Sons of Liver Failure

I wanted to give FX's new "Sons of Anarchy" a shot, because, hey! Ron Perlman! Katy Sagal! Biker shenanagans! Why not?



Keeping in mind that I have yet to watch a single FX program - other than "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia," of course - that I've stuck with for more than six episodes. It's not that they're bad shows, really. It's just I feel like they're trying too hard to be edgy, so I'm always put off.



We know you're bad-ass, FX. You're like your danger-loving parent company Fox. Except you're so tough you don't even need that pussy-ass "O." We get it.



Short version: it was...eh. Sagal and Perlman are cool, but you can hear the creator pitching it as "'Sopranos' meets the Hells Angels meets muthafuckin' HAMLET, DUDE!"

But rather than blather on, I instead invite you to play the "Sons of Anarchy Drinking Game."



1) Invite friends over and a bottle of your favorite poison.

2) Turn on the "Sons of Anarchy" pilot. (Comcast subscribers: It's onDemand! In Hi-Def! (Where available!) )

3) Drink every time you see the words "Sons of Anarchy" or hear a character reference the biker club's acronym SAMCRO.

4) Whoever's liver doesn't fail wins.

4a) Alternatively, depending on how BAD-ASS you are, whoever's liver doesn't fail is some kind of nancy who can't handle liver failure like a BAD-ASS!

Vampires: Eternal Poseurs of the Night

I’m not a “vampire guy.” Find a new angle on it, and I might be interested, but it’s not an innate selling point. On the negative end of the spectrum, Anne Rice had made the subject silly in its pompous romanticism. On the positive end, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”/”Angel” had pretty much locked in what a TV show with bloodsuckers should be for me.

So I was curious what HBO’s new vampires-in-the-south show “True Blood” would try to do, to make the “monsters are people too” subject interesting.

This is an easier task than trying to make the Deep South interesting. Usually it comes off as mocking, or…no, it always feels like there’s some outdated idea of The South that creators are trying to winkingly play into or subvert.

By the end of the first episode, I found myself enjoying the southern aspect while still being frosty on the vampire side.

“True Blood” starts pretty shakily, pulling the “That goth guy isn’t a monster; the everyday-lookin’ fella behind you is!” trope that’s already pretty old-hat. Then, after a brief bit of exposition/Bill Maher product placement about The State of Vampirism, there’s the introduction to the rural Louisiana town. It’s the standard assortment of twangy, folksy southern types – the slutty townies, the wary bartender who just wants to keep things quiet, the sassy black gal, the waitress who wishes she’d gotten outta this dump.

But over the course of the hour, the show did a good enough job of making a few of them feel like actual characters, rather than an assortment of voice-coached accents. In particular, Anna Paquin, essentially playing a sunnier version of her Rogue character from the X-Men films. The fact that our viewpoint character is open-minded, likeable, and, well, adorable, helps us accept the rest of her people.

When an overarching murder plot was introduced midway through the episode, I thought, “I could actually watch a ‘murder in a small southern town’ kind of show like this.”

Which makes the supernatural aspect feel that much more unneeded and intrusive.

So no, I’m not at all sold on the vampire element yet. Vampire-as-vampire has been given up for the most part in pop culture, in favor of vampire-as-metaphor. In terms of the first episode at least, now that readily available synthetic blood has allowed vampires to publicly join society, the metaphor is homosexuality. Which lets the southerner-cliches react to a bloodsucker in town a lot like we’d assume they’d react to having their first Resident Gay. It feels a bit forced.

(FYI: They do, actually, have a Resident Gay, a mildly annoying motormouthed fry-cook.)

Not helping is the fact that the new vampire in town – despite the pedestrian name “Bill” – behaves with all the preening, posing, and glowering mannerisms that make Anne Rice’s material seem so ridiculous. REALLY not helping is that the actor playing him looks like Paul Rudd doing an amusing impression of “menacing.”

The show’s definitely worth watching a few more episodes – I’ve yet to watch an HBO show that didn’t need a few episodes to really make its intentions known – but so far, it’s Anna Paquin’s supreme lovable-ness that’s going to bring me back for the next episode.

Fall TV: It is, as they say, "Time to Face the Hole"

The 10.5 most amazing things about Fox's “Hole in the Wall”:

10) Brooke Burns says everything in the same weirdly halting yet totally excited cadence. “You’re the team captain, right!” and “Introduce me to your team!” sound like the exact same sentence. It’s really bizarre.
9) The two teams in the first episode were made of “Six-Packs” – guys on the shortish side who are “personal trainers,” but from their descriptions sound more like unemployed bodybuilders – and “Beer-Bellies” – radio employees who likely think “The Jerky Boys” was the apex of comedy. In other words, there are no winners here. Only losers.
8) There are actually lifeguards on duty when the contestants fall into the 5-feet-deep pool. At least, I think they’re lifeguards, because they’re wearing Baywatch-style swimsuits and holding those pontoon thingies. Once again: for the 5-feet-deep pool. That a camera man is standing in.
7) Before every…ah, let’s just be charitable and call it “event”…there is an explanation – complete with cute visual aids – of what the next challenge will be. “This time, TWO contestants need to jump through the holes.” In case the whole concept was just too confusing for the average viewer.
6) After every commercial break, there is a recap of the results of the previous jump through the hole. Again, just in case viewers were having trouble keeping up.
5) In addition to Brooke Burns on the sidelines, there’s a host up in a balcony, whose best moment came when he referred to one of the very white, American, Californian bodybuilders as “an Iraqi war veteran.”
4) The grand prize is $100,000. For jumping through a cutout in a Styrofoam wall. Just let that sink in.
3) The show’s attempted catchphrase is, “It’s time to face the hole.”
2) This show is 22 minutes long, when by all rights, it’s hard to make a case for it being longer than 2 minutes.
1.5) Watching this show, you are actually likely to utter the words, "Y'know, I think I'd probably be pretty good at this."

And the #1 most interesting thing about “Hole in the Wall”…

1) There will actually be more than one episode of a show called “Hole in the Wall,” wherein obnoxious people attempt to jump through a cutout in a Styrofoam wall.

Will I be watching this show again? …Possibly. I’ll definitely watch it after it follows the “Fringe” pilot. But if I can’t be bothered to plop myself down on the couch Thursday nights at 8 to watch “My Name is Earl” – a show I actually kinda like – it’s not too likely I’ll make time for this one. No matter how many oddly-shaped contestants they promise to shove through those holes.

