'The Goode Family' review - Sepinwall on TV

In today's column, I review "The Goode Family," Mike Judge's new animated ABC comedy, which I found funny in a few spots but mostly disappointing. Because it's Judge, and because it's summer, I'll likely give it a few more shots, but I don't see the premise (the world's most politically correct family) sustaining itself. Click here to read the full post

Breaking Bad, "Phoenix": There's no real way to dust for vomit

Abbreviated, holiday-length spoilers for the penultimate episode of "Breaking Bad" season two coming up just as soon as I move to New Zealand...

"Want to see what your daddy did for you? That's right: Daddy did that. Daddy did that for you." -Walt

I spend a lot of time in these "Breaking Bad" reviews making comparisons to other movies and TV shows about crime and the drug trade, because creator Vince Gilligan openly invites them. His pitch for the show was and is "We're going to take Mr. Chips and turn him into Scarface." Various storylines and moments have echoes of "The Godfather," or "The Wire," or "The Sopranos," not least of which was Saul Goodman offering to be Walt's Tom Hagen a few weeks back.

The scene at the end of "Phoenix" wasn't quite as overt in its homage as the Hagen scene. For all I know, it may not have been intended as homage at all. But if you've seen "The Sopranos" (and if you haven't but plan to at some point, you may want to stop reading this review immediately) it's impossible to watch and not think of Tony snuffing out Christopher's life after their car accident in "Kennedy and Heidi."

Now, Tony actively chooses to smother Christopher, while Walt simply lets Jane choke on her own vomit rather than turn her on her side (as Jane had done for Jesse earlier in the episode), but beyond that, it's the same scene: our crime lord protagonist doesn't go into the scene intending to kill anyone (or let anyone die through inaction), but when an opportunity presents itself to eliminate a troublesome junkie acquaintance -- someone who doesn't even pose a current threat, but who might one day be a problem -- he can't resist taking advantage of it.

The Tony/Christopher scene was notable as the moment when even the most devout Tony worshippers could no longer deny that they had been rooting for the bad guy all these years, and I imagine Walt's moment here will have a similarly clarifying effect about the monster that Walt has become.

One person who remains firmly in denial, though, is Walt himself. Just listen to how tenderly he speaks as he shows baby Holly the money he's acquired through such unspeakable crimes, or the look of horrified self-pity on Walt's face after he lets Jane die(*). In his mind, Walt is still the hero of his own story, making hard but necessary decisions to protect his family.

(*) Insert boilerplate "Bryan Cranston is an acting god" commentary here.

At the same time, "Phoenix" (written by John Shiban and directed by Colin Bucksey) gives us a stinging reminder of just how unnecessary this has all been, with the subplot about "Flynn" setting up a website to get PayPal donations to help pay for his dad's expensive cancer surgery. When Walt tells Skyler that "It's charity," the disgust in his voice at that word brings back how much Walt's pride has driven all of this. He could have just gone to Gretchen and Elliott himself, or at least dropped out of the drug game once they made their offer, but he refused, because Walter White is too damn proud to accept help from outsiders. And because of that pride, a lot of people are dead -- and, I imagine, a lot more will be dead soon.

Some other thoughts on "Phoenix":

• Two notes on SaveWalterWhite.com: first, the site design looks like something you might have seen on Geocities in 1999. Second, at the time I write this, the URL directs you back to AMC's official "Breaking Bad" page, but for all I know, they have a fake version of Flynn's site that went live once the episode aired.

• Another "Sopranos" parallel, intentional or not: when Walt is drinking with Jane's dad at the bar, he refers to Jesse as his "nephew," which is the same term Tony always used to describe Christopher, even though they were more like distant cousins. And, like Tony with Christopher, Walt really is starting to think of Jesse like a surrogate son, which makes his frustration with Jesse -- and his horror at what he just did to him -- that much greater. For all the terrible things Walt does in this episode, and in the series as a whole, I believe he really did mean to do right by Jesse by denying him the cash until he got clean.

• John DeLancie got quite a bit more to do after little more than a cameo a few episodes back. One thing to keep in mind about guest stars on this show: Vince Gilligan talks a lot on the podcasts about how the show can't afford to bring in actors from Los Angeles unless the part is significant. So if you see a guest star you recognize, chances are they're going to be doing something of note.

• Speaking of Jane's dad, are we to assume that he's also a recovering addict -- which means that his recent struggles with Jane had kicked him off the wagon? Or is it customary for sober family members to escort loved ones to 12-step meetings? From what little I know of that world, it seems that if you need to be dragged to them, you're not really ready to work the program.

• I like how, when Jesse comes back to his old classroom to confront Walt and demand his money, Walt deals with him the same way he dealt with the student trying to con his way into a higher test score a few episodes back.

• Check out the way Walt reacts to the realization that Ted Beneke is in Skyler's hospital room, and that he was there the whole time while Walt was off selling meth to Gus Frings. Walt knows there's something between his wife and Beneke, and he doesn't like it one bit.

Season finale next week. I'm not ready for this to be over just yet.

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

Party Down, "Stennheiser-Pong Wedding Reception": Talking comedy with Rob Thomas and John Enbom

As I've been promising for a couple of weeks, here's a combined transcript of interviews I did with "Party Down" producers Rob Thomas and John Enbom. Because of my schedule this week, I didn't have time to do a separate review of the season finale, featuring a long-awaited Veronica Mars/Dick Casablancas reunion, but feel free to discuss the episode here, along with general thoughts on this hilarious season.

The transcript (and I re-arranged things so that Rob and John's answers to the same question would be together) coming up just as soon as I direct you to the bathroom...

How happy are you with how the season played out?

Rob: Extremely happy. We went into it very very rushed, not knowing whether we had the time to write the scripts and be ready in time. Starz asked us when we could be ready to go if they ordered the series, we gave them a date, then we dickered on the terms of the deal and the budget for a couple of months, then they said, "Okay, go." "When we said two months ago we could have it ready then, we thought it meant we would be starting then." For John, it was a really speedy process, burning the candle at both ends. We're really pleased with the show in a first year. In a potential season two, we would have more time to write, we would know the actors better. All of this was written prior to knowing who would be in it. Constance is barely in the porn party episode, and I think had we known we had gotten Jane (Lynch) and seen what she was doing, we never would have done an episode where you wouldn't see her that little.

John: I'm really happy with it. Having worked enough in television to know how much chemistry, in the biggest regard, plays a part in the success of how things work. I think we got a great cast, great crew -- everybody got it in a way that really exceeded my expectations in how smoothly things would come along. For me, stepping in and trying to run things day to day, there was a large possibility of everything going bananas. So the fact that it didn't was good.

How did John wind up running the show?

John: Kind of by dint of being the one person who was free to do it. Basically, we got the offer from Starz at a point when Rob was finishing two pilots, and the "90210" thing was in some kind of play. So he and Dan Etheridge were in very over their heads, we were all excited to do it, but Rob didn't feel up to taking on the showrunner responsibilities of a fourth show. So Rob asked, "If this does happen, how would you feel wiggling out of your current writing job to write this?" Which I jumped at, I was on "The Sarah Connor Chronicles," and they very graciously allowed me to run off and do this. (Rob and Dan) were swamped doing "Cupid" at the time, so it really ended up with me as the only guy who could do it.

