Thursday, August 6, 2015

Extant and Tyrant-Two of My Favorite TV Shows


Extant is an American science fiction television drama series created by Mickey Fisher and executive produced by Steven Spielberg. The story revolves around astronaut Molly Woods (Halle Berry) who returns home to her family inexplicably pregnant after 13 months in outer space on a solo mission.

On August 7, 2013, CBS announced that it had placed a 13-episode straight-to-series order, bypassing the traditional pilot stage. Steven Spielberg served as one of the executive producers. Production began in Los Angeles on February 10, 2014. The series is broadcast in the United States on the CBS television network, and is a production of Amblin Television. It premiered on Wednesday, July 9, 2014, at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/8:00 p.m. Central.

On October 9, 2014, CBS renewed Extant for a second season, which premiered on July 1, 2015.

Molly Woods, an astronaut with ISEA (International Space Exploration Agency) is assigned a 13-month solo mission aboard space station Seraphim. She returns home to her husband John, a robotics engineer who created their son Ethan, a prototype android called a "humanich". When Molly discovers that she has mysteriously become pregnant despite years of infertility, she begins a search for answers.

The series is available for streaming on Amazon Instant Video devices four days after broadcast on CBS. In Canada, the series premiered on July 9, 2014, on Global Television Network. In Australia, the series premiered on July 13, 2014, on Network Ten. The series premiered in the United Kingdom on July 10, 2014, on Amazon Instant Video. It made its television premiere on January 20, 2015 on Syfy.] In New Zealand, it debuted on July 23, 2014 on Prime.

In 2014, Extant was chosen, along with six others, for the Critics' Choice Television Award for Most Exciting New Series.

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Tyrant is an American drama television series created by director and writer Gideon Raff and developed by Howard Gordon and Craig Wright. The first season of Tyrant consisting of 10 episodes premiered on American cable network FX on June 24, 2014 and ended on August 26, 2014. FX renewed Tyrant for a 13-episode second season which premiered on June 16, 2015.

Bassam "Barry" Al-Fayeed, the youngest son of an infamous Middle-Eastern tyrant, has been running from his past for 20 years. Now a pediatrician living in the United States, he has an American wife, son and daughter, and has no desire to revisit his familial origins. However, when he is reluctantly compelled to return to his home country (the fictional Abbudin) for his nephew's wedding, he is quickly drawn into a taut political crisis when his father passes away in the midst of growing popular revolution against the ruling family. Bassam must now attempt to use his influence to guide the new President, his brutal and unstable older brother Jamal, to a political solution that will avert a bloody conflict.

While the show is filmed throughout many cities in Israel (such as Kfar Saba, Petach Tikva, and Tel Aviv) and Morocco, but because of the ongoing violence between Hamas and Israel, FX has moved its production from Israel to Istanbul, Turkey. The fictional Arab country of "Abbudin" is deliberately compiled out of mixed elements of a few different actual countries, in order to not appear to simulate a particular nation or situation. The producers of the series have also said that no particular sects or clans will be named while relating details. Executive producer Howard Gordon stated, "We do want to stay away from reality and yet hew to it as long as it sort of feels emotionally correct and culturally correct. I think we’re going to try to stay away from names as much as possible."

Tyrant has received mixed reviews. On Metacritic, the show holds a score of 54 out of 100, based on 33 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". On Rotten Tomatoes, the show has a rating of 60%, based on 47 reviews, with an above average score of 6.2 out of 10. The consensus on the site reads: "Realizing a uniquely vital representation of life in the Middle East, Tyrant mostly thrives as a biting family drama set against immersive scenery".

The above two TV shows are my favorite drama series both Season 1(last year) and now Season 2. Season 1 of Tyrant is now available for sale as a DVD.

Do you have any favorite TV shows this season? I will delighted to hear from you.

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