ABDC3's Battle of the Sexes

Hm.  Not sure how I feel about America's Best Dance Crew having a Chris Brown song for one of its performances (not only too soon... but, like, I really don't know if I'm going to EVER be able to listen to that guy's music again...)

Not only that, but Fly Khicks are performing a Rihanna song... oy!

I called 2 of the final 3 way back when... Strikers All-Stars screwed up tonight (but I have to say Fly Khicks have grown on me throughout the last few weeks so I'm alright with this turn of events).

Whatever, no one freaking touches Beat Freaks.

316

WHO PUT THE PILOT OF LOST ON AFTER THE PREVIOUSLY ON INSTEAD OF THE NEXT EPISODE OF SEASON FIVE.

Lol.

Seriously, though, Jack waking up in the bamboo jungle like in the pilot is what I, for a long time, expected would be the series' final image because of all of The Dark Tower references.

But this is the show that spits in the face of expectations, like, twice a scene lately, so... yay.

And, like, 45 seconds in, I'm more confused/excited/ZOMGed than ever.  I LOVE THIS M*****F***ING SHOW.  Who could've anticipated a flash forward to the Oceanic 6's return to The Island in the SIXTH EPISODE?  Not I.  But, y'know, we all knew they were gonna get back to The Island at some point (after all they had TO GO BAAAAAAAAACK) so I like that the writers are setting up more blanks to be filled in between, but giving us a sense of where things are headed (foreboding, woo).

Fionnula Flanagan rocks.  And a 'splainy for why the place she was in at the end of "The Lie" looked so much like a Dharma station!

"Is he telling the truth?" "Probably not." LULZ.

I feel like I'm in 2nd grade and my teacher is explaining long division... only much more complicated.  Or having "how to beat that last ship in Space Invaders" explained to me.

Oh, Desmond.  Don't you know how TV works?  You say "no" at the start of the episode and by the, for some reason, you're going to be saying "yes."  But I don't expect you to be on the plane.  After all, you weren't on 815 (and neither was Ben...)

AJIRA AIRWAYS!

OMG this is possibly the longest scene in Lost history, almost entirely expository... AND I AM RIVETED.

So, because of the back-on-The-Island flash forward (or I guess this makes the off-Island events a flash back?) we know Jack, Hurley, and Kate were on the flight.  3 of 6, 3 of 6, not bad.  Aaron?  Sun?  Sayid?  Locke?  Ben?  WAAAAAAAAALT!!!!!!!?

OMG, LOCKE IS PLAYING THE ROLE OF JACK'S FATHER IN A COFFIN ON THE FLIGHT.  Recreating the 815 crash as best as they can... heart the idea.

So Jack = Thomas the Apostle and Locke = Jesus.  Too religious for my taste for this show (that's not involving Eko).  Locke was a man of faith... but never religious faith.  Faith in The Island.  Faith in Fate.  Dammit we still need to find out WTF happened to Locke and what he said to all these peeps after turning the donkey wheel in the Way Way Back When last episode (timestream = confuddled after last week... other timeflashes all had pretty specific events and years attached to them).

Dear lord, do not let Ben go off and kill Penny.  I will cry.

Once again, I suspect that SOMEONE is going to be asking Kate WTF happened to Turniphead.  Because I demand to know.

Sidenote - the "I don't need you to be a doctor, I need you to be a god" part of the Grey's Anatomy/Private Practice was the worst part of those promos and now the promo is, in big letters "Doctor... of GOD?"  Oh, ABC.  Oh, Shonda.  Oh, vomit.

But back to Lost.

Oh, Ben.  Oh, Ben.  I will be so unhappy.  I will cry.  Oh, Ben.

Good thing rigor mortis hadn't set in on Locke's corpse.  Also, good thing those shoes fit?

Hm, are we going to have a whole slew of new characters aboard this plane to keep track of (or at least this guy who offered his condolences to Jack)?

Yay, Sun is on the plane!

YES.  YES!  SAYID IS BEING ESCORTED BY A US MARSHALL (who is this woman?)

Good call on buying up all the empty seats, Hurley.  Good call.  But how did he get out of prison...?

"The other people on this plane... what's going to happen to them?"  "Who cares?"  I love Ben.  But I hate him.  But I love him!  But no.  I must.  But I cannot.

FRANK LAPIDUS IS THE PILOT.  ARE YOU SERIOUS?  AND HE SHAVED.

"We're not going to Guam, are we?"  Nope.  Nope...

"How can you read?"  "My mother taught me."  ROFL.

Jack, that is NOT the proper way to open an envelope.

HOLY FORWARD MOMENTUM!

And the kicker is that the jumping through time is NOT done for our, um, did-not-leave-The-Island-ers and our Ajira 316ers have joined them (at least temporarily... at the very least they're back in the 70s and Jin is driving Roger Workman's VW Bus).

HOLY EFF.

3 of 12

Can I call it OR CAN I CALL IT, BITCHES!?

I think we'll be seeing more of Anoop, though.

Out of everyone, I think the poorest hand of this new elimination / advancement format was dealt to Ricky Braddy, who got no screentime prior to the performance and did well (not amazing, but very well), but went early.  And, yeah, no screentime.  Does not bode well for people in the next two sets of 12 who weren't featured.  They're really going to have to blow people out of the water to survive.

Based solely on what I remember about next week's performers and assuming no one screws the pooch, my expectations are Adam Lambert, Jasmine Murray, and... sigh... Normal Gentle (if Nick Mitchell performances as Gentle, I think he's a lock...)

Please Note

I will be away from my computer for a good portion of today, so if final nationals that were delayed because of Presidents' Day do come, they will be posted when I get back later this afternoon.

12 of 36

Now this is a change of format.  I wonder how the show put each set of 12 semifinalists together... note how not all of the ringers are in a single group.  Only 3 being put through in each set (highest vote getting male and female, plus next highest vote getter), plus the judges' 3 wildcards (um, but there are 4 judges...? maybe it's one per group of 12?)

Yay!  I love this part of Idol... we actually get to HEAR THESE PEOPLE SING.

Yay!  Simon vs Ryan!

Jackie Tohn - Loved this girl in auditions.  Great personality, amazing rock-chick vocal edge.  HATE her outfit.  The backing music is way too low key.  On the other hand, it's all about her voice (and those pants...)  I suspect if she doesn't make it through, she could get a wildcard berth because her voice is so wildly different from everyone else's.  I'm with Simon on the trousers (and the song choice).

Ricky Braddy - Who?  Oh, and he's singing one of the songs I'm incredibly sick of (thank you, Cupid pilot fifth act).  Ricky starts out very lounge-y (IMHO), but I actually liked him breaking into falsetto, and I have to say he won me over.  Very smooth.

Alexis Grace - Rut roh, singing Aretha.  Love the hair.  Love the lipstick (maybe a shade too red?)  But, um, wow?  I officially hate this "send three through" thing (provided everyone is as good as the first three have averaged out to).  When it was 12 guys sing, send two home, 12 girls sing, send two home... you could count on a couple screwing up and cracking under pressure or choosing wrong songs.  Oh, good, I won the battle with the plastic bag wrapped around my Pad Kra Pao.  OMG NPH and Ted Danson in da house!  When Ryan said "and your girlfriend..." I thought Alexis was a lesbian, but then, no, it's her dad's girlfriend.  I feel bad that she's in the first half-hour because it's the least watched.

Brent Keith - Hot guy alert!  But can he sing?  WOW.  Live on-air VIDEO PLAYBACK ISSUES!  Blanchester is totally a portmanteu of something and Manchester, right?  Eh, I'm not a country music kinda guy, so it might be that, but I don't see Brent going through.  Poor, forgettable choice (once again, I agree with Simon).

Stevie Wright - Who?  She's singing Taylor Swift... who is of course known for her vocal prowess?  Oh, Stevie.  Leggings are not pants.  Don't you read GoFugYourself?  Hard to do anything with that song because there's no opportunity to go on riffs.  It's all rapid-fire lyric.  Girl's having fun, but not a lot of stage presence.  And some FLAT notes.  So, bad song choice... because of responding to judges' critiques (at least partly due to that).  HAH!  Simon says "but they listen to me" in response to Paula's "America votes" when he said Stevie won't be through to the next round (um, d'uh).

Anoop Desai - I love it when guys sing songs from female artists.  This is such a great song.  I miss the 90s.  There's a lot of backup singing... isn't there?  I wish he wouldn't hold those notes out all the time.  Give us a run!

Casey Carlson - BUBBLE TEA!  That's all I can think about.  This girl looks like a mix between Mandy Moore and Annie from 90210.  Not sure if that's a good (Mandy) or a bad (Annie) thing... I don't get the song choice for her.  Thank you, Kara, for complimenting Casey while tearing her down and ACTUALLY ADVISING HER.  You don't touch The Police, dammit.  Poor girl is going to cry onstage.  The air is completely sucked out of the room.  Why didn't this girl sing, like, "Everytime" by Britney?

Michael Sarver - Woo!  Heart this guy.  Oh, splech, he's singing the theme song from One Tree Hill.  Okay, aside from that factoid, I do like this song (separate from OTH, which as we all know, I think is landfill).  This song was waaaaay more uptempo than what I expected Michael to sing (given the songs he's performed).  Dude's got chops, though.  Put him through, America!

