Episode 3's tone was too campy, why??

[davidknightrider]

ok,

im being open minded about this series, and I am wanting them to make it better,
but the whole tone of the 3rd episode last night was bordering on a camp fest.

why have they chosen to go with this tone? its too campy.

the original series, and even Knight Rider 2000, the tone was much more serious throughout, and little bits of humour thrown in.

But in this particular episode, the Billy & Zoe characters were too campy and at times, this brought the whole episode down.

since this show is about high concept technology, adding in this type of severe campness does not help the show.
and in the long term will most likely put people off.

And also, some of the background score was pretty poor. At times, it was like a daytime soap score.

I mean, when you listen to Don peake's music, it was an integral part of the series, driving on the series.
And even Knight Rider 2000, even for just 1 and a half hours, Jan Hammer managed to bang out a great score on a par with some of his Miami Vice music.

I would prefer it if someone new came on board to score the series, give it a clear and unique identity, and use more of the Knight Rider themes.

One of the few shows which has managed to create a unique identity through its music and character's is HEROE'S.

Why can't these lot do the same for Knight Rider?? its not exactly rocket science. It just requires people with courage and balls to do something innovative rather than giving us generic crap.

I applaud the makers of Heroe's for using Wendy & Lisa to do the music score for that series, they are proper musicians and work hard to make the music enhance the scenes.

Knight rider needs to learn from them.

[Shapeshifter]

One quick note:
HEROES is not possessive. Leave out the apostrophes.

Now, on to your point about the music;

Scoring has changed a lot in 20 plus years. In those days composers scored shows 'wall to wall', that is, there was always music going, and it always commented on the action. Today's music supervisors, in general, take a different route. If there is constant music (and there seldom is today) it tends to be more of a soundtrack, ie, a song or repetitive rhythmic piece that adds energy to a scene, but doesn't reflect every bit of action taking place. I think that the KR08 producers were looking for a more 'old school' approach, with more music than usual, but not the old approach where everything that happens on screen gets a musical sting. People would think today that the kind of score that reflected every bit of action in a scene would be corny.

Still, your point that KR could use a unique musical stamp, is a good one. I do think that Lost and Heroes, in particular, do a very good job of having their own musical palettes. The chick shows like Grey's and Desperate Housewives, do, as well, although they tend to be all the same pizzicato strings.

[KnightINSTINCT]

Man, Don Peake SUCKED on the music score! WTF are you talking about? He nerded up the whole show when he took over for Stu. And even during the first season with Stu Philips' remarkable scoring, there was campy-ness all over the board. *sigh* It's probably why Don took over.. We had to tolerate the overuse of his synth keyboard on everything.

There is a dream for a dark Knight Rider, and I believe we will get one when we get older. But for whatever reason to our circle of evolution for anything to grow in cult culture, it has to start off easy. Knight Rider is a world wide known franchise, and so was Batman and Superman. They all started with campy roots, so will this. So, grab a hyperbolic sleeping chamber and wait for the future

[PHOENIXZERO]

Well, Batman didn't start off campy, that didn't start happening until the late 50s and exploded into the mainstream thanks to the Adam West show. I dunno if I'd consider Superman originally campy either, even on TV, I don't recall the George Reeves series to be campy. Of course then the Salkinds of their grubby mitts on it with the movies and kept wanting more and more stupidity/comedy and fired Donner and brought in Richard Lester.. Ugh...

Hopefully the next episode will be a bit more serious with the apparent story. For the most part I actually kind of like Zoe now but Billy still needs to have his goofiness toned down a bit. I think they also need to stop doing bong assisted brainstorming, especially with the KITT stuff. I still need to watch the episode again, I think I will tomorrow, now I need sleep.

[knightofthephoenix]

Man, Don Peake SUCKED on the music score! WTF are you talking about? He nerded up the whole show when he took over for Stu. And even during the first season with Stu Philips' remarkable scoring, there was campy-ness all over the board. *sigh* It's probably why Don took over.. We had to tolerate the overuse of his synth keyboard on everything.