Then again, “It’s time to face the hole” is a phrase I’d really like to see used in regular conversation.

R.I.P., Henchman #24

The "Venture Bros." season finale aired last night, and by the end of it, I actually shouted, "Holy Crap! They killed Henchman 24!"

My girlfriend looked up at me and said, "Wow, you're really upset, aren't you?"

"No! No," I answered. "It's just...I didn't expect them to do that. It was a funny gag."

This was a lie. I was, in fact, a little upset.

"Venture Bros." is the last of Cartoon Network's old-school "Adult Swim" shows. It came in at the tail end of the first batch that mocked old Hanna-Barbara shows - "Sealab 2021," "Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law," etc. - and just before the newer batch like "Tim and Eric Awesome Show" and "Squidbillies," - shows you'd have to be really, really stoned to find funny.

"Venture Bros." is the apex of the old-school because as it's gone on, its nerd jokes have become more obvious and esoteric all at once. By which I mean, they'll throw a "G.I. Joe" parody out there, and that might be funny for what it is. A newbie might laugh at it.

But by this third season, the joke itself is really more of a capper to a series of other jokes from earlier seasons. And so the newbies might be wondering why the big fans are laughing so much harder.

It's a bizarre turn of events, when a show that started off as a riff on the quick-punchline idea, "What would Johnny Quest be like if we followed him into his middle-aged-failure years?" has actually developed a huge supporting cast, a plethora of important thematic devices, an assload of running gags, and an alarming detailed sense of continuity. "Venture Bros." has officially become the "Lost" of Adult Swim.

As a result of the audience's investment in the characters and mythology, "Venture Bros." can do something a show like "Metalocolypse" can't - it can pull the rug from under the audience and provoke a genuine emotional reaction.

Case in point, the Henchmen. Half-assed supervillain The Monarch has had a giant band of nameless henchmen throughout the series, but two of them - portly, squeaky-voiced #21 and skinny, Ray-Ramano-sounding #24, both audience-surrogates - have managed to survive onslaught after onslaught of absurd violence, though what The Monarch refers to as "that rare blend of expendable and invulnerable."

Until last night, when #24 was accidentally blown up. REALLY blown up - #21 actually caught his flaming head.

That the season ended with Brock quitting his bodyguard job didn't really matter. FUCKING #24 died!

That this is both hilarious and upsetting is why "Venture Bros." is the best Adult Swim series. And maybe the only Adult Swim show where you'd hear someone say, "...Actually, you should just start with the first season. Everything will make more sense after that."

Rest in Peace, Henchman #24.

(Oh, also? Last season, they revealed that the head of the shadowy villainous organization was, well, David Bowie. So...you really should put "Venture Bros." in your Netflix queue, just for that, right?)

Olympic Fever, Catch It! (Part 4: Robot Smile)

Things Shawn Johnson Is Probably Thinking, As She Keeps Grinning No Matter What Happens:

"Oh, boy! China!"

"My life's just gonna get better and better after this!"

"I hope NBC thinks of me when they start casting 'Small Wonder 2.o'!"

"This'll be a great way of making friends!"

"If I keep smiling, maybe Mommy and Daddy won't fight so much!"

"I bet I'll live forever!" (Okay, that one stolen from McSweeney's - don't care.)

"Gee, d'ya think they like me back home?"

"It's awfully hard to breathe in this leotard!"

"Puberty? What's that? Sounds fun!"

"I'm cute, but puppies are cuter!"

"Why does that Liukin girl look so mad? We're Olympians!"

Olympic Fever, Catch It! (Part 2: A Word From Canada)

TO: ISTV Global Stronghold
FROM: Canada
SUBJECT: RE: Canada’s Capabilities in Summer Olympic Sports

Dear Global Stronghold folks,

Shut up, eh?

Look, we know we’re not the strongest swimmers out there, right? And yeah, it sure does look like we’re last out of the pool every time. But cut us some slack, will ya? Our water’s only swimmable – like three weeks out of every year. So we don’t get a lot of practice, eh?

And that official regulation-sized pool…it just goes on forever, and everyone’s zippin’ past us. An’ it’s sooo deep! We’re just happy not ta drown!

Point we’re tryin’ to make is, we’re self-conscious enough without you hosers makin’ fun of us, eh?

And we’re not stupid, in spite of some comments you’ve made at our expense, both in swimming and in other summer sports.

F’r example: We know those badminton rackets are used to bat around the little feathery thing. You don’t put them on your feet to trudge through snow. We KNOW that. (Now.)

So, just easy does it with the jokes there, eh? In a couple a’ years, we’ll see you at the Winter Olympics. And I think we’ll know who’ll be laughing then, eh?

(We will – Canada. Just so, y'know, there’s no confusion.)


Sincerely,

Your friendly, frozen neighbors to the north

Nearly Worth Watching: "Fringe"

Caught the "Fringe" pilot early, so I can officially tell you that this is 80% a Show Worth Watching.
First, the bad: There’s a good deal of “Let’s Set Up The Series” stuff – characters speaking in exposition, vague subplots initiated, and a nice tour of the set you’ll get to see each and every exciting week, if the show gets picked up. It’s annoying, but on a pilot, everyone’s gotta just soldier through it, and assume this won’t be so prominent in later episodes.

The more painful bit of the bad is the fact that the lead actress looks like Kate Blanchett and performs like Elizabeth Rohm. She is startlingly bland, exhibiting almost no personality in the face of some truly weird concepts she’s supposed to be at the front of. It’s disappointing, firstly because how many decent, attractive character actresses are there who could deliver lines with a spark of excitement and curiosity – let alone decent AMERICAN actresses who could do the job?

But that’s something we have to cope with, since the rest of the cast makes up for it. In particular, John Noble, playing the scientific lead who will anchor the plot of the series itself. He isn’t charming or rakish. He’s not Dr. House. The Walter Bishop character is quite truly a Mad Scientist, delivering his lines like an autistic Vincent Price. At one point, he casually mentions that he’s pissed himself – “Just a squirt,” he clarifies – and that tells the audience quite a bit about the show that’s hopefully lined up.