Ann Marie Boskovich - Oh, THAT'S who she is.  Yeah, I totally forgot her from the auditions.  Girl's got, like, a hot Celine Dion thing going on?  Love the dress.  Not as good as Alexis' take on Aretha, but I didn't think she was as bad as most of the judges made her out to be.  Certainly the second best female tonight thus far...

Steven Fowler - I want him to move from the one spot he's shaking around in.  After the judges critiqued Michael Sarver on switching the microphone between hands... Steven did it a couple of times.  He may have remembered the lyrics, but I think he was flat for a lot of the time and the song was, as Simon so often puts it, utterly forgettable.

Tatiana del Toro - This girl was so annoying (and teh dramz... TEH DRAMZ!) throughout auditions and Hollywood Week, is there any chance people will actually vote for her?  Singing Whitney Houston... you better work it, girl.  Um, what?  From the first note, the annoying girl is gone.  Can someone just not let her talk to people?  No interviews?  No video pods?  She's got a pretty damn good voice (though some of those low notes were too deep for her) and it wasn't consistent.

Danny Gokey (PIMP SPOT) - I kinda like his interview hair.  OMG he's SINGING MARIAH.  Screw Anoop's Monica song.  This is balls, man.  BALLS.  And everything we've seen of Danny says he wouldn't sing it unless he can own it because I don't think Idol had a technical singer like him (certainly not a male one) since Melinda Doolittle.  HOLY SHIZ KEY CHANGE.  Damn, boy, you deserved that m*****f***ing pimp spot.

If the gods are just...

Top Female: Alexis Grace.

Top Male: Danny Gokey (anyone else think this guy is Robert Downey, Jr in a slightly-overweight suit?)

Next best... Michael Sarver and Tatiana del Toro (I AM SHOCKÉD).

Middle of the road options who, if this semi-finals section weren't like this, would get another shot: Jackie Tohn (for the fun of it), Ricky Braddy (he was good, but early, and not great), Anoop Desai (because according to the judges he's likable), Ann Marie Baskovich.

So, basically, I'd chop 4 of these people off instead of the 9 that will be cut, and give the other 8 another chance to earn their way forward.  Life's hard, bitches.

200 pounds of cheese

That cheese challenge might just be the most amusing thing since Charla was in a knight's costume walking horses in The Amazing Race All-Stars.

I like that The Amazing Race and American Idol are both featuring deaf contestants.

I missed the first 18 minutes of the show (including commercials, so really just the introductions and the first airport segment since teams were already divided in Switzerland).  Thank you, Time Warner Cable.

Also missed: The Simpsons' first HD broadcast with new opening (I'll catch it on hulu, but... sigh).  WTF, TWC?  Seriously, you recorded United States of Tara at 7pm.  You weren't off.  You weren't recording anything else.  You just decided to not record the two programs at 8pm I have series passes for (TAR is set to record next week... so, yeah, I don't get it).

Not.  Cool.

UGH!  And Family Guy, which has been in repeats for, like, years, wasn't going to record!  I caught it in the middle of the opening theme.  Jeez, this is disturbing...

Meanwhile, Desperate Housewives was recording as expected.

SNL: Alec Baldwin / Jonas Brothers

Pretty solid episode, actually.  Most of the sketches (except the interminable opening sketch) even had endings.  The digital short was amusing.  Even Keenan got some laughs from me for the Sir Mix-a-Lot's Photo Shop.  And you know I never get tired of Cougar Den or Vincent Price specials.

They really name dropped 30 Rock up the wazoo...

Wish I Hadn't Watched Caprica Before Watching the Rest of BSG

Just saying.  Should've known better.  Not that there were spoilers (er, thus far) in Caprica.  But with the information revealed on tonight's BSG, my impression of Caprica would've been different (certainly my assumptions and impressions would have been).

Anyway, tonight's BSG was super fun and expository and all of a sudden the numbers assigned the various Cylon models make sense (why was there a Number 8 if there were only 7 numbered models?)

Interesting that the colonies were able to develop FTL drives, but the Kobol tribe that went to Earth were able to develop resurrection and NOT faster-than-light travel...

Cavil is an annoying, whiny bitch.

I will get around to writing a Caprica review one of these days (as well as writing pilot script reviews).

End transmission.

Grrr Argh

Even if Dollhouse was disappointing (though, actually, with all the "it's going to suuuuuuuuck" buzz it was more engaging than expected... still... not awful to the point of turning it off halfway through but not great... I think the appropriate word is "intriguing" with all the positive and negative connotations that word implies) it's nice to see the Mutant Enemy company card on my television again.

Grrr argh, indeed.

The Return of Izzie Stevens

So, yadda yadda yadda Grey's Anatomy/Private Practice crossover.  Y'know what I liked the most about the GA episode?  The Izzie Stevens story.  I know, shut up.  But that was a return to why we fell in love with Izzie in the first place.  She's cheerful and amusing and does glittery art projects that have a point.  Why did that character go away for the first half of this season to have sex with Ghost Denny?  Stupid, stupid, stupid.  But, of course, that story is continuing because we get bookend reminders from Karev that Izzie is not fine even though she insists she is.

Are we shocked that the "Doomsday Sucker" surgery that the patient begged Derek to perform that night went wrong (considering the Archer Montgomery surgery, essentially, went miraculously)?  Yes, because it didn't go wrong.  Why didn't it go wrong?  Hello?  Old Grey's Anatomy totally wouldn't have let that surgery go so smoothly.  Oh, wait!  It did!  Yay!

Smokezilla's Back!

How much have we missed the monster?  How much?  Especially after Ben sicked it on the militant Freighter people to, like, no avail.

Smokey!!!!

And how much do we want it to kill blond French dude who said Nadine, as a woman, probably ran off from the group chasing a butterfly she saw?

But slowly.  Let us savor the kill.  Yes.  Good, Smokey.

DUDE!  DUDE!  DUDE!

Suck it, Lacombe (?)

This is why Jin is awesome.  He can barely speak English (though it's totally gotten better!) but he doesn't need a physicist to tell him he's traveling through time.

Oh, shiz, we're when the Others came to take Alex from Danielle.  Shiz.  And the sickness is apparently the monster and not some actual contagion like what's making Charlotte and Miles and Juliet's noses bleed.  How did Robert know the monster was a security system guarding the temple (oh, and it specifically guards the temple?)

This episode is too good to keep going "oh, shiz!" to.  Must pay attention.  Night, interwebz.

Top 36

Kinda really enjoyed the "sing for your life!" twist in tonight's Idol.  Kept me on my toes (though seriously, Seacrest didn't need to point out the "irony" of almost every single sing-off pairing... are we really so stupid we can't understand irony when it's in front of us without it slapping us in the face for comi-tragic effect).  Especially that last sing-off... I was like "really?" when we were made to think one of them was going home.

Wondering whether Tatiana or Nick "Normal Gentle" Mitchell is going to be the more annoying contestant.

Praising the judges for letting ZOMFG DRAMZ QUEEN Nathaniel Marshall through.  He's going to be entertaining as long as he lasts (not seeing Top 12 here) and the costumes.  THE COSTUMES!

Loving that the show played Embrace's "Gravity" under a section of rejections.  God I love that band, they need more American exposure.

I think the show did a decent job filling viewers in on a lot of the Top 36 who weren't featured in the audition episodes / ones who were featured in auditions but not so much in the Hollywood rounds, but there are several who I'm still like... "who are they, again?" (Alex Wagner Trugman? Anne Marie Boskovich? Arianna Afsar? Jeanine Vailes? Junot Joyner? Kris Allen? Meghan Corkrey? Mishavonna Henson? Rick Braddy? Stevie Wright?)

My favorites right now are Lil Rounds and Danny Gokey, next tier would definitely be Jasmine Murray and probably Michael Sarver (hence my "you're going to make him sing-off?  Really?").  Looking forward to Adam Lambert's performances (either going to be really musical theater, really cool and current, or really terrible), and Jackie Tohn rocking out.

Christine Baranski

Well, that was a highlight episode of Big Bang Theory last night!

Love that Sheldon and Leonard's mom are so compatible with their neuroses.  And hilarity!  Guest Emmy?

It Tingles

Oh, Friday Night Lights.  You bring a smile to my face.  What a great end to the Smash Williams story.  Skin-crawling happiness.  Where you at, indeed!

The end of the Zarek-Gaeta mutiny was fantastic.  I wasn't hugely into it last week, but on so many fronts I see why it needed to be told.  And I'm glad the line was drawn between Gaeta's moral convictions and Zarek's, um, insanity.  Although, what happened to Sam?  Did I pass out or did the Starbuck/Sam/Lawyer going to Cottle story not actually reach an end (which, y'know, I understand given the HOLY FRAK of the final two acts).

Crossover time

Lol, Mode magazine in Grey's Anatomy.  I didn't know this was an Ugly Betty crossover, too!

Y'know, I'm actually enjoying the Grey's part thoroughly (minus Derek = idiot re still not having proposed and Izzie trying to administer whatever test on herself post long-delayed realization something wrong with her... honestly the show could will Derek, Izzie, and George off in one fateful car accident and I'd be just dandy)... I'm gonna shut up and watch (unless I really have something ) say).  I don't expect the crossover to really begin until the last moments of Grey's anyway.

Hey, Kevin McKidd's a series regular now!

Introducing Peds to the show has helped immensely (not to mention giving Bailey a lot to play with).  Hard to not care when it's a little kid's life at stake.  And Jessica Capshaw is a hoot!

Serial Killers!