There is a dream for a dark Knight Rider, and I believe we will get one when we get older. But for whatever reason to our circle of evolution for anything to grow in cult culture, it has to start off easy. Knight Rider is a world wide known franchise, and so was Batman and Superman. They all started with campy roots, so will this. So, grab a hyperbolic sleeping chamber and wait for the future

Don Peake sucked? Wow. Pretty sure you're in the minority on that one.

But I do share your dream for a Dark Knight. I'd really love to see that someday.

[Rockatteer]

I don't think it hurts to have a campy episode once in a while. I certainly found myself laughing a lot through this one.

And to be fair TOS had it's fair share of camp.. but I think 3rd episode into a new show is probably a bit early for camp.

I'm beginning to wonder if the plan is to use sex to sell the show rather than action/adventure.If that is their plan.. it's not a very good one.

[KamenRider]

A lighter tone and camp are not the same thing. Sometimes I think modern audiences are so ingrained on darker tones to a point where if somebody stops angsting or being "badass" for five seconds and cracks a smile then suddenly it's camp. It's like with Batman people think it's always a choice between Adam West or Frank Miller with no middle ground. I'm not really into camp but extreme amounts of grim n' gritty can be just a silly, maybe even more so because it's so pretentious.

I think tone of the episode was light and there was a lot humor but it doesn't veer into camp or making fun of the shows basic premise. Maybe it wasn't exactly a high octane episode but still entertaining and got Mike into an interesting fix that was fun both for it's "damn I wish I had his problems" factor and as an episode in and of itself.

[Lost Knight]

davidknightrider,

While I agree with pretty much everything you said (aside from the Knight Rider 2000 score which only consisted of one song and a smooth jazz one for an "action" movie at that), I believe we are going to get a mixed bag of quality and style right now. There are different writers and different directors and they're all trying to use their own style. "Knight Of the Iguana" reminded me a lot of the movie Point Break which could have been a good thing if it wasn't in my opinion a boring episode (not counting the last few minutes).

I've noticed that the musical score is actually made up of much of the music from the backdoor pilot, which is decent, but nowhere near as distinctive as Don Peake's score. In fact, I've been wishing the whole time that they'd bring Stu Phillips or Don Peake back to really help make these two shows feel more connected. True, the original series had its fair share of campiness, but that was more a reflection of the times since that's how television was mostly done in the '80s. The problem with the new show is that it's trying to emulate that in a world that's now vastly different and with audiences expecting more realism/darkness.

Let's also not forget how much NBC is hammering into the producers' heads that it's an 8:00 show, meaning that NBC wants a lot of the darkness toned down. From the looks of things, however, it might be better if they stayed the hell out of the way and let the show be a little darker, especially with all of the suggested sex and T&A shown every 5 minutes. (Not that I'm complaining, just saying.)

[Sue]

A lighter tone and camp are not the same thing. Sometimes I think modern audiences are so ingrained on darker tones to a point where if somebody stops angsting or being "badass" for five seconds and cracks a smile then suddenly it's camp. It's like with Batman people think it's always a choice between Adam West or Frank Miller with no middle ground. I'm not really into camp but extreme amounts of grim n' gritty can be just a silly, maybe even more so because it's so pretentious.

I think tone of the episode was light and there was a lot humor but it doesn't veer into camp or making fun of the shows basic premise. Maybe it wasn't exactly a high octane episode but still entertaining and got Mike into an interesting fix that was fun both for it's "damn I wish I had his problems" factor and as an episode in and of itself.

I couldn't agree more, there definitely is a middle ground. Part of what we loved about TOS was the humor. I think the new show needs to keep some of that lightheartedness and I think that they have done an excellent job so far in achieving that. With that accomplished I'd like to see the darker side as well. I think the writers have proven they can accomplish both and I think they should be given free reign to tell their story.