For years, Canadians have been able to watch episodes of iconic American classics such as “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Batman” or “I Love Lucy.” But where was Canada’s TV heritage? Why was our homegrown fare always, after its initial run, locked away in a vault?
Well, “The Littlest Hobo” has finally been let out of his kennel. After years of development, the Canada Media Fund and Google Canada have teamed to launch encore+, a new YouTube channel giving viewers here and around the world access to decades of Canadian film and TV gold.
OMG OKAY SO. If you’ve been following me since the LJ days, this is your golden opportunity to experience some of the things I used to go on and on and on about.
–They have the whole first season of DaVinci’s Inquest. This is not the best season of DVI, but it’s still good and worth watching. Features Ian Tracey, who you know if you’ve watched anything filmed in Vancouver ever, Gwyneth Walsh aka The Less-Intellectual Duras Sister, Donnelly Rhodes, another anything-filmed-in-Vancouver-ever actor, and a young Jewel Staite, who needs no fannish introduction.
–They have some of This Is Wonderland. In the absence of Power Play (if this channel uploads PP, it will get its own post), this is your best introduction to the force of acting nature that is Michael Riley. If you watched Being Erica, you may think you know him already, but trust me, you do not.
–They have Due South, but if you’re in fandom you very likely already know dS.
–They have s1 of Slings & Arrows, which is JUST THE BEST THING. (Also: HILARIOUSLY PRESCIENT. Although that doesn’t happen until s2.) It has Paul Gross and Rachel McAdams and Mark McKinney and DARREN NICHOLS. DEAL WITH THAT.
–They have The Littlest Hobo, which all non-Canadians should watch at least one episode of just for the ~experience~.
–Other notables: Little Mosque on the Prairie, Degrassi Jr High, Ready or Not, Mr Dressup, Are You Afraid Of The Dark?, Incredible Story Studio, various movies and TV movies.
Concept: a TV series consisting entirely of “filler episodes” from some notional story of grand adventure whose ongoing events can only be inferred from the incidental context of whatever character-driven bullshit is happening this week.
Like, maybe they’re a D&D-style adventuring party, and we only ever see them during downtime between adventures. Sometimes one of them is suffering from some improbable injury or bizarre curse, and the particulars of how it happened are only vaguely alluded to – their entire professional lives are basically one big Noodle Incident from the audience’s perspective.
I think you could get some use out of “previously on” and “next time on” segments showing footage that never happened.
For example: “Previously on, Champions of Karamore!” *Shot of a scepter lying on a pedestal in a tomb somewhere* Wizard: “The Scepter of Aratoom is the key to Garroth’s Ascension” *Four Seconds of the Heroes engaged in epic combat* Warrior: “I’LL HOLD THEM OFF, GET THE SCEPTER” Rogue *Looking at empty pedestal*: “IT’S GONE! WE’RE TOO LATE!” *Dark cloaked figure that the audience has never actually seen before, holding the scepter* “At last…it begins”
And then the entire episode consists of them hanging around the nearest inn, looking at maps and arguing about different ways they could have gotten there, and if any of those methods would have gotten them to the Tomb fast enough. “I told you we should have sold the horses in Roksport and taken a ship to Veremen” “We paid good money for those horses! Staying overland cut at least three days off our trip!” “It would have, HAD THE HORSES NOT BEEN EATEN BY WEREWOLVES!” “There’s no way we could have known about the Werewolves.” “THE TOWN WAS CALLED LYCANSBURG JEREMY!”
okay but people need to read the article to see the additional photos because she also did Korra-era Toph and the original Rita Repulsa oh my god!! What a great lady!
I’d like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up at your lifeless eyes and wave like this. Can you and your associates arrange this for me, Mr. Morden?
its shark week and michael phelps is about to race a shark but how do we know this is the fastest shark were there shark prelims set out underwater to test this i think this is an unfair process discovery u cant have a world class human and just regular jeff the shark do u know how humiliating its gonna be for jeff and his family when he gets beat by michael phelps™ cuz hes just a normal average joe accountant shark why u gotta do jeff like that man
Steel Phoenix Studios 