The Gravedigger is back on Bones!  So says episode info.  Yay!  So happy.  But I have much TV to watch first (because, well, no one at work watches Bones and I need to watch the watercooler stuff... what with tomorrow being the last day of work and all...)

THR Feed re pilot season

James Hibbard has a truly amusing take on the pilots that have been ordered by the major networks thus far here.

I've read many of these pilot scripts (or drafts of them) and, naturally, have my opinions.  As tomorrow is my last day of work for a little while, I should have plenty of time to, y'know, espouse said opinions.

Just a warning.

In reading (especially loglines) please remember that just because something is unique does not mean it is good.  Or that it will be unique/good for long.  Also, there have been some very entertaining cop-lawyer-doctor shows!  Just because they're part of a mold doesn't mean they're going to suck.

Now, off to writing Paging Doctor Detective McCoy, Esquire...

Chuck 3D / Heroes Vol. 4

Chuck - The most "meh" episode of the season as far as, well, comedy and drama goes, but the visual gimmick was fun... but count me happy to take those damn glasses off!  This was as good a "restatement of the show's premise in a fun, easy to get into way" as possible given the day-after-Super-Bowl airing.  Still... disappointed in the episode (compared to the rest of this season, which has been awesome).

Heroes - Shut up, I know.  I, too, was suckered in by promise of a reboot even though we all knew that Bryan Fuller doesn't have anything to do with the first five episodes of this arc.  Not that I expect his presence behind the scenes to make much of a difference.  Let's just say this entire episode was straight from Joseph Campbell's monomyth with countless characters denying their, er, heroic nature.  But I have to ask... if Nathan's plans are, in fact, insidious, WHY abduct Peter and put him in the same place with a bunch of other "extraordinaries"?  And, Peter, if you're on a plane that's crashing and you previously had the power of flight and just absorbed Mohinder's super-strength (he still had this?) shouldn't you fly out of the plane and stop it from crashing?  Just saying, Superman would totally do it.  Also, Peter, WHY ARE YOU SUCH AN IDIOT?  In short, boring.  The only real fun to be had in the episode was Sylar taking down Nathan's goons.  Someone wake me up if/when this series gets better or is cancelled.

Kthxbi.

Sigh, going to have to wait until tomorrow to watch BBT/HIMYM/House.  Damn you, DVR only being able to record two things at once!

Blair

When did Blair Waldorf become such a f***ing idiot?

Seriously, I think that the first 55 minutes of this episode were some of the worst episode the has done since the not-yet-addictive early days (IMHO, everything pre-"Hi, Society").  The characters are doing things that make no sense, even in heightened, campy, teen soap world.

And the Chuck story?  WTF?  I guess it's setting up a new long-arc storyline/mystery about Bart, but boy was that clumsy.

Meanwhile... finally, Dan and Serena are DUNZO.  God, I hate Lonely Boy.  He's such a dick.  But I'm suddenly giving a crap about Rachel Carr...

But, seriously, after all her dealings with the Chuck Basses of the world, Blair let herself get (almost) taken down by this young, wide-eyed ingenue teacher?  Really?  REALLY?

Post-Game

Post game running time: 27 minutes.  By my account, the game ended at (putting this all in Eastern time) 10:13pm, when the telecast cut to commercial after the game ended and the celebration began.  The Office began at 10:40pm.  NBC, you were cutting it cloooose.  Did we learn nothing from ABC's 2002 Alias fiasco?

Show itself...

The opening is hilarious.  Classic Dwight.  And the opening credits have EVERYONE IN THEM!  Nice!

Alba/Black/Leachman cameo... eh/ew (though nice shout-out to not illegally downloading content yay).

Second half (the revelation that Michael was what was stressing everyone out and the roast) were less yay.

Amy Poehler sitcom promo!  Wait, it's called Parks and Recreation?  I thought it was called Public Service.  Meh on the official title...

Jim/Pam was cute (for, like, the first time this season).

I miss Holly.

Overall... easy to get into for nonfans?  Yeah (you just have to accept les shenanigans and go with the characters' quirks).  Doesn't necessitate tuning in again, though, and it wasn't LMFAO enough to convince nonfans that they ought to watch the series regularly.  We'll see what, if any, effect this has on the ratings on Thursday (is this the week it beats Grey's Anatomy and CSI in the demo?)

Without knowing the future effect on The Office's ratings, I still feel like NBC screwed up by not giving Chuck the post-game slot (would certainly say "look, we have confidence in this series!") and capitalizing on the 3D episode (which potentially could have continued into tomorrow's 8pm episode... thus dragging viewers in and giving the show a much-needed, much-deserved ratings bump as the sophomore series resumes its run).

Game Day

So, wow, that was some football game, wasn't it?

Ads... not a lot of awesome (certainly not in comparison to the football on display).  In fact, I think the only one that I genuinely loved was the Hulu spot.  I enjoyed the Coca-Cola ad where people drinking Coke became CGI characters, too, but didn't love it.

Okay, also the Transformers 2 spot was effective because, while I truly had no intention of seeing this sequel, the prospect of seeing Shia LaBeouf get the crap kicked out of him is too much to pass up.  They had to write (Write?  In this movie?  Really?) the actor's hand injury into the, um, plot of the movie (or somewhere between car chases, crashes, explosions, and CGI machinery).  You know me.  I have to say the word schadenfreude at least once per day just so I can prove I know how to pronounce it.  Also I remembered they filmed part of the movie at my alma mater (even if it's substituting not as my alma mater, but as the college in my hometown).  So, yeah.

But, overall, the ads both sucked and blew.  I have the 3D glasses for tomorrow night's Chuck, but the Monsters vs. Aliens trailer and the SoBe spot left much to be desired (the latter, I'll admit, I wasn't a big fan of the dancing lizards last year either, so this wasn't a surprise).

Of the NBC show spots, the Heroes-play-football thing was the best of the Monday bunch (and, man, they sure pushed the f*** outta Mondays), but the (mid-halftime) Thursday night "LMAO" ad was better.  I was surprised NBC gambled so much on the Monday promos.  Nothing for Biggest Loser (hello, post-Super Bowl weight loss inspiration?)  Nothing for Friday Night Lights (okay, THAT was no surprise).  Nothing for Knight Rider (lolololol).  Actually, okay, I was merely surprised there were so few "watch The Office tonight after the game" (there were only 2 or 3 that I can remember) or "watch NBC Thursday comedies" spots.

And apparently that annoying Pepsuber thing from last night's SNL was actually an ad for Pepsi.  Interesting.  Definitely got me to watch last night instead of skipping through the ads like I usually do.

SNL

Dude, Will Tippin is hosting SNL next weekend.

Ugh, can't believe they did Laser Cats 4 tonight.  I hate the Laser Cats digital shorts.  The female cast members proclaiming their love for Steve Martin through love standards was funny, and I enjoyed the opening Obama sketch.  Richard Dean Anderson cameo in the MacGruber set from tonight was fun... in the first part.  But the whole Pepsi-sponsored-MacGruber thing was lame (even more than MacGruber usually is).  Abbie Elliot as Angelina Jolie during Weekend Update was amusing... I miss the repartee Seth and Amy had, but yay featured player doing an impression for a character that could continue (where is Casey Wilson's Rachael Ray and Michaela Watkins' Arianna Huffington?)

Zzzz

Tom Zarek's revolution bores me (even if it basically exists solely to make Roslin wake up from her post-Earth-apocalyptic stupor).  I mean, yes, the show has always been about humanity being idiots and frakking themselves.  And they've managed to complete assassinate Gaeta's character (boo, lying to Hoshi).  But at least there was good stuff for Starbuck this week.  Still feel like I missed an episode bridging the gap between the first and second episodes of the season.

Can we please get to Cavil's fleet, an explanation for Starbuck's viper and burnt corpse (with refreshingly untouched hair), and the opera house with Roslin/Boomer/Six?  You know... the things that matter.

Goddamn, Edward James Olmos has presence.

Britney Spears Week on ABDC!

So excited for this.

Beat Freaks - Damn, they're doing choreography to "Womanizer"!  Haven't seen a single B-girl move yet. That they can be so sultry while doing choreography in addition to their usual stuff... wow, this is why they're gonna last much longer than Fly Khicks.  DAMN.  I love that Lil Mama associates "classy" with "Womanizer".  Oh, JC, please don't try and create new slang.  "Crispy" is never going to happen.

Strikers All Stars - "Gimme More"... what, no striptease?  Great prop, though (it rotates!)

Side note... wow, viewers do not love Team Millennia... in the bottom two again!

Dynamic Edition - Doing "Stronger," which is totally Britney's first SEX BOMB video (thank you, director Joseph Kahn... also, thank you for "Toxic" and "Womanizer" :D) Good lord, my eyes cannot keep up with the cloggers' feet.

Side note... Ringmasters are in the bottom two.  No way Lil Mama lets them go home unless they give a severely bad performance.  Buh bye, Team Millennia.

Quest Crew - "Toxic" (nah nah nah nah).  With blindfolds.  Them boys know how to dance (and with their hips).  Just sayin'.  And that move at the end by Ryan (that was like a banana kick but he ends up on his back... on purpose and with control)?  Wowza.

Fly Khicks - "... Baby One More Time".  Unfortunate for them because they've already been criticized for being too cheerleader.  Which, um, hi?  There was something off at the beginning, but they got in step.  Somehow... not as sexy as Beat Freaks.  Also, is that dance move really called "the Single Ladies"?  Guess I didn't consider the heels.  Meh.

