Friday Night Lights

My decision to start watching this show was based on some advice, or rather a command, from Kristin. I love her column for many reasons, but if I ever meet her, the one thing that I will make sure to profess my undying gratitude for was her urging me to watch Friday Night Lights.
I did enjoy the movie from a couple of years ago, and I have liked Peter Berg (writer/director of the film and executive producer for the show) ever since he was a guest star on Alias. But neither of those facts prepared me for the attachment I would feel for these characters, even from the very first episode. My favorites are without a doubt Coach Taylor and his wife, but everyone else, from Riggins to Matt Saracen's grandma, adds something special to the overall feel of the show. I have such respect for all of the actors because of how real they make the people and town of Dillon, Texas, which I'm sure has a lot to do with the fact that they often do scenes without following the script exactly. What comes out ends up being so genuine you just forget that you're watching television.
I do, however, agree with some of the criticism about Season 2. Ken Tucker, a writer for Entertainment Weekly, put it perfectly when he said, "Here’s the thing about Friday Night Lights so far this season: You have to pour everything you know and love about these characters from last season into these hollow versions of the same characters this season, because the show has become all about its melodramatic subplots, and not about people. Remember when we could happily spend whole segments just watching Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton debate, argue, make up, and crack each other up? Remember when a high point of an FNL hour was overhearing Landry and Matt (Matt Saracen! How much we miss you and your shy, halting talk this season!) bicker and joke about silly things? No one behind the scenes is writing that kind of dialogue anymore, or letting enough time play out in any given scene for us to become emotionally reinvested with these people."

Here's hoping that this season regains some of its old life- one that's full of heart. Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose!


Last scene of Season 1

Viva Laughlin

I was so excited about this show 6 months ago. I mean, they showed all those cool previews during the Tony's, and Hugh Jackman was in it, which is pretty much all I need to know to watch anything. The premise of a musical crime-drama seemed...interesting. But again, Hugh was going to be singing, so I didn't really ask any questions. The reviews leading up to the premiere were horrible, but I chose to ignore them, hoping that the critics were wrong about this one. All I can say is- Oh NO. I could barely even get through the first episode. Hugh did sing, but I could barely even hear his voice because the original song was playing at the same time. Not cool.

I wanted so much for the show to be a success because even though Hugh was only going to be a guest star and not a member of the regular cast, it was produced by his company, Seed Productions. He is so amazing, and I want all of his projects to do well. But even I was glad to hear yesterday that the show was canceled. Maybe now people will forget that this ever happened, Hugh's career will continue to thrive, and Eric Winter (who played the police officer investigating the murder of that rich dude) can get his cute self back over to Brothers & Sisters. He belongs there with Kevin.

Now I'm going to go listen to The Boy from Oz soundtrack and be incredibly happy.

The Office

Last night's episode, "Money," was what I had been waiting for all summer. The first 3 hours of the season have been alright- I mean, they definitely had their moments of hilarity- but they just seemed inconsistent. I felt like by putting all 4 hour-long episodes at the very beginning of the season, the writers were having to stretch the stories out instead of packing the funny stuff in. But fear not! The Office is back.

My favorite parts from this episode:
1) The intro. Yay for Michael's Meryl Streep impersonation ("Get me Armani on the phone. Where is Armani? Too slow. You're not going to Paris. I'm so much better than you.") and yay for Pam figuring out what "manushka" meant ("Mo cuishle! He's watching Million Dollar Baby... He's gonna try to kill me."
2) The conversation about the correct usage of whoever/whomever. ("Nobody asked you anything ever, so whomever's name is Toby, why don't you take a letter opener and stick it in your skull?")
3) Jim and Pam. A night at Schrute Farms with a Harry Potter bedtime story. And the first AMAZING kiss we've gotten to see. Apparently, Jim is really passionate about Italian food. In fact, he's in love with Italian food.


