“Wonderfalls is a lovely series,” writes my friend and mentor Harry Knowles in his recommendation of the series’ box set this month. “Although - after the 13 episodes - I felt that was all I ever needed from it. As a continuing series I think it might have just become way way way too gimmicky - but in this short, but sweet run it's just right.”
Honestly, I did wonder if perhaps Harry didn’t have a point.
But. You can’t always judge a series’ future by its first 13 episodes. I had, at best, lowish expectations for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” following its uneven first season. It took the magnificent arrival of Spike and Dru in the third episode of the second season to make me sit up straight and start paying attention.
So. What if Fox moved “24” to Mondays a year early? What if, instead of granting “Wonderfalls” its Friday-night death-slot, Fox had launched “Wonderfalls” right after a Tuesday edition of “American Idol”? Would last season’s best new series also be Fox’s highest-rated scripted hourlong right now? And where would Jaye Tyler’s second- and third-season adventures have taken us?
The “Wonderfalls” box set finally hit shelves Tuesday and with it comes word of what creator Bryan Fuller had in mind for the series, post-1.13 (beware the major box-set spoilers that follow):
* At what point in season two would Jaye and bartender Eric have commenced boning? “I'd argue for episode one,” Fuller tells Ain’t It Cool. “I mean, Jesus, fuck already. Right?”
* A major season-two story arc would have involved Jaye’s sister Sharon enduring a miracle pregnancy. "The big thrust of the second season was going to be a miracle-birth arc, with Sharon [Katie Finneran], the lesbian sister,” Fuller told SciFi.com. “We set that up in a [first-season] episode called 'Safety Canary,' where she breaks up with her bisexual girlfriend, who then goes back to her husband and has sex with him. After they've had sex, Sharon comes back to her bisexual girlfriend and says, 'I want to still be with you,' and then they have sex. So the semen in the bisexual girl's vagina gets into lesbian Sharon's vagina and she becomes pregnant, though she's never had sex with a man. So the whole arc of season two was going to be this miracle birth/Jesus arc and Jaye coming to the conclusion she may be a little bit of a prophet.”
* The DVD’s own mini-doc reveals, if I remember correctly, that Jaye would be institutionalized at the conclusion of the second season. At the start of the third season, she asks “Why me?” And the answer comes back: “Because you listen.”
* Season three follows up on the first-season episode “Cocktail Bunny,” with the world learning that Jaye Tyler has powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. “Dr. Ron was going to write a book about Jaye and her quasi-Jesus complex and expose her,” explains Fuller. “There would be groupies.”
Herc, I wonder who won your “Wonderfalls” contest!
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
But. You can’t always judge a series’ future by its first 13 episodes. I had, at best, lowish expectations for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” following its uneven first season. It took the magnificent arrival of Spike and Dru in the third episode of the second season to make me sit up straight and start paying attention.
So. What if Fox moved “24” to Mondays a year early? What if, instead of granting “Wonderfalls” its Friday-night death-slot, Fox had launched “Wonderfalls” right after a Tuesday edition of “American Idol”? Would last season’s best new series also be Fox’s highest-rated scripted hourlong right now? And where would Jaye Tyler’s second- and third-season adventures have taken us?
The “Wonderfalls” box set finally hit shelves Tuesday and with it comes word of what creator Bryan Fuller had in mind for the series, post-1.13 (beware the major box-set spoilers that follow):
* At what point in season two would Jaye and bartender Eric have commenced boning? “I'd argue for episode one,” Fuller tells Ain’t It Cool. “I mean, Jesus, fuck already. Right?”
* A major season-two story arc would have involved Jaye’s sister Sharon enduring a miracle pregnancy. "The big thrust of the second season was going to be a miracle-birth arc, with Sharon [Katie Finneran], the lesbian sister,” Fuller told SciFi.com. “We set that up in a [first-season] episode called 'Safety Canary,' where she breaks up with her bisexual girlfriend, who then goes back to her husband and has sex with him. After they've had sex, Sharon comes back to her bisexual girlfriend and says, 'I want to still be with you,' and then they have sex. So the semen in the bisexual girl's vagina gets into lesbian Sharon's vagina and she becomes pregnant, though she's never had sex with a man. So the whole arc of season two was going to be this miracle birth/Jesus arc and Jaye coming to the conclusion she may be a little bit of a prophet.”
* The DVD’s own mini-doc reveals, if I remember correctly, that Jaye would be institutionalized at the conclusion of the second season. At the start of the third season, she asks “Why me?” And the answer comes back: “Because you listen.”
* Season three follows up on the first-season episode “Cocktail Bunny,” with the world learning that Jaye Tyler has powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. “Dr. Ron was going to write a book about Jaye and her quasi-Jesus complex and expose her,” explains Fuller. “There would be groupies.”
Herc, I wonder who won your “Wonderfalls” contest!
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
The “Wonderfalls” box set finally hit shelves Tuesday and with it comes word of what creator Bryan Fuller had in mind for the series, post-1.13 (beware the major box-set spoilers that follow):
* At what point in season two would Jaye and bartender Eric have commenced boning? “I'd argue for episode one,” Fuller tells Ain’t It Cool. “I mean, Jesus, fuck already. Right?”
