Battlestar Galactica: I, bored

Actually, I wasn't especially bored by the latest "Battlestar Galactica," but given the episode's obvious Jean-Luc Picard influence (which even Ron Moore copped to in the podcast), I couldn't resist the hacky play on words. Sue me. Spoilers ho...

Does humanity deserve to survive? Sharon suggested otherwise early in season two, and that question was the subtext of "A Measure of Salvation." On the one hand, the Cylons have made it clear that they're going to keep coming after humanity and won't stop until they've either destroyed or imprisoned every last person in the ragtag fleet. They are by far the superior military power, and barring a miracle, it's only a matter of time before they overwhelm Adama and company. Under those circumstances, genocide becomes self-defense. But again, if you have to completely wipe out your enemy to survive -- even an enemy that has tried to wipe you out with little to no provacation -- do you deserve to?

I think Roslin and Helo both make legitimate cases, even if I'm more inclined to side with her, because, again... the Cylons aren't going to stop, ever. Helo's dream of converting them through love one at a time will take longer than the lifespan of the babies born on New Caprica, and what good is love when everybody's dead?

It's a weighty subject, one that the episode didn't have enough time to deal with in full depth, even after cutting significant subplots/scenes involving Doc Cottle studying the virus and Starbuck torturing the Cylon prisoners for information. (Look to the left for a glimpse of the latter bit.) It's rare that the series bites off more than it can chew, but it happened here. I liked the episode overall and lots of moments in it (the Raptors nudging their way through the dead Cylon ships, the Helo/Sharon scenes, anything with Adama and Roslin, plus the entire sex/torture/sex sequence with Baltar, but I'll get to that in a minute), but at the same time felt like we got the Cliff's Notes version (or is it Spark Notes now? I'm old, so I don't know) of a story about what to do with the option of wiping out the Cylons once and for all.

(Something that I really hope comes up once the humans get over the shock of learning that Baltar's alive and helping the Cylons: should they even keep looking for Earth at this point? Moore has talked about how they're approaching the search for Earth as a "race," but if the humans and Cylons are both looking for it and have the same rough directions, is it much of a prize if humanity finishes first and 12 Cylon baseships pop up a few weeks later? The value of Earth was supposed to be that the Cylons didn't know its location; now the fleet's probably better off going on a needle in a haystack search for some other New Caprica-esque world that the Cylons don't know about. Unless the series takes place far in the future and Earth has some hardcore technology, hooking up with the 13th colony's not going to do a lot of good, I don't think.)

Meanwhile, looks like Baltar's going to have more than one amazonian Cylon blonde getting hot for him after his expressions of romantic/sexual/religious ecstasy while simultaneously being tortured by D'Anna and mercy-boinked by Head Six. The writers have often played the note where Baltar has to cover in the real world for something he said to Head Six, but this is the first time the naughty talk appears to be doing him some good. I ask again, though: who/what the hell is Head Six?

There have been too many occasions where she told him things he couldn't possibly know for her to be just a hallucination. Doc Cottle couldn't find evidence of anything inappropriate in Baltar's brain, but at the same time, the Cylons are indistinguishable from humans on close examination, even though Sharon can jam a fiber-optic cable up her arm and use it to wipe out a Cylon fleet. So there could be some kind of technology in there that an ordinary MRI wouldn't spot. On the other hand, D'Anna sure seemed to think Gaius was talking to her and only to her, and Caprica has never once inquired about the thing she put in Baltar's head. In the opening moments of "Downloaded," I briefly harbored the notion that the Baltar who "survived" the nuclear detonation was, in fact, a Number Six's personality downloaded into a Baltar lookalike body but with that knowledge repressed, ala Boomer not knowing her true identity. But even with last week's questions about Baltar being one of the unseen five models, I think my scenario's too far-fetched. Theories?

Much as the fleet is finding its way after the New Caprica exodus and Roslin's reinstatement, it feels like the show itself is doing the same. It's not running in place, as significant things have happened, but the absolute narrative confidence that was in place from "Lay Down Your Burdens Pt. 2" through "Collaborators" has taken a hit. But whatever the problems are, the show sure ain't dull.

What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

Borat: Fantasy vs. reality

Saw "Borat" yesterday afternoon and am still getting the hiccups every time I think of the naked wrestling scene, but here's an open question for those who have seen it: which scenes do you think were staged and which do you think were "real"? (As real as anything where Sacha Baron Cohen is playing Borat can be.) A few spoiler-y thoughts after the jump...

Well, we have pretty good evidence that the frat guys weren't in on the joke, judging by their lawsuit, and I can't imagine a circumstance where Pamela Anderson wasn't aware of what was happening (especially one that wouldn't result in a savage on-camera beating for Cohen). And the hooker was an actress. But wouldn't Cohen and the guy playing Azamat be arrested for running around the hotel in the nude, let alone disrupting that awards dinner? And the kids reacting to the bear definitely seemed like they had been coached.