I imagine a lot of actors chomp at the bit to play The Good-Guy Mad Scientist, quietly excited to inject an FBI agent with an LSD-Ketamine mix and toss her into a sensory deprivation tank. That enthusiasm is clear here.

Most surprising, I must admit, is Joshua Jackson as the scientist’s estranged son – also a genius, though a stubbornly directionless one. Though at first I thought he was trying a bit too hard to come off as “adult” despite looking like a youngish 25, as soon as he’s got Noble to play off of, Jackson comes alive, alternating between snarkily berating his father’s work and bemusedly translating for him, since he seems to be the only other one that “speaks Walter.”

That the show’s got J.J. Abrams’s “Bad Robot” company attached can be read one of two ways – “Lost,” or “Alias.” The vague references to “The Pattern” hint at the problems the latter series faced when it became clear that it had no real gameplan and just kept inventing new, obtusely-named threats. But I’m hoping for the quality of the former to keep it in check.

Helping that is the clever bits of gruesomeness displayed in the pilot. Not only the airborne toxin that turns people’s skin translucent – which the show manages to keep looking disgusting no matter how close up it gets - but more throwaway gags like the woman who casually strips off the skin of her arm to reveal a bionic prosthesis. If they can keep this attitude going, I’ll be impressed.

There’s a way of looking at this like a 21st-century redo of “The X-Files,” and hopefully that’ll be the case. The alternate is it devolves into a painful hybrid the last couple of years’ failed genre shows, “Night Stalker” and “Bionic Woman.” But it’s my hope Abrams and company have learned their lessons by now.

Extended Play: Lost, Season 3

Well that’s more like it.

Season 3 of “Lost” starts off floundering and directionless, much like its writers apparently felt, not knowing how long they’d have to string out mysteries and answers before they knew when the damn thing would END, so they could work out how to start finishing the story.

So while the first half of the season is devoted to answering questions all but the most dim-witted of viewers had already kinda guessed, the second half – after the creative crew got a schedule for when the show would end – starts tossing out answers and barreling into the next phase of the story.

By the middle of Season 3 (and once again, taking it in as a “TV-novel” beats the shit out of the frustrating experience of watching it as a weekly series with a big gap between new installments), there’d been a lot of throat-clearing episodes (“How Jack Got His Tattoos” the most annoying example), and a half-answers to tide weary viewers over.

But after the last deck-clearing outing – one entirely devoted to doing away with poorly-conceived new characters Paulo and Nikki – a sharper, more coherent display of the show’s Big Story began to emerge. This culminated in the first Ben flashback – which explained a bit while offering specific questions about the character and his place in that Big Story. The questions stopped being “What’s going on?” – that vagueness that got folks annoyed last season - in favor of “Who knows what?” – which holds the promise of concrete answers.

Let me back up for a second and talk more about the added characters. Introducing new folks onto a show set on a supposedly uninhabited island is a tricky proposition, but while most people bitterly recall Nikki and Paulo – two previously-unseen castaways viewers were unfairly asked to readily accept as part of the ensemble, even though they brought nothing of merit with them – it’s important to note that this season also brought Ben, Juliet, and Desmond to the fore.

I have a soft spot for Juliet because of her unflappably dry sense of humor (which ironically contrasts her off-island basket-case status). And she is important to the Big Story, in that she’s a catalyst for explaining the mysterious malady that’s killing pregnant women on the island (which affects original characters Sun and Claire). But Ben and Desmond are the ones to pay attention to, as they turn out to be insanely important additions necessary to drive the Big Story and its emotional themes forward.

Pushing Ben – leader of the mysterious Others and keeper of the magic island’s secrets – to the forefront of the story gave the viewers fair warning that the serious questions about the overarching plot were, in fact, going to be answered.

And with the arrival of Desmond, viewers learned that there was a deeply romantic element of the story we didn’t even know was there.

(If there was a drawback to our quick investment into the starcrossed Desmond-Penny love story, it was the “duh” realization the Jack-Kate-Sawyer love triangle seemed that much more pointlessly juvenile in comparison. “Kate wishes Jack paid more attention to her? Fuck her. Desmond’s devotion to Penny was the only thing that kept him alive for THREE YEARS.”)

It’s amusing to note that all three of these characters, so important to the Big Story, also brought with them a sense of humor that had been lacking previously. The tone of the show mirrored this in a way by tossing in a bit of self-effacing meta-commentary. Characters started pointing out how over-the-top Sawyer’s nicknaming had gotten, or how ludicrous Locke’s island-worship actually sounded. It felt like a clear message from the writers: “We know what you’re thinking. Don’t worry. In the end, we’re all here to have fun.”

All this culminated in the game-changing season finale, throwing viewers off by flash-forwarding to the post-island torment of its leads. If the meta-jokes were the writers’ way of saying they understood viewer frustrations, the finale was their way of saying, “And just to shut you up: yes, we know where all this is going, too.”

+++++


So that’s three seasons viewed pretty closely together, with full knowledge of season 4 (which kept all season 3’s lessons to heart by introducing more useful new characters and giving answers to big questions without leaving viewers feeling like they’re being maliciously dicked around with). When the season 4 DVD shows up, I’ll plow through them, too – particularly with an eye on how the writers strike affected the story’s pacing and reveals).

What’s my final prognosis? Very simply, I’ve learned to trust the creators again. It’s been a tough road, and there have been some hiccups along the way (which reminds me, I forgot to mention how off-handedly they killed off Mister Eko, or how they had to foretell Charlie's death just to make the audience like him again), but I remain incredibly impressed by the body of work they’ve managed to produce so far. And I fully believe they know what they’re doing.


At this point, I wouldn’t be shocked to learn they had a bigger plan for Bai Ling’s “Jack’s Tattoos” character all along.

Extended Play: "Lost," Season 2

When I talk to people about “Lost,” the general response is, “Yeah, I tuned in every now and again, but every episode was about pressing a frickin’ button, so I lost interest.” Which made me all the more curious to watch Season 2 – I mean, how much frickin’ button-pushing was there?

What surprised me most about Season 2 is how quickly the show changed from being about one thing – surviving on an island – to being about another – discovering that the island is a totally different place than previously understood. While Season 1 had virtually no mentions of The Dharma Initiative and only a bare glimpse at the notion of The Others, Season 2 dove headlong into it from the first episode, and these two new additions dominated the stories for the rest of the year.

