to get such crap on screen?
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Why do people always like to suck off him and Alan Moore? 'The best writer not Alan Moore, yadda yadda'. WTF? Haven't you read any Garth Ennis, Moriarty ya prick??? The BEST and most fuckin original comic writer ever! Read that over hyped Jack the ripper crap, and then read just one book of Preacher, you'll see what I mean. Warren-fuckin-Ellis, and Alan-bloody-Moore: i shit em.
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I'm getting to the point in my life, where I almost despise everything new. I find myself abandoning any new music these days, going back to Motown instead, and I can't stand new TV shows, and I find myself enjoying reruns of M*A*S*H or Barney Miller. Back when things were different, new and refreshing. Instead, every show has the same thread. The disgruntled person with a mission for redemtion, the gay couple or gay guy struggling for acceptance or hiding from certain expulsion, and the not so witty plot twists that just arent exciting anymore. I fear that the idea fountain has officially run it's last drop......
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what a pile of crap! judge dredd worked because it didn't take itself too seriously - but it seems this is where NYPD 2069 has gone wrong. what next - muppets 3050: when muppets rule the world?
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NYPD 2069 sounds like the name of A) A retro-futuristic comic book, B) A Playboy Channel Original Series, or C) An episode of Emmanuelle in Space, or D) A children's cartoon program with a jive-talking robot. I'd suggest as a new title: Unfrozen Post-Y2K Copper, with Hulk Hogan as the lead. "Your futuristic world scares and confuses me, BROTHER!" (I'm sorry, I had to make at least one Hogan reference in my lifetime of posting on AICN).
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so if this show even gets to the second season, what are they going to call it - NYPD 2070? or have the producers set the whole series to occur within the space of one year? methinks they didn't think much about the title very logically.
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Maybe Mr Stephen hasn't seen Demolition Man. Sounds more like he was watching Futurama and thought to himself, "now how could I do that - Dramatically?"
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Jun 19, 2003 4:23:40 AM CDT
Yeah. . . I have to say it. . . Hate to be a follower spitting o
by mccormic
I really do think Stephen Bochco has a beer and cheets on his wife. . . I mean. . . at least I hope so.
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Okay, first off, I don't share the stated belief that Ellis is the best non-Moore writer out there, primarily because Ellis' name is not Gaiman, Miller, Bendis, etc. I would, however, like to say that even though the man is hopelessly liberal, his writing is strong enough to keep big ol' conservative me coming back for more and given me some dose of respect for him. Anyway, to the point: I VERY rarely talk back any more (I never did with any regularity), but I'm so pissed off I couldn't resist, especially with the sheer coincidence of this all. Just last night I finished the last trade of the StormWatch, known as Final Orbit (so I'm a newbie, shoot me). All day I've been incredibly motherfucking pissed at Warren Ellis for the insanely horrible way he ended StormWatch. If you don't know how SW ended, stop reading because I'm going to talk about it at length. I'm so supremely fucking pissed that I'm going to take the sudden appearance of Ellis' name in giant blue letters on my default homepage as a sign that I need to rant and rave and scream questions at this mad genius. The way Ellis killed off the main StormWatch team was, quite frankly, one of the most disgusting things I've ever read. For Lord knows how many issues, I loved those characters, I loved everything they got into and the way they talked and fought and looked and all that jazz. And then... Ellis goes off and kills them all (except Flint). Not only does he kill them, but he kills them OFF-SCREEN. Not only does he kill them off-screen, he kills them off-screen in SOMEONE ELSE'S COMIC BOOK-- a WildC.A.Ts two-shot, I believe. And not only THAT, they get killed by... wait for it... the creatures from the "Alien" movies. Yes, THOSE Alien movies. The creatures popularized by Ridley Scott and James Cameron (and then ruined by David Fincher and Jean-Pierre Jeunet). The motherfucking creatures that Signourney Weaver and Bill Paxton can kill. This is the greatest superhero team in the solar system, and they can't take down a hive of aliens? No no, forget that, fuck the implausibility of it. It's so ignominious-- in fact, it's ignominy piled on ignominy. Those Alien comics are really nothing more than glorified fanfics, bastardized from a movie mythology. If the second Robin had been killed by, say, Hannibal Lecter, instead of the Joker, fans would have been shitting bricks, and rightly so. Now, maybe there was indeed an uproar back in the day and I just missed it; I also have little doubt that Ellis was in a hurry to kickstart The Authority, which is a piece of epic ass-kickery in its own right. But does that, if anything, excuse such an inglorious end to such a wonderful team? Anyway, I'm just pissed, and I wanted a sounding board. It'd be nice if somebody had some answers, but I'd settle for just simple commiseration. I mean... dammit! The fucking ALIENS!
