Jan 23 2009
REVIEW: Millennium Season 3
I am beyond confused. I just finished watching Millennium Season 3 (and therefore I finished watching the entire show) and I am not sure what to say, exactly. It is becoming quite clear to me that Millennium was a tortured property. Season 1, a project that was Chris Carter’s baby, was graphic, violent, shocking and often formulaic. Season 2 dipped into the bizarre, took risks, sometimes hit genius gold and sometimes failed in bizarro fashion but at least did something. Season 3. . .is just kind of. . .there. It just kind of sits there and makes you go: ‘I remember when this show was different’ or more importantly ‘I remember when this show used to be fun’.
Fun is a bizarre term: Millennium, mainly in season 2, was fun for many reasons. It always kept me guessing, it always pushed my emotional limits and it often made me work for my entertainment which is very rare. Season 3 just passes as moderately entertaining but most shockingly, and this is probably the worst thing you can say about a thriller, especially one with supernatural elements, boring. Season 3 is just plain boring at times.
At the end of season 2, Catherine Black was killed by the Marburg virus as was, apparently, most of the planet. The Millennium Group, who had become a more religious Syndicate (the X-Files‘ alien colonization group), had engineered the virus and had subjected it to the planet. Frank was left grey-haired and motionless as his daughter, Jordan, tried to snap him out of it. This was epic. Not only was a major character killed for the second season in a row but this earth-shaking apocalypse, which wasn’t necessarily hinted at being just religious/scientific but possibly man-made, was coming TRUE! There were EPIC consequences in the Millennium universe.
But how does Chris Carter who, after being immensely frustrated with season 2 to the point of booting Morgan and Wong from ALL of his productions, took over as executive producer do with his once beloved property? He has Frank investigate a plane crash with a new puppy-dog agent named Emma Hollis and. . .he lives in Falls Church, Virginia. . .and its, uh, been six months. . .and uh, the planet is fine. . .and. . .yeah, lame. Very lame. Instead of running with the brilliant but sometimes flawed themes of season 2 and working to add to them, Carter, in what is becoming a very frustrating selfish streak (see X-Files seasons 7-9, I Want to Believe, etc.) decides to pretend it all didn’t happen, explain away the virus as ‘overexaggerated’ and not even mention Catherine’s death until bloody fucking episode 12!!!!!!
That, above all else, will frustrate someone who got sucked into the show. If I were watching Millennium season 3 as a stand-alone show then it would still be mediocre but acceptable. But after all that happened before, season 3 starts out with a shocking jolt to your system. It just makes you wonder if you are watching the same show!
It’s not to say the creators didn’t try. Lance Henriksen, nominated for his third consecutive Golden Globe for playing Frank Black here, is always exceptional and can definitely carry this show. Klea Scott, the new partner, Emma Hollis, is both competent and beautiful (but downright sour. Please smile more!). The other two new main cast additions, Stephen Miller as FBI AD McClaren and Peter Outerbridge as the immensely annoying I-wish-he-would-die-now FBI Special Agent Barry Baldwin, all add nice colors to the Millennium canvas.
And technically, season 3 is superior to most or all of television. The cinematography is, I can honestly say, the best in the history of television. The Canadian forests sure do help but season 3 is absolutely breathtaking. The writing is very poor but only because its grandiose ideas fail when delivered to us. The effort is there for sure. The set design and location shooting is also exceptional though in one episode quite lazy since fifteen locations from the X-Files can be found within it.
But, despite all these great A-for-effort achievements, Millennium season 3 is an immense failure and something, if you aren’t a completest, you can ignore. At the very least you can ignore large portions of the episode rundown and finish off storylines that were left unfinished in season 2. Season 3 just lacks bite. Whereas season 2 was more a psychological evaluation of its characters and often showed the temptations of good and evil with the main character of Frank Black and how it led to his often tortured existence, Season 3’s psychological bents are confusing, pretentious and unsatisfying.
The biggest Wow-Season-3-Crapped-On-Me moment is when you watch the ’series finale’ of Millennium which is the X-Files seventh season episode “Millennium”. Wow. Just wow. What a stink fest. Sure, the idea of concluding a show in another show is ballsy but the story is so god damn stupid and craps all over the Millennium universe (and all it built) that you can’t help but feel cheated AND incomplete. Anyone remember the series finale for Enterprise. . .yeah, it’s ALMOST, I said ALMOST, as bad as that.
But I’ll end on a high note. There is one simply horrible episode called “. . .Thirteen Years Later” that is a blatant rip off of Scream 3 (or vice versa, I guess. . .when did Scream 3 come out) which, ironically enough starred Lance Henriksen, but has guest appearance(s) by KISS. Brilliant stuff. And the demonic foe of Frank Black’s, Lucy Butler, played by the intoxicatingly beautiful Sarah-Jane Redmond, returns in what is the most frightening (albeit by cheap tricks) episode in the entire Millennium run (the episode is called ‘Antipas’).