Team Millennia - "Me Against The Music".  God I hate this song.  Nice shout out to the Britney/Madonna kiss at the 2003 VMAs at the end.  They hit the choreography, but you expect them to.  Hm.

Ringmasters - "Circus".  Yeah, well they're gonna have to dance to this, aren't they?  They didn't have to use props.  But, wow.  There's a lot of wow in this performance, especially the opening.  Only issue I have is that there was a section where the choreography was all in their hands... they weren't moving their feet.

Color me unshocked (but also pleased) with the results.  My guess is Fly Khicks and Dynamic Edition for the bottom two next week.

Ultimate, my expected Top 3 doesn't change... Beat Freaks, Quest Crew, and Strikers All Stars

Meet Charles Widmore

ARE YOU KIDDING ME, LOST!?

SERIOUSLY!?

Goddammit, is it just me or is/has this show somehow been outdoing itself every episode since it came back from the writers strike?

Private Practice

Based on several recommendations on PIFeedback.com, I finally streamed last Thursday's episode of Private Practice (since next week it's the crossover, so I wanted to get a feel for the characters if it was worth the time).  Anyway, I haven't watched the show in a while and it seems like an ENTIRELY different show than what premiered in Fall 2007.  It's not early-Grey's good... but is it better than current-Grey's?  Yeah.  I think so.  At the very least it hasn't descended into ghost/Angel of Death Denny sex and heavy-handed metaphysical preponderance.  Yeah, it does have the life-or-death stakes in most/all of its cases, though I guess it tries to replace that with ethical quandaries.  But a generally enjoyable, watchable hour.

Addison is no longer Ally McBeal 2.0.  She may not be Addison from Season Two of Grey's Anatomy... but she's much closer to that than what she was made into at the start of this series.

Hm.

I still don't understand the point of the KaDee Strickland character.

Seriously.

So, Grey's. I've decided to do the live-ish bloggy thing for tonight because it promises to be a Very Special Episode.

Denny is doing the voiceover, talking about heaven, hell, and limbo. Ooh, spooky. Anyway, he keeps badgering Izzie telling her that he's there for her. So, he's pretty much the Angel of Death and I now expect Izzie to die sometime this season. I figure Denny disappears whenever she faces her own mortality, and she's dead ("but we did everything we could") in the season finale. Or sooner, who knows.

Mer calls Bailey in to hint that she's trying to kill the serial killer patient so Bailey's young patient can get his organs because they're a match. Bailey, thank god, calls her on her bullshit (which is only slightly dampened by the promos that show Bailey walking into Derek's surgery on the serial killer begging him to let the guy die... so I guess she comes around).

And, um, Lexie just broke Sloan's penis. That's, um, tight...? ROFL...??

With the way Denny is telling Izzie she doesn't have time to think about anyone but herself... well, I suspect we know what's really up by episode's end.

Love Sara Ramirez. Callie's reaction to Lexie breaking Sloan's, um, bone...r was priceless.

Boring things are going on between Cristina and Major Hottie.

Hey! George gets a scene!

Derek is asking people (namely Cristina) if Mer will like the ring his mother gave him last week. He is so, so, so stupid. I want Cristina and Mer back together, dammit.

Hey! George gets another scene! And there's a patient in the hospital about to die who is not a donor but is a match. Jeez. How lucky! How unlucky, the doting wife (Amy Sloan from Big Shots and her hilarious lazy right eye... sigh, she's so pretty otherwise) won't let George and the Chief harvest her soon-to-die husband's organs.

And Derek puts the ball in Bailey's court, and she tells him to finish his surgery (btw... Derek is such a dick for making her do that).

Dear lord the way the meaning of "I'm here for you" finally dawning on Izzie was so freaking overt.

Is it wrong that I kinda wanted the kid to die? Just to have a horribly bitter ending? Serial killer lives (temporarily), innocent kid dies, Izzie realizes she's dying. Everybody loses! Yay!

At least Chandra Wilson has an Emmy reel.

Snooze

Well, the Oscars have managed to successfully protest their relevancy with today's ho-hum nominations. Don't get me wrong, I loved both Milk and Slumdog Millionaire. But the absence of both/either of The Dark Knight and WALL•E in the Best Picture category shows just how out of touch the Academy is. Yes, yes, both scored multiple nominations elsewhere (with Heath Ledger getting his lock nomination as Supporting Actor). Still. This is a very disappointing development. And, of course, the ratings will suffer.

Because You Left / The Lie

Well, today was a fickle bitch, as they say.

Thank god for Lost's premiere. And tomorrow morning the Oscar nominations are released! Are work shouldn't be quite so hellish! Yay!

I might even find the time to post final nationals on PIFeedback...

And rewatch Lost because my brain was so fried by the time I got to my friends' viewing party that I was, y'know, watching but not totally mentally on top of everything.

I feel like this season is going to be The Two Towers to next season's Return of the King. Doesn't mean I can't be happily surprised when, say, it turns out that Ms. Hawking ("Flashes Before Your Eyes") might be Daniel Faraday's mother.

I'm digging this season's narrative format that, at least for these two premiere event episodes, followed everyone instead of being centered around a specific character's flash-something. It's pure narrative drive.




LOST IS BACK!!!!!!

The Best Thing That Ever Could Have Happened

What!?

Where the hell did that episode of Desperate Housewives come from? I mean, I know, I know, 100th episode... but it wasn't, like, a pull-out-all-the-stops game-changing very-special-episode episode. It was just... amazing. Except maybe Edie's flashback. Could've done with something from Katherine (during the 5 year skip, perhaps?) instead / in addition to (since the firm/perk line was great). Emotional fulfillment. I has it.

Kinda funny how, pretty much, nothing happened in the episode, but it was satisfying nonetheless. And centered around character we'd never seen before and never will again.

Sigh, and there's three weeks until the next episode?

ABDC3

So America's Best Dance Crew premiered this Thursday... who knew? Apparently FauxVo did. It's snap judgment time!

Strikers All Stars - Nice way to start off the night, very exact choreography. Jury is out (I'm not the biggest step fan, admittedly).

Beat Freaks - Yes! B-girls! A team of B-girls! And they (borrowing show terminology) ripped it.

G.O.P. Dance - I agree with Lil Mama (although she was much more upfront with her disappointment than I would have been... biatch be blunt!) Sigh, I feel like this is an unfortunate name for a crew... G.O.P.? I can't even remember what they said it stood for. Pretty obvious routine for the sudden death.

Quest Crew - Great costumes (although I love purple, it's a little Fall 2008...), very high energy and entertaining.

Fly Khicks - Sexy, but in a competition with a girl team like Beat Freaks... I dunno. I thought their sudden death was much more exciting than their main performance (maybe because G.O.P. Dance went before them and they weren't that hot). Don't see them making it too far, though.

Ringmasters - I don't even know what to think... but holy contortionist hell! I feel like this may wind up more of a novelty than lasting, but, um, yeah, wow, hi.

Boxcuttuhz - This season's Fanny Pak (but not as good)? Mixed genders (though only one girl, and Lil Mama called her out), but they aren't doing B-boy stuff, it's all costumes, props, choreography, and theatricality. With a touch of nerdy.

Dynamic Edition - Hehe! Tap shoes! Clogging! On ABDC!

Team Millennia - Glad they lost out to Fanny Pak last season, but it was fun! Theatrical opening was the best part of me.

Favorites? Beat Freaks and Quest Crew. If everyone keeps up the same level of performance / there aren't any major f*ckups, I'm putting these two in the finals.

When Did Fridays Start Getting Programming Worth Watching?

I have no reactions. Because, um, wow. BSG. FNL. What? Also Psych but I haven't watched that yet.

I just can't even talk about BSG. I can't. WTFrak.

Benefits

Oh my god, you guys. Did you watch last night's How I Met Your Mother? It was GENIUS. I don't normally laugh out loud through much of HIMYM, though I am generally entertained. Last night was hi-lar-i-ous. And touching.

This episode showed why this show is a step above other multi-cam sitcoms. The quick cutting back and forth and short scenes that "traditional" sitcoms don't do because they tape in front of a live audience (admittedly, a 10-second scene won't be very funny when taken out of context of the surrounding scenes).

Anyway. Holy eff. I think we already have a nominee for Best of 2009.

Oh, and the ratings?

A 4.8/12 in the demo and 11.847 million viewers.

Elsewhere on FOX

Damn you, Fox.

First you move Bones to Thursdays.

Then President Bush wants to make a farewell speech so you postpone the premiere.

Then you make it a two-episode premiere meaning I have to choose between 9pm Bones and Grey's Anatomy for the second tuner while the first on my DVR records The Office/30 Rock.

Then I see that thanks to American Idol and the NAACP Awards the show is essentially going to air a new episode every other week and be preempted the weeks in between (Bones two-hours on 1/22, Idol on 1/29, Bones on 2/5, NAACP on 2/12, Bones on 2/19 and 2/26, Idol on 3/5). Stability: Impossible.

Haven't you done enough f*cking with this show yet?

Hm?

It is(/was) a stable, mid-sized utility player that attracted 10 million viewers on Wednesdays and was (easily) winning its timeslot in the the demo. You have no idea how it's going to perform on Thursdays without the above maddening preemption schedule.

STOP F*CKING WITH BONES.