What's Jane's availability going to be for next season, given that she's now under contract to "Glee" and Fox?

Rob: We're planning on pleading our case with "Glee" and Fox. If there's a glimmer of hope, we want to pursue it. We love Jane, the person. We love Jane, the actress. Finding out she might not be able to return just as we get the pickup up, well, Alanis Morissette knows where we're coming from -- it's kinda like rain on your wedding day.

John: But not as "ironic" -- just a straight-up bummer.

The season ends with many of the characters either leaving Party Down or being in position where they could leave. Was that by design?

Rob: Yes. It was absolutely by design. We had everyone in a one year deal. So we had to prepare ourselves for the potential of losing any of our actors.

So how are you going to deal with bringing them all back together next season?

John: I think we're just going to use the natural passage of time, to just pick up the chips where they've fallen. Some will be easier than others. But I think we established Casey would be gone for six months. She can be back. It's always possible to figure out how somebody's big break turns into not their big break. We've been batting around ideas of what happens to Ron and his Soup 'R Crackers. Thinking up a way for Ron to screw something up doesn't seem that much of a stretch. One of the things that we're looking at is just to see how does Henry deal with this evolution of being promoted further into a world he never really wanted to be in. We might be looking at that, might be trying to deal with the idea that he's even more settled into this kind of life than he wanted to be.

Is there a character you feel you couldn't afford to do without?

Rob: Losing Henry in particular. He just feels like such the center of the show for us that it doesn't feel like it would be the same thing without him. He's the grounded character. He is our, meaning the viewer's, eyes into this world. He's the most relatable for the people who are entering the show. The brilliance of Adam Scott is that he is so damn funny in a straight man role. He represents the rest of us in this situation. He allows everyone to be bigger and more overtly funny.

It's funny that a bunch of my readers have said things like "This is the first time I've ever seen Adam Scott play someone likable." Because he's always cast as a douchebag.

Rob: He even played a douchebag in "Veronica Mars. Which is funny. I think there are people, and I do not mean this to be disparaging, there are people like Jay Mohr and Jeremy Piven where they just give you that vibe, "This guy's going to play someone a little venal." And for playing a lot of those characters, he doesn't have that quality. Not only doesn't he have it in real life, but it's very much something he has to put on.

John: I find it kind of funny. One of the reasons I thought he would be great in this role was because this is how I've known him, as kind of a nice, likable guy who has this slightly under the radar sardonic sense of humor. That's why I thought he would be great. He really knows and finds and nails that guy. I was actually kind of amused to find out that (douchebaggery) was his bread and butter. Hopefully, this will change that. He's a very good actor, and he's also very good at the sort of loose comedy side of things as well.

How different is Adam's version of Henry than the way Paul (Rudd) might have played it?

Rob: Adam plays a little dryer than Paul. It's tough to say. There has been an evolution in our heads. For five years, it was Paul's voice in our heads. Paul was sitting in the room working on it with us. Paul would say these lines out loud. It was even largely Paul's voice when the episodes were written. Now, of course, I hear Adam's voice in my head now when I think about it or write it. I think both of them can be subtle actors, but I think Adam is more inherently dry.

What's Paul's involvement been this season?

Rob: Paul had a hand in casting. All of us. We did pull a bunch of favors, as you can tell from watching the shows. Every week we'd pick the scripts and try to figure out, 'Who can we get for this?' And we do think it'll be much easier this year. We think we'll have to call in fewer favors. Even the people who did us favors want to come back if there can be any excuse. There's been talk of Enrico (Colantoni) divorcing his wife and we find him playing in a Top 40 cover band. JK Simmons e-mailed us and said, "You know, my daughter will turn 17 next year." But whwat we thought was funnier was to do the actual movie release party of the Edgar Allen Poe movie, and have Breckin Meyer come back and do more Matthew McConnaughey. Paul weighed in on all the scripts. The intention was for him to write one.

Is he going to be on the show at some point?

Rob: Paul is desperate to do the show, and I think it's a little odd for all of us that he hasn't. It's about a hole in his schedule and finding the right bit of business.

Who are the holdovers from the original guerrilla pilot you shot a few years ago?

John: Ken (Marino), and Jane, and Adam...

Adam played Henry even back then? I thought Paul did.

John: Not at that point. Way back when we had the show as a logline, I think Paul was at a point in his career where he said, "Well, doing an HBO series might be interesting." But by the time we shot it, it was Adam. I actually knew Adam as a friend of Paul's for a while. I didn't know his work as an actor, but I thought he was pretty good. And Ryan (Hansen) was in it. Those four guys crossed over, and then we got Martin (Starr) and Lizzy (Caplan).

How did Casey and Roman change from your original conception once you got those two?

John: Lizzy was a little younger than we had managed. Andrea Savage played the role in the little scrappy pilot we did. She's a little older and closer to Henry's age. We were originally interested in the idea of two people who were at the same point in their careers but had made different decisions about what to do. Lizzie being younger skewed that a little bit, we had her rejecting the normal life to stay and scrap. But she and Adam had a great chemistry, and you could see them clicking the way they did.

Martin, I think. It was funny: when we were casting for that role, we had seen some people, and we were looking around, we told our casting director, "We'd like a Martin Starr type," and they said, "How about Martin Starr?" And a week later, he had joined the cast. Obviously, the great thing about him is that he totally nails that role, it just gave us license to give him further rein. He does such a good job of both capturing the kind of bitter unfairness of that guy's worldview while also playing the kind of comic oblivion that allows him to say those things.

None of you who write for the show have any traditional comedy writing experience, right?

Rob: No, but we're all fans of comedy.

One of the things I really liked about the show was that it has this kind of classical farcical structure where everything just builds and builds, and then it all blows up in someone's face -- usually Ron's. And I might have expected that from more seasoned comedy writers.

Rob: I don't know that we ever used the term farce, or talked about the structure of farce, but we ended up building towards some big humiliation for Ron in the final act. And that became sort of a structure. It was interesting. There are a couple of things about the Ricky Gervais show "Extras." We had this show written before "Extras" came on. And I really adore that show, the Ian McKellen episode was my favorite episode of television the year it came out. They were doing something similar, building to some huge Andy Millman humiliation in that act. And year two when they gave him a catchphrase, we were all slapping ourselves in the head going, 'Oh, no!' Because it was, to a degree, our structure, and less so than "The Office." That was more our direct line. We may not be the writers who can or want to do set-up, punch, but that kind of comedy, we thought that's what speaks to us. We think we can do that. Let's take a stab at that.

How was it to be writing straight comedy?