As a result of introducing the overarching Dharma mystery – a story that, unlike the character-based dramas, has to have a beginning, middle and end – Season 2 started to tug fitfully in a lot of directions. In particular, the Dharma story was introduced, but couldn’t progress too far since the writers didn’t know how long the series would run.

And because the new stuff was so interesting and offered viewers the hint that there was something more important going on here, the character drama started to feel needlessly manufactured (see: Charlie, who ended Season 1 triumphantly but became truly insufferable for no real reason shortly into Season 2 – but it did give me a theory, which I’ll get to in a second) or so slight as to be totally pointless (hello, “Sawyer hunts down a noisy tree-frog”).

If Season 2 saw a lot of false starts in terms of plotting (my favorite being Jack’s idea to “train an army” to combat The Others, an idea that sounded terribly important but disappeared within three episodes), it saw its greatest cock-up with the introduction of the tail section characters, in particular Ana-Lucia and Mister Eko. And here’s where "TV Series As Novel" meets its arch-enemy, “Everyday hassles of working on a weekly network show.”

It’s clear they intended to do more with both characters – Ana-Lucia as the island’s sheriff and Eko as its spiritual guide – but through a mix of uncertain planning, bungled introductions (Ana-Lucia was so insanely grating from the outset that it was simply impossible for viewers to get behind the character even after she started to rehabilitate), and casting actors who would prove too difficult to work with, that revisions had to be made (and man, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje must have been a major pain in the ass, for the producers to jettison the Eko character after setting him up as a major player in the series).

Add to this the often erratic airing schedule for new episodes, and it’s no wonder the audience started turning on “Lost” in Season 2. And while the season does view better in large chunks (once again lending credence to the “novelistic TV” theory), watching 40 minutes of “Hey, Sun’s pregnant” just to get three minutes of teases about The Others does make a viewer feel like he’s getting dicked around.

Even viewing it now, with the knowledge of how things start to pull together, being aware that some throwaway bits do have actual meaning, there were still some moments where even I was developing outlandish theories that didn’t even track with what I already knew, just to stave off frustration.

(My favorite made-up theory is that the “island sickness” that was heavily alluded to in the first two seasons but since then has been pretty much forgotten about was meant to explain why some characters – say, Charlie – started behaving erratically or, well, stupidly, for no reason and with no later follow-up. I’m still working on a theory that would explain why the hell the island would want Hurley to jump off a cliff, though. I’m open to any suggestion that doesn’t begin or end with the phrase “crappy writing.”)

So yes. Officially speaking, Season 2 was sort of iffy, in comparison with the nearly-perfect first season. But I think it was a necessary learning experience for the show’s writers. As we’ll see as we get to Season 3, once they got past some first-quarter hiccups (most glaringly, another stupid introduction to new characters Nikki and Paulo…oh, Nikki and Paulo, how I can’t wait to revisit you two), the show started firing on all cylinders, and hasn’t really stopped since.

Onwards to Season 3!

Addict TV? Really?

The evolution of VH1 from "adult contemporary music channel" to "a network that finds it acceptable to air a program called 'I Love Money' " was slow and soul-crushingly inevitable enough that it wasn't exactly surprising.

But A&E? Didn't that, at some point, stand for "Arts and Entertainment"? Didn't they used to run a bunch of "Biography" episodes, and in the afternoons offer repeats of "Newsradio" and "Night Court"?

I used to make sure to get home from classes in college so I could catch some "Newsradio" at lunchtime. It was...comforting.

This past weekend, I watched A&E and saw a show called "Intervention," wherein a knock-off Dr. Phil coaches a family on confronting their addict to get help. It was depressing, to put it mildly (not least of which because the guy DIED - way to go, Dr. Faux-Phil).

During the commercial breaks, I got to see a preview for "The Two Coreys." The show that asks viewers to give a shit about two self-absorbed, borderline delusional recovering addicts who for a brief period were also teen actors.

Most heavily promoted was "The Cleaner," the network's new scripted drama, starring Benjamin Bratt as, from what I could understand, leader of an A-Team of addiction counselors.

At what point did A&E come to stand for, as Tad puts it, "Addicts and Ex-Addicts"? And more importantly...is there really a huge market for this? VH1's freak-show mentality I get, but where is the real audience reward for watching a cancer-riddled fall-down drunk refuse treatment and die?

I hope it's not schaedenfraude (and no, I'm not spell-checking that, you know what I mean), but are we supposed to learn from them, or what?

No One Watched It But Me: "Kitchen Confidential"

The Show:
“Kitchen Confidential,” Fox, 2005

The Premise:
Based fairly loosely on the book by Anthony Bordain, disgraced star chef Jack Bordain is given one last chance to head up a slick New York restaurant while keeping his ne’er-do-well kitchen staff in check.

What Made It Special:
This one was all about setting. For every five shows set in a precinct, hospital, or law firm, there’s one that tries to do something different. “Kitchen Confidential” had the added bonus of stranger-than-fiction source material in Bourdain’s book, a memoir of life on the fringes, because let’s face it – no one in their right mind would want to work in a restaurant.
It was also blessed with an outstandingly talented comedic cast, starting with Bradley Cooper, who’s really gifted at playing assholes you still kinda like. Also on hand were Nicholas Brendan (“Buffy the Vampire Slayer"), John Francis Daley (“Freaks and Geeks”), and John Cho (Harold and Kumar…).

Signs It Was Going Somewhere Good:
When the show adapted the warts-and-all parts of Bourdain’s book, it was really sharp, and had an air of authenticity to it. There were also hints that we were actually watching Jack, initially at an emotional high after a year of sobriety and newfound sense of responsibility, reaching the beginning stages of egomania that led him into the sordid booze-drugs-women combo that finished him off the first time around.

Signs of Wear and Tear:
It was a fucking Darren Starr production, so it frequently abandoned the enjoyable heightened realism of the “day in the life in the kitchen” angle for “Sex and the City but with Chefs” sex-comedy nonsense that felt nothing but contrived and worse, conventional. “The chef’s dating a vegan!” probably sounded great in the writing room, but honestly – the book had a story about a guy stitching up his own wound and returning to work. How did that not strike them as the more interesting source of humor?

Sign the Producers Knew They Didn’t Have Much Time Left:
They didn't hear the train until it was right on top of them – the show got pulled four episodes in.


