Oh goodie, I love this topic!
I could type my fingers to a nub ranting about all the ways shows go wrong because there's some fatal flaw in the premise:
1.
Bionic Woman - I don't mind dark, but the boo-hoo-I'm-a-victim routine turns me off immediately. It's meant to elicit sympathy but in me it just elicits contempt for how blatantly manipulative it is. Jamie should have been enthusiastic about her bionic enhancements at first. Later the reality of it can hit her, after we've gotten to like her. Nobody's going to like her if she's mopey right away. And I agree, recast the lead role. Katee Sackhoff would have been great.
2.
My Own Worst Enemy - It made no sense at all that the gubmint would give superspies an innocuous secret identity and leave him clueless and therefore vulnerable to enemies.
3.
Dollhouse - The boo-hoo problem rears its ugly head again. Presenting the dolls as poor victims of mean people - blergh. How about if the dolls were all terrible people - no PETA style cop-outs about how "they care too much," but people who would never earn our sympathy, loonies and mass murderers and such. The Dollhouse erases their memories and allows them to function in society to some degree, even if it's not much of a life. The alternative is life in prison or the death penalty for their crimes. And by erasing their memories, they don't have to feel guilty (although the level of criminal I'm thinking of would be a sociopath and therefore incapable of guilt).
4.
Jericho - The flaw in the premise wasn't apparent because it was one of those "big mysteries that will be explained." So often when the explanation comes, it's idiotic. Near as I can tell, the reason America was nuked is some lefties wanted to clear out the people in authority, yet had no plan for taking authority themselves so of course someone stepped into the power vacuum - that's a given - and they happened to be right wing loonies. Yep, brilliant plan.
5.
BSG - Well they still have "The Plan" left to use to try to explain what the frak exactly the Cylons' problem was. There has been some attempt at explanation already and for the sake of spoilers I won't say what, but it was so stupid that I'm really hoping there's more to it than
that.
6.
Harper's Island - Since the characters haven't yet figured out that they're being stalked and killed, this problem hasn't yet happened, but they're going to have to face it soon because it's not reasonable that they can go another episode not knowing when people have already started finding corpses. So when the characters realize there's a killer on the loose, what will stop them from simply fleeing for their lives? They don't need to stay on the island. I originally thought the show would somehow trap them on the island. I was going to bail on this show but I'll give it one more episode to see how they handle this.