Hour 3 (and Lie To Me*)

Much better. Bill Buchanan and CHLOE. Jack in an interrogation room. Revealing that Tony was doing secret covet things with the terrorist organization because the government can't be trusted (yay...? although wasn't there a big undercover agent working with terrorists but wait not really thing back in season three?)

Oh. And CHLOE VERSUS DARIA IN A BATTLE OF THE COMPUTER HACKERS. Please let them meet IRL over the course of the day. Governments and financial markets will rise and fall at their every whim.

Meanwhile, other things are still happened with the African Subplot That Is Actually The Main Plot, and with President Woman President's husband / suicide committing son. Sorry for adopting Dave Barry-speak, but, well, I'm just so gosh darn entertained by him. [EDIT: Please note that I wrote my capslock Chloe versus Janeane Garafolo thing before actually reading Dave's blog to see that he referred to it as a far more eloquently and entertainingly put "KEYBOARDING DUEL OF DEATH."]

The FBI is "setting up a perimeter". Woo! Perimeters!

Seriously, though, good to know four ex-CTU agents and staffers can basically thwart the FBI in a matter of minutes.

Onto hour 4!

Oh, there's a Lie To Me* commercial. I was displeased with that pilot. It's not terrible, but it's just a run of the mill pure procedural with a gimmick that wore thin halfway through the episode. I certainly won't be watching any more of Tim Roth reading facial ticks and explaining what they mean to solve crimes. I mean, what's the most interesting thing they can possibly do on this show? Put him up against an expert poker player? Meh. Giant heaps of meh.

Family, Death, Irony

Oh, Gossip Girl. You continue to astound and confound my expectations with a combination of misleading promos and completely true-to-character developments that, like a car crash in slow motion, you knew was coming a mile away but keep watching hoping it can be diverted. It's like "I know where you're going with this! But I can't believe you're going there! OMG you went there, took pictures, and came back!" Seriously though, a pretty predictable episode... but still a massively entertaining one.

Desmond Harrington as Jack Bass (who is somehow Bart Bass's brother?) is fantastic. Somehow even better here than on Dexter, where I'm still sure his Detective Quinn is up to little-to-no good. Well played, sir. Well played. Chuck and Blair were too busy being, um, themselves and teenaged and in love/hate that they didn't notice your moves. OTOH, you only got yourself a higher paying job. The board can't strip Chuck of his 51% controlling stake in Bass Industries, just the position he decided he desired. And, oh my, the resulting Chuck/Blair seeming-final break-up (of a relationship that never actually started). What's a Chuck Bass to do now?

Meanwhile stuff happened/came to a head with the Lily/Rufus lovechild plot. Yay, it's done (and, um, Matthew Settle, you're totally hot with your shirt off, but if you're going to wax the front, you might as well get the pits)! Only it's not because there's still potential for it to come back because the Sekrit Van Der Woodsen-Humphrey First Born isn't actually dead. Remember this, people. No matter how hard those adoptive parents try to hide it, the lovechild will come back into play. Eventually.

That final tableau of Dan, Serena, Jenny, and Eric looking on at Lily and Rufus walking in (as Lily says something about always wanting to be family) and grasping hands...

The thing is, I think the six of them work MUCH better as a family than as well-preserved starcrossed lovers, a couple of twitterpating teens in an on-again off-again relationship, and a girl and her best gay.

About this weekend

Quickly about the rest of 24's first night... meh. Glad I stopped the minute-by-minute commentary because eventually it would've started droning on about "goddammit, why am I still watching this series?" I'll watch tonight's installments and make my decision about continuing to record the show. There had better be some more thrilling cliffhangers. The ratings were middling, and without knowing the effect having House as a lead-in will have on 24, come February it and Heroes will likely be neck-and-neck in the demo (though 24 will likely have the viewer advantage, I am guessing).

Anyway / also... Legend of the Seeker.

The 100-ish pages about Denna, the Mord'Sith (basically the fantasy-world combination of a dominatrix and a professional torturer) was the only truly original and entertaining part of Wizard's First Rule. So I was super-excited that the title of the episode was Denna. But oh my was that an arch performance. Great costuming job, though. However, I seem to remember the description of the pain-inducing instrument (the Agiel) as being a stick that was about foot long and a finger thick. So I got a hefty guffaw when the Agiel prop looked, well, much more like a sex toy than a long, thin, horrifyingly painful instrument of torture and death. Maybe it's just me?

But having Craig Horner shirtless, sweaty, and hanging from the ceiling for much of the episode was appreciated. See, I'm very easily amused when it comes ot campy fantasy series.

And, oy, we're something like 8 episodes into the series and they've already introduced something called "the breath of life" (I don't recall this from the book, but it has been a while and I didn't read past the first in the series)... which basically eliminates death provided you get "the breath of life" shortly after you die. Good lord, we've learned nothing from Heroes' second season. NOTHING! Anyway, Denna was brought back to life at the end of the episode, unbeknownst to our heroes, so I guess the show wanted a recurring villain. She's no Callisto... but I guess she'll do?

There's No Time

(all tape-delayed-live-blog hour/minutes are "into broadcast," so 1:05 = the fifth minute of the second hour of tonight's premiere)

0:00 - Hey, it's that guy from The Nine! He's so hapless.
0:01 - I dunno, I get T-boned and go into a tailspin, I'm screaming like Egan Foote's daughter, not semi-worriedly glancing over my shoulder.
0:01 - Do you have any idea how difficult it is to time one car crash intentionally? Let alone two? PWN.
0:01 - Downtown LA just got f*cked up. Oh, wait, it's supposed to be DC. The props department isn't doing a great job with substituting the street signs. Just saying.
0:02 - The credits say Carlos Bernard is in the show, so even if I somehow were unspoiled... Tony Almeida is back. Yeah, we've known this for about 18 months and I *still* don't get it. And I don't trust the show to give a decent explanation. Anyway... the Soul Patch is back, too!
0:03 - Jack is so badass he doesn't even care that Kurtwood Smith is eating up valuable ass-kicking time by setting the stakes so we know that the government agencies are doing a 180 later when he needs a hacksaw.
0:03 - Oh, and the multiple angles of the same person are back on the split screen! Yay! This stylistic thing was sorely missing in Day 6. Ugh. Day 6. Ugh.
0:04 - Jack is fingering that pencil something fierce. Did he watch The Dark Knight? I want him to make the pencil disappear. Do it! Do it!
0:05 - Oh, now Jack wants a turn at setting the stakes by saying that when he's activated, he's brought in to do whatever he deems necessary to stop a threat.
0:06 - Someone vaguely familiar looking just walked in. Was she in 24: Redemption?
0:06 - Right, like Jack is going to be back in the Senate when the reconvene the next day at the same time. Right.
0:07 - She is not Special Agent Walker. Special Agent Walker is on Chuck.
0:07 - Janeane Garafolo is delivering semi-snarky exposition. Is Chloe back? I miss Chloe.
0:08 - Oh, and there is high-flying co-worker tension at the FBI, too. Love. It. Also, hi clean-shaven Billy Walsh!
0:08 - Hey, the FBI is using CNN's magic screen! Can a hologram of will.i.am be far behind?
0:09 - Terrorists! Aaah! Also, it's only been 7 minutes, but they have Egan Foote wherever they wanted him and he's already doing whatever they wanted him to do. So... yeah. I buy that not?
0:10 - And he finished whatever they needed him to do already. With post-car-accident bleeding going on.
0:10 - Something will eventually happen with the terrorists, Egan Foote, and that airplane. But for now...
0:11 - Something will eventually happen between Not Chuck's Special Agent Walker and that Larry person. But for now...
0:12 - CIP Firewall explanation... check.
0:13 - Can I just say that in the six minutes it took for Jack to get from the Senate / DoJ committee / whatever to the FBI Washington Field Office, his hair became a mess.
0:13 - Touché, explanation for Tony being alive. Touché. Sort of.
0:15 - Nothing happened to the plane (yet)? What a twist!
0:16 - Dammit Tony, stop threatening Egan Foote. He was in two car crashes 15 minutes ago, you know. Not to mention that whole 52-hour bank hostage crisis.

COMMERCIALS!

Hm, a thought occurs. It's 12:42am and I have work in the morning, as well as about 65 minutes of this premiere to watch. Sadly, I must sign off for the night, but any further large scope thoughts will assuredly be blogged about on the morrow.

The Shonda Night

Overnights are in for Grey's Anatomy / Private Practice's premiere as lead-in/lead-out.

PP kept 2/3 of GA's ratings. Just like the first repeat did back in December. Which, if it holds true across all demos (like the repeat did), will result in "pretty decent" ratings for the ABC relocation.

Marc Berman's PI Newsletter reminds that this isn't up against original CBS programs... but it WAS on against the BCS Championship Game. Which is much stronger competition than a new CSI and a new Eleventh Hour, even if the football audience is heavily male skewing (CSI/11H are much more male skewing than the ABC shows, too).

EDIT

So, fast nationals are in and while the 2/3 thing holds approximately true... it's still not positive news because, like Desperate Housewives on Sunday, the December/holiday hiatus hurt GA and it came back below 14 million and at a 5.1 in the demo. Leaving PP at 9 million and a 3.3.

ABC needs new hit shows... stat!

Oh, and 30 Rock (which was new last night along with the rest of the NBC lineup except for The Office) was the highest rated new sitcom on NBC's schedule but the ratings were bad. Why would the Peacock air most of its gender-even/male-skewing comedies (a) against the CBS Championship, and (b) without the flagship show? It makes no sense. Just leave them all in repeats!