What say you? Disagreements? Any other obviously staged scenes I'm leaving out? Click here to read the full post

SNL: I like things that are great

Shock of shocks: Alec Baldwin hosts, and "Saturday Night Live" delivers its best episode of the season.

It wasn't a consistent masterpiece and I felt like they relied too often on surprise cameos in lieu of actual jokes (the monologue in particular was just several minutes of "Please watch '30 Rock'!"), but I liked the Nancy Pelosi opening (a compendium of every Republican caricature of Pelosi), the quasi-sequel to the Tom Hanks Five-Timers Club with Steve Martin (particularly Baldwin's "I was in 'Schwetty Balls'!" taunt), and thought the carpooling sketch was kind of great, particularly Baldwin's line about Bobby McPherrin. (It was also a rare example of a sketch that had a distinct beginning, middle and end instead of a fake TV show parody with a theme song to get the writers around that problem.) I'm not a big Aguilera fan, but loved her duet with the real Tony Bennett; too bad they couldn't figure out a way to get The Cute Beatle to sing with one of them or the other. Click here to read the full post

Feasts and famines

Spoilers for "The O.C." and "Survivor" coming right up... On "The O.C.," I quote Fox's own ratings release from last night:

Although still modest, THE OC outperformed last Thursday's performance by +12% among Adults 18-34 (1.9/5 vs. 1.7/4) and +9% in Total Viewers (3.7 vs. 3.4 Mil)

Woo-hoo! Well, not really. But improvement's improvement, and those extra three hundred thousand or so viewers saw a very good episode, one that for the most part laid to rest all the Marissa angst in satisfying, surprisingly understated fashion. Ryan gets his face to face with Volchok and realizes there's no point in using his Kid Chino fists of fury on the guy (in a scene reminiscent of Tommy Gavin with his brother's killer on "Rescue Me"), Summer confesses that she misses her friend, and in the end, Julie comes to Ryan and says, simply, "Tell me about her." Again, it's so much easier to feel bad about Marissa when she's not physically present to remind you of what an irritating character she was. (Here's a question: I watched the first four episodes in a rush, and when I got to the start of next week's show, I made this note: "Have they referred to Marissa by name at any point this season?" Her name definitely pops up next week, but I'm curious whether they actually avoided using her name during these mourning episodes, and Josh couldn't remember for sure. Has anyone heard it come up in these first three?) The comedy blended better with the tragedy than I felt it did in Wednesday's episode, especially the presence of the increasingly hilarious Taylor at the Cohen family Thanksgiving and Seth introducing the homeless guys to the wonders of "Battlestar Galactica." (So we know Seth watches it, Dwight Schrute is obsessed with Starbuck and Veronica Mars has started using "frak" as a curse word; how many other network characters can we get to start referencing it?) Decent "Grey's Anatomy" in-joke with Dr. Roberts, too. I keep trying to watch "Survivor" on CBS' Innertube, and it keeps vexing me. Last week, I couldn't get it to play on any of the four browsers on my Mac, and this morning at the office, the episode completely skipped over the act featuring the mutiny and the reward challenge. Shame, too, as it sounds like that was the most memorable moment of the entire season. Poor, stupid Jonathan. I suppose an argument could be made that he was next on the chopping block at Aitu and has now moved over to a tribe with more potential room to maneuver (either by going with a White Power strategy or banding together the minorities to get rid of Adam and his harem), but that would require the kind of skills he hasn't displayed since he was chopping up Bill Paxton in "The Last Supper." Click here to read the full post

Earl & The Office: Come together

Spoilers for "My Name Is Earl" and "The Office" coming up just as soon as I read this message from the future...

"My Name Is Earl" has been better this season than it was last year, but this was the first time I felt it was outright funnier than its companion. Another tweak of the formula with Catalina tagging along -- and with Randy going meta with his explanations of how the list works -- plus a rare and welcome instance of Bad Earl appearing in present day. They don't have to show him struggling against his better nature every week, but this kind of episode was past due.

"The Office" wasn't bad, but plot advancement was the primary goal over the jokes. We now have a semi-plausible explanation for why Scranton gets to stay open, but Josh goes away so it's not a total remake of the British second season. Still, some good comedy: Jim sending Dwight faxes from the future (Stanley's reaction made the coffee scene), Ryan and Stanley's glee at being laid off (they may need to cool it on Happy Stanley for a while, though, or he'll lose his effectiveness), Kelly's manic-depressive reactions to the bad and good news, Roy looking to Cinderella (the band, not the movie) for solace, and Michael's flustered reaction to Dwight's perfectly reasonable role-playing. And in the 'shipping news, Karen has become the Jim in her relationship with Jim, down to being hurt when he suggested she take a different job (just like Pam did with that Maryland gig). Interesting that the writers have avoided coupling off any of Pam, Roy, Jim or Karen before putting them all in the same building.