Why No One Watched:
Its lead-in was, god bless ‘em, “Arrested Development.” In its third season. When any hope of getting new viewers in was totally lost. (I believe around the third episode, they might have switched the timeslots. Which is hilarious in its own way.)

Available on DVD?:
Yup, a two-disc set you can grab through Netflix.

Where You've Seen It Since:
Pretty much every single cable network now has its own reality-chef show, but ironically, none of them are going to give you the terrifying (and frequently hilarious) reality of working in a restaurant that Anthony Bordain does. (Though weirdly, neither does “No Reservations,” Bordain’s otherwise-enjoyable travelogue show on Discovery.)

Flip This Global Stronghold!

Anyone who watches “The Office,” and thinks Michael Scott has become too much of a cartoon to be believable on what is supposed to be a reality/documentary series…head on over to TLC. Pop on a little show called “Property Ladder.”

- Watch! as people with absolutely no real estate experience listen to the advice of a woman who, in addition to having a decade of experience in the field, is the host of the show – advice intended to save them time, money and trouble – and respond, “Nnnaaah, I like my idea better.”
- Marvel! as these people listen to plumbers who are clearly screwing with them, and reluctantly agree that putting a toilet directly in front of a low window in the center of the room is probably okay.
- Wince! as a young couple decides to forego a housing inspection prior to buying the property, and then immediately discovers that, based on the pervasive wood rot, the house seems to be holding itself up on pure optimism more than anything else.
- Gawk! as three friends, who together refer to themselves as “Team Tripod” (also the name of their pub-quiz team, I assume), systematically destroy a waterlogged backyard because of their firm, yet completely unfounded, belief that adding a master bedroom is the key to selling the house for far more than any reasonable human being would pay.
- Grin! – while curling your fingers into Punchin’ Fists! – as one of them says, without a trace of irony, “Making a million dollars is harder than I thought.”

Now go and watch “The Office” again. And thank god they don’t write Michael Scott as blindingly, offensively stupid as these people.

The Daily Show Has Not Forgotten

There’s a special talent to being press secretary in the Bush Administration, because they have the unenviable task of representing the public face of All That We Hate. Ari Fleischer knew this. Because in 2001-2002, Ari Fleischer made virtually no effort to hide an attitude that mostly said, “That’s okay – I hate you too. But our approval rating means you can just suck it.” His distain actually made him pretty good at the job.

Then came Scott McClellan, who got the position just as public opinion on the administration finally reached the sane conclusions, and things, as they say, took a turn. McClellan is not a man who doesn’t have arrogant distain in his armory, nor the sharp edges of Fleischer. McClellan, all round softness, had only flop-sweat to save him as he wearily repeated the same things over and over, even though the White House press corps had recently located its collective balls – something McClellan had clearly not been warned about.

But McClellan was a visual reminder of the heavy kid who couldn’t make it through gym class, who dreaded the presidential fitness tests, who got hit with Every. Last. Dodgeball. And so while I could be satisfied in hating Ari Fleischer, I always had a bit of pity for Scott McClellan.

If “Daily Show” interviews in the last year or so are any indication, it’s that the former members of the Bush Administration will never Get It. They will never understand why we are so goddamned angry. They seem to think that leaving, writing a book, and going on TV with a practiced-genial smile and light admissions of, “Well, now that I’m out, I can say what I really thought!” is enough to win over the embittered liberal viewership of something like “The Daily Show.” A viewership whose collective anger and confusion over the administration’s refusal to admit to even the most basic of truths is voiced by Jon Stewart.

In the nation’s long, painful break-up with the Bush Administration, Jon Stewart seems to be representing our friend who is trying like hell to explain our feelings to this group we don’t want any more part of. He is the Joan Cusack of our John Cusack movie, really.

So there Scott McClellan sat, smiling obliviously, clearly not expecting a verbal pummeling, because apparently he has not learned anything and did practically no prep-work before showing up. He thought he’d get a pat on the back and a “welcome to our side” from Stewart.

Instead, god bless him, Stewart took the opportunity to push the issue of how McClellan and crew’s systematic manipulation of facts leading up to the Iraq war are not the very definition of the word “Lying.” Which McClellan tried to squirm out of, not at all well, before finally, pissily mumbling, “Well were you in the room?” as the practiced smile cracked a little. And the sweating started.

Meanwhile, Stewart’s smile widened, because behind the light ribbing and the “I’m no expert, but, uh…” playing dumb, he was sending McClellan a message: “The book doesn’t matter. We don’t care that you’re sharing weak-ass opinions now that your boss’s already done for. You stood there and lied to us consistently and totally for years, and we want an apology.”

It’s happened a lot, lately. McCain was the last time I noticed Stewart’s interview strategy of laying out basic facts and watching, astonished, as McCain couldn’t satisfactorily reconcile what he’d said with what was true, but wouldn’t admit to the mistake, either.

So Stewart and “The Daily Show” have become a useful way to send a message, from us, to every former insider currently angling for a cable-news pundit job:

"We haven’t forgotten, and fuck you for thinking we might."

Your Buddy, Your Pally, Your Season Finale: "Lost"

What Happened, Basically (in no particular order, because what's the point, really?):

1) The original castmembers: The Oceanic 6, more through chance than design, made their way off-island, and concocted a cover-story to keep the rest of the islanders safe from any further Widmore-related attacks.

2) The newer favorites: Charlotte and Miles decided to stay on the island for reasons known only to them; Daniel Faraday (I like using his full name) tried like hell to leave (also for reasons known only to him), only to be sucked away with the island mid-boat-trip; Frank Lapidus (same here) flew the Oceanic 6 to "safety"; Desmond was reunited with Penny (much sooner than I expected, actually) when she found the group out at sea.

3) The Island/The Islanders: In "moving the island" (which, appeared to be a literal event - or at least a "re-cloaking" of the location), Ben was cast out, while Locke took on the role of new Others leader with a weird little smile; Sawyer's stuck with Juliet, and...shit, I can't even keep track, how many more castmembers are there?!

4) Who died? Well, by appearances (read: I'll believe it when I see bodies), mean sonufabitch mercenary Keamy (first during an extended knock-down fight with Sayid, then definitively during a much shorter encounter with Ben), Jin (blowed up real good with the freighter), and Michael (but c'mon - he got visited by ghost-Jack's-Dad, so...probably not so much).

