Tag Archives: Television

May 1, 2008 · 9:27 pm

Lost – “Something Nice Back Home”

“Something Nice Back Home”

May 1st, 2008

Welcome to May, folks, and welcome to yet another new episode of Lost. If the trend continues, this week has the potential to upend last week’s momentum: if there’s ever a way to stop plot development in its tracks, the past has shown that Jack and Kate episodes are the most effective. So, when we flashforward to a time when Kate and Jack are in angsty situations, there are signs that we might be in the wrong territory.

But then, things got interesting: it wasn’t a Jack story at all. You start to realize that although Jack is the window into our flashforward and this episode, this isn’t about him: it’s about people haunted by their past, and haunted by its impact on their lives. Where is home for these people, when all of them are struggling to reconcile their new lives with haunting flashbacks from their past?

There’s a lot of questions this episode, and while they might not be as game-changing as last week they remain dramatically strong and certainly important to developing these characters as we march towards a finale.

WARNING: Spoilers, so don’t be clicking until you’ve watched it, or until you’ve decided to turn to the dark side.

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April 29, 2008 · 6:43 pm

Greek – “Move on.Cartwrights”

“Move on.Cartwrights”

April 28th, 2008

As Carrie over at Zap2it noted, there was probably nowhere to go but down: after an episode that had me psychoanalyzing characters on an ABC Family series as if it was on HBO, chances are that the next episode of Greek wouldn’t be able to live up to such a high standard. In this situation, a show has two choices: either over-emphasize your dramatic tension or allow for comedy to take over to lighten the load.

Not one to choose sides, Greek decided to have thier cake and eat it too: Casey and Evan provide the dramatic pathos (Admittedly not my favourite storyline for the series right now), and Rusty’s romantic exploitation (Not exploits, exploitation) couples with Dale in order to provide the comedy. Sprinkle with a storyline to justify the existence of Rebecca Logan, and you’ve got an episode that moves on from its hideously awkward episode title to become a moderately successful forty minutes.

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April 29, 2008 · 12:18 am

How I Met Your Mother – “The Goat”

“The Goat”

April 28th, 2008

A true sign of a show’s commitment to continuity is when they flash forward to the future during an early episode, and then when they reach said moment in time (If this is a show that pays attention to time) they actually deliver on this moment. Needless to say, there are not many shows with the same commitment as How I Met Your Mother in this area, and so it is not too surprising that they live up to their promise: having reached the story of Ted’s 30th Birthday, it is time for the goat…maybe.

Of course, after last week’s episode left us on Barney and Robin about to hook up, are we really thinking about the goat? The aftershocks of the events of last week are perfect because they affect most the character who is usually so inscrutable: within seconds of returning to McLaren’s, Barney is assaulted with reminders left, right and centre of his deed. Sleeping with his best friend’s ex-girlfriend is something that Barney has never quite done, even considering how much he’s done.

It’s even more delightful that Robin is (on the surface) far less affected by it, as Barney is a nervous wreck by comparison; actually, you don’t even need the comparison to know that Barney is destroying himself inside and out. This takes the form, most directly, Barney scrambling a legal defense against the Bro Code.

What is the Bro Code, you ask? Why, it was a legal document written in 1776 in Philadelphia by Barnibus Stinson, contemporary of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington, while they were having a drink. And, yes, it’s delightful.

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April 28, 2008 · 10:57 pm

House – “No More Mr. Nice Guy”

“No More Mr. Nice Guy”

April 28th, 2008

Of all of the shows who had set up extravagant storylines before the strike, House had perhaps the most to lose without returning: it had gutted its existing team, hired on new cast members, and had left at a point with nothing resolved. David Shore and company wanted to be able to see this to its end, whatever that end may be, so here we are with “No More Mr. Nice Guy.”

The episode is a fitting return: a central question of House’s lack of niceness, a chance to further indulge House’s relationship with Wilson and his new girlfriend Cutthroat Bitch, and a sly way to both reference the writers’ strike and find a way to add more of Cameron and Chase to the show all at the same time.

If I were to, like House, give the series a performance review, I’d say that it’s back on track: it’s hard to really analyze the various medical cases, largely interchangeable, but this one was smartly unmemorable in favour of allowing these characters to regain some space in the viewer’s mind. As my mother says, the new lineup wasn’t as favourable once it settled in beyond the entertaining reality show metaphor, so it is important that we get to know them more than we get to know a lovable oaf.

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April 28, 2008 · 9:07 pm

Gossip Girl – “Desperately Seeking Serena”

“Desperately Seeking Serena”

April 28th, 2008

It’s SAT time on Gossip Girl, as our heroes and heroines are obsessing over their futures. Of course, how can one study for the future when your past is haunting you before you can even get there? Georgina Sparks is a dangerous catalyst of the old Serena, a Monday night synergy moment where it appears that Serena has a case of associative regression: when she’s around, something clicks inside of her.

Michelle Trachtenberg (Buffy) arrives on the scene just as Serena’s life seems too idyllic for this drama-filled universe – we are to believe based on the hype that even being stepsiblings with Chuck Bass is a cakewalk compared to weathering the arrival of this character. Here she is, with her entire academic future on the line, and now she has to try to avoid waking up an angry ghost from her, still, mysterious past.

Smartly, the rest of the episode avoided the uber-drama in favour of romantic entanglements of the adorable and/or intriguing variety, along with Blair’s usual scheming and Dan’s usual neuroses. It’s a sign of a show finding its balance, a show capable of taking its storylines and making them into something that affects the entire cast. Much as the pregnancy storyline before the break didn’t break down into something dominating, so too goes Georgie’s arrival on the scene.

