Revenge - How's your 401k doing?

Are you in for the ride? Are you here to have a good time? Are we going to invest in TV viewing and fun speculation like we haven't in a long time? Who's with me? Give me a Hell yeah!

Are you pumped? I said are you pumped? Ok let's get to this!

First off let me say, this is not a blog about facts, this is a blog about speculation (as in this is not a story about forgiveness, this is a story about revenge) I'm going to do what I do 4,596 best on the web, and that is speculate about crazy stuff in a fictional world and hopefully take you with me to the Hampton's for a couple minutes to indulge in polo matches and life on the other side of the economy.

Dede had brought up the idea of doing a blog for this show yesterday, but I told her that two things needed to happen, the first being that it continued to be awesome, check. And that people were actually going to watch it so that it was worth my time to write up my blog (I am an attention whore afterall =) ) Well the show is awesome and I don't see it getting cancelled anytime soon, so why not go all in on it. If people read my blog cool, but if nothing else it gives me a place to play my little guessing game with myself. And with everything that is going on in the little details of the show, oh yeah there is a lot to play guessing games with.

First little item that I'm going to throw out there in my little guessing game speculation, the man killed in the pilot isn't Daniel, it's that punk rich kid Adam (irony, it burns it burns). Here is why... We see that the shooter appears to be Jack (normal Joe who's father owns the sinking bar) sure a lot could happen between now and then, but with a show titled revenge, wouldn't it make more sense to see Jack getting revenge for some punk kid basically killing his father from the heart attack? Sure it's early and there isn't a lot to go on, just kind of a hunch, it's the type of twist that would make sense, since we're all supposed to think that it's Daniel. Oh and before I forget, "Welcome to the OC Bitch!" Anyone that watched the OC will get the joke, I hope....

Second little piece of speculation, Nolan was on the phone with Jack's voice mail when Emily showed up in his car. They went on to talk about very bad things happening to rich people and I wonder if that might have been recorded. Sure Jack seems like a good guy in all of this, but if I'm right on my first thought that he is going to shoot Adam, who knows.

Third how are we to know that Emily's father really was a good guy? Let's say that he really was guilty of the stuff that he was convicted of, except that he was the only one that went down for the crime. We're being told to believe that Emily's dad was this great paragon of goodness that was wrongly convicted and thus ruining Emily's life. However is there one redeeming person in all of the rich characters on the show? At this point, no they're all evil, why not her dad? The main theme of the show is revenge, you know the second theme? Betrayal, what better way to get that point across to us the viewers than to betray our trust by telling us one thing and then flipping that around on us later on down the line. How would Emily respond to knowing that all of her revenge activities were based on a flawed premise?

Let's go a little further down that rabbit hole for a second. Let's say that Emily spends the majority of season one ruining the people's lives that she thought were to blame for her father, only to find out in the end that he was just as guilty as they were. That conviction that she has for destroying them would be shaken to the core and she'd be forced to question all of her motives. But the worst part of it for her would be that she had already committed so many acts of vengeance against the people in the Hampton's that she would be too far down the dark path to turn back. At that point her acts aren't about vengeance, it's about survival.

Speaking of survival, Victoria is a great character, there is just something menacing about her where you know that she can destroy a character at any moment if she wants to. Emily might have some power, but that is based on surprise and secrecy, Victoria is in your face and can crush you at any time. Victoria also sees Emily for what she is, maybe she can't place her finger on what that is, but she recognizes it, birds of a feather... As the investigations into Emily's past go on we'll see her get closer and closer to the truth of what Emily really is, and who she is.

Another thing to take into consideration as the show moves along, as the metaphorical body count rises, it's going to become more and more obvious who is behind what is going on. My guess is that the characters, especially Victoria are going to get wise to the events and see the correlation eventually. Taken with my other speculation that Emily's dad wasn't such a great guy, I could see these two possibilities coming together at about the same time.