5) Flash-Forward Stuff: Turns out burn-out addict Jack, responsible-mom Kate, assassin-Sayid, and nutso-Hurley were all visited by an undercover Locke, before his "suicide" (he's the body in the coffin from last year's finale); Sun, now a hardcore corporate type, is forging some kind of alliance with Charles Widmore; and Ben visited Jack with a proposition for getting back to the island, provided everyone - including Body of Locke - comes along.

6) Misc: Walt visited Hurley, and, uh...well, that's puberty for you. And a lot of other shit I can't remember happened, too. Come on, that was a pretty good recap there, considering I'm not getting paid by Television Without Pity, right?

How Good Was It?:
Very good, in the sense that the middle of a good book is good. Not at all satisfying on its own, but for what it sets up, hoooo-boy. This year's finale was all about prepping the structure and dropping hints for the next two years.

Which is to say: Now is not the time to jump on board with this show. If you've never watched it, borrow or Netflix the previous seasons. If you gave up during season 3 like everyone else, sit down with a friend who watches and prepare to ask a lot of questions that get flustered responses of "...Look, don't worry about that right now."

But god bless ABC for trying to get new viewers involved anyway, by occasionally airing one of their pop-up-info reruns, where a text box at the base of the screen tells you thinks it thinks you're apparently too stupid to piece together for yourself. Tidbits like, "Sawyer gives a lot of people nicknames," and "These are C4 explosives" during the scene where you can clearly read "C4" on the EXPLOSIVES the characters are all talking about.

Anyway.

My favorite character bits were the rare displays of deadpan humor. While Hurley and Sawyer (and Sayid, for a drier joking style) are usually the go-to comic relief characters, lately it's been Ben and Miles walking away with the prize:

When somewhat-psychic Miles tells Charlotte he knows she was on the island before, she cagily asks, "What do you mean?" to which he replies, mock-dumbly, "Yyeeaahh...what do I mean?" and walks away. And pretty much any time Ben has to explain anything to Locke, the two become the mystical-messiah equivalents of Laurel and freaking Hardy.

Did the Strike Hurt the Season?:
Yes and no. On the one hand, the tightened season forced them to streamline the story a little bit, which means there was virtually no filler on any episode. On the other hand, that meant the audience had a lot of paying attention to do, since there wasn't much slowing down to explain (which is going to make for a few frustrating episodes next year, I'm sure, as they actually spell out some things for the slower viewers).

Based on producer interviews, the short straws apparently got pulled by the new characters (the "freighties" - and let me just say now how sick I am of every little fucking thing getting a nickname on this show, especially when it gets referenced later BY A CHARACTER). Fleshing-out flashbacks for Miles, Charlotte, Frank and Daniel were planned but unfortunately postponed until next year. This does not bother me, because it ensures that four well-concocted new characters will get to stick around for at least one more season.

What I Hope Happens Next Year:

Man, that's a loaded question, since "what I hope for" versus "what the producers will give me" might likely be two very different things. But for the hell of it, here's what I think will happen:

1) The structure of the show will shift to the Oceanic 6, etc.'s attempts to return to the island as the main plot, with the island action taking the flashback role;

2) The time-tossed romance of Desmond Hume and Penny Widmore will remain a focal point - particularly as revenge-minded Ben (and by extension, Sayid) targets Charles Widmore's daughter, setting Desmond directly at odds with the rest of the cast;

3) More goddamn shit I can't reasonably explain.

It's fun to look at failure. Yes, a few successes here and there, but at the end of the graduating TV Show class of 2007, it's nice to take some time and laugh at the dropouts.


So What Died Screaming?


NBC:
Bionic Woman: No loss. It was crap.
Journeyman: Slightly more of a loss. It was boring, but mostly because it had to set up the basic rules of its time-traveling premise before it could get into the interesting, weird territory - like "what if he accidentally changed the timeline?" A great big "oh well," with the hope that Kevin McKidd is now freed up for better things.

_________


CBS:
Cane: Hooray, now Nestor Carbenell can appear on "Lost" without any big contract issues!
Moonlight: Hooray, now I don't have to deal with people who never watched "Angel" telling me this show "really wasn't that bad"!
Jericho: Because my dear friend Pam and her family liked it, I will not laugh at the fact that CBS got the rare opportunity to cancel a show twice. Heh. (That was a snicker, not a laugh!)

___________


ABC:
Nothing you didn't see coming during its first two weeks of airtime. Y'know. "Cavemen."
God, just look at that picture. Live and learn, ABC. Live and learn.

_________



FOX:
I feel a bit bad here. EVERYTHING they put out got cancelled this year, save for "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles." Granted, none of it was much good, but who knows? Maybe "New Amsterdam" might've gotten better. I mean, I stopped watching two episodes in, but I keep my ear to the ground, y'know?


So What, Through Whatever Arcane Means, Survived?
Here's the neat thing about the surviving fall shows: because of the strike, anything that wrapped up its season around, say, December, will be getting a huge push in the fall, like they're brand-new series. The problem with that? Count on a few pain-in-the-ass "Getting the newbies up to speed" episodes that are utterly redundant to returning viewers. Que serra.


NBC:
Chuck: Blandly pleasant to the point of being incorporeal, but as long as Adam Baldwin has a job, I'm happy.
Life: I actually heard this (also bland) Zen Detective series got better as it went along. Might be worth Netflixing the DVD, I'll let you know.

_________

CW:
Reaper: Once again - heard it got a little more involved during later episodes, so it'll be back by mid-season. It was a fun enough show, but repetitive stories and slack pacing put it on the back, back, back burner for me. Once again, if the DVD's worth it, I'll tell you.

_________


ABC:
Pushing Daisies: Yaaaaaaay!
Dirty Sexy Money: Really? Huh. Okay.
Eli Stone: Oh, COME ON.

_________

CBS:
The Big Bang Theory: Jeez, really? I guess people who don't actually hang out with nerds enjoy the vicarious thrill.

________


Fox:
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: Just like with "Chuck," as long as fellow "Firefly" alum Summer Glau has a regular gig, I'm happy. And one more time, say it with me now: we'll see if the season 1 DVD's any good. Apparently, the show really pulled together once they introduced Brian Austin Green's character. That's one of those sentences you never expect to write.