The show is not without its moments but, in general, just leave this season be.
,
Wow, someone doesn’t like Season 3. That is just fine, we all have our opinions. Mine the total opposite, I could have done without Season 2. Season 3 I will agree does not directly address the so called virus issue, but there are reasons for this, behind the scenes stuff. I wasn’t a happy camper with Morgan & Wong taking over Season 2 because I was afraid they would try to turn Millennium into X-Files with all the conspiracy crap and they did, which is a shame. Season 3 was filled with excellent episodes, The Sound of Snow, Antipas, Darwin’s Eye, …13 Years Later and the brilliant and quirky Omerta.
I am involved with the campaign to get a Millennium movie made. Check us out at http://www.backtofrankblack.com. We do a podcast called The Millennium Sessions Group and we would love to have you come on and talk about your likes and dislikes of Millennium. Send me an email and we can set something up.
TL
Hey TL,
Season 3 will always be special to me because a)KISS was in it and b)Antipas which is, in my opinion, technically and production wise the finest produced episode of television EVER! It is also the creepiest thing I’ve watched in a very long time.
Everything is relative. Do I HATE season 3. Not at all. It was great fun to watch. It just lacked something COMPARED to season 1 and 2. I LOVE season 2 mainly for the serial nature of it and the bizarre steps it took. Sometimes it failed. . .no question about it but so did season 1 and season 2. Behind the scenes issues are a shame, for sure, but I feel it messed with the flow of the show. I have NEVER watched a show that goes so back and forth in such a wild way before. Only three seasons too. . .it felt like nine.
I really liked TEOTWAWKI though it was a bit silly in retrospect. I really liked Closure as well. That felt very season 1ish. Borrowed Time was moving and innovative. Saturn Dreaming of Mercury was a favorite as well. These four are my very favorites of the season (plus Antipas) and even they have flaws. Borrowed Time has so much promise but couldn’t deliver. And unlike season 1 or 2 (who at least tried a lot) season 3 had some amazing clunkers (like Forcing the End. . .yeesh).
I’m honored you want me to talk about the show. . .I just re-read the post on season 3 and I sound so childish. Haha. Oh well. . .I’ll contact you!
Will,
Thanks for the response. I hope I didn’t come off as bitter, because I didn’t meant to. Fans of any tv show will have their favorite seasons, characters, episodes and so on. I think it’s great that people can talk with such passion about something, but talk like adults and not take it to the gutter, if you know what I mean. We would love to have you come on the podcast and talk about Millennium. The bottom line is, we all love the show and would love to see a movie produced. So, when you have a second, contact me and we can set something up.
A movie would be amazing. And since the show didn’t have the problem (or the benefit depending on how you look at it) of going 5-9 seasons (like X-Files) it is possible to stay faithful to the source material AND create an original, uncomplicated film.
If a movie looked like season 1. . .it’d be the scariest film I probably will ever see. If a movie looked like season 2. . .I’d be kooked out and my brain would fry (the good kind of fry). If a movie looked like season 3. . .well. . .I’d still see it. Haha.
The question is this: do you want a love note to the fans (i.e. X-Files 2) or something that will rejuvenate the series? Is this a one and done thing or are we looking at a franchise? I think Millennium gets stuck. . .its grand enough for theaters but fits the television bill as well. I am interested in discussing this with you.
The potential should be great and I am 100% supportive of trying to get a movie made! I wrote you an email and, once I get back from work, will check back with you. Great website by the way! And TIWWA was a constant resource during my Millennium days.
I LOVE Millennium and I’m glad I found some people who like it too.
Just as we are subjected to low budget made for cable horror movies onchiller and sci-fi channels respectively, we had a classic seris made by Chris Carter which was both made well and had good plot lines for most episodes. Following sucess of X-files I found myself rewatching this incredible show into reruns again and again because it has all the great elements of the horror genre with decent actors and more importantly continuity for certain plot themes. THE GOOD VS EVIL WITH lUCY BUTLER WAS THE BEST AND i COULD SEE A FULL LENGHTH MOVIE FOLLOW UP if Chris would see the writing on the wall. The cuts were fantastic, the make-up and monster creations imagative,believeable and unique. The filming in the Northwest was genius since this is a real hip area to place these kind of story lines. Mr Carter could get most of original cast and create a movie that makes todays remakes like Clash of the Titans look more cartoonist and cheap a they are. In other words the show had legs, long legs and ended abruptly due to falling ratings of the short attention span of the Gen-Xer’s but he failed to notice that many boomers loved the show and its plotlines. I vote for more but as in most cases good ideas as this show was will not materialize because it doesn’t pander to the idiotic sit coms and poor comedy shows forced on network Tv today. Sadden