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. . . for people who don't know, that means I think this review is completly made up bullshit.
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Jun 19, 2003 7:23:57 AM CDT
Squashing Moron Numero Uno Posters Whenever They Appear
by dog of mystery
ejcarter9, you fucking felchtard. You should know better than to post first on AICN. You're NOT wanted. We don't like you. You're not welcome here. If you're familiar with the works of Warren Ellis, perhaps you've read THE AUTHORITY. After Ellis' genre-busting run, his understudy Mark Millar took over the book with a wonderful take on Marvel's Avengers. In it, The Midnighter gets revenge on the erzatz Captain America for beating up his boytoy Apollo by fucking him up the ass with a jackhammer. Yup, that's right...Cap was a first poster. And first posters get fucked. FUCK FIRST POSTERS. FUCK THEM UP THEIR STUPID ASSES. With a jackhammer, too...!
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This sounds like an unholy combination of Blade Runner, Demolition Man, and J.D. Robb. And Ellison is right: people who don't know SF think it's easy, and they're wrong. *blech*
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And Elijah Snow should be played by Kris Kristofferson in the movie/animated version. Get your ass in gear man
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The American musical has a long tradition of using song and dance to reveal character motivation and to advance plot. Bochco tried to apply these principals to a gritty urban police drama. His only mistake was that he hired Randy Newman to be the show's chief composer. Oh whom am I kidding. It sucked. (But I still have them on tape)
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Jun 19, 2003 8:06:52 AM CDT
Someone should really let that ManFrmUncleFucka cunt post first
by regicidal_maniac
This series sounded like it had potential when they greenlit the pilot but it seems they squandered said potential in favour of cliche. More's the pity. Demolition Man probably would have made a better candidate for a tv series than the likes of this rehashed hash. And as someone below, ([?]fix the damn talkback order already), has previously stated the premise may have been ripe for series televison however the execution sounds like it will be as interesting as a 'dramatic' and unfunny Futurama. Bleh.
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Your thuggish, profanity-laden post is the perfect example of the sort of person that thinks Garth Ennis is a better writer than Alan Moore. Yeah, I like Ennis too, but I also like someone who can write without having to resort to anal-rape jokes for laughs. sk
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Because the last twenty-odd issues of Preacher are outright shite, my friend. Thank you, Warren Ellis, for making me believe in mainstream comics again.
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Jun 19, 2003 10:16:36 AM CDT
Thank god this failed. It would have opened the door to such hor
by big bad clone
Seriously NYPD 2069 after you are known for NYPD Blue? Bochco get you act together. Get with Fontana and revive The Beat on a real network with a real budget and none of that videocamera view shit. That could be a dynamite mix of Homicide and NYPD Blue. But then, there are far too many cop shows on TV. Maybe there could be a new show where an organization using some sort of talking vehicle to sovle fairly petty, pedastrian crimes...
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... because it shows you never watched the frickin' show, which had solid characters, clever ideas, and a plot that --- now, bear in mind, this was pre-Rodney King -- hinged on the trial of a police officer accused of brutality against a black man in South Central Los Angeles. and hell, many of the songs were so catchy i still remember 'em 13-odd years later. "I'm the baby merchant, tots r us..."