++++





Next: "Lost" finale
Upcoming: The absolute abortion that appears to be the fall season; and: What the hell are you gonna watch during the summer?



Stick with us, TV watcher. Just because the season's over, it doesn't mean the Global Stronghold's shutting down.

"Puppy Bowl"'s Biggest Fan

(Guest-written by Molson, lead hench-dog at the I Speak TV Global Stronghold)

Hi everyone! Hi! Hi!

I just saw this TV show, and it's the best TV I've ever been distracted by! Oh, boy, is it great!

It's better than the commercial where a doorbell rings, which always excites me. And it's better than that other commercial where there's a dog in it. That one was pretty cool, but not like this.

This show - no, that's not right, it's more like sports. I'm not sure what sports are. I know they make some of the people around here bark at the TV. But it never barks back, which I think is maybe a bit mean.

Anyway, it's called "Puppy Bowl," and on it? Right? There are dogs! Dogs like me! And they run around, and they drink water, and they play, and they play, and they play! Oh boy, is it great! I said that already, but it still is!

The other dogs run around and look right out at the screen, and it's like they want me to play with them. So I stand up and bark, right? But not like how the other people do it, I'm not mad at them, I want them to know I like them, and I wanna play with them too!

And y'know what? They bark back! And then they run around more! It's the greatest thing ever!

Someone here just said the word "hyperbole." I don't know what that is, but I'll bet it's fun!

But I'll bet it's not as fun as watching "Puppy Bowl" all day! I'll bet I could. But watching it sorta tired me out, so I'm gonna go take a nap wherever the guys here like to walk around a lot.

Hey, that reminds me: Isn't walking fun? Aw, man, sometimes I just walk for...ooh boy...sleepy. How do these people type all the tatk;js s;kadl; tkj;oiare;ajrkej;goiar;ejig;geihoh'eoeaoihgiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

(Guest columnist Molson is a professional small dog who has lived in the ISTV Global Stronghold for as long as he can remember. It is a length of time impressive only to him. In his role as lead hench-dog, he is chief engineer of barking at imaginary noises he thinks he hears.)

Your Buddy, Your Pally, Your Season Finale: "House"

What Happened, Basically: The show did its semi-annual break with the formula in order to indulge in some pretty interesting "House solves a case based on his own fractured memories/hallucinations." Eventually, it's revealed that the mystery victim is Amber (formerly fellowship candidate "Cut-throat Bitch" and currently Wilson's girlfriend/walking external spine). Who then DIES, forcing Robert Sean Leonard to pull on his puffy thespian pants and do some hardcore Acting. I tease – he did a hell of a job with one of the saddest scenes in the series.

How Good Was It?: The potential crapness of going back into House's brain for a finale after it was already done to finish Season Two was offset by the emotional resonance and genuine shock of Amber's accident/death. And the gaping implausibility of House being up and around after suffering a skull fracture and a heart attack was eased by Hugh Laurie's intrinsic awesomeness (actually, the entire cast was just acting the hell out of this two-parter).
This is par for the course with "House," as it has slowly but surely given up on pretensions of plausibility while remaining a solidly entertaining hour of TV.

Did the Strike Hurt the Season: Hoo-boy, did it. The only benefit – breaking right after choosing the three new cast members gave it a kind of "intermission" feeling – was lost by not having nearly enough episodes to properly balance the newbies with the older cast (even though they seemed to have fun finding different ways to cram Jesse Spencer into an episode – he's House's bowling buddy! He knows surgical hypnosis! – or, alternatively, having him bolt out of the main plot at the earliest convenience).

What I Hope Happens Next Year: 1) They come up with a half-plausible reason for putting an intensive care physician in charge of the surgery department, and an immunologist in charge of the ER (while leaving Foreman, an actual neurosurgeon, in Diagnostic Medicine)…I mean, really, show; 2) They strike a better balance between the Dangerous Drug Addict House of Season 3 and the Wacky Uncle Misanthrope House of Season 4. This was hinted at by the last episode, where House was able to admit to Amber in dream how deeply unhappy he really is. And coupled with his guilt over his perceived complicity in Amber's death, an interesting character arc may have been set up for Season 5. (Then again, they jettisoned three main characters at the end of last season without a good plan for getting out of that one, so…)

Your Buddy, Your Pally, Your Season Finale: A Comedy Tonight!

(About the title, I'm sorry. The Global Stronghold's atomic title generator hasn't worked right ever since our lead hench-dog pooped on the controls.)

Finale: "The Office"

What Happened, Basically: Jim's attempted proposal to Pam was derailed by Andy's impromptu proposal to Angela; Ryan's coke-fueled business fraud led to his arrest; and Michael actually managed to flirt successfully with new HR rep Amy Ryan before getting blindsided by the return of a pregnant (but not by Michael-seed...sorry for that phrase, really) Jan. Also, Amy Ryan was under the mistaken impression that Kevin was retarded - an impression Kevin did nothing to dissuade.

How Good Was It?: Pretty damn good. The show manages to keep the Jim-Pam dynamic fresh by just letting them be a fun, pleasant couple who make sense together (without being cloying) while successfully shifting the "Will they/Won't they" thing to, of all people, Dwight and Angela. And Michael's unhappy return to Jan because he's going to be "kind of a daddy" underscored the season's overarching plot of abusing Michael's life at every turn just to see if he eventually notices how bad shit has gotten (they whipped Jim and Pam around for three seasons, so it's only fair to aim the misery in a new direction).

Did the Strike Hurt the Season?: Yeah, a little. Even though it more or less added up to a full run thanks to the front end's double-episodes, they clearly had to rush some plot points, like the Ryan-as-morally-bankrupt-yuppy thing and the resulting Ryan-Jim animosity (which really could've used a few more episodes to breathe). Still...minor issues they can certainly handle more fully next year - here, and on the upcoming top-secret spin-off. (Also, according to Jenna Fischer's blog, they were as bummed about what got left out as anyone. So.)

What I Hope Happens Next Year: 1) They don't try screwing with the Jim-Pam relationship (note to TV producers still twitchy about romantic chemistry because of fucking "Moonlighting" 20 years ago: Sometimes two people get together and it's NICE and it WORKS); 2) Amy Ryan comes back, and they don't ever bother explaining to her that Kevin's not retarded (this is a joke that could go on for years!); 3) The spin-off doesn't suck, and features Toby.

