ZOS: The One to Beat in '09

THE INTERVIEW SITS partially transcribed. But sadly it seems that my paid job as a writer has overwhelmed and subsumed my unpaid job as a Blogger.

But I'd be remiss if I let tonight go by without pointing you to ZOS, (Zone of Separation,) the Canadian-made limited series about a group of UN Peacekeepers trying to keep the two sides apart in a fictional town in the Balkans.

ZOS is surprising in so many ways. It goes for the tough scenes, with unbearable tension...tension that some people find difficult to watch. Yet it's also cut through with sophisticated, gallows humor. For anyone looking for an English Canadian window on the world, and an answer to the question, "what exactly is that Canadian perspective?" This is it. You want to contrast that with the American view? Well somewhere, there's a truly excellent thesis waiting to be written comparing ZOS to Generation Kill.

American troops do not serve in UN peacekeeping roles, for the most part. Canada, for the small size of its military, rotates between peacekeeping roles like in Bosnia and Cyprus, and the war footing in Afghanistan. ZOS is also about the futility of military power, and the no-win of trying to keep the peace in a place where nobody particularly wants peace. But it's also a sophisticated character study of the different players in the town, and in the Forces thrown in with them. Characters who start out hated, become sympathetic. Characters who are thuggish have remarkable conversions. Surprise and shock lurk around each juncture. And then there's Speedo Boy.

By the third episode of ZOS, as a viewer you are juggling about eight or nine storylines -- but with ease. It's involving and absorbing and funny and terrible and profound and wonderful. And very human.

During the interview last week, I joked that ZOS was the best Canadian series of the year, and Malcom MacCrury and Enrico Colatoni took a decent, Canadian beat before reminding me that it was, in fact, only January. No matter. Come time for Geminis and other Kudos, I'm pretty sure ZOS will stand above them all.

Hopefully I'll get that feature and focus piece done for next week. For now, you can sup on the truly excellent multi-part interview that Alex Epstein did with Co-creator and showrunner Malcolm MacCrury. And I'd also encourage you to check out Diane's article on the same show.

And if you're plum tired of reading, the delightful Judith Klassen has her Judecast of the entire fandango available to you, you lucky so and so. (What's interesting about Jude's podcast is that it's on-set, which means it's of a 2007 vintage, as opposed to most of the press interviews which were done in January 2009.)

Oh...and if you watch, check out my man Jim Codrington, who turns in a performance that's winning, and light years away from his work on THE BORDER!

As for me, I'll let you know how many people on Air Canada are taking advantage of the free preview. I'm off to Vancouver for a few days, so blogging might be erratic. Between work and the Tuesday night Inaugural euphoria, I imagine I'm going to be rather occupado.

Be well. Oh, and if you do watch ZOS and can't resist the nifty STARS song that serves as the show's theme -- the version of "Celebration Guns" they use is the remix from Do You Trust Your Friends? NOT the album version from Set Yourself on Fire.

Now you know.

ZoS premieres Monday Jan 19 @ 9pm PT on Movie Central - 10pm ET on TMN