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Er, rev? Did you read the last LoEG? Never mind. Of course you did. You were being ironic. I feel so stupid.
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The difference between the last issue of LoEG and (say) the issue of Preacher where Starr gets buggered by the sexual detective is this - Ennis played his scene for sick laughs, but Moore's scene was actually SCARY. But getting off the subject of ass-rape, let me make the Moore/Ennis comparison a different way. Moore is the comic book equivalent of Stanley Kubrick, whereas Ennis is comics' Quentin Tarantino. Both produce well made, entertaining, even thought provoking work, but one plumbs the deeper depths while the other is shallow with a lot of flash creating the illusion of depth. In 20 years time, people will still be talking about "Watchmen" and "2001," but will the still be discussing "Preacher" and "Resevoir Dogs"? sk
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Where's No. 2?
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It's not Ellis's fault. It's because the artist has been working on better-paying work like ... ugh ... Captain America.
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Jun 19, 2003 11:56:40 AM CDT
I was on the backlot set. It looked like a bad Roger Corman movi
by uncapie
The Hummer police cars were the only cool thing.
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As is Moore, as is Ennis.(The PRO was satirical GOLD) Millar's a 50/50 (sometimes he's alright sometimes he sucks asswind) hack. Them's the facts fellow geeks (If you're reading this you ARE a geek-get over it ) so shut the fuck up and get back to ass-raping Harry Potter with a dead deer already. Anything I forgot? Oh yeah, Planetary owns the house yeh bitches.
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...turn off the friggin' telly and get back to work on Planetary
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I'm SO happy to see Warren's review here. Great stuff. He's one of my favorite writers in any medium, and his diepunyhumans.com is a daily must-read. Truly, if you aren't reading diepunyhumans.com, you're life is woefully incomplete.
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Hey, here it is; there are 2 kinds of comic books now, today; the pretentious books by people that wish they worked in Hollywood, and the FUN books.
Alan Moore made his name with PRETENSION, but there is nothing clever, nothing meaningful about anything he ever wrote, my pet CAT could have done a better Jack the Ripper story.....now while everyone else was off copying Moore, Garth E. was busy schlepping this art form back into the world of FUN! Now that's all he's ever been man, FUN, and if you admit to liking him while saying in the same breath that people who use foul language, thugs, are the type that like him, I don't know what that says about a Cat like yourself.....
But as for this dumb cop show W.Ennis reviews, dig this; it sounds like Now and Again meets that uncool Space Precinct thing, there was only ever 2 cop shows that ever were hip --- one was Homicide Life On The Street (we miss you Pembleton, man) and now we have The Shield - which COOKS.
Bocho? Should look up the word DINOSAUR -- and he'll find a picture of himself.
Shalom! -
That was a terribly silly movie. just bad. I just finished watching the nypd 2069 pilot and i have to say it's a lot better than this guy is saying. It's a fairly powerful drama, as powerful as recent seasons of nypd blue (which has been weak since season 2) The attempt is valiant and the execution could have been stronger, but this is a pilot and has TONS of potential. stop being dicks. Oh, and there were more than a couple really nice bladerunneresque moments. Minority report was no more effective.
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Jun 19, 2003 5:04:04 PM CDT
So they put shit like this together, but completely ignore the i
by chastain-86
Which actually isn't that bad an idea, when you think about it. Oh, and whoever started the whole Stone Cold Steve Austin thing needs to find a fresh new idea. Replacing Hulk Hogan jokes with SCSA ones is very, very lame, and I hope you get hit with a very, very large bat very, very soon.
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There are so many great writers in comics. Garth Ennis is not one of them. He had a decent run on Preacher and Hitman, but this does not make him a god. A comic god is someone who can do it all. Alan Moore is comic god, Neil Gaiman is a comic god, the Beranek brothers from Silent Devil Productions are comic gods, Frank Miller was a comic god, Warren Ellis is when he turns in scripts. Others have moments of greatness, such as Brian Michael Bendis. Other suck ass. I am glad that Warren Ellis keeps his site updated on a regular basis. He seems to really care about his craft. Now finish Planetary for fuck's sake! I need to read the ending to one of the greatest comic book series ever!