One thing that stands out for me is that the writing here is really good. Sure there are instances that are a little contrived, for example: If they were able to buy all that stock so fast, how come they couldn't sell it all so fast too? But in the end it all works, for me at least. What I really liked was that Lydia didn't just disappear, she showed up demanding some money since her pre-nup kicked in and she was going to be without anything. Anyone notice that she had a file with pictures taken I'm guessing by some third party? Emily didn't need the pictures, she got what she wanted, so was Lydia's husband already tracking her? There was some suggestion that Emily and Lydia's husband might have had a thing since they were on some NY art board together, my guess, that's going to end up being nothing, it's too obvious. Besides why would Emily just hand that piece of information over to Victoria in their little tea session? My guess is that Emily hasn't left a trail, just a false trail meant to be found as a wild goose chase, the character is too smart.

What is fun about the show is that there are just so many directions that it could go in. I might be right, or I could be so far off that it's not even funny. Thankfully the plot isn't obvious, sure there is some cliche in the poor kid having a crush on the rich girl, and that could be a disaster, my gut tells me it's setting something up, like a murder in the season finale....

Let's hope the show keeps the bar high, I like liking TV.

I could have found the clip of Homer Simpson hugging the TV asking they they never fight again, I would have placed it here.

Thinking about it, the show isn't perfect, but when it's so much fun to watch, who cares. Case in point. If they could have bought all of those shares as fast as they did to drive up the price, how come they couldn't sell them just as fast?

Revenge - Best served cold, with Awesome Sauce!

Once upon a time I was in love with a TV show, we'd get together every week and it's dizzying plot would keep me riveted week in and week out while I would try to pour over everything that it promised me. Over the years friends of mine (like my wife) would try to warn me that it wasn't real, but I held on, I knew we had something special. But as the years went on I found myself working to convince myself that what was once there still in fact was. Oh sure we were still having fun together, but the thought that it was going to betray me was in the back of my mind. In the end I was let down, the show failed to deliver on the majority of the things it promised me. I was heartbroken, despondent to anything on the TV except college football, left to play alone on my computer for any sort of entertainment value.

Initially I was in disbelief, "No I liked the ending of Lost." But deep down I knew the truth, I had been lied to. I also thought that maybe I could find love in another's arms, so I went out on dates with Flashforward and a blind date with The Event. Call it a rebound, but neither of them could deliver the same type of fascination that I had had with Lost. Oh sure I tried to give myself to those shows, but the love just wasn't there. The plots of both were trying so hard to be something they weren't, they were trying to be Lost, to replace Lost, but in the end they were just jumbled up messes that pushed me even further away from serialized drama.

After the rebounds I took some time off for myself, I went out on some dates with the Bachelorette and we had a really good time together. But those were just flings, one night stands if you will. We knew there was no real love between us, but sometimes it's not about love, it's about having fun. In the end the Bachelorette helped to get me back on my feet so that when the next show came around I would be ready for it.

This summer I had been looking up something online and I happened to come across ABC's fall lineup, filled with all sorts of new show trailers just waiting to be released. One of them caught my eye, it was a red titled show that just had a special darkness about it, it immediately caught my attention with it's catchy name, Revenge. I told my wife that this might be something good, so I kept an eye on it, waiting to see when it was going to premiere.

So last Wednesday Jen and I sat down to give the show a try. After an hour we were both blown away (ok I was blown away, but Jen really liked it too). Here it was, a serialized drama about bad people getting what they deserve all being served up by a main character that herself was pretty evil by her own right. Not to mention a list of characters that you just didn't know where they were coming from, were they your basic douches or were they all demons by their own right. Then to top if off, writing that I think is just exceptional in how it uses the characters and moves the plot. Oh sure we think we know where the plot is going, but with so many possibilities on where it could go, it's tantalizing. I was expecting a let down last night, instead I got more of the awesome sauce that I tasted in the first episode.

After every love there is heartbreak, but in time wounds heal. I'm not sure where this new relationship is going to go, but I'm sure willing to find out, Revenge has my attention like no show has since Lost and knowing that it's getting great feedback online it's going to be around for a little while. Jump on board folks, there is plenty of awesome sauce on this polo pony for everyone!