Rob: I had the best time. It feels like the way I normally write, with the boundary on the comedy side expanded a bit further. I'm thinking in particular with how pleased I was with the pancake lady story (in the investor's dinner episode). That's something I couldn't quite do in "Veronica Mars," but the boundaries in "Party Down" allowed for an anecdotal story that doesn't move plot in any direction. Something that's so hard to do in normal network television. You always feel like you're having to drive a story point, this scene will link Part A to Part B, I don't get the opportunity to just tell a two-minute anecdote using pancakes and sex metaphors. It was liberating in that sense. And having written both comedy and drama, comedy's harder, because the fear of failure's so much stronger. When you write a scene and you see it cut together, and it doesn't make you laugh, it hurts in a way that failed drama doesn't. Failed drama, it's all, "that's not that compelling," but failed comedy just lays there. The investor dinner episode, there are a couple of moments, when they're having the conversation about Baretta's gun, and we cut inside the house, and there's about two minutes as they just go into that mansion that just feel flat and painful, and I go, 'Oh, just please...' Things I thought were funny on the page weren't funny. It hurts as I watch the episode. But honestly, the joy of seeing Jane Lynch take the "Old McDonald" scene -- when I wrote that, I thought, 'Oh god, I hope this works. Because that will be so ugly if it doesn't work.' But you're putting it in Jane Lynch's hand. I'm so oddly proud of myself when I watch that scene, because I'm watching comedy for comedy's sake, as opposed to "Veronica Mars," where I feel like I'm writing "Heathers."

What are some things you learned from the first season, in terms of things you felt worked and things that didn't?

John: I just don't want us to repeat ourselves. I think we did a pretty good job of arcing out the season, we kept things moving and not too bogged down in a kind of repetitive, all the sort of things you could see being said over and over again. To me, the thing is just to find a new direction to take these characters that doesn't take away what makes the show funny and poignant or whatever. That's why we're looking at new ways to put Henry and Ron and these guys into, not just episodic situations, but overall life situations that give us new material to work with. I think we want to be able to settle in on the combination of the pathos, comedy, farce that seems to really work for the show. One thing that we really liked was the degree to which every episode is a different party and yopu're plunging into a different world. It sounded like a good idea on paper and was easily pitchable, but we weren't sure we could give life to those things. And we did. We got some great guest casts, and it was a way to allow every episode to stand out, and keep pushing that as well.

Rob: There were moments of pretty big, broad comedy, funny for funny's sake, and then there's that dark, painful, this hurts comedy. One of the things we want to do is a better job of blending those things, making sure that there's a combination of those elements. Like Ron's 20th high school reunion -- that's a pretty dark episode. Which is fine, and I love a lot of that material. But I wish we had had some Kyle Bradway daffiness in it. I wish we had had more funny and light stuff to go hand in hand in that episode, so we didn't feel like such an onslaught of our misanthropic tendencies. I like both things, but I just want to make sure that we do a better job, episode by episode, that there are elements of each that they don't tip over. I think the antithesis of that episode is the mobster release party, which is just kind of a fun romp throughout. I think that episode probably pushes us as close to the comedy line. Every show has a boundary of "What universe are you operating in?" I think that takes us as far into the pure comedy range as you'll ever see us. I adore Stephen Weber's performance, but I don't think we can push that any further.

That episode had the vomit joke at the end, and even though I'm tired of so many on-screen vomit jokes in movies these days, I thought that was hilarious.

Rob: A big, huge debate in our universe here, and I'm not sure Fred Savage is happy about it to this day. Fred directed both the porn party episode and Ron's 20th reunion, and Fred was very disappointed that we ended up showing more of the fake penis in porn party. In his cut, you just saw a whisker of it. You just saw Ron's hand stuffing it back, he was worried how fake the prosthetic looked, thought it was funnier the less you showed. I respect that, he could be right. But the rest of us liked the one-second clip where you knew Casey saw the whole thing. But then what I thought was funny, "Okay, Fred, you think that the penis is overdoing it, but you gave us a bathtub of puke." I thought they both were funny, maybe that's my taste. You'll see these people who've worked in the business, very smart people discussing fake vomit and penises.

With the Roman/Kyle rivalry, I think a lot of series would be inclined to make Roman the likable one and Kyle the jerk, and it turned out the other way, for the most part.

Rob: It's the attempt that we consciously make, wanting to tip some storytelling devices on their heads. It's the reason we had Henry and Casey sleep together in episode three. We know that there are going to be enough "Office" comparisons, beyond the obvious that every show on television has delayed gratification with a couple at its center. Kyle is harmless and self-absorbed, and the tragedy of the rest of the crew is that he's the one likely to make it, but he's not a bad guy. The scene of him inviting Constance out to Okey Dog (in "Investor's Dinner"), I thought was a defining moment for him. It's a bit of soul in there. And Roman, he's not a very huggable character.

John: Some of that, I think, has to do with the nature of Ryan, for instance. One of the reasons we have always cast him in stuff is because he really is such a likable presence. That helps his character, it steers him a bit away from being the total cliche of vapid empty-headed actors, that he also has this sweetness to him. And there, again, came out of the natural chemistry between the two of them, especially matched up together as they often tend to be. That was deliberate: Roman matched up against Kyle is always going to lose. I think he's aware of it, and he finds it unfair. That's one of those things I liked about that relationship. There was this comic fatalism to the fact that, even when Roman was correct.

Roman gives you that great moment in the porn episode where he can't stop himself from ruining his shot with the actress who's into dragons.

Rob: Martin is so good in that scene. I've watched that scene just so many times. You can just watch the thought process. You know he knows he should shut his mouth, this girl told him her real name, she's into sci-fi, and he just can't help himself. It's one of my favorite moments.

When did the show start clicking for you?

John: I would probably say either the senior singles or sweet sixteen episodes. I think we just did good scripts where all the things kind of clicked. Tone-wise, they kept us very much in the realm we ended up feeling was the sweet spot for the show. It was the right balance of, there was some plotting, but it's not overly farcical or manic. We liked those episodes

Well, speaking of the level of plotting, it felt like there was just the right amount of continuing storylines, so if you were new to the show, you wouldn't be confused, but if you watched every one, there were small rewards about how, say, Henry and Casey's relationship was evolving.

John: I think that's another thing we pointedly tried to avoid was to make it overly serialized. The impulse is always there, you can sit down, rub your hands together and ask what the big picture is. We did our best to keep it very simple, and down to easily trackable little elements and focus on episodes. Some of that anxiety came from the "Veronica Mars" days, when there was always a tension between how convoluted you want your big picture plot to be, versus episode of the week stuff. But it also frees you up, comedy-wise, if you don't have to be servicing this big plot all the time. I liked being able to keep the carry-over stuff at such a level that you can either address it at the beginning of the episode, and everything else is the fun of what happens. It's enough that you can make a meal of it on its own, but it's never the thing where you're required to deal with. Having never sat down to do straight-up comedy, the biggest panics I ever had was, "There needs to be funny things happening as often as possible," and the more plot you have, the harder it becomes.

How has the experience been with Starz?

Rob: Unbelievably great. It's why I'm pitching them this Austin rock band drama I'm working on. I want to work with those guys. I want to be happy going to work. I want to do a show I'm proud of. Starz gives us notes, they have thoughts on the show, they have thoughts on the script, and we do a number of their notes, but the ones we disagree on that we don't want to do, we never hear from them again. There have maybe been 2 or 3 notes this year where we said we want to do it our way, and they said, "Really, we want you to reconsider this." The reason we have is they've been so genial and supportive. It's just nice doing a show for a network that clearly loves the show and are happy you're doing it with them. This year has taught me that I would be much happier, even if the number of viewers are in the hundreds of thousands, rather than millions, if I can be doing something I'm proud of with a supportive group of people. There are some quirks of working with a network that's new to original programming -- that everything you do is like setting precedent. It's not the factory. In a way that will slow you down, but God, I'll take this experience.

What ideas do you have for parties for next season?

