Summer TV - Finding Carter

So I was watching something.  I forget what.  Big Bang Theory re-runs on TBS or something and they ran a commercial for a new program "Finding Carter" which was set to premiere 15 minutes later on MTV.  I was intrigued by the premise and switched and...

Hey, Wesley!

I did not know that Alexis Denisof had a new show.  He's looking hawt!  Er... he's the DAD!  Of teenagers!  OMG, Wesley is now hawt (morally ambiguous) dad.

I feel old.

There was enough going on in the story to keep me watching for Summer TV.  Yeah, it's rather teen-y TV but... it had some interest.

Premise: 

Teenaged girl goes out and does 'rebellious teen' stuff and is arrested.  While in custody, the cops discover that she's 'a face on a milk carton,' IOW, she was kidnapped as a 3 year old.   Teenaged girl's world implodes as she discovers that her single mom stole her and that her 'real' family has been looking for her.  The 'kidnapper mom' runs away and disappears before she's caught, becoming a fugitive (who still sends messages to the girl).  To the protagonist, 'kidnapper mom' was an affectionate  'cool mom' and beloved by the girl.  She's angry at the police for going after the mom who raised her (more on that in a moment.)

Protagonist is dumped into her 'real' family which has suffered the fall-out from her kidnapping.

* non-identical twin sister reacted to the protagonist's kidnapping by becoming a hyper 'good girl'.  She never stepped out of line, never did anything to upset her parents, always does everything 'right' etc.  In her words, she 'never did anything'... because she grew up fearing 'what had happened to her sister' only to discover that to her sister 'it never happened at all.' At first, the fraternal twin welcomes her sister, but you see frustration growing as the prodigal sis 'rebels' all over the place and no one stops or corrects her out of fear of being rejected by her.

* tween younger brother is smart and empathetic, but feels as though he's grown up as 'the invisible kid' because the parents were obsessed with the lost child.

*  Dad is scruffy Wesley...erm... Alexis Denisof (looking hot) with his real American accent (which totally throws me off).  He appears good-looking and easy going.  Protagonist daughter gets along with him better than her bio mom (it's that easy-going vibe).   But his 'career' turns out to be the best seller he once wrote on his daughter having been kidnapped.  Plus, he appears to be in some sort of financial trouble (not entirely sure yet why.  To be revealed later, no doublt.)   And his agent is pressing him to write a sequel to his book,  based on his now having found his long lost daughter... or rather having found a teen girl who is a complete and total stranger who is biologically related. The newly rediscovered daughter discovers the proposal to write the book and Denisof agrees that he shouldn't write it... but he totally lies about his not doing so and is keeping notes and writing the book anyway.

*  Bio Mom (Cynthia Watros - LOST, Guilding Light).  Is controlling and no non-sense.  According to the tween brother, she had a breakdown/depression after he was born (9 weeks premature with low odds of surviving, but he did survive).  Unable to handle the prospect of losing another child, she (according to her) went somewhat numb at that point.    More recently, she had resolved to divorce scruffy Wesley (you don't get a close vibe in that marriage.  Not toxic, but not close either.  Then again, statistics show that couples who experience a tragedy involving a child commonly break up).  Mom is involved with/having a romantic association with a co-worker who wants to marry her (no indication that scruffy Wesley has any clue about this).   She called the romantic relationship off when the daughter was found, saying she couldn't break up the family again.  Mom is 'damaged' and not the warm-n-fuzzy 'cool mom' that kidnapper mom had been and the newly returned daughter is incredibly hard on Bio Mom (really hard.  I find myself sympathising with Watros' character who, when you think of all of this from her POV, has been through hell).

One of the many reasons why the long lost daughter hates her is that bio mom is a cop...a cop who is determined to find and jail the person who stole her daughter, a daughter who continues to refer to the kidnapper as 'mom' and to herself as "Elizabeth" (when new found daughter is being nice about it.  Long lost daughter has been known to call her several less nice things as well.  Yeah, this is clearly the central relationship problem of the show, though they set up issues with each family member.)

Toss in a couple of cute teen boys (one of which is the son of the mom's secret almost boyfriend)  and you have your family show.

The writing seemed fairly good,  execution makes it seem less soap opera-ish than the summary sounds, and far less cloying than anything on the Family Channel.

I'm actually glad I tuned in.  For summer TV, it wasn't half bad.  I would watch again.

What Are You Reading Wednesday

What Are You Reading Wednesday... where yet again the answer is that I'm not really reading anything much.  I did sort of half-read/Kindle-buy a book to read later and being something of a spoiler slut I read the final couple of chapters (hey, do that within the first twenty-four hours and I can decide whether or not to return the book.  I know not to judge a book by its cover... or its ending, but...eh.  This is fluff reading and I don't think it much matters).

Anyway, impression from reading the end of the novel -- Good Reads is as per usual a bit crazy.