+++++

Finale: "How I Met Your Mother"

What Happened, Basically: Wow, fuck if I know. Turns out, if you miss the first ten minutes of this show, the rest of it makes no sense. None. All the running gags and themes are set up by the first commercial break, and if you don't tune in by then...damn!

How Good Was It?: To the extent that I understood it? Well, the Barney-Ted reconciliation was sweet, and Barney's realization of his burgeoning love for Robin is even sweeter.

Did the Strike Hurt the Season?: No, if anything it helped. I'm a big proponent of the cable model of 13-episode seasons, so the shortened run meant the focus of the season - Ted's foray into Barneydom, its consequences, and how he got back on track - was a lot tighter and more meaningful (particularly when you see that while The Maturation of Ted is the main point of the show, The Accidental Maturation of Barney has been a great through-line of the season).

What I Hope Happens Next Year: 1) The Mother is introduced (I'm not convinced it's Sarah Chalke's character just yet) and we can start some kind of end run (since this is a show with a built-in expiration date - how people in their twenties learn to become Real Adults - and if you want to see what happens once a show goes past the end of that theme, go ahead and watch "Scrubs" [see below]); 2) the Barney-Robin relationship is explored intelligently (read: not annoyingly - see previous "Moonlighting" nervousness).

+++++

Finale: "30 Rock"

What Happened, Basically: Pregnancy scare for Liz (really scary when you consider it was almost noogie-extolling Beeper King Dennis); Jack Donaghey suffered through a position in the Bush Administration while inspiring his new best friend, the Bush-nicknamed "Cooter Burger" ("No crying in the bathtub for me tonight!"); Tracy successfully completed the world's first porno video game.

How Good Was It?: For the second straight year, "30 Rock" has created a unique blend of absurdist political humor (even Proud Republican Jack is embarrassed by the current administration's lack of anything approaching logic - or pens), sincere character development (Liz's muddied attempts to get her life both successful and fulfilling, without any real idea how normal people do that), and just flat-out lunatic bits (the porno videogame). I love this show so much.

Did the Strike Hurt the Season?: Yeah. The short run meant the many secondary and tertiary characters were pretty much MIA (Toofer? Pete? Hello?), and the show's ability to meander into quirkily inconsequential sideplots went with them. (And recent interviews have shown Tina Fey is totally aware how beloved all the side characters are, and will make pains next year to include them.)

What I Hope Happens Next Year?: An honest-to-god plotline for Pete Hornberger. Also, seeing just a little bit of that porno video game might not hurt.

+++++

Finale: "Scrubs"

What Happened, Basically: The creators had an exhaustive group-wank over their love for The Princess Bride and did a fantasy-retelling of a medical case. It was about as funny as the last episode of "The Simpsons." And if you didn't bother to see the last episode of "The Simpsons,"...well, that should tell you a lot.

How Good Was It?: Seriously, we only watched it because we were waiting for "The Office." It's fucking terrible these days. Though it is evilly fun to watch Zach Braff's face age into grotesque fishiness (enjoy your character-actor bits as an old man, you pompous jackass!).

Did the Strike Hurt the Season?: Through mind-boggling logic, it actually helped this increasingly annoying series, as they somehow earned a "farewell" season on ABC next year, even though all its characters and plotlines were exhausted by the end of season 3, and now everyone on it is just annoying as all hell.

What I Hope Happens Next Year: An asteroid falls on the hospital two minutes into the first episode; only Dr. Cox survives, and in minute three he goes home to his wife and kids and shuts the door behind the viewing audience so we don't have to watch any more of this heartbreak that used to be an amusing series.

+++++

Tomorrow: "House"

Late Next Week: "Lost"

Inbetween: Hey, remember how there were all those fall shows that got totally sideswiped by the writers strike? We're going to talk about them - or what's left of them. Also "24" and "Heroes" will be discussed. Because if we don't talk about them when they're not on, how do we know they exist?

(Oh yeah, DVDs. Well, still.)

I Hate TV: NBC

Watching the otherwise perfect "30 Rock"/"The Office" block, an anger arose in me. Not because of the shows - "30 Rock"'s season finale was awesome, with only one minor complaint - NOT ENOUGH PETE HORNBERGER! - and "The Office" wasn't the best of the season, meaning it was only really hilarious and not astoundingly hilarious.

But I couldn't shake the nagging feeling of irritation.

As luck would have it, a Locke-centric episode of "Lost" gave my brain a nice, trauma-induced case of amnesia, so it took a few days to remember what had pissed me off so much.

Today, it all came back to me, in increasingly hurtful stages.

First, I remembered promos for "Deal or No Deal." Thanks to the summer, this show will actually INCREASE ITS PRESENCE. (I hear as a follow-up to GW's appearance, Dick Cheney will show up to shoot the banker in the face!)

Then the memories of the flop-sweat extravaganza that is "Last Comic Standing" flooded my memory. This is a showcase for excruciating mediocrity masquerading as standup comedy that, four years ago, was getting such deservedly bad ratings that its finale results were announced during a John Goodman-voiced animated sitcom (also cancelled after six episodes). And yet, it's summertime, so the thinking is, "You assholes will watch anything, won'tcha?" And to really rub that in, it's often hosted by Jay Mohr, whose mere presence screams "There is a God, and he fucking hates you."

This gaze into the abyss was jarring enough to unlock the final bit of trauma from my brain:

Blammo.

This summer, I will be watching "Lost" from the beginning, season 2 of "The Sopranos," and I might just get into "Battlestar: Galactica."

I will NOT be watching NBC.

(Does anyone remember when NBC felt like the "smart" network? When it ran "The West Wing," and Tina Fey wrote "SNL" so it wasn't absolutely horrible? Turn of the century NBC. Good times.)

I DEFY You to Be More Boring

Not a bold statement to say I like to be caught up on entertainment news. TV Guide, Entertainment Weekly, the usual stuff. And so I can speak with some authority when I say I have found The Most Boring Entertainment News Headline of All Time:

"George Eads to Cameo on 'Two and a Half Men.' "

I read that and thought, "Wow. It is not possible for me to care less about any aspect of this headline."

And then I thought, "There's someone out there reading this, and getting really excited."

This is why I Speak TV exists: To keep you from turning into them.