"Whomever" scene

Brothers & Sisters

My new obsession is this amazingly beautiful show about the complicated relationships of the Walker family. It is so heartfelt and funny and well-acted that I fell in love with every single one of these people. This is not an exaggeration: Senator McCallister (Rob Lowe) is one of my favorite characters in all of the television that I have ever watched. Aside from the fact that he is absolutely gorgeous, he is so charming that I found myself replaying his scenes just because they made me feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside. And extremely giggly on the outside, as my mother can attest to.

I really don't know how it took me so long to get around to adopting this show. I mean, its executive producer is Ken Olin, whose work on Alias as a director/producer was amazing. I think it might have something to do with the fact that B & S started last year at the same time as 6 Degrees, and they seemed so similar to me from all the promos that I saw. I decided that if I had to pick one, I would choose 6 Degrees because it was J.J. Abrams' show (this was at a time when my anger towards J.J. had not yet been fully realized-- *see previous post, "Rescue Me," for explanation). Needless to say since that show is no longer on the air, but I was disappointed.

Anyways...Partially out of my boredom from doing homework and partially because of the fortuitous and random nature of my moods to watch certain shows, I thought now would be as good a time as any to see how much I like Brothers & Sisters. If it's great, I'll have something to watch after Desperate Housewives. 7 days and 26 episodes later- I'm completely hooked. I love everything: from the sweet family moments that made me tear up on several occasions and the hilarious bantering between the brothers and sisters, to the insane drama that occurred throughout the season (Ohmygosh, I can't believe their dad died. And he had an affair. And he had another kid. And now she's living with Nora.) and the meaningful lessons about the importance of family and about living life to the fullest.

All of the Walkers bring something unique and wonderful to the dynamic of the show. Nora is the heart of the family. She loves all of her children so much but is constantly having pointless little fights with them. Sarah can be pretty moody, yet at the same time she is a strong and intelligent woman. Kitty, whom I personally adore, shares my love for Ronald Reagan (and my newfound love for Senator McCallister). She's brilliant and witty and reverts to this cute childish behavior when dealing with her siblings. Tommy takes a while to get to know, but now I've seen how sweet and mature and endearing he can be. Kevin is awesome. There's really no other way to describe him. All I know is that I would love to have him as a brother. Justin seems like such an idiot at first when he's strung out all the time, but he has grown so much since then that I almost forget about his moronic addiction phase. He's an amazing uncle to Paige and Cooper, a loving brother to his siblings, and a great son to his mother, even though he has to endure being treated like the child who always needs to be taken care of. The supporting characters- Saul, Joe, Julia, Rebecca, Robert, et al- sometimes get lost in the heat of the Walker family arguments and mayhem, but they each play a valuable role in the overall scheme of the show.

Okay, I realize how much I am rambling right now. I think I have made my point that I think the show is fantastic and engaging and deserving of all kinds of praise. In conclusion, I love Senator McCallister. He is dreamy. The end.

Reaper

I am very much inclined never to watch anything on The CW again, more as a matter of principle than because I believe they will actually get the message that they suck from my personal boycott of the network. After all, they made 2 big mistakes last year that solidified their place as the worst decision-makers in television programming history.

Firstly, they were unwilling to negotiate with Amy Sherman-Palladino for the last season of Gilmore Girls, meaning that the entire essence of the show disappeared. Not only that, but they couldn't make up their minds whether they wanted to renew the show for another season, or possibly a half-season. As a result, when they finally said no to any new episodes, there was very little time to give closure to the story and the series finale was a complete dud.

Their second mistake was with regard to Veronica Mars. I don't know if the network execs realized what a fan following that show had, or maybe they did but the ratings just weren't good enough. Needless to say- Kristen Bell and the rest of the cast could have continued to make great tv for longer than 3 seasons. Creator Rob Thomas even pitched the idea for a Extreme Makeover: Veronica Mars Edition that would have taken us a few years into the future with Veronica doing her thing for the F.B.I. From what I could tell during the deliberation period where the fates of shows are decided, the people at The CW considered it, wavered on it, and then pulled the plug at the last possible minute. Similar to the aforementioned situation, the end result: a very unsatisfying series finale.