This particular book (historical romance. Yeah, yeah.  I know.  It's fluff, okay!)...   Anyway, this book had 3 1/2 stars and rather opposing reviews. After poking about the reviews a bit, I went what the hell and downloaded the book.  Here's my issue with Good Reads:  Most of the really highly negative reviews stated that it was because they disliked the heroine.  Glowing and negative reviews frequently featured adoring the hero.    Upon my (rather cursory) look-see of the final chapters, my response would be that I LIKED the heroine and the hero is problematic!  In fact, the hero is problematic in such a way that I do not downgrade the novel for it (because his problems are deliberate by the author and addressed within the story) but I DO side-eye the glowing love of the hero by some of the readers.  Erm... guys --or in many cases, ladies-- the hero is a misogynist!   It's flat-out stated by the heroine (more than once!) that he's a misogynist.  What's more -- he IS one!

Now, the misogyny has an internal cause in the story.  As a child, he was abandoned by his mother and was raised by a 19th century male Miss Havisham-like uncle, who specifically and deliberately instilled a misogynistic mindset in the boy and fostered a distrust of women which, in tandem to his being 'late-blooming' and socially awkward to begin with (on top of growing up in atmostpheric Wuthering Heights-like physical isolation with a couple of Estella-like interactions as his female cousin) causes this hero to have actual social problems  (ala what you occasionally run across in bitter fanboy circles while they're complaining 'OMG fangirls ruin everything!'    You know the ones I'm talking about.   Yep, he's that guy.  Prior to his (superficial) transformation he has a full-blown case of nice guy syndrome).  Again, he has actual social problems that the author and the heroine recognize, address, and react to.  These issues are deliberately part of the story and thus I don't downrate the novel for its misogynist hero.  It's a point.  He has to change himself, beyond superficially (which was the sum of his early idea) but actually examine his attitudes towards women and really change by recognizing the toxicity of misogyny in his life and in his relationships.   So, yeah, a misogynist hero but...hmmm... I'm still inclined to read the book because the author has a take on that.   I'm more inclined to downrate stories with unintentional misogynistic heroes where it's never recognized (there are tons of examples of these.  Tons.  Too many.  Way too many.).

So, first, I'm distrustful of the Good Reads love of this hero.  Exactly  -- specifically -- what are they loving?  Is it his evolution by the end? That would be good.  But given the way that the love of him is paired by the reviews loathing her, I wonder whether some are actually adopting the nice guy syndrome  aspects of his character in which case...ugh!.

Second, why all the heroine-hatred?  I'm pretty much siding with her. While her early transgression wasn't 'nice', neither did it deserve the seriously OTT reaction of the hero.  I consider the heroine to be correct when she says the offense the hero took was disturbingly disproportional to her actual offense ( Yes, she actually points that out.  Cooly, rationally, analytically, and dead on.  This is why I liked her!)  In the early stages she had apparently made a bet with hero's older cousin that she could get his socially awkward bespectacled (virginal) misogynistic cousin to kiss her... and like it.   And she had).  Said socially awkward bespectacled virginal hero discovered the bet, felt humiliated, and decided to superficially transform himself into what 'women like her' want and then humiliate her in kind at a later date.   Again, her early actions were not 'nice' ...but, really, it was just a kiss! (Even if it's the early 1800s. It's still just a kiss.)   Hardly the sort of thing deserving the hero's protracted fuming, much less his intention to  'get back' at her for it either.

However, several of the Good Reads reviews seem to have wholly adopted the hero's view that her stolen kiss from the awkward (woman-hating) male virgin was mean, mean, mean and what a bitch!

I...er... don't really think the author intended us to think the hero was being reasonable here. That's stated more than once by several characters in the last couple of chapters that I sneak peeked.  There's a reason why the heroine and severak other characters ping the guy for having misogynistic views on women (instilled in him by the aforementioned mother abandonment, Miss Havisham-like misogynist male guardian, general inexperience with women, etc). The hero's narration of the situation is unreliable.  He reaction is not okay. The heroine is not wrong in telling him he overreacted in the extreme and that his behavior was messed up.   Do not adopt his view of it as the correct one.  It's not intended to be.  It's the thing about him that he must FIX if he is to find a happy life (and, it being a romance, of course he does --perhaps unrealistically so, but that's romance for you.  Happy endings are required.  By the end, he even recognizes societal male privilege as an issue.)

Anyway, from the partial part that I read, that's my impression.   And I'm intrigued enough not to return the book for a refund and to read the thing sometime soon.

But, boy, do I side-eye some of the Good Reads reviews.  Um, ladies, there seems to be a bit of internalized misogyny going on.  Exactly why is a female's bet over a kiss unforgivable... but a hero bent on revenge because of a KISS  A-okay?

Maybe the 3 star reviews are because the author seems to be taking the heroine's side that the hero is screwed up where women are concerned and needs to get the hell over it?

I LIKED the heroine because of this. She was matter-of-fact about it and stated the problem bluntly. I thought, 'good for her!' But, then, I tend to frequently be out-of-step with some of Good Reads romance reviews.

(No, I don't remember the name of the book at the moment.  I've only read the last three chapters and not the whole thing and would have to look it up on my kindle  in order to remember. It was written by Miranda Neville, though.)