What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

Studio 60 gets the back nine

Here's the release. Given the amount of entertainment I get in picking it apart, I don't mind NBC making the stupid, futile gesture, but only if they do the same for Friday Night Lights. Click here to read the full post

Lost: See ya in 13 weeks, suckers!

Some very brief, disinterested thoughts on "Lost" coming right up...

So here we have an episode in which Kate and Sawyer finally get it on -- and, hopefully, bring an end to the lamest love triangle in primetime -- and that ends with Sawyer being held at gunpoint while Jack holds Ben at scalpel-point, and the entire thing bored me out of my mind.

Am I the only one not feeling the least bit eager for the next three months to end so we can find out what happens next? Click here to read the full post

The O.C.: Really, who doesn't need Chiclets?

Spoilers for "The O.C." coming right up...

First off, I need to get this off my chest: Hollywood needs to institute at least a 5-year moratorium, if not longer, on stealing the "Silence of the Lambs" fake-out about who's knocking on whose door. I think my three-year-old daughter could have figured out the Seth/Ryan switcheroo before it happened, and I spent a good chunk of the scene with Seth and Volchok groaning at it instead of paying attention to what was probably one of Adam Brody's better performances in a while.

The Mexico jaunt is the weakest of the season's first four episodes, the one where the tones mix most awkwardly -- and, not surprisingly, what works best is the funny stuff, whether it's Taylor's horrified reaction to Summer's crunchy new look ("When was the last time you shaved your legs? It's like a forest! You've got hobbit feet!") or the entire scene with Luke's brothers shaving their chests ("Gay dad always trumps slutty mom"). On the other hand, the insertion of Steve-O to add some levity to the Mexico scenes didn't work, aside from inspiring a lengthy philosophical debate between myself and Josh Schwartz over which would be more likely to keep Seth from being buried in Jewish cemetary: the shiksa mom or the tattoo?

I did like Seth betraying Ryan to save him, but rewatching this one made me glad I was immediately able to go to the next one (and to the one after that). In that way, it's a good thing episodes two and three are airing on back-to-back nights. Now if only Fox had bothered to promote this at all...

What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

Don't forget: The O.C. is on tonight at 9

Will be back tonight with a review. Click here to read the full post

Disappearing acts

Since "Lost" is about to go bye-bye for the next three months, I wrote a column expressing my dissatisfaction with a lot of what's happened this season.

Haven't seen "Gilmore" yet, but some thoughts on "Friday Night Lights" and "House" -- both of which featured characters who went without a trace at some point -- coming right up...

Well, based on the early numbers, it looks like the "Friday Night Lights" audition in the "Studio 60" timeslot didn't bring a single new viewer back to the Tuesday airing. Not that I expect the show to survive to next season anyway, but couldn't they at least tease me with false hope every now and then?

As for the episode itself, a much stronger effort than last week. I like that the show isn't ignoring the realities of Street's recovery (the no ejaculation rule is a bummer, though I would think/hope it's temporary), yet is willing to be just sunny enough to show him and his two backstabbing pals having a fine old time on their day trip. Taylor and Saracen both struggled in their own way between, as Matt put it, doing what's right for the team versus what's just right. They're essentially in the same situation: considered too young and inexperienced for the job, in the position because of Jason Street, constantly having their authority questioned, etc. One of the things I like most about this show is the natural rhythms of the dialogue, the way conversations circle back over the same handful of phrases ("He was promising things") without sounding like a Sorkin pedeconference, and either Saracen or Taylor tends to be at the center of those exchanges.

The writers are still struggling with what to do with Tyra, who parachutes in for a few scenes each week that have little to nothing to do with the rest of the cast. The shame of it is that the actress playing her seems much more talented than the one who plays Lyla, but she's a square peg right now. (Smash isn't doing much better, spotlight-wise, but at least he's on the team, and the previews next week suggest he's finally getting his moment.)

So with Voodoo gone and the last win all but overturned, how dead is their season? Can a Texas high school team with two losses get within sniffing distance of the playoffs? What's interesting is that we've now gone six episodes and only seen three games. If that pace keeps up, Berg and company may be able to save up on life without football stories for next season... ahh, who am I kidding? Let's move on before I get too depressed.

Nice to see Pruitt Taylor Vince, my favorite character actor whose name sounds like it's listed backwards, wearing a ginormous fat suit on "House," but the meat of the episode was Detective Tritter's roto-rootering of House's life and pill-popping. Wilson is a terrible liar, and I look forward to seeing how he and House get out of this mess. Back during the Vogler arc, people kept speculating that House would wind up saving Vogler's life. The writers avoided the thorn in the paw approach back then; can they resist that temptation again? And what the hell happened to Chase for the second half of the episode? Does he hate fat people that much?