Lordy, the only intelligent people at the Big Three seem to be at CBS these days... CBS aired all repeats!

Dear Suarez Family

Oh my god, you people are ridiculous. I'm 40 minutes into the episode (and have to leave for a friend's birthday party), but Betty just walked out of Hilda's party celebrating the reopening of her salon... because she has a small glimmer of a chance to fix a gigantic error made at work that cost Mode magazine 30 pages of ads (that's the business version of it). Um... you can't / won't fire her from her family. They could fire her from work. PRIORITIES, PEOPLE. God, and the guilt trip they laid on Betty. I'm so annoyed at them. Even after two years of Betty at Mode they don't understand. Ugh. UGH!

Anyway, to the dinner party!

Damages Season Two Premiere

While I will say that the show is pretty disjointed (which makes sense give the show's format of slowly piecing together past and present until they converge)... damn that was exciting, entertaining television. Here's hoping the pace and thrill can be kept up throughout the season this go around. The new cast members are obviously amazing (um, and Paige Turco as William Hurt's wife! aww) Timothy Olyphant is probably my favorite so far. He's understated yet creepy. Although I guess that's par for the Timothy Olyphant course? Of course we haven't met Marcia Gay Harden yet.

Also: I now know that the Cadillac Escalade Hybrid only gets 20 MPG city. It's a hybrid, people.

That Wasn't Funny

There was something very, very off about last night's two Scrubs episodes. Like the almost complete lack of comedy (the show isn't incredibly often laugh out loud funny, but it's often amusing and Dr. Cox's rants and the cutaways fill the void). And the lighting! There was a lot of darkness. Anyway. Hm. Dammit, this better be the final season because that's the only reason to keep watching / crawling and gasping to the finish line.

Okay, the new "tag" thing the show is doing over the credits is kinda funny. Especially the first one which was the show being totally, 100% obviously-and-embracing-it meta about the fact that the show has been on for 8 years and its ratings suck.

Peace the Spork Out, 90210

So, I told myself I was going to give this show one final viewing before making my final decision (cut or not cut). I mean, there are occasional moments of fun. Not everything has to be dark, broody, delicious Gossip Girl. But, um, wow. The classroom scene about "seeing without using your eyes... it's called intuition" was possibly the WORST THING EVER. This was such an underwhelming episode. So very poor. Not even having friends who work on it will keep this on my DVR list.

Sigh, next week American Idol comes back. Guess I'll be recording two reality shows on Tuesdays from 8-10pm and catching up on Scrubs via the internet.

Also The Mentalist. Saw a preview for tonight's episode and it was about the Red John case, which is what interested me about the pilot. Then the second episode was pure procedural and I was like "Oh my god, I'm so bored" (haha, that was totally the best line on last night's GG... respect the Girls on the Steps, dammit!) Anyway... I'll find that online tomorrow since I saw the preview at a friend's house and didn't get home until after it already aired.

However...

... while I won't do a Top 50 episodes of 2008, here are the two that stood out to me. Don't ask me to pick. Please?

Lost - "The Constant". If only Heroes had taken notes note on how to properly infuse time travel into a narrative. This episode was just pitch perfect. And that phone call. Just thinking about it makes me come close to tears.

The Wire - "Late Editions". If The Wire had submitted "Late Editions" instead of "-30-" (the series finale) to the ATAS blue ribbon panel, I'm convinced it would have been a nominee for Best Drama Series. "Late Editions" had it all... and didn't have the extra 30-some-odd minute running time and wrap-ups for characters that people unfamiliar with the show wouldn't fully comprehend as genius. Sigh.

Location Location Location

Hah, the "gay club" Susan and Lee went to in tonight's new Desperate Housewives (new? who knew!?) was Boulevard3. That space is so recognizable. Many a drunken night spent there... with straight friends. Well, that's the magic of television.

But, clearly, what Susan thinks happened didn't, and Lee knows what did. Right? I mean... you don't sleep with the hag...

No Top 50 of 2008... but here's some favorite things

Not doing that this year as inevitably every one of the top 40-some-odd slots would be filled by The Wire, Mad Men and Lost, with a couple 30 Rock, The Shield and Battlestar Galactica episodes thrown in. Also there was that whole writers strike and there's so much less TV to choose from. Also I cut down semi-significantly on my TV consumption this fall.

Instead here are a few of my favorite things from TV 2008 (outside of the above shows... which, um, d'uh), in no particular order. Please beware of spoilers. Ride the walrus.

- Tina Fey. Oh, come on, you knew she'd be on this list and for reasons no one in their right mind can deny. There, I said it. Lemon, out!

- Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf. Where would I, and Gossip Girl, be without them? Also the Yale episode (hahah, shot at Columbia... just like the University of Pennsylvania substituting for Princeton University in this summer's Transformers sequel)

- Jim Parsons as Sheldon Cooper, Ph.D. on The Big Bang Theory.

- Amy Ryan as Holly Flax on The Office. And then she left and the show sucked again.

- Grey's Anatomy. Shut up, I know! Here's the thing. For a lot of 2008... Grey's was actually kind of good? Not, like, back to its apparently-a-fluke second season good. But much better after the writers strike. Meredith seeing Amy Madigan as a psychiatrist worked. The way season four ended totally worked. And the start of season five worked, too. And then Erica Hahn had a minute long diatribe and glasses and foliage and lesbianism and Izzie started seeing ghosts and then Melissa George showed up and the interns started playing basement surgeons on themselves and then Izzie STARTED HAVING SEX WITH GHOSTS. Shut up, I know... basically all this shows is that Shonda can put together a string of pretty good episodes when not burdened with having to do more than, y'know, about 5 episodes. She'd do great in the UK. Anyway, the revival and quick fall from grace (again) of Grey's is totally one of my favorite things about TV 2008.

- Jimmy Smits dies on Dexter. I dunno, I just don't like him in, well, much of anything. And I thought his character, among other things, brought season three down several notches from the first two seasons (also hurting: obvious plotting and a snail's pace). But I was relieved when the last few episodes built to his death in the penultimate episode of the season, because it showed that Dexter still had it.

- South Park. The fall half-season wasn't so great (although who can forget the Indiana Jones Gets Raped sections of the premiere?), but the spring half was typical South Park genius. Cartman gives Kyle AIDS, Britney is ritualistically killed off in a harvast ritual (watch out, Miley!), cat pee drugs, The Writers Guild of America Canada goes on strike for more internet revenue, Mrs. Garrison (a MTF transexual who is a lesbian, who used to be a gay man, who used to think he was a straight man) gets her penis back (so, is Mr. Garrison straight now?) as Cartman teaches inner city kids to cheat like Beel Belichick in a Stand and Deliver parody, the internet fails... the only down note of the whole half-season was the finale.

- Frumpy Gabrielle Solis on Desperate Housewives. Okay, Eva Longoria Parker doesn't ever look bad but, um, that character now has a few more layers and that's what I've been asking for since early season one.

- Kevin and Scotty get civil unioned on Brothers & Sisters, a week later the CA Supreme Court rules that same sex marriage is legal in the state, then the dolts at ABC air the episode that talks about Prop 8 a week after the election. While on the topic of B&S... Kima Greggs as the birth mother to Kitty and Robert's not-yet-born baby!

- Ugly Betty kinda sorta gets its groove back? The show has certainly opened up since moving production to NYC. They use those locations (but, um, Gossip Girl did it first!) And I think that, somehow, Betty's wardrobe has gottem even more clashy/poofy/over-the-top/unfashionable since the NYC move. I loved the episode "When Betty met YETI" because, now in her third season, Betty really needed a kick in the pants to start moving away from Daniel's desk, and the resulting conflict showed some truly ugly behavior from Marc (who remains my favorite character), but then some real heart from both he and Betty and yay. Also Justin's straight/str8 friend at school rejects his offer to go see In The Heights together because his friends are hecklers and homophobes. Also Amanda as Betty's roommate has been fun. The only things not working for me at the moment are the slight declawing of Wilhelmina and WHEN THE EFF IS CHRISTINA GOING TO BIRTH THAT BABY!?

- Anne Dudek as Cutthroat Bitch on House is dating Wilson and then she dies. Season five just hasn't been as good.

- Chuck. Man is there any other show currently on the air hitting it out of the park pretty much every episode the way Chuck has this season? Although they're going to run out of women who turn out to be secret agents for Sarah to get into girl fights with at some point... but hopefully not soon! "I hate you, Bryce."

- How I Met Your Mother's ratings rise. Who knows if it's linked to having a strong/funny/compatible lead-in with The Big Bang Theory, but in its fourth season, finally HIMYM isn't a bubble show. The final 2008 episode "Little Minnesota" was a lot of fun (Barney's smutty holiday song parodies... the Canada bar with karaoke at the end). Oh, and "Sandcastles in the Sand"! Barney/Robin! If only the show could get rid of Ted...

- David C beats David A in the American Idol season seven finale. Who knew there were more hungry cougars than horny teenage girls?

- Isis on America's Next Top Model.

- Christian Siriano winning Project Runway 4 and forever destroying the show in the process (seriously, even the top group of season five's designers sucked in comparison to, like, all of the season four designers... and they were all trying to catch phrase it up... annoyalicious!)

- Stephanie from Top Chef: Chicago and Jamie from Top Chef: New York.