* A major season-two story arc would have involved Jaye’s sister Sharon enduring a miracle pregnancy. "The big thrust of the second season was going to be a miracle-birth arc, with Sharon [Katie Finneran], the lesbian sister,” Fuller told SciFi.com. “We set that up in a [first-season] episode called 'Safety Canary,' where she breaks up with her bisexual girlfriend, who then goes back to her husband and has sex with him. After they've had sex, Sharon comes back to her bisexual girlfriend and says, 'I want to still be with you,' and then they have sex. So the semen in the bisexual girl's vagina gets into lesbian Sharon's vagina and she becomes pregnant, though she's never had sex with a man. So the whole arc of season two was going to be this miracle birth/Jesus arc and Jaye coming to the conclusion she may be a little bit of a prophet.”
* The DVD’s own mini-doc reveals, if I remember correctly, that Jaye would be institutionalized at the conclusion of the second season. At the start of the third season, she asks “Why me?” And the answer comes back: “Because you listen.”
* Season three follows up on the first-season episode “Cocktail Bunny,” with the world learning that Jaye Tyler has powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. “Dr. Ron was going to write a book about Jaye and her quasi-Jesus complex and expose her,” explains Fuller. “There would be groupies.”
Herc, I wonder who won your “Wonderfalls” contest!
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
* A major season-two story arc would have involved Jaye’s sister Sharon enduring a miracle pregnancy. "The big thrust of the second season was going to be a miracle-birth arc, with Sharon [Katie Finneran], the lesbian sister,” Fuller told SciFi.com. “We set that up in a [first-season] episode called 'Safety Canary,' where she breaks up with her bisexual girlfriend, who then goes back to her husband and has sex with him. After they've had sex, Sharon comes back to her bisexual girlfriend and says, 'I want to still be with you,' and then they have sex. So the semen in the bisexual girl's vagina gets into lesbian Sharon's vagina and she becomes pregnant, though she's never had sex with a man. So the whole arc of season two was going to be this miracle birth/Jesus arc and Jaye coming to the conclusion she may be a little bit of a prophet.”
* The DVD’s own mini-doc reveals, if I remember correctly, that Jaye would be institutionalized at the conclusion of the second season. At the start of the third season, she asks “Why me?” And the answer comes back: “Because you listen.”
* Season three follows up on the first-season episode “Cocktail Bunny,” with the world learning that Jaye Tyler has powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. “Dr. Ron was going to write a book about Jaye and her quasi-Jesus complex and expose her,” explains Fuller. “There would be groupies.”
Herc, I wonder who won your “Wonderfalls” contest!
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
* Season three follows up on the first-season episode “Cocktail Bunny,” with the world learning that Jaye Tyler has powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. “Dr. Ron was going to write a book about Jaye and her quasi-Jesus complex and expose her,” explains Fuller. “There would be groupies.”
Herc, I wonder who won your “Wonderfalls” contest!
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
And so, at this point, do I. The average “Wonderfalls” talkback, I think, generates maybe 16 talkbacks, four of which have nothing to do with “Wonderfalls.” So you can imagine my fear and surprise when we got more than 1,000 entries vying for the five “Wonderfalls” box sets AICN is giving away. (Entry deadline has long since expired, so please. Enough.) I printed all the entries out and bound them together with very long-stemmed brass brads. They look like two Greater Los Angeles phonebooks. I’m done with the first phonebook. I carry the second around with me everywhere, reading as my car registration renewal and tax returns go begging. Suffice it to say, with this many entries, you have very little chance of winning. You might just want to just buy the set. If you win, you can always turn a friend, family member or object of lust onto this incredible dead show by re-gifting. In any event, I’ll be certain to notify all five winners by email the minute I’m done. Hopefully within another week or two. You'll forgive the delay. Because it is entirely your fault.
No, it wouldn't have been one of Fox's highest rated series with a better time slot ... because it sucks. Horribly. Please hurry up and give away the DVD sets so maybe THEN I won't have to see the word "Wonderfalls" anywhere. Ever again. Thanks. -- talkbacker "Lou C."
Well, good luck with that, Lou. Because Harry Knowles' positive notice was only one of many ...
chud.com says:
"Wonderfalls has quite the surprising cult following, considering its quick downfall on FOX’s behalf. I can only predict this following growing larger now that the entire series has been released on DVD. If you were ever curious about this show, be sure to pick up this set. And if this review has your interested piqued please be sure to pick up this set. Wonderfalls has something for just about everyone out there."
tvshowsondvd.com says:
"Six of the 13 episodes contain commentary by Caroline Dhavernas, Katie Finneran, Todd Holland and Bryan Fuller. The tracks are great, and you can hear the bonds formed between the cast and crew members. Listen to these; they're entertaining."
The mini-doc's great too, especially the giddy new interviews with Caroline Dhavernas and Katie Finnerman.
Looking for bumper stickers, plush toys and girls’ underwear covered with cute cartoon double-amputees? Visit The Herc Store!