Rob: There was this movie premiere that just happened where the caterers and the event planner got the dates mixed up, and they didn't have supplies. The catering team was literally running to whole foods and buying out there anything that could fit on a cracker, so this high class movie premiere was a disaster. Te really, other than the Edgar Allan Poe movie, don't have anything specific planned yet. I remember a pet wedding being discussed this year, and yet I'm so fearful that this is one that's funnier in the two-word pitch. I'm just not sure that Chriostopher Guest hasn't already nailed crazy dog owners.

I imagine you get a lot of pitches from people you meet.

Rob: It is the funniest thing, though. It's a great cocktail party thing. You can be talking with almost anyone, and they will have an idea for a "Party Down" episode. When we talk to people about the show, everyone gives us, "Oh, I was at this party where..." It's one of those things we're not worried about.

Were the guest roles written with specific people in mind, or did you write the role and then see which favor you could cash in to fill it?

John: I think it was mostly the latter. The only one we knew beforehand were Rico Colantoni in the pilot. Uda was eventually written for Kristen, but it wasn't from the beginning. When we first conceived that party idea and that character, I think it was originally supposed to be a guy. Kristen is good friends with Ryan Hansen, and she came and visited the set and said, "Can I do one?" And we said, "Are you serious?" And we switched it around.

We don't actually find out what Uda did to Ron to make him so afraid of her.

John: I think the idea was just that she was awful to him, in a way that you see he can't really deal with. Certainly, that's something we can explore in a season two. I'm not sure we've got the whole thing quite nailed down yet. If there were ever a prequel of the show, I'm sure we could be kind of amused with the idea of a younger Uda and a younger Ron, working side by side.

It sounds like your guest stars generally had a good time.

John: It was certainly the most fun set I've ever worked on. The actors were all very smart, funny guys who got along well. We never had the money to go over schedule, so it was not mind-crushingly hard work. Having that kind of semi-improvised looseness to it allowed people to step in and not feel like they were just coming in to punch the clock. And we love the idea that the people that did come in and do it just felt free to come in and do what they felt like. They not only delivered these great crazy performances, but also had a good time doing that. Steven Weber was so much fun. He said, "I usually play jerks in suits." I think that gives us a good rep on the street when it comes time to find some more. Certainly, we've gone pretty deep into the "Veronica Mars" rolodex. But I was surprised by how many people outside that world we got as well.

There's always Weevil for next season.

John: This is true. This has been discussed. Click here to read the full post

The love you save may be your own

Blogging's going to be light over the next few days, owing to the holiday weekend, the relative lack of programming, and my own need to take it (relatively) easy after the crazy week I've just had. Tonight, I'll have an interview with the "Party Down" producers to run after the season finale finishes, Sunday night I'll have a "Breaking Bad" review, and I'll have a column and an "In Treatment" season two post-mortem on Monday, but that's it. (That really doesn't look like I'm taking a break, does it? Sigh...)

But before I go radio silent (or radio quiet), I wanted to throw out a question to you guys, related to what happened this week with "Chuck."

Ever since Tuesday, when Ben Silverman credited me with helping to save "Chuck," first on the upfront conference call, then in another interview, I've been getting some good-natured ribbing from other critics and bloggers (many of whom did more than their own fair share in this). Fienberg took to calling me "The Saviour" for a few days. Joe Flint wondered if Silverman gets to fire me if "Chuck" doesn't succeed next year. Other critics have jokingly wondered why I couldn't save one of their favorite shows from years past, going as far back as Tim Reid on "Frank's Place."

And I've been contacted by fans of "My Name Is Earl" (who want Fox to pick it up) and "Life" (who want USA to pick it up) in hopes I could use my alleged show-saving powers on them.

All of which brings me to my question for the holiday weekend, for those of you who are still around your computers over the next few days: if you had the power to both save one show and only one show, and travel back in time if necessary to do that, what would it be? What one show from seasons past -- or even what show that got canceled this year -- would you expend that power on, even if it was just for another season? Even if it was just for another episode? You can't go with a show where the creators ended it on their own terms ("Sopranos," "The Wire," "The Mary Tyler Moore Show"), but anything else is fair game.

Now, I have to assume I used up my own alleged power on "Chuck," and was glad to do it. But if I had a second bullet in this gun? I briefly thought my choice would be "Freaks and Geeks," if only for the chance to see Martin Starr dance like that again. But I think the 18 episodes, which I reviewed a couple of summers ago, are kind of perfect as they are, the ending works as an ending, and I always worry I'd think less of it if it continued and went downhill, even a little.

Then I thought about a show like "Now And Again," which ended on a maddening cliffhanger. But much as I enjoyed that show, and want to know what Glen Gordon Caron would have done with it next, I didn't love it that much.

So I guess I'm going to go with the predictable answer and choose "Deadwood," which is currently in third place in my ranking of HBO's Holy Trinity of Davids, largely because David Milch never got to finish it. Now, there's always the chance that the hypothetical fourth season would have been a mess, as Milch has a tendency to go off the rails at times, and even large parts of season three were problematic (notably the acting troupe and the stuff with Wyatt Earp). But when it was great... man.

So, pick your show and state your case. Click here to read the full post

CW fall schedule announced -- Upfront Week

The CW just announced their fall schedule, and I have the details at NJ.com. Not surprisingly, "Reaper" wasn't picked up, though there's still the chance of the syndication deal. Click here to read the full post

American Idol: Are you ready for the finale?

The two-hour-plus "American Idol" finale is tonight at 8. Due to the deadline to get my column into tomorrow's newspaper in time, I'm basically going to have to be writing throughout the show, so I won't be able to live-blog the finale like I have in past years. So feel free to discuss the show as it airs, who you think should/will win, etc. Just remember to be polite, as I know passions tend to run hot with this show.

UPDATE: As things have worked out, I'm attempting to slip in snark when I can on my Twitter feed.

I'll get a post up as soon as a winner is chosen, and then update it ASAP with my column on who won and why.

UPDATE #2: Winner's been crowned, and I have some thoughts on why he won over at NJ.com. Click here to read the full post

CBS fall schedule announcment

This morning, CBS was the last of the Big 4 networks to present their fall schedule. (The CW goes tomorrow, but they're the CW.) I have the details, and some quotes and analysis, up at NJ.com. Click here to read the full post

Are you ready for the summer?

The 2008-09 network TV season ends tonight at 11 p.m., so it's time to start talking about summer plans for this blog.

When I was growing up, summer TV meant lots of reruns, or watching an endless loop of cheeseball movies like "Just One of the Guys" (pictured above) on HBO. And while we could certainly have some fun discussing those movies(*), the boom in original summer programming, plus the existence of great old series on DVD, means that's no longer the case.

(*) For example, where does Joyce Hyser in "Just One of the Guys" rate on a scale of most to least believable Hollywood drag kings in a continuum that includes Gwyneth Paltrow in "Shakespeare in Love," Amanda Bynes in "She's the Man," Julie Andrews in "Victor/Victoria," Kristin Davis in "Sex and the City," and Cameron Diaz and Drew Barrymore in "Charlie's Angels"? (Streisand in "Yentl" and Swank in "Boys Don't Cry" obviously represent the extreme ends of the continuum.) Discuss.