Okay, now that I'm down off my soapbox, I will stop ranting about how anyone can possibly decide that The Pussycat Dolls are more worthy of being renewed than GG and VM (as my high school teacher, Mrs. Plosser, would say- this is the great dumbing down of America). Anyways, I watched Reaper in spite of my feelings for The CW and found it entertaining. Not amazing, not award-worthy, but funny enough that I will probably continue to watch it. The main character's best friend had some great one-liners ("Now you're this cool devil man with your Jedi mind trick!"), definitely showing the influence of Kevin Smith, who directed the pilot episode. I mean, it wasn't much of an original idea- the concept felt a lot like Dogma- but I enjoyed it.

Chuck + Heroes

There is a character on Chuck named Captain Awesome.
Nathan and Peter Petrelli are both alive.
All is well.

To elaborate:
I decided to watch Chuck because Kristin, my hero and television guru from E!, recommended it, as well as the fact that some of the previews leading up to the premiere compared it to Alias. It is definitely going to be added to the color-coded t.v. schedule on my wall. I thought it was adorably funny and was glad to see that it doesn't take itself too seriously. The characters are all very endearing and I really enjoyed the episode in general.
(P.S.- I was very glad to see Adam Baldwin again. There's so much of those Firefly boys going on right now! In addition to Adam on this show, Nathan Fillion is joining the cast of Desperate Housewives this season, which is super exciting, and Alan Tudyk did a great job as the doctor in 3:10 to Yuma.)
The season 2 premiere of Heroes seemed more like an ordinary episode than a get-pumped-up-for-the-new-season premiere. I liked getting caught up with all my peeps, but I didn't really get into it until the last few minutes. At least the end was freakin' cool- I was all like, *gasp* "HRG and Mohinder are conspiring to bring down The Company! Somebody just threw Hiro's dad off a roof! Peter's alive!!" That's how it went down. Hiro is still his cute, little, heroic self, and now he gets to run through fields with Sark. What could be better?

Not much.
:)

The Real Emmy Winners

I have a few theories about what happened to the Emmys this year. The members of the Academy of Television whatever-their-name-is A) have never watched television in their lives, or B) were abducted by some evil Commie agency and replaced by people that have never watched television in their lives. Or C) I was dreaming the entire thing and when I wake up tomorrow none of this will be real. The only parts of the entire show that I would let myself enjoy were Steve Carell's presentation and Stephen Colbert's and Jon Stewart's presentation. Congratulations, Emmys. Try though you did to ruin everything, you couldn't keep 3 of the funniest people alive from being funny. From Ryan Seacrest to the theatre-in-the-round stage to the mostly insane choices of winners, this was without a doubt the worst awards show I have ever watched. Therefore, I have decided not to accept them. That's right, denial is my only position with regards to this year's Emmys. If anybody asks me the results of a certain category, they will only receive the outcome from my ideal world. Here's how the 59th Primetime Emmy Awards really happened!
Host: Conan O'Brien
Stage: Rectangular (But I'll keep that little trapdoor thing, because that was pretty cool)
Supporting Actor- Comedy: Rainn Wilson, The Office
Supporting Actor- Drama: Michael Emerson, LOST
Supporting Actress- Comedy: Jenna Fischer, The Office
Supporting Actress- Drama: Sandra Oh, Grey's Anatomy
Actor- Comedy: Steve Carell, The Office
Actress- Comedy: America Ferrara, Ugly Betty
Actor- Drama: James Gandolfini, The Sopranos
Actress- Drama: Kyra Sedgwick, The Closer
Comedy Series: The Office
Drama Series: The Sopranos


Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert presenting the award for Best Comedy Actor