- Ed pleading with America to let Heba be in The Biggest Loser Families finale instead of him and then America so obviously telling him it hates his wife by choosing him over her 84/16.

- The Mentalist showing freshman series can be hits (and simultaneously that, perhaps, once again, broadcast TV isn't dead)... even if I didn't like the second episode so stopped watching...

- True Blood showing that, while it's possible to make television shows about vampires, you're inevitably going to get Buffy comparisons and you just won't win that battle. Also the series started out laughable, got better, then became, um, just odd? Also for showing that you should never reveal to the audience who the killer is in a serial killer mystery before the main character(s) know unless there's going to be some sort of super awesome twist. Which there, y'know, wasn't. But, hey, at least HBO is making buzz-worthy TV again (cough, Entourage sucks, cough). Also... Ryan Kwanten.

HD

Wow. So DVR recorded part one of the Damages season one recap in HD (because now that I know I have FX in HD, I'm of course recording the series in HD instead of SD).

Let's just say that one of my biggest complaints about the first season was that the video quality made the show practically unwatchable. I knew that it was an HD/SD issue (as well as potentially bad calibration on my TV set... but none of the shows I recorded at the time in HD had color or contrast issues). The problem persisted on other cable shows, so... yeah.

Anyway, the recap looked AWESOME. Yay high definition video quality! Can't wait for the Damages premiere. And BSG (another show I had video quality problems on so would often just wait and watch online... and now I have Sci-Fi in HD, too!)

Here's hoping, should I still have Time Warner Cable, when Mad Men season three comes out, I have AMC in HD...

It's January 2009?

I'm back from being away on vacation. Oh, my, it was necessary. Don't go back to work until Monday, so it's not entirely over, but the "away" part is.

Anyway, Happy New Year, everyone!

Have you all programmed your DVRs to record the plethora of new/returning programming that January brings us?

I must say, I was going to post today about being angry at Time Warner Cable for dropping Viacom's MTV Networks, meaning I'd lose my beloved Comedy Central programs (South Park - available online, The Daily Show / Colbert Report - available online, and Futurama repeats - available on DVDs I already own) but an 11th hour agreement was reached and I no longer give a flying nun.

But, looking into this revealed that TWC has started supplying several new HD cable channels without informing me. Which means that come January 16th, I'll be watching the final season of Battlestar Galactica in HD. Woo!

I've also programmed Psych to record, as I watched the holiday special over Thanksgiving and was charmed at least by the character-based interplay between the two leads, if not astounded by the crime case (it's supposed to be funny, and it succeeds at that).

We've also got Damages returning this Wednesday and to a lesser extent Nip/Tuck (which is now very much a "save for weekend" show... but still one I can't stop watching for some reason).

Oh, and, um, can anyone say LOST!?

2009 is looking good, my friends.

Rachel Maddow

She really is the smartest newsperson currently on TV, isn't she?

The Biggest Loser Finale

ROFL, "America" voting in a 84/16 landslide AGAINST what Ed and Heba wanted and what Ed directly asked viewers to do. I mean... love it! For the irony, of course. Since if it had been the other way around, Heba would've won the competition and $150K more than she got.

Villains, and other Monday Television

I'm still not watching the next chapter (given the oh-so-been-there-done-that of the glimpse at the "Fugitives" volume... really, another X-Men plot rip... although knowing me I'm sure I'm going to watch the first episode just as I'm watching the 24 premiere against all logic) but is it possible that from the series' worst season, the best volume finale was made? I mean, they did kill off a LOT of characters, which at the very least helps the series concentrate-ish on the few characters the few viewers may still have an affinity for.

Perhaps it's all relative.

I wasn't vastly entertained during the first half of the episode, but I think it built to several decent, if separate, climaxes.

Ironic that Ando gained a power and it's AMPLIFYING OTHER PEOPLE'S POWERS. Meaning he's still got nothing on his own. Also Hiro is now powerless? My guess is that's undone during the next premiere, although NOT having a time traveler (er, except Peter? or does he need to reacquire all the powers he previously absorbed so now only has the power to fly like Nathan?) will help avoid the time travel plot device the show always falls into (and they have brought back the African version of Isaac Mendez meaning the show will continue to rely on paintings that show the future).

Sigh.

Anyway.

How I Met Your Mother - hilarious Christmas episode (Barney's sexually charged parody carols!) capped off by one of the best/most unexpected tags the show has ever had (Marshall in a Canadian bar with Robin karaoke-ing Robin Sparkles' "Let's Go to the Mall")! Ted is a dick and I'm glad Barney and Ted's sister showed him, using Lily's new inability to keep a secret.

Big Bang Theory - the show's first Christmas episode, and of course Sheldon has his own special holiday. So glad I was (easily) convinced to not remove this from my DVR series recording list. Also Michael Trucco! That reminds me, BSG in one month! Have you been watching the webisodes?

Gilded Globes

The Golden Globes are a joke. These nominations, on the whole, are terribly uninspired.

Hollywood better hope that the Academy has better sense than the HFPA. If neither The Dark Knight nor WALL•E are nominated for Best Picture, it's going to be yet another low-rated telecast. And both those movies thoroughly deserve BP nods.

House shipping...

OMG did Foreteen just happen?

Leno in Primetime?

Not sure how I feel about the news that, starting next fall, Jay Leno will bring some form of his show on the road to the 10-11pm hour from Monday through Friday for NBC. From a ratings perspective, the show is bound to do better than, say, My Own Worst Enemy. But Jay can't come cheap, and while his show may have a pretty stable viewing base after so many years in late night (so we probably won't see the typical second episode slide from a premiere we see with basically every new show)... his show has been on for many, many years. Are new viewers going to flock to it just because it's earlier? Will younger viewers watch it? I don't know. This seems like a desperate attempt to plug up the sinking ship that is NBC... and it may be a lifeboat, but I just don't see it as the savior NBC needs.

Plus we all saw how disastrously stripping 5 hours of primetime with the same show worked for MyNetwork TV in 2006-07. Granted, Jay Leno's show isn't exactly a telenovela...

... the loss of 5 hours of primetime real estate for scripted television depresses me wholeheartedly.

Oh Thank God

1) Scare of the weekend tonight when I came home from a friend's place where we watched the penultimate Dexter of the season... and my DVR would not play anything back. I was able to watch much of Brothers & Sisters live, but because it was still recording I didn't want to unplug my cable box to reboot. Anyway, 11pm rolled around and I did. And the DVR was working again! And...

2) Thank God that Nick and Starr won The Amazing Race. Nick and Starr were perhaps the only fully competent team on this cycle. If the show ever does another All-Star edition, I'd love to see them competing against other capable teams. Did anyone else, um, totally notice the absence of Toni and Dallas at the finish line? Can we get a spin-off about the State Department getting them home from Russia after Dallas lost the passports? And then an MTV reality show about Starr and Dallas dating? And some more interesting and smarter contestants next cycle? Ken and Tina's putting their wedding bands back on was touching.

3) The Simpsons actually had some real laugh out loud moments tonight. I had to pause and cackle for about 30 seconds after Mr. Burns shot the guy in the gorilla mascot costume. And, of course, Homer's WALL-E moment.

4) Yay for Desperate Housewives letting us know the reason Dave is after Mike... and it's a reason that some people (at least in online chatter) predicted, but not many. Which, IMHO, is a sign that the writer is doing a mystery correctly (if some can guess, then it can't be entirely out of left field, but if most haven't guessed, then it's still a good reveal).

Character Promos

Now that The CW has given two Gossip Girl characters their own promo spotlights (er, aside from the way the netlet originally promoted the show...) what character/song combos do you suggest for the other four main teens (no, I don't count Vanessa)? Remember, they apparently need to be tarty modern upbeat pop songs... so as much as we want Dan to have a promo to Radiohead's "Creep" it's just not gonna happen.

Chuck / "Womanizer" (Britney Spears)


Blair / "Keeps Getting Better" (Christina Aguilera... OH NO THEY DIDN'T!)


How about character/song combos for other shows?

R U SRS

Dallas and Toni. DALLAS AND TONI.

You give me such pain.

Okay, first of all, sending Dallas to do a mental task? Very smart (can you detect sarcasm?) As Toni acknowledged in confessional. Dallas soooo is lucky Tina helped him.

And then LEAVING THE BAG WITH MONEY AND PASSPORTS IN A CAB!? R U SRS!? As I'm watching and the camera lingers I'm thinking "surely, the producers are contacting the cab company and will have the bag and money and passports waiting at the Pit Stop. Remains to be seen, but... um... yeah...?

If I were Toni I would (a) be kicking myself really hard for sending my dumb son to do that Roadblock, and (b) be kicking the ass of my dumb son.

Also Phil's explanation of the detour took about 5 minutes. Damn this is a complicated leg... and there's so much stupidity-induced drama!

Also... WTF DAN'S DANCING. OMFG. AND HOW THE EFF DID THAT LADY GIVE THEM THE CLUE BASED ON HIS SO NOT GETTING IT!?

OMG DAN AND ANDREW ARE IN THE FINALS. SANJAYA. SANJAYA!

You know there's gonna be some plane-related and task-related bottlenecking, but seriously if Dan and Andrew somehow beat Nick/Starr or Ken/Tina... I don't know what I'm going to do.