So look for me to blog on the Summer Burn-Off Theatre run of "Pushing Daisies," on the return of shows like "Burn Notice" and "Mad Men," and on whatever new shows ("Nurse Jackie"? "Hung"?) happen to catch my fancy.

In addition, with the summer TV season just about upon us, it's time to finally get off my rear end and get to those long-promised blog reviews of season two of "The Wire" and of "Sports Night."

The "Wire" reviews will be done the same way I did it last year, with slightly different versions for people who watched all five seasons versus the ones who are watching the show in order and haven't gotten to the later episodes yet. I'm still trying to figure out what kind of schedule makes sense, but Fridays seemed to work well last year.

I still need to figure out "Sports Night." Some people had suggested doing two episodes at a time, both to get through it faster and to simulate the amount of time spent on hourlong rewinds like "The Wire" and "Freaks and Geeks," but between "The Wire," the other summer shows and my desire to finally use some of my accrued vacation time this summer, I think I may be safer to commit to one episode at a time, and we'll get as far as we get before Labor Day. Right now, I'm guessing those reviews will run on Wednesdays.

When I know for sure what the schedule on both will be (allowing, of course, for vacation disruptions), I'll post it here, probably early next week. But I wanted to remind you, as usual, that the blog doesn't go dark in the summer months, and there will be plenty to watch and talk about, plus the return (not today, as I'm too swamped with Upfront Week still) of the open thread discussions people like.

And in lieu of one of those, let me just ask you this: what shows (new, returning, or on DVD) are you most looking forward to watching this summer? Click here to read the full post

Rescue Me, "Play": Road trip? Road trip.

I know I promised to get lengthier in my reviews of "Rescue Me" once we got past the first five episodes, but I'm going to make an exception for "Play" for two reasons: 1)It's Upfront Week, and I'm beyond slammed; and 2)Way too much of "Play" featured Tommy and Janet together, and while this season has managed to rehabilitate a number of characters and relationships, this duo isn't one of them for me, ad I had to start fast-forwarding through their scenes after a while.

Some good stuff with Garrity, and with Lou and Genevieve, but overall this one felt much more like a relic of last season.

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

Glee, "Pilot": Just a small town girl...

As I wrote yesterday, I wasn't very fond of "Glee", but I also recognize that I'm not really in the show's target demo. (At the same time, other series have been known to overcome my demo-inappropriateness, like "Gilmore Girls.") But as I imagine some of you will really enjoy it, or at least want to discuss it, I'm setting up this post.

What did you think? Click here to read the full post

American Idol: Thoughts on the top 2?

As I warned yesterday when I linked to my "American Idol" finale preview, I wasn't sure if I was going to get to watch the final performance show live. I couldn't, so The Star-Ledger's Vicki Hyman filled in for me on "Idol" recap duty.

I did manage to see most of the show, sort of, and the one thing I was struck by was how patronizing all four judges were to Kris after his final performance, basically telling him to be proud he was going to finish second. It wasn't quite as brutal a case of a finalist being thrown under the bus as what Simon said to David Cook last year (which backfired on him, and he had to apologize the next night, no doubt because he knew big David was the winner), but that sequence is going to be more fodder for the people who are convinced the show desperately wants Adam to win.

What do you think? Who did better tonight? And at this late stage, does that even matter, or is it all about fanbases (or anti-fanbases)? Click here to read the full post

Chuck: Chris Fedak vs. the renewal

I have comments from Ben Silverman and Chris Fedak on the "Chuck" renewal up at NJ.com, including the bizarre moment when Silverman told me "It's because of you" that "Chuck" is back(*). After the jump, the transcript of my conversation with Fedak:

(*) Keep in mind that I was also the first one asking a "Chuck" question. While I wrote my open letter, credit should go to a whole lot of people, including Mo Ryan, Give Me My Remote, Fienberg, Joe Adalian, Chuck TV, and, especially, Wendy Farrington, who came up with the Subway campaign in the first place.

Anyway, on to Fedak...

How you feeling?

Feeling great. Josh (Schwartz) and I and the entire cast and crew are so excited to be coming back. We were so excited to continue this story, keep telling Chuck Bartowski adventures.

How close do you think the show came to not coming back?

I think there was always the chance that we would not show up on the schedule. I'm a neurotic person by nature, and a nervous person by nature. The fact that there wasn't an announcement (at the NBC "infront" earlier this month), there was definitely cause for concern. But I was emboldened by the fact that we had such great critical support, and we had the best fans in the universe.

And they all went to Subway.

That was such a great idea. When it comes to great ideas for promoting the show, that was an excellent idea.

When you did that initial scene where Morgan bought Big Mike the sandwich, did you have any idea it might lead to this?

I don't think we thought that that integration would be one of the lynchpins of us returning for a third season.

How will the expanded sponsorship deal with Subway work?

We're still hashing out the details of how that's going to work. But we're excited. Looking at the last two seasons, we've always had fun with the idea of product integration.

Are we going to see a character working at Subway, like Sarah, or Morgan, if the Benihana thing falls through?

That's a possibility

There were all these reports that the pick-up was going to lead to a tighter budget. Is that going to happen?

I think if you look at TV shows across the board, there's been contraction for most shows. However, for any type of budget cuts we've looked at, Josh and I are committed to delivering the same show. The same level of entertainment you guys saw last season, you'll get next year.

Well, what's the situation with the cast going to be? Will everyone be back? Will they be in every episode?

We look forward to bringing our cast back. Because the episode order is for 13, we need to tell our story in a little different way, so you might not see every one of our castmembers in every episode, but that means when we do see them, they'll get more time in that particular story.

(NOTE: Most of the supporting cast wasn't in every episode for season two, either, so this may not be that big of a change.)

You and Josh had already mapped out season three's storyline when you thought you might be doing 22 episodes. How much does the 13-episode order change that plan?

It doesn't change.

Well, one of the things that was great about this past season was that, while you told a lot of big story arc episodes, you were also able to do standalones like "Chuck vs. Tom Sawyer" that had little to do with anything but were a lot of fun. Will you still be able to do that if you're squeezing things into 13?

Yes, we will have room to do standalone episodes. I think that it doesn't change the overall story, but it does change how we structure the story, but we still will do standalone episodes.

Ben also said there's a chance he might order more than 13 and extend you into the summer. Would you be prepared for that?

We are prepared for that if it happens. It just means that we tell more story.

How concerned are you about being off the air for so long?

Obviously, 10 months is a long time. But it is exciting to come back with the idea of the Winter Olympics as a launching pad. We had a long break because of the strike going into season two, and season two was fantastic. We look forward exceeding everyone's expectations for a mid-season launch.

Ben mentioned a plan to give the show a presence online in the fall. What do you know about that?

We're in very preliminary discussions on that at this point.

Given how vague you were when we talked after the finale, I'm guessing you don't want to say too much more about next season. But given how long we're all going to have to wait, is there anything you can tell the fans about next season that might in some way sate their appetites?

I will say this: Season three will not be lacking in romance. Click here to read the full post

NBC renews 'Chuck,' announces fall schedule - Upfront Week

NBC just put out their schedule release, and "Chuck" is on it -- albeit not airing until March (post-Olympics), Mondays at 8. More details of the whole schedule over at NJ.com. I'm going on the NBC conference call in a few minutes, and I'm going to talk with Chris Fedak after that, so look for one or two more posts on this later today. Click here to read the full post

ABC fall schedule announced - Upfront Week

ABC just announced their fall schedule. I'm jumping on the conference call right now, but you can read all the details at NJ.com, and I'll be back later with quotes and analysis.

