Salem Season Two/Lucy Lawless

[michael c]

Salem season two was just released on Netflix and I'm three episodes in...

all of my worst fears about the Lucy Lawless casting addition have come true. she is AWFUL.


it was obviously just a piece of stunt casting set up to capitalize on her "Xena" fame and get the "comic con" crowd more fully onboard. her acting style is too campy and out of synch with the rest of the tone of the show. whenever she's onscreen it takes you "out of the story" because it's so inorganic and forced. like a "celebrity" cameo or walk on that screams "this is just show biz".

staggeringly bad. 

[Gothick]

That's too bad.  Wasn't Lawless in that awful TARZAN series with Travis Fimmel about 16 years ago, before anybody bothered to teach him how to act?

A friend of mine who will normally watch anything involving male eye candy had to stop watching SALEM before the end of season 1.  He is also an authority on Massachusetts North Shore history and folklore and the awful writing and direction of the series was just too much for him.

G.

[michael c]

I don't know much about her beyond she played "Xena" on a syndicated late 1990s TV series (it used to pop up on Saturday afternoon if one didn't have premium cable) that has a "cult" following similar to DS but less soap and more fantasy/comic/scifi. from what I recall it was cheaply shot and produced and just awful.


but it's why she was cast in Salem. which is admittedly a goofy show but she's plays it with a broad, wink at the camera stroke out of tune with the "seriousness" with which it tries to take itself.

she's stunt casting.