What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

Veronica Mars: The two faces of Veronica

Spoilers for "Veronica Mars" just as soon as I stock up on little shampoo bottles...

When we last left our heroine, she was in danger of going from prickly to, well, something without the "ly" (or the feminine equivalent). And there were plenty of times last night where I still wanted Veronica to cool it with the cold, judgemental act. Seriously, I was on the verge of buying her one of Tom Smykowski's Jump To Conclusions mats, especially after we saw what she did to poor, semi-innocent Ratner. (That's assuming that Ratner wasn't in on the scam with Tim the TA, but that scene with Tim and Veronica suggested the Rat was just an unwitting dupe.) There comes a point where all of this j'accuse!ing doesn't just make Veronica less appealing, but less bright. She's a flawed character, always has been, but even at her lowest moments, she and we could rely on the belief that she was a smart cookie.

But this episode did a much better job of balancing Veronica's baser instincts -- also including the worst of her green-eyed monster in that scene with the hotel desk clerk, who would have been totally justified in blowing off Veronica, pal of Logan or no -- with showing her friendlier, more generous side. A lot of that comes from the most interaction she's had with Wallace since the season premiere, as their friendship has always shown Veronica at her best. But we also got to see her reaching out to Parker, treating Piz with something resembling humanity, torn about what to do for Dean O'Dell and about getting that girl expelled from Hearst, being vaguely cordial with Lamb (and vice versa), etc. Again, I don't ask for Veronica to be perfect, and as long as Rob and Co. can balance Evil Veronica with Normal Veronica (to paraphrase Wallace), I can deal better with the Evil moments.

Keith's car crash brought back uncomfortable memories of My Worst Day Ever So Far, By Julio (and he had much more of a fun, sexy time of it after the accident than I did, lucky SOB), but I liked the symmetry Keith and Harmony bonding over noir movies followed by Keith getting embroiled in a very noir situation with a married lady who seems a hop, skip and a martini away from asking Keith to take care of her husband, permanent-like.

We're two-thirds of the way through the rape story, and after a sluggish beginning to the arc, I've been really pleased with the last few episodes, particularly the cliffhangers on the last two. So who are our suspects to date?

• The Pi Sigs, who certainly wouldn't be above this -- and wouldn't it be ironic (dontcha think) if the feminists' faux-rape with Claire helped keep the Pi Sig rapist or rapists free and clear long enough to attack a few more women?
• Mercer, who had the suspicious cologne, the clippers and the GHB -- but who also has an alleged alibi from Logan. And remember the last time Veronica suspected Logan and his buddies of using GHB for some raping, things didn't turn out quite as she assumed.
• Tim the TA, though I think they're going more in an "unlikely allies" direction for him and Veronica.
• Professor Landry, though philandering and adultery don't automatically lead to serial rape. Still, Tim seemed troubled by more than just the catting around.
• Dean O'Dell, who I put here only because it's always fair to suspect the most famous guest star. I think it'd be a waste of Begley and a good character who could be around for several years to dispense with him in nine episodes.
• Nish and/or one of the feminists. There'd be some really messed-up psychology involved, and I think the faked rape was designed to make them into red herrings, but you never know.
• The college humor magazine guys. Not likely, since we only saw them in the one episode, but if they pop up again in the next one or two, I'm going to raise an eyebrow.

So what did everybody else think? Have I left out an obvious suspect? Should we start a contest to see who can come up with the most contrived in-story excuse why Mac or Weevil or whomever can't appear in the latest episode?

Click here to read the full post

Everybody loves Swarley

Spoilers for, in order, "Heroes," "HIMYM" and "The Class" coming up on the other side of the space-time continuum...

Weakest "Heroes" to date, I thought. Far too much Peter Petrelli, a character who's not remotely as appealing without Mohinder or Isaac around to mock him. (Adrian Pasdar could certainly bring the snark, but most of Nathan's put-downs tilt more towards pure mean.) The pointless return of Simone, the unsurprising revelations that Showkiller Rena Sofer is in a wheelchair and that Parkman's buddy was sleeping with his wife, and yet another cliffhanger that failed to blow my mind.

It wasn't all bad. I liked the Claire scenes, D.L. in an unexpected team-up with Hiro (and either D.L. can't phase other people like Kitty Pryde can, or he doesn't understand the full extent of his powers yet), and Parkman letting the coma wife talk to her husband one last time before letting go was reasonably touching for what's an emotionally two-dimensional show most of the time. I'm even really warming to Ali Larter, both as Niki and as "Jessica." But after weeks and weeks of edge of the seat stuff, I was reclining for most of this. Hopefully, just a blip and not a sign that Tim Kring is turning into a pumpkin (or just back into Tim Kring).

The Swarley running gag on "How I Met Your Mother" gave me so much happiness, it's possibly not even legal. It wasn't even the endless variations on Swarley itself that I loved (though the use of the "Cheers" font for the producer credits was brilliant) as it was Barney's increasing despair at the gag. Solid episode all-around, and I'm pleased to see Morena Baccarin getting non-space-ho acting jobs. (Not that I didn't like her as a space ho; it's just nice to see that barista roles are open to her as well.)

After the last episode of "The Class," I wrote, "Somebody let me know if they ever get around to punting about half the cast and I'll give it another go." Well, while having it on in the background so I could build up enough of a DVR buffer to skip the "Heroes" commercials, I realized that, for one week at least, they did just what I asked -- and yet even without Holly and Kyle and that annoying corner of the show, it still wasn't very funny. Now I need a new operating theory for what's so wrong... think, think, think... Click here to read the full post

Studio 60: The flabby dog story

Spoilers for "Studio 60" coming up just as soon as I ask my wife why she chose the violin over the viola...

Well, that was less hateable than it was flat and labored. I used to complain about the 30-minute length of "Sports Night," that every time an episode was really building up a head of steam, they had to roll credits. This was the opposite, a thin idea stretched out beyond interest. Maybe as a single episode, it would have worked better, but there isn't remotely two hours worth of story here.

I wasn't wild about "The West Coast Delay," but at least when that one shifted into Murphy's Law farce, it moved like one. "Nevada Day Part I" just limped along, filling in details to explain the in media res opening at a pace suggesting an Abe Simpson story involving an onion on his belt (which, in fairness, was the style at the time). Outside of Tom's reaction to the dog sniffing out the joint, I don't even think I cracked a smile, let alone laughed, at any of this. And what was with Matt's voiceover summarizing everything we just saw at the end of the show? That's the sort of narrative spoonfeeding you save for the beginning of part two, not the end of part one. It was so clumsy and pointless that I would assume it was the result of a network note if I didn't know that Sorkin's deal banned all network notes.

The previews for this episode had me going to the store to stock up on anti-nausea medication to deal with Sorkin using the John Goodman character as a red state punching bag, but I have to admit that the character wasn't nearly as annoying as I had feared. When Sorkin introduced Goodman as Glenallen Walken in his "Screw you, Wells!" farewell to "The West Wing," there was that one bit where Walken broke down the origins of World War I, and I thought, "Huh. That sounded not dissimilar to a lecture Bartlet might have given." Wells quickly turned Walken into a cartoon (also with a dog), but Sorkin seems to understand how to use Goodman to create a non-strawman Republican character.

The wordiness of Sorkin's attempts at sketch comedy make it impossible to tell whether his ideas might work with someone else writing them, but the fact that Danny trashed the Jesus sketch doesn't make up for how long we had to sit through the read through of the thing. The creative process is only interesting viewing if we get to see when, how and why a sketch goes from troubled to funny, and Sorkin has proved himself incapable of getting to Point B on that.

Lots of leftover problems from earlier episodes, whether it's the continued references to "Search and Destroy" as a smash hit in the making to Sorkin's misguided belief that anyone without a Variety subscription would care about Jordan's sex life and Jordan's complete political naivete, which Jack nicely illustrated on the plane with Danny. But the only time I was actually motivated to yell at the TV was the hint that Tom had an important reason for speeding. Maybe Sorkin will prove me wrong with some unexpectedly moving reveal in part two, but what's wrong with the guy just doing some reckless driving?

Meh -- which, for this show, is arguably a step up. What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

Brought to you by the letter D

So a couple of weeks ago, a reader sends me an e-mail complimenting Neil Patrick Harris for his ability to succeed playing a character so different from Doogie Howser, and whether I could think of other TV actors who had successfully reinvented themselves like that. I didn't have space in that week's mailbag, so I held the letter a week and put it into today's column -- not realizing, of course, that ol' NPH would come out of the closet over the weekend. Not that it invalidates anything I wrote, but on this Monday morning, the man's versatility isn't really the top subject people are interested in.

So in honor of Doogie -- and to compensate for a busy weekend that didn't give me much writing time -- quick hit spoilers coming up on, in order, "Desperate Housewives," "Dexter" and "Doctor Who," plus honorary D show "Battlestar Galactica."

Now that's how you do a Very Special Episode, "Desperate Housewives." I figured the much-publicized death would be of a non-regular, but the shooting of Nora happened so abruptly that it shook me, and this is a show that I generally consider a Take One For The Team selection. Some fine performances all around, but especially by Felicity Huffman, Marcia Cross and Laurie Metcalf, may Carolyn Bigsby rest in peace. When even Teri Hatcher isn't annoying me at the moment, it's a sign that Marc Cherry and company really have gotten things back on track.

One of the best "Dexter" episodes so far, in which the creators' ability to make us like this guy have us suddenly rooting for a serial killer to escape justice. I thought the Patrick Bateman alias was a little too clever, but the tension between Dexter and Deb gave some weight to his scrambling. (Also, is this the first we know that Deb was Harry's biological daughter? I had been under the impression they were both foster kids.)

I didn't comment on last week's "Doctor Who" because so much of it was set-up for the Cybermen conclusion. And while it didn't move me on the same level as "The Girl in the Fireplace" or "School Reunion," it worked very well. Raise your hands, anyone who's ever read or seen another parallel universe story who didn't assume Mickey would stay to take Rickey's place. (And was I the only one wondering if Rickey and the blonde guy were a couple? Apparently, it was in the script but then got cut.) What I love about this series is how every character gets their turn in the spotlight, whether it's Mickey escaping tin dog status, Alt-Pete proving to be a swell guy, or, my favorite, Mrs. Moore becoming a character I liked and mourned in the space of about four minutes. (Until she got zapped by the Cybermen, Tennant was looking at her like he was ready to sign up another companion.) Hell, I even felt bad for the poor bride-to-be who got Cyber-ized, and she had, like, three lines of voice-modulated dialogue. Aside from the deux ex machina of using the TARDIS power cell to get out of the cliffhanger, another superb outing from these fine folks.

Ron Moore spends the latest "Battlestar Galactica" podcast discussing how much of this episode had to be saved in post-production, particularly the Cylon scenes. And it's a credit to the editors and writing team that very few of the seams showed in the final version. There was too much tell and not enough show in the subplot about Starbuck and Tigh sowing dissent throughout the ship, but beyond that, it worked. The use of dissolves and classical music lent the Baltar storyline just the right amount of unreality, and Adama's showdown with his surrogate brother and daughter was the best moment Edward James Olmos has had all season, St. Crispin's Day included. Interesting, the divergent paths that Kara and Saul take after that meeting. But then, the person who was taken away from Kara still exists -- as much as it may hurt at first, she can have some kind of relationship with Kacey -- where Saul has nobody and nothing to live for.

What did everybody else think about any of these? Click here to read the full post

Wire week 9 talk for the On Demand'ers

Go crazy on episode 9, "Know Your Place," in the comments. Click here to read the full post

The Wire, "Corner Boys": It's their thing

Spoilers for "The Wire" episode 8, "Corner Boys," coming up just as soon as I bone up on Baltimore club music...

The biggest challenge of doing these weekly reviews is offering analysis that's not too colored by what I know is coming, and Michael's story has been the toughest example of that. For weeks now, I've been struggling to find ways to discuss Michael's distrust of adults in general and Cutty in particular without giving away the reason. Not that it was some M. Night-level twist -- some people here and elsewhere guessed that he had been molested -- but when you see the fear and hatred burning in Michael's face when Bug's father touches him, everything clicks into place: why he's into boxing, why doesn't want to be alone with adult men, why he's so protective of Bug and Dukie and Randy, etc., etc., etc. And the hell of it is, what's been done to him means that he won't get help from people who are offering it, like Prez, because in Michael's eyes, every man is someone who can hurt him, and he won't let himself be hurt ever again.

The education theme picks up a head of steam with visits to three different classrooms: Prez's math class, Bunny's Corner Boy 101, and Chris and Snoop's Soldier 103b. Every time it seems like Prez has his kids acting like any average middle school class (I had a friend in junior high who absolutely would have taken advantage of the dinks on the chalkboard), he has to witness someone having a nervous breakdown over fractions. Just as Bubbs was told weeks ago why Sherrod couldn't be placed in a grade appropriate to his skill level, Prez is starting to realize how few of his kids are qualified to be studying 8th grade math. The problem is, No Child Left Behind is designed to do exactly that, to focus on stats ahead of actual teaching.

(Here's a question for anyone more knowledgeable of public education than me: why is it considered such a horror for the state to take over the school system? When Prez suggested that maybe it would be a good thing for the kids to fail the test so the state would take over, Ms. Sampson and the others looked like he had just suggested feeding the kids to a pack of dogs.)

Stats are also an issue for Carcetti, who witnesses Baltimore's finest at their lamest, especially the entrapment-esque arrest of the guy on the bike. And yet even as he's meeting with Rawls and Daniels to find a way to move the department away from stat-driven policing, his new pals from the DNC are telling him that one of his top three priorities has to be reducing the crime rate by 10%. That way lies Clarence Royce.

Bunny's classroom continues the deconstruction of the corner lifestyle that the series began with Hamsterdam. Yet even as Namond is trying to claim that the corner lifestyle is no different than Enron or Big Tobacco, he's threatening the life of his new lieutenant, who's so young his voice probably won't drop until the next mid-term elections. (And, yes, we've long since established that Namond's all talk, but the little kid doesn't know that.)

On the policing front, we get to see what happens when the extremely resistable force (Herc) meets the immovable object (Marlo and company). After days of his usual threats and head-busting, Herc winds up giving Marlo the info he wanted and spooking Chris and Snoop into throwing away the dreaded nail gun and other evidence that would be useful if a more competent investigator was on Marlo's tail -- someone like, say, Bunk, whose shredding of the Omar frame was a complete 180 from Herc and Dozerman's bumbling.

There have been complaints that Marlo, Chris and Snoop don't have the personality of Avon and Stringer. I think that's part of the point -- that they've spent their entire lives among the corner culture, and it beat everything else out of them -- but we got a few glimpses of color in this episode, particularly Chris' attempt to school Snoop on the local music scene.

Learning is everywhere. Hell, Rawls even soaked up all of Daniels' lectures about high-level investigations -- if not as something he personally believes in, then as something he knows will be useful in making his move to leapfrog over Burrell. Poor Erv looked even more poleaxed than Royce did when Tommy sprung the dead witness on him in the debate.

Some other random thoughts:

• Omar fans may be aware that Michael K. Williams has a recurring role on ABC's "Six Degrees" as the limo driver's brother, but in the original version of the pilot, the role was played by Cyrus Farmer, aka Bug's dad. Guess the "Six Degrees" people just wanted a "Wire" actor in the part.
• I liked seeing the Homicide detectives' utter disdain for Carcetti, especially Kima getting her small measure of revenge by making him brew a new pot of coffee.
  
• The Irish wake for Col. Forrester was, much like Ray Cole's wake last season, the result of the actor (in this case, Richard DeSantis) passing away in real life.
  
• Boy, Prop Joe and Slim Charles were going out of their way to not offend Marlo when they complained about the disappeared New Yorkers. They're working all the way on the other side of town and they're still scared of the guy.
  
• Prez and Dukie bond over cheat codes. Of course they do.
  
• When Michael goes to pick up Bug from that rec center, he talks to a Miss Ella. That's an homage to one of the most memorable figures from "The Corner," Ella Thompson, who responded to the murder of her 12-year-old daughter by taking over a neighborhood rec center and turning it into a safe haven for the stoop kids. According to Simon, the real Ella died of a massive stroke (while driving a car full of donated computer equipment to a rec center), so as a little tribute to her, he wrote a Miss Ella cameo into the script and cast Denise "NeeCee" Preddy, who was one of the girls at the rec center when he and Ed Burns showed up in the neighborhood in '93.
  

Lines of the week:

• Crutchfield on Omar: "This ain't the motherfucker who came up with 62 ways for the peanut!"
• Bunk on McNulty drinking club soda: "Why don't you suck a dick and get it over with?"
• Snoop's prayer: "Here we lay a couple of New York boys who came too far south for their own fuckin' good."
• Prop Joe using an alias: "This is Sidney Handjerker, with Handjerker, Kevin and Bromberg..."
• Namond to his mother: "Ma! Let me build! Ma!"

So what did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

The Office: Best meeting we've ever had

Spoilers for "The Office" just as soon as I confiscate some culturally explicit pamphlets...

Think that one fell a little too far on the wrong side of the cringe-to-laugh ratio. I don't know that I've had to employ the horror movie finger shield this much since the British episode where David Brent got sacked. And as bad as I felt as Michael was proposing to his slutty cheerleader, I practically had to pull a Winona Ryder singing "Mary Had a Little Lamb" when Michael leaned in to kiss Pam.

Which isn't to say that I don't believe Michael would do either of those things. His entire personality has been crafted by popular culture, and in a cheesey movie version of his life, the hero absolutely would smooch the pretty receptionist and it would turn out to be true love. (Also, nine dates in four months? I suspected Michael was exaggerating the intensity of the relationship, but that's barely better than belonging to the same book club with a woman you like.) I just don't think there was enough great comedy to compensate for the awkward! moments. Compare this one to "Gay Witch Hunt," also featuring Michael at his most unable to read a room (and also featuring Michael offering his lips to an unwilling recipient), which had me doubled over in laughter at least as often as it had me hiding behind the couch.

There were some nice little moments, especially in the cultural sensitivity briefing at work: Kelly not having the first idea what Diwali is about (and Dwight knowing too much), Pam enduring more Jim-less sexual harassment from Kevin, Toby exercising his authority in a rare moment when most of the staff didn't want him to (did you see the disappointed look on Phyllis' face when he snatched the pamphlet?), etc. Jim and Andy's drunk "Closer to Fine" duet was genius -- especially Andy's sheer joy at finding a fellow bro who likes Indigo Girls. Ryan enduring the scorn of Kelly's parents was good, and I liked the symmetry of Michael and Jim both winding up in the back of women's cars under very different circumstances.

Not a bad episode, particularly in advancing the relationships (Pam/Roy, Jim/Karen, Michael/Carol), but not this season's best. And was I the only one who viewed the Diwali Song not as a scene, but as Steve and Rainn stepping out of character to perform for the cast and crew? Because that was entirely too good to have been written by Michael Scott.

What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

The O.C.: Who are you to say chickens can't fly?

Spoilers for "The O.C." (posted a little early because I'll be out for the rest of the evening) just as soon as I remember what wise man once said "Cage matches work. Of course they work. If they didn't work, everyone would still be inside the cage."... Damn. That was... not bad. No, better than that. That was good. Confident, in character, funny on occasion (any scene with Che), genuinely touching at others (the comic book store intervention), really the most like itself the show has felt in a long time, maybe even going back to season one. There's too much bad karma built up over the last two years, not to mention too much plot that Josh burnt through in the first one, for the series to ever really recapture the magic of the good ol' days, but this was a quality level I didn't think the show could hit anymore. I actually watched it twice, and it's grown on me even in the week since the second time. Ryan's cage-fighting sounded cheesey in theory, but it worked in execution, playing into his constant need for self-flagellation and difficulty in thinking without his fists. I've grown tired of dramas that do in media res openings, but that entire opening sequence -- from Ryan cleaning his wounds in that dingy supply closet to the WTF? meeting with Julie at the Mermaid Inn (where the two of them used to sleep with Luke and Theresa, respectively) -- really drew me in and hit harder when we revisted it two-thirds of the way through. (The reveal of where Kaitlin got the Pretty Woman boots was particularly nice.) Back when Josh capped Marissa in the finale, I wrote:

Ryan has always been and will always be an angsty character. It's his reason for being on this show. But there's a difference between the "Sorry, nice rich Jewish man, for accidentally burning down your father-in-law's model home and getting into fights at every cotillion" kind of angst and the "My explosive temper triggered a series of events that led to the tragic death of the only girl I've ever loved" angst, and I don't see how either Ryan or the show pulls out of this. Julie can still be funny and bitchy after her wrinkly sugar daddy husband dies, but her daughter? Does Summer get over her best friend dying anytime soon? Is Taylor quite as amusing taking Marissa's place in the inner circle? Bah. No good can come from this.

Mea culpa. The show isn't skirting the consequences of Marissa's death, but in spite of the mood lighting and the cage fights and Julie's pills, it doesn't feel overwrought, but just right. It also helps that I've seen the first four episodes and have witnessed some of the light near the end of the tunnel, but I felt okay with it even at the end of the first hour. Marissa is proving a more useful character in death than she ever was in life. Everybody's responding differently: Ryan through his masochistic fights (and, after the intervention, by unbottling his anger to win his last fight and go hunting for Volchok), Summer by latching onto Che and keeping Newport at a physical and emotional distance, Seth by going into a corner and doing his best not to bother either his best friend or his girlfriend, Kaitlin by tempering her conniving with about 5% more compassion for her mom, etc. Yes, parts of it are melodramatic, but that's what this show is -- just, on its better days, it's a smart melodrama. Ben McKenzie, Rachel Bilson and Melinda Clarke all gave among their best performances, and there was just enough of the funny ("Let me buy you a new toothbrush," Luke's dorky kid brothers) to reassure us that Josh knows where the show needs to go once he gets through this shiva period. It's probably going to get slaughtered by "Grey's," "CSI" and possibly even "Supernatural," but at least I don't feel like I'm just watching the show out of nostalgia for the book-worthy days. What did everybody else think? Click here to read the full post

When you ain't got nothin'...

...you got nothin' to lose. At least, that seems to be Josh Schwartz's attitude at the start of this much-improved season of "The O.C." An excerpt from today's column:

"You hear that news" about "Grey's Anatomy" and the smaller episode order, "and you suddenly become zen, or as zen as a neurotic Jew like myself can get. I actually feel like some of the decisions we made last year were made about ratings. The network was getting darker and edgier, and we were trying not to get canceled. We've always tried to walk a line between being part of a genre and tweaking it, and I think last year the genre side won out. A lot of that was because it felt like it was stuff we had to do. There was a lot of carnage."

Faced with a no-win timeslot and a network that, as he puts it, is "clearly moving in a diffrent direction," Schwartz and his writers decided to get back to "just doing the show."

NJ.com finally got the story up. To read the rest, click here. Click here to read the full post

30 Rock: I just got back from Ann Coulter's 60th birthday party

No major spoilers, but "30 Rock" gets a big thumbs-up just for that line, and for the rehearsal snippet of Jack's "Meep! Meep!" sketch. Last week's episode was more consistently funny, but this is turning out to be a good little comedy. Loved the Sorkin pedeconference parody. Click here to read the full post