UPDATE: Take two is now up on NJ.com Click here to read the full post

In Treatment: Week six in review

For the next-to-last time this season, I'm going to be looking at all five episodes of "In Treatment" at once, offering a brief overview of the week and then going patient-by-patient. Spoilers coming up just as soon as I'm placed on hold...

"It's not about you, Paul. They're human beings. They're struggling with profound problems. If only you could find courage to sit with the fact that what we do is hard, and sometimes it makes you feel like an idiot. It's a humbling profession, and if you lack anything as a therapist, it's humility." -Gina

Because "In Treatment" is a scripted drama and not a documentary, Paul's makes more progress, and faster progress, than a real therapist would. While he really only "cured" one of last season's patients (Sophie), he consistently achieved breakthroughs with them over the course of that season. (Mr. Prince would argue that Paul was too successful with Alex, which is why his son is dead and not flying jets.) And here, in this shorter season, Paul has done remarkable work with a group of patients who often fight him kicking and screaming every step of the way.

But as Gina says in the line I quoted above, therapy is often a lot trickier than that. The process doesn't always work, the patients don't always want to let it work, and sometimes outside circumstances conspire to prevent Paul from accomplishing much of anything at all.

And so it feels right, and moving, to see a week in which Paul repeatedly, and painfully, smacked up against the limits of his profession, encountered one scenario after another where his training seemed to be of little use. By the end of the week, it was no surprise he was ranting to Gina about his desire to chuck it all and become "a life coach."

Also, while we may be at the it-goes-without-saying point on the genius of these performances, holy cow was everyone amazing this week. A few specific points on that as we go patient-by-patient...

Mia

"Why did she give up? Okay, she was sick for a year. But after that, why didn't she fight harder to be my mother? How come nobody sticks by me?" -Mia

As Paul says to Gina, what can he really do for Mia? The things that Mia wants -- children, and a husband to raise them with -- are almost beyond her now. There's still a chance she could find the right man, and they could adopt, etc., etc., but it'll be a struggle all the way. But at the same time, as Gina notes, the only way Mia even has a chance for that to happen is if Paul can help her learn to let love and affection into her life, to not be so guarded.

Now, when Amy had her miscarriage in Paul's office last season, I didn't like that choice (even though I'm guessing it came from the Israeli version), as I thought the more interesting choice would be for Jake and Amy to realize that a baby didn't come close to curing all the ills of their marriage. But here, I was okay with Mia's condition turning out to be a false positive (does anyone still use the term "hysterical pregnancy"?), because far more than Amy, so much of Mia's unhappiness is genuinely tied up in this lack of a child. Having one wouldn't solve all her problems, either, but it would solve enough of them that, in "In Treatment" terms, it wouldn't give Paul enough to work with to make for good TV.

And while helping her cope with the realization that her fantasy of being a mom was just that, and might always be, Paul also started to make significant progress on helping her deal with the underlying issues that have likely kept her from succeeding in previous relationships. He still hasn't gotten Mia to drop her idealized view of her daddy, but he did at least get her to start re-examining her belief that her mother is to blame for all her problems.

All the patients are, in some ways, a reflection on Paul, and here we got to see him apply a lesson he'd learned from Gina about the unreliability of childhood memory -- of editing your own mental autobiography and learning to believe the altered details -- and show Mia how maybe, just maybe, her mother wanted to reach out to her, but her father made that impossible.

Two great acting moments to highlight here: first Hope Davis as Mia sitting on the couch and debating whether to follow Paul into his office, as if crossing that threshold would make the therapy session real, as opposed to this impromptu waiting room chat she could pretend was just two friends chatting; and then Gabriel Byrne as Paul learning that this was no miscarriage at all and understanding the depths of Mia's pain.

April

"I don't believe in anything anymore. I don't believe in love, or my mother, or my body, or you. Because of all this stupid therapy, I don't even believe in myself anymore. I literally have no idea why I should get out of bed in the morning." -April

Wow.

One of the limitations of the series' format is the difficulty in showing an event like Paul at the hospital with April, calling her mother in. It could have been done, but it would have had to be clumsily shoehorned into someone else's episode. So instead, we learn about it after the fact, as the episode opens with Paul and April as physically far apart in the TV frame as possible, her arms crossed, her attitude sullen and chilly. At first, I assumed she was still mad at him for not wanting to take her to chemo anymore, but instead it was this whole other story, with Paul making a choice to violate the one cardinal request April had made of him.

And I understand why he did it -- just as, I think, April finally did by the end of the session, even though she didn't want to admit it. But her level of anger with him, and his frustration with her, led to some amazingly raw acting from both Byrne and Alison Pill. (Pill also had some hilarious black comic moments, like her delivery of "I don't understand: are you for this woman or against her?" She's at the can-do-no-wrong stage for me.)

What we're seeing here, as we saw last week, and as we'll see in the Oliver episode, is that, while Paul's desire to play savior with his patients is admirable, it also creates problems that a more professionally-distanced therapist like Gina simply wouldn't have. April has come to think of Paul as much more than her therapist, and she feels flat-out betrayed by him. No matter how much she might objectively understand why Paul did what he did, it still hurts too much for her to deal with.

And then comes that moment at the end, when she physically can't get herself up off the couch, and has to ask for help from this man whose help she's not sure she wants anymore. Mortifying, devastating, and brilliantly-played.

Oliver

"You can't help me." -Oliver

And this one hurt -- badly.

With Mia or April or even Walter, Paul at least has the hope that he can do something for them emotionally, even if he can't solve their bigger problem (Mia's loneliness, April's cancer, Walter's career). Here, he has completely and utterly failed to do anything to help Oliver -- not through any fault of his own, but just because Bess and Luke are such selfish, messed-up, oblivious twits that they have created a situation -- where Bess takes Oliver away from the city altogether so she can take this new job -- that no therapist could fix. Paul can rail against them, can cross all kinds of professional lines with them, can flat-out yell, "You have got to figure out a way to look after your son!," but there's no getting through to them. As Oliver realizes, neither of them wants him, and he's stuck with the one who doesn't want him less than the other one.

And the hell of it is, Oliver has grown to like and trust Paul so much that, like April, he can't see him as a doctor anymore, but a father figure. And so of course he pleads with Paul to stay with him, and there's nothing Paul can tell him -- that it's ethically unkosher (I think it is, anyway), or that once Oliver went from being his patient to being his foster son, Paul would likely become just as distant with him as he's been with his own kids -- to ease the pain of being rejected by another parental figure, and especially by the one parental figure who actually seems to like him.

There was a finality to that scene on the playground (beautifully shot by director Paris Barclay) that has me feeling, sadly, like this is the last we'll see of Oliver. Last year, we saw a few episodes towards the end without certain patients, and I could see us getting a "Wednesday" episode in the final week that has nothing to do with Oliver at all. (Maybe Paul's court hearing?)

But dammit, it stinks that it had to come to this for the kid.

Walter

"I'm not supposed to malfunction, Paul. That's for other people." -Walter

Wow, and then double wow.

