Casas vanguardistas

I watched the first season of this show a year or so ago and really liked it. The second season - not so much. This review will be basically about the second season since it's fresh in my mind.

On too many of the "Homes" - the owner/architects and their backgrounds and, frankly, childhoods and all kinds of other things were examined. Everything BUT the house.

This is called "Home" - Not "Meet the Family". I watched this because of an interested in the architecture and a bit of background is great, but OMG, there were episodes where the house was barely shown, but I now know waaaaaaaay too much about the people who built them.

I won't give a list, because everything is relevant. The ones that are good are so worth the watch! The ones that aren't, well, they are people's stories and I used fast forward. You can too, if you want.

Sad commentary on what could have been a really memorable show.

This is going to be a somewhat skewed review as I haven't had time to view all of the episodes, but I fail to see how anyone can think that the owner/architect of the 344 sq ft home in "Hong Kong" is that far outside of "average" - which seems to be the criterion most viewers were looking for in this series. But if the creators of "Home" had sought out "average" architects (rather than "creative" ones) how would they merit a series about those designs, if their creations followed everyone else's cookie-cutter housing?

To me, the Hong Kong architect came across as down-to-earth, practical, and driven. The home which he remodeled had been in his family for generations, and his intention was to keep it in the family, and make it more livable in the process. However high-tech (and yes, expensive) the interior of his tiny home might have been, the view OF its EXTERIOR, and FROM its interior starkly revealed the incredibly average environment which this man's home was crammed into. So to me, this particular episode at least (and "Malibu," from a different perspective) did exactly what another reviewer accused it of failing to do, namely, showing us "...these homes, how they were built and how people actually live in them."

To be fair, I can easily imagine a series such as this swinging in the opposite direction, and focusing more on "special owners" and egos, rather than the pragmatic (but much less 'sexy') transformation of "manufactured" homes, as only one example. The "average" viewer/homeowner could probably have benefited more from this approach, and therefore, yes, perhaps the series as a whole could have been more balanced. But I still valued the passion and insight that I took from parts of "Home."

Some of the houses in this series are very cool however I am not sure it is worth it to have to endure the cheesy music and pretentious drivel that spews out of these people's mouths like vomit from a possessed person being exorcised.

Some of the episodes felt a bit slow and concentrated more on the story of the builders than the actual homes, but the Malibu episode was an inspiring standout. The Skysource invention is brilliant and gives me some hope that there are still amazingly smart people like David Hertz solving problems to give the entire planet a better future.

I was hoping they would focus on the architecture of the buildings - the way the homes and constructed. The design process. Instead they seem to focus every episode almost entirely on the owners and their personal stories. Could have been so much better, such a shame.