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Be Well, John Spartan.
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Jun 19, 2003 10:47:47 PM CDT
Reg...I don't care what order my posts are in...and that's kind
by dog of mystery
People who place significance on the order of their posts don't need to be here. Fuck 'em, I say. Fuck them up their stupid asses.
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The part about what Ellison says about people who don't know anything about sci fi sounded dead on right (although I thought Harlan hated being called a science fiction writer). It's a shame cool stuff like Farscape or Firefly gets cancelled while boccho's crap probably gets huge production dollars and promotion.
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Sounds like a merger of "NYPD Blue" (which he can steal from since it belongs to him) and "Futurama." And a cop named Bolander? Sounds like somebody's been watching Homicide on DVD in his spare time...
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The pilot did not read that bad. But my question would be, where to go from there? I mean the protagonist still is in America, it is 66 years later and what. That's it. And as far as COPROCK goes, I never saw it. But I would like to see a robotic John Ritter in Hooperman 2069!
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... (non Star Trek) sci-fi show that has lasted more than 3 seasons..". Okay! "Babylon 5". What do I win?
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I presume Ellis is referring to the long-running comic series and not the movie. (And since it has been long-running, one could say it "worked".)
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Man...I remember that show! That was funny as hell! Bochco's a genius...wait a minute...I remember sending in a treatment for a series set in a hospital...a musical. A few months before Coprock showed up! I was gonna be a mega-bucks Hollywood Producer! A mover! A shaker! They told me nobody would watch a show called "DocRock!" Thieving bastards...
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The muppets will rule the world, not in the year 3050, but much earlier. In fact, in an uprising led by the Great Gonzo and Lew Zealand, the muppets will overturn the next presidential election before a result can be determined and place Scooter in office as 'Supreme Overlord of the United States'. The House and Senate will be replaced by Statler and Waldorf, and the Supreme Court will be replaced by Dr. Teeth and his band. As the months progress, muppets will orchestrate coup d'etats of every nation, making subtle, and sometimes drastic changes. Animal will kill and eat the British royal family in an attempt to take the throne. Sweden will be renamed 'Bork' by its new Prime Minister Chef. Fozzie Bear will be elected UN Secretary General, and in his first act in office, will ban the growth and production of tomatoes and all tomato-based products. His second act will be to commission Bunsen Honeydew to assemble an invincible army of robo-Beakers to force humanity into submission. The muppets' iron-fisted rule will be short-lived, however, as humanity realizes that the robo-Beakers are solar-powered and muppets are made of highly flammable foam. It was scary stuff; Romana and I barely escaped with our lives. Unfortunately, K-9 was destroyed when he was stepped on by Snufalupagus (which, I may add, does indeed exist, despite a puzzling lack of evidence) so I spent quite some time afterwards building another annoying but useful robotic animal friend. My goodness, I've lost all track of time, I've been rambling for ten minutes. You must be bored out of your skull...Would you like a jellybaby?
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...then rent "Bubblegum Gum Crisis Tokyo 2040". All other films/TV series of this genre cannot touch it.
And beside, who can get tired of seeing animated women getting hard?
BTW, avoid the "A.D. Police" at all cost. A triple decker shit sandwich that has been pee on days ago. -
It WAS pretty good, dispite it's kinda silly title.
does anyone know if it got picked up? i couldn't find out. thanks. -
So let's all quit with the Alan Moore bashing already.
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Could the reviewers try and be a little more up on the news they are reviewing at AICN? NYPD 2069 was dropped by the network and will not be airing. Print Media posted this news first so how slow is this site?
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NO MORE COP SHOWS PLEASE. It's bad enough everyone wants to see shows like Law and Order that cater to mindless audiences who refuse to think and follow a show with a season long storyline.
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