TV Roundup this week

[yendi]

Monster House -- Good episode, and a nice rule change to make up for Steve screwing the crew over (both by doing no background check on the "electrician" and by adding a new addition on Thursday). Not my favorite house from the show, but still fun. Now, next week's Las Vegas House, though, looks great.

Smallville -- They're not even pretending to be anything but trash anymore. Crappy plotting, no attempt to hit comic continuity properly (I mean, Morgan Edge hiring Clark Kent, even under an assumed name, will figure out who this Superman dude is some years later), bad Fight Club/Castaway rip-offs, soap-opera character shifts (Lex's wife), etc. On the other hand, no show is more fun to make fun of. Once Lex and Clark get back to Smallville, we can even have the gay sex storylines again (how the hell did they avoid that with the island plotline?), and the show will be complete.

Angel -- Wow. Fucking wow. Just a great, funny episode. Sets up all sorts of nifty stuff. Give us the return of one of my favorite characters (Harmony), does more with Gunn in a day than has been done in the last year, and more quotable lines than all of last year's Buffy. The secret ingredient is otters.

Gilmore Girls -- Um. Lots of good stuff, but lots of crap. Rory's big "I miss you" speech was fucking horrible. One of the worst speeches she's ever been given. And too many plot points were nonsense. Once again, the writers prove that they know shit about the college admissions process. But once you ignore all of that, the episode was still fun. And more Paris is a good thing (even if her Life Coach needs to die a horrible and miserable death). Now, anyone seen Lane?

Still haven't watched Karen Sisco.

Tonight, the season premiere of the only good sitcom on NBC, which has been neglected in favor of promoting a crappy sitcom in its final year and a rip-off of a Britcom that in turn is ripping off that crappy sitcom (Scrubs, Friends, the American Coupling, and the British Coupling, respectively).

Anyone else remember when NBC Thursdays meant five genuinely great shows?

Comments

[branwynelf.livejournal.com]

The secret ingredient is otters.

I thought the look on Angel's face at that comment was what really made it priceless though. I tell yah, with Harmony and Spike both back in Angel's life, I'm thinking David B's facial expressions this season will be one of the best things about the show. *grin*

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

otters!

Favorite line from Angel

[maneaterlad.livejournal.com]

"I have no trouble spanking men." Bwah! And anything Harmony said. :)

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Anyone else remember when NBC Thursdays meant five genuinely great shows?

No. They quit doing good television on a regular basis when M*A*S*H went off, at least on the broadcast channels, IMHO. ST:TNG was ok. Miami Vice was watchable back then... would I watch it now? No. Babylon 5 was excellent. Jeremiah is excellent, but it's only on premium cable.

But after keeping up with LJ, writing, and all the other stuff that goes on in my life, it's got to be damned good for me to take an hour out of my schedule just to sit and watch a CRT. Other than Jeremiah, nothing qualifies these days.

Just MHO; y'all watch what you want to.

[gmslegion.livejournal.com]

The best moment in Gilmore Girls was the remarkable buildup, waiting for Paris to bite their small, eccentric suitemate's head off, and responding ever so sweetly about how much fun they'll have this year. I missed the next sixty seconds of dialogue for laughing.

[vikkilynn.livejournal.com]

I thought Rory's speech was dumb, too. Every once in a while it seemed like the speech was getting back on track and not sucking quite so bad... but then Rory kept talking and the speech went back off track and sucked again.

Smallville/ Angel

[myrrhdusa.livejournal.com]