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April 28, 2008 · 10:54 am

The Office – “Night Out”

“Night Out”

April 24th, 2008

So, yes, I am extremely late blogging about the most recent episode of The Office. This isn’t because I didn’t like it, but rather that after a long, long day of packing and moving things I didn’t particularly feel like watching anything that I knew I would be viewing critically (It’s inevitable). As a result, I chose to watch the second season of Project Runway (Which, now that it won a Peabody, doesn’t qualify as a guilty pleasure), and only last night sat down to glimpse at the latest The Office had to offer.

I was admittedly quite satisfied with the episode, as it demonstrated the show’s willingness to step outside of the Office while maintaining the character interactions that make the series function. It was great to see a corporate falling out that actually makes sense (Why couldn’t we have had that for Jan?), and the office storyline was slight but certainly demonstrative of a side of Jim and Pam which we rarely see.

And there’s really not much more to say: it was funny, it was entertaining, and it showed some interesting sides of characters. But, let’s go into a bit more detail, shall we?

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April 28, 2008 · 12:27 am

Brothers & Sisters – “Double Negative”

“Double Negative”

April 27th, 2008

I have absolutely nothing against Justin Walker and Rebecca Harper. I have nothing against Dave Annable or Emily VanCamp, two attractive and charistmatic young actors who in real life make a charming couple. I don’t have anything against romance, having myself been a shipper in a past life (Oh, who am I kidding, a present life).

And yet, I have all sorts of issues with the forbidden, quasi-incestual love affair between these two characters, characters I like stuck in a storyline that just feels wrong. I know it’s been inevitable, with rumors and storylines leading us to this point, but the way it has been handled has made its problems even more apparent. These two actors have chemistry, but the writers are forcing their characters to overcome a fairly substantial hurdle (You know, being related) through a series of contrived hoops and over-exaggerated characterizations.

If this reveal had been done a few months into their friendship, I might buy it – as it stands, it’s just a bit too awkward and forced for me to accept being slapped in the face with it over and over again. “Double Negative” has all sorts of other storylines, so let’s talk about those before my rant drivels on any further.

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April 26, 2008 · 11:26 pm

Battlestar Galactica: “Escape Velocity”

“Escape Velocity”

April 25th, 2008

It was inevitable: after a monumentally eventful third episode for the show’s fourth season, we were bound to find ourselves at least mildly disappointed in “Extreme Velocity.” Written by Jane Espenson and directed by Edward James Olmos (Adama, for the unknowing), the episode was very slight: of the four plots that we picked up on last week, we abandoned two of them while the other two never really showed any new potential to the level that fans had imagined it.

In other words, we probably wouldn’t have conceived an episode that portrays a predictable Tyrol-like response to Cally’s death, and we wouldn’t have abandoned the Cylon Civil War in order to focus on not Baltar’s character, per se, but rather the emergence of his total religiousity. For others, it might hearken back to the unfortunate string of episodes at the conclusion of the third season that the show admits were desperate attempts to save an episode in the editing room.

I don’t think it is nearly to that level: while certainly a lighter episode on plot than we are used to, there was nothing overly objectionable about its content. Considering that the themes of the season are very much returning to the opening of the second season and the division within the fleet along religious lines, it is good that we are seeing more of both politics and people relating to this development. While I do think that a few of the storylines felt like they were getting either too much or too little time, and that there were certainly some balance or editing issues to deal with, the end result is a decent setup for the things to come.

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April 24, 2008 · 10:55 pm

Lost – “The Shape of Things To Come”

“The Shape of Things to Come”

April 24th, 2008

Of all of Lost’s characters, I think I missed Daniel Faraday the most. He’s such a piece of work, but not in a negative context: he’s just a perfect character for this moment, a man too caught up in his own scientific world to hide his knowledge of things of a social nature. He’s also, admittedly, an opportunity to get a little bit meta, as seen in his answer to Jack’s question as to when he last saw a washed up member of the boat’s crew:

“When is kind of a…relative term”

It was said with the most delightful uncertainty, with total certainty in his answer but not in the reactions he thinks he will receive. The show, perhaps, might be on the same page: as we travel into Ben’s future as he wakes up in the middle of the Sahara Desert, we learn that he is in a particular time and place: October 2005, to be exact, right at the time when Sayid is burying his wife in peace. Is it the start of a beautiful friendship? Well, perhaps, but it’s also a total time warp.

If this is the shape of things to come, then I would say it is a shape of indeterminate size, of indeterminate shape, and yet most certainly growing to dangerous proportions. Both in the present and the future, said shape grows in Benjamin Linus – this was a showcase of acting from Michael Emerson, and a fantastic and intriguing display of the way this show works, and the way this show will work in the future. We don’t know exactly what will come, but we know that it looks pretty damn intense.

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April 24, 2008 · 10:25 pm

30 Rock – “Succession”

“Succession”

April 24th, 2008

I’ll be getting to Office and Grey’s Anatomy in the morning (Depending on how the last one strikes my fancy, same goes with Ugly Betty for that matter), but on this ridiculously busy night of television I certainly think that 30 Rock wasn’t on its game all the way through. I admittedly was a bit distracted by the thrilling conclusion to the Montreal Canadiens game, but something about “Succession” didn’t, quite, succeed.

The return of Will Arnett is certainly a strong development, and he was delightful as usual, but the storylines never quite clicked in this one: Tracy had nothing to do, Liz was totally out of character (And slightly too far for it to remain funny throughout), and the succession storyline was too predictable by half. And yet, then someone saved the day in a billowing cape.

It was Dr. Spaceman in a brilliant scene (And apparently a sendoff of Amadeus, I hear?)

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