Psych

Sat down with the family to watch holiday specials of both Monk and Psych tonight. I'd seen a few episodes of Monk in the past and had decided the schtick was just not for me. And tonight's episode was no different. Psych, OTOH, I had dismissed after the pilot and hadn't watched again despite several friends telling me they thoroughly enjoyed the show. And I must admit I enjoyed tonight's episode. I believe that Psych has a new convert in me.

Not like I'm recording two other things on Fridays at 10pm that it would be a conflict (and BSG doesn't start again until the week after Psych returns).

See, I can admit when I'm wrong.

Hehehe

ROFL

So Long, Vic

Just watched The Shield finale, since I took the red eye last night back to the east coast.

All I can say is... yes.

Absense. Heart. Fonder?

Starting 24: Redemption now.

I loathed the sixth season of 24. Had the Writers' Strike not happened last year, the foul taste left in my mouth would still be so pungent that I would not have considered watching it (until people told me if/that the show had markedly improved... I've already heard from Fox friends that Cherry Jones will win the Emmy for her role). Of course, those people (well, not them specifically) also greenlit Do Not Disturb) so... grains, salt, etc.

So here we are, about 18 months after "Day 6" counted down its final minutes (in such a boring, boring way as I recall).

And this two-hour movie is going to air.

And I'm... well, I'm watching it. Hopefully, as a two-hour standalone piece involving Jack "There's No Time / It's For National Security" Bauer is, well, two-hours of standalone story it won't be bogged down by the tiresome antics the writers of 24 constantly employ (a mole! in CTU? again?) and thus, perhaps, it has a chance of being a fun action-thriller MOW (movie of the week for those not versed in TV Industry English).

I wonder what Dave Barry has to say about this... he was the only thing that got me through "Day 6". Well, I'll find out after I've watched.

If this doesn't completely suck (read: it's markedly better than the "Day 6" average), I will be watching the 2-day, 4-hour premiere and making my decision then on "Day 7".

Dammit, I thought we had a legit time jump (a would-be first in 24 history), but apparently the first few minutes were prequel to the rest of the "events occur in real time" (which they are back to saying out loud, I see...) two hours.

Onward, etc. It's 11:33pm, I'm going to shut up unless I absolutely have to comment on something. After all... tomorrow is Monday.

The Amazing Race Where Contestents Couldn't Read Good

OMFG WTF DAN AND ANDREW.

How are you IN FOURTH PLACE in this cycle of TAR when YOU CAN'T READ THE CLUES. CONTINUOUSLY. LIKE, EVERY LEG OF THE RACE.

Only 27 minutes into this episode, so they could still somehow pull victory out of the jaws of defeat... but could they please NOT?

HOW THE EFF IS DAN "SPORTS AND TV BASED" WHEN HE CAN'T MARCH? AREN'T SPORTS PEOPLE SUPPOSED TO BE MODERATELY PHYSICALLY COORDINATED? AND AREN'T TV VIEWERS USED TO WATCHING THINGS!? OMG LOOK AT THE OTHER PEOPLE YOU STUPID, STUPID PERSON.

I know this is probably a non-elimination round... but can it please be an elimination round?

And can someone PLEASE make that Dan and Andrew blooper reel and post to YouTube?

K thx bai.

Srsly though, the only characters this cycle who have been remotely interesting are the semi-villains Ken and Tina (really just Tina) and kinda Ugly Americans Terrance and Sarah (really just Terrance).

Though we do enjoy the presence of Nick, Starr, Dallas, and Toni (well, not so much Toni).

ETA: Dallas, seriously, do them one at a time. I R Dumb Jock.

ETA: Dammit, it was non-elimination.

Um 2

Grey's Anatomy. WTF. You are killing me with your CRAZY.

How do you go from hilarity like "Who's making a porno in Izzie's room" to THE INTERNS TAKING OUT THEIR OWN APPENDICES.

Plus side: Melissa George has great abs.

Also... Izzie having sex with Ghost!Denny... WTF.

W.

T.

F.

Was at Twilight earlier. Just watching now (about 1/3 of the way through). 30 Rock was amusing, The Office was... odd. Felt like we skipped an episode coming off last week with Pam coming back. Weird.

America's Next Top Mehdel

ANTM is not going to win fans back by continuing to kick fan favorite models out in 3rd place and leaving choices between "meh" and "bad" for the crowd. I mean... SAM!? Over Analeigh? Seriously? With those CoverGirl photos? SERIOUSLY!?

Good to see last season's ought-to-be-the-winner is getting booked like crizazy in the "Top Models in Action" segment. Love the brunette look on Anya sooooo much more than the Joely Richardson blonde.

Tyra pulled me back into ANTM this season with the tranny. But I'm just as disappointed with this finale, and with this season's contestants as a whole, as I've been the last few cycles. Cycle 8 had some spark, Cycle 7 was probably the best group of contestants the show ever had (at least from an entertainment standpoint... and from a modeling standpoint! CariDee? Melrose? The twins?) Since then it's just been crap, crap, and more bland crap.

Glad that Tyra, from her talk show, is giving Isis the sex change operation. You go, girls!

I think I may be done with ANTM.

So it's a tumor, right?

WTF is wrong with Izzie Stephens?

KTLA

WTF. Tomorrow will be the 3rd week in a row that Top Model is preempted in LA for a Clippers game. THE FREAKING CLIPPERS. FOR A THIRD WEEK IN A ROW.

This would never happen on a real network.

At least it hasn't happened on Gossip Girl night.

Yet.

Dear God, It's me. Barney Stinson. What up?

I only realized what was happening on HIMYM 20 minutes into the episode when Ted and Robin walked into the bar and were fighting so Robin is going to stay somewhere else for the night.

BARNEY AND ROBIN ARE ON (maybe).

Why did I wait to watch this until 9am.

Oh, right, I fell asleep in the middle of Heroes (yeah... I decided I was going to keep watching until the end of this arc... OMG that was the most retcon episode of television I HAVE EVERY SEEN).

Dammit, Ted and Robin made up and Barney and Robin aren't on. This makes me sad.

Marshall better get ready to have a kid fast... Alyson Hannigan is preggers.

FYI

I'm quite behind in television viewing. Have been insanely busy with the Prop 8 protesting effort since Wednesday. Have no voice... not that it should affect typing or TV viewing. Anyway... peace and love to all. Am sitting down to watch Desperate Housewives and Brothers & Sisters (which I hear has a Prop 8 plotline that, because of faulty scheduling information given to the producers or something... is, um, too late).

Back to the Island

Lost returns Wednesday, January 21st with a three-hour event (two-hour premiere following a one-hour clips show).

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now let's play scheduling shuffle.

Private Practice to Thursdays at 10pm following Grey's Anatomy (which will help the reported February sweeps crossover arc... although February sweeps is actually in March in 2009 because of the DTV transition... FYI)

Life on Mars to Wednesdays at 10pm, it should do as decently as it's doing now when airing against a currently weak NBC, CSI: NY, and having a more male-skewing audience in its lead-in.

Dirty Sexy Money is canceled (I've heard rumors that ABC told Berlanti to choose between DSM and Eli Stone and Berlanti chose ES).

Pushing Daisies is canceled, as I previously reported but it hasn't officially leaked out yet. But who knows what will be sacrificed to the (rusting?) Idol machine.

Pushing Daisies Going Six Feet Under

Hearing Pushing Daisies has been canceled. Not sure if they'll air the rest of the series. It's off the air next week for the CMA Awards.

Rumor Mill

Hearing that two ABC midseason dramas, Castle and The Unusuals, had their orders cut from Pilot + 12 to Pilot + 9. Purely for economic reasons, is what I'm hearing.

Legend of the Seeker

Well... let's just get this out of the way.

Xena it ain't.

I've read the first book in the "Sword of Truth" series on which Legend of the Seeker is based. I liked it a lot. I was told by friends who'd read the rest of the series or at least other books in the series that subsequent installments suffered from diminishing returns and from eventually excessive preachiness on the part of author Terry Goodkind.

Anyway.

We've got HD New Zealand scenery. That does count for something. And we've got two women on horseback with heaving bosoms (the women... not the horses...) with a bunch of armored men in hot, archery heavy, occasionally slow motion pursuit. Oh, no, blonde breasty woman in black garb got shot. I don't remember this from the book. But I read it over three years ago... so it may have happened? Um, actually, I'm pretty sure it didn't. But yay death in shallow, muddy streams. And Kahlan runs into a shiny barrier. Ah, yes, this definitely did not happen in the books kind of sort of at least not at the beginning. I'm remembering the books better now. Three separate kingdom-ish things with barriers keeping them apart since times of yore based on some moral issue surrounding the use of magic. I think? Anyway, the books started with Richard, our naive woodman soon-to-be hero, as opposed to Kahlan the Confessor, she of the cool temper and impeccably white dress. Kahlan was already through the barrier. There may have been a flashback-y explanation of her coming through at some point... again, my memory ≠ perfect. But I totally understand using this sequence to start off. There's urgency, death, and, well... women with heaving bosoms. Are you liking what you're seeing, young male viewing audience?

Sidenote... IIRC the last 150-ish pages involve Richard becoming some dominatrix's torture victim. How's this going to work on TV???

Okay, I'm just gonna let the mindnumbing action-hour (or two!) take me back into the cold, dead, raped corpse of the book I read years ago. Peace out, ya'll!

But don't get me wrong. I'm very happy to have a fantasy hour on TV.

I just wish George R. R. Martin would get A Song of Ice and Fire done faster so HBO could do the seven books. Read "A Game of Thrones" if you haven't. It'll knock your socks off.