The closing sequence, with Walter doubled over and bawling and wrapping his arms around Paul's leg like a little boy clutching his daddy, was among the most affecting scenes of this incredible week. In fact, I loved it so much, I asked "In Treatment" showrunner Warren Leight (who's been writing most of the Walter episodes of late) about its origins, since he'd alluded to it when I interviewed him before the season. Here's what he had to say:

The truth is, I had been hoping for Walter to breakdown in front of Paul for a few episodes: week four, right after he'd been fired, and week five, in the hospital after his suicide attempt. What was fascinating to me was Mahoney's first take on those two episodes. His Walter stumbled, but he didn't breakdown. And even stayed confrontational. So, after week four, I wrote week five, set it in the hospital, and waited for a breakdown which never came (the Israeli week five was a one on one session between Paul and Walter's daughter discussing her spiritual quest in India, and her lesbianism, I believe. There was no suicide attempt).

After week five, I thought, Walter's defenses are crumbling, but they are all he has, and he won't go down without a fight. So I wrote week six with that in mind. When I got to the last line from Paul, about how the other Walter is the one who wants to live, I thought, 'OK, this will work.' And it did. We had a long talk on the set about the false self and the true self, and how often people split off from themselves to please others or to survive. This seemed to resonate with both actors.

The grabbing of Paul's leg was a spontaneous gesture on Mahoney's part. After the first take, Gabriel came up to me and Paris and said, basically, "How am I supposed to sit in the chair when the man is falling apart in front of me?" He asked if he could go over to Walter, we said yes, and we all decided not to tell John that would be happening. John reacted in the moment, and I think it's one of their strongest moments. Week seven then had to be rethought, to acknowledge, or deny, what had happened in week six.

John would've gone there earlier if we'd asked, but I trusted his instincts. It would take someone like Walter a very long time and a huge amount of pressure before he'd drop his defenses. Older men don't come to therapy easily.

Am I the only one who finds it really cool that the writer of the episode was trying just as hard to get Mahoney to open up as Paul was trying with Walter? In the end, it all played out perfectly, so I'm glad Mahoney had the instincts he did; Walter crying pre-suicide attempt, or even right after, wouldn't have had nearly as much power as it did after this long wait.

Other than Walter's breakdown, the most interesting part of the episode to me was the comment by Walter's shrink from the hospital, about how Paul maybe opened a Pandora's Box he shouldn't have with Walter. That's what he arguably did with Alex, and what I was worried about in the early episodes of this season. I think the "other Walter" does deserve to come out after all this time, but I can't help but wonder if the Walter who came to Paul as a patient will be better off this way.

Gina

"I really think that you're acting like an a--hole. I really think that you're a therapist who has remarkably little insight into your own behavior. You are so self-absorbed. You are so entitled. You come in here and you spout the same old bulls--t!" -Gina

Triple wow.

What's usually so wonderful about Dianne Wiest's performance as Gina is the extreme control she displays in front of Paul -- both how she manipulates him where she wants him to go, but how she keeps her own emotions buttoned up tight. While Paul is obviously more demonstrative with Gina than he is with his patients, it's more of a matter of degree; it's not stunning that the guy who occasionally loses his patience with the likes of Luke and Bess might explode even more when outside the confines of his role as a therapist. So to see Gina finally, after two seasons of goading from Paul, lose it and unload on him... amazing. I usually take meticulous, near-transcribed notes of these episodes, but when we got to Gina's outburst, I put the computer down, except to jot down an occasional line or two, because I didn't want to miss a second of this when I might be otherwise distracted by making sure my notes were correct.

After all of Paul's failures during the week, Gina argues pretty convincingly for the value of what they do, and hopefully we won't see him asking for the letter back next week. But things got really, fascinatingly, ugly there for a little while, didn't they?

Finally, I want to say that I've written all of the above without watching the final week's worth of episodes. I hope to get to those in the next few days, depending on my Upfront Week schedule, and to maybe talk to Warren Leight for a season post-mortem interview. I don't know what the future is for the show, or for these patients, but it feels like there's too much left to deal with in each case for the show to wrap up anybody's story the way that season one did, in one way or another, with all of its patients. I'd like to think this year leaves things a little more ambiguously, whether or not there's going to be a third season, and whether or not any or all of these four characters would be a part of it.

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

How I Met Your Mother. "The Leap": Carter Bays Q&A

Because of all the time demands on me during Upfront Week, I won't be able to do a proper review of the "How I Met Your Mother" fourth season finale, "The Leap," save to say that I really enjoyed it, and that my opinion on the various romantic storylines (specifically, about the ongoing necessity, or lack thereof, to focus on the search for the Mother) is unchanged from previous episode reviews.

But in lieu of a review, I've got a Q&A I did last week with "HIMYM" co-creator Carter Bays, where we talk about all the big developments in the finale:

Let's start with by far the most important question raised by the finale: how did you decide that this would be the joke involving the goat? And what were the other goat ideas?

We always knew it was going to be a fight. That was set up very early on in the fight episode, when Ted sort of makes a reference to Ted fighting the goat. The other ideas were the degrees to which we would take the idea of Ted fighting the goat. And that was off us having ideas and our production staff saying, "No way." There were going to be wires at one point, "Matrix"-style special effects, and we negotiated it down to a puppet goat.

After all this time, do you feel like this was a satisfying resolution to that gag?

I think so. Nothing's going to ever satisfy. It's hard to build something up for that long, but it was certainly fun to shoot and be funny. I think we got away with it in terms of realism versus the fantastical.

I love that Ted goes through the rest of the episode with the goat's hoof print on his forehead.

Maybe the rest of the series, who knows?

So where do Robin and Barney stand now?

That's a good question. This episode, I think, kicks the door down for the barney and Robin romance. We have some ideas. Our big challenge as writers is "What would that be like?" We have some ideas of that would be like. Obviously, it won't be as easy as they're just boyfriend/girlfriend now.

Barney knew going into the season that he had feelings for Robin; what do you feel he and she had to go through this year to get to this point?

Robin's journey was a little more internal. We didn't explore it as much as Barney's. We've seen her in a relationship, she made the journey with Ted, going from the single person to someone who can open up to another person. It was kind of about Barney's side. It was like leaving it a mystery where Robin stands. That's what made it exciting, not knowing what the answer would be. We still kind of don't know what the answer is. I like the ambiguity of, "On what level is she saying that she doesn't want to be in a relationship or she does?" I like that we decided to give ourselves season five to explore that.

And what had to happen to Barney to get him to this point?

It's sort of a slow build over the series. Seeing his best friend get engaged, and seeing Marshall and Lily's relationship blossom. Over the course of the series, this has been something that's been simmering for Barney.

Well, there was that nice moment at the end of "Right Place Right Time" where he rips up the list of his 200 conquests and looked hopefully towards Robin, like he was finally ready for her.

That was definitely what that moment was about. It was a nice way to see Barney giving up something immature and move towards maturity. Not too close to it, though,

So does this mean that we've seen the last of Barney trying to seduce other women?

I'm sure that won't be the case. I think you sort of established where Barney stands with this in the first episode of the season. It's the scorpion and the toad. There will always be a part of him that's a flirt. It'll be about him trying to reconcile the two parts of himself.

Was there anything that had to be done differently with this storyline as Cobie's pregnancy advanced?

It didn't feel like it. I'm sure subconsciously there were things we were keeping ourselves from doing. The last few episodes, we definitely tried to go easy on her. She was getting along. It's pretty tough to go into work every day when you're tucking a baby in your belly.

While I'm sure it was a hassle to have to write around the pregnancies, and then around Alyson's absence, one of the nice things was seeing so much emphasis on the Marshall/Barney friendship. Is that something we'll be seeing more of in the future?

We've always loved getting those two together. They're very funny, just goofballs together. It always feels like the Three Stooges when those two are together. I think one of the wonderful things about our show, and we're excited to have Aly back, is that every two-person combination we've done has its own energy and can be equally fun and entertaining. Like, Marshall and Robin, we realized this year that we hadn't done any good Jason and Cobie stories, and we did two of them back to back, they were great together.

In terms of the mother, we know now that the mom is in Ted's architecture class. That gives you a lot of leeway; how aggressively do you intend to pursue this next season?

It's funny. We're hoping to take a long time with this story. That will be addressed in the first episode of the season. The mother is in the classroom, there's definitely no trickery there, but it's not going to be as easy.

So, is it a situation where he's going to be dating a lot of his students, or will we be on alert the first time he does that?

I'm not sure. We haven't figured it out yet. We want to be careful, don't want to string it out.

At this point, is the reveal of the mother's identity something you're going to save for the end of the series? Or has the show evolved enough that you could introduce her, have her be Ted's girlfriend or wife, and just keep telling stories about all these characters?

I'm always hesitant to answer that question, because if I give my personal preference, it's kind of a spoiler. But it's definitely evolved beyond that. It's definitely a show about these five friends. I don't think we need to focus on the framing device. It's funny, when we did the yellow umbrella last week, it was like, "Wow, we forgot all about this," and we had written it. I kind of like our lazy, rollicking pace, making it a really windy story.

Do you ever feel like the title is a hindrance in some way, like you're beholden to that part of the story?

I don't think I've experienced that. Often, we'll pretty easily forget the name of the show that we're writing and just tell good stories. It's hard to know how people are watching it. I know there are some people who come to the show every week with the hope, "Tell me how he met the mother," but we've created a big universe for ourselves, but that's just one element, and there's a lot of other stuff to explore.

Are we done with the umbrella? Has it served its purpose?

It still very much has a role. It's kind of in now way served its purpose. The fact that he was holding the yellow umbrella meeting Stella was kind of a red herring. We did want to signal in that scene that this is part of the story, and that's why we put it in that scene, but it will be tangibly involved in him meeting the mother. When he said two years ago that "the story of your mom's yellow umbrella is the story of how I met your mother," he meant it, and so did we.

There was that scene in the episode where Ted acquired the umbrella where he bumps into some random woman at the club on St. Patrick's Day, and the camera lingers on it longer than you'd expect for something so minor. A lot of fans are convinced that's because the random woman was, in fact, the mother. Are the people who keep talking about that like the "Sopranos" fans who kept waiting for the Russian to come back, or are they onto something?

I can't say one way or the other, whether that's the mom or not. It was artistically significant just to show Ted bump into a girl. Maybe one of these girls in the club could be the mom.

Or maybe that was it: maybe that was the Russian from "The Sopranos" after a sex change.

Can Barney drive?

Yes. It's hard to go back to this, but that scene took place in the past. In the Fiero episode, what we were seeing was a flashback to before that. We established that he had a BMW at the end of season one. Barney can drive. He was just a late learner. I'm sure if you put that (in this interview), someone will find a way to prove me wrong. We had that discussion, but it felt like it fits. We had stuff in (last week's) episode that we had to cut out for time where Barney talks about how he didn't start driving until late. So he was learning new things about driving like you can talk your way out of the speeding tickets.

This is two season finales in a row where someone's wound up in the hospital and Barney had an epiphany about Robin. Coincidence?

It is a coincidence, though we highlighted it by casting the same orderly both years. That's another thing we were going to do a joke about but we couldn't get around to. There's something nice about bookending Barney looking at Robin that way for the first time and actually kissing her and telling her he loves her in a hospital room. Sort of the way that Ted and Stella's first scene this season was them sitting in a driving game and their last scene was in a car together.

Last week's episode established that Tony's movie, "The Wedding Bride," will be coming out in May 2010. Should we be expecting an episode about that?

We have some preliminary ideas for it. We have a whole story built around it.

Ted was originally modeled on you, and Marshall on Craig. How far have those characters evolved from that? Do you ever sit around and say, "I wouldn't do that" or "We wouldn't do that to each other"?

Ted certainly isn't me anymore. I haven't been engaged, or had a lot of the other experiences he's had. It's more the characters have become themselves .We definitely do try to ask ourselves, "Would this happen to us? Would this happen to someone we know?" for all the characters. We try to keep them personal and real, but there's more overlap now. I relate to Marshall as much as I do to Ted.

Well, the reason I ask is because the writing has been more overt this year about how Ted can act like a douche sometimes, and I was wondering if that was something you were comfortable with.

I think I'm way more of a douche than Ted. No, I allow for that part of the show to be fictional.

Alan Sepinwall may be reached at asepinwall@starledger.com Click here to read the full post

'American Idol' finale preview - Sepinwall on TV

Like an episode of "Early Edition," you're getting tomorrow's newspaper story today, as I preview the "American Idol" finale and look back on what went right and, mostly, wrong this season:

"American Idol" is a show that's more or less idiot proof, as demonstrated by how interesting the end of this season promises to be despite all the backstage idiocy leading up to it.

There have been tweaks aplenty, virtually all of them blowing up in the show's face, and yet here at the end, we have the most compelling, and maybe evenly matched, finale the show has had in several seasons.

I may be away from a TV set tomorrow night for the final performance show, but Vicki Hyman is lined up to pinch-hit again at NJ.com, and there's always always Fienberg, Throwing Things, etc. And with "Lost" wrapped from the year, I'll be covering Wednesday night's finale myself. Click here to read the full post

Upfront Week: Fox's fall schedule

Fox just officially announced their fall schedule, and the alleged mid-season one (though we know that one is always written in pencil and subject to major changes before we get to January). I have both schedules, and the full press release, up at NJ.com. About to start a conference call with the execs from Fox, and I'll likely do a second NJ.com post with quotes and analysis when that's done, so check back there (or here for a link) in an hour or two.

UPDATE: Take two is now up at NJ.com. Click here to read the full post

In Plain Sight, "Aguna Matatala": Get outta here!

It's Upfront Week, so I'm going to be terse with a lot of my non-schedule-related posts over the next few days. I quite liked last night's "In Plain Sight," as it dealt with a couple of WitSec-specific problems (how do you deal with divorce, and what happens if your cultural background is unusual enough to be noticed in your new home?), and had a funny turn by Richard Schiff (even if he did overplay the accent a little).

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

'Glee' review - Sepinwall on TV

In today's column, I review Fox's "Glee," which I wasn't a big fan of. Beyond the fact that I'm not exactly the target demo, it also reminded me too much of aspects of Ryan Murphy's other shows ("Nip/Tuck," "Popular") that I tired of quickly. Your mileage may, of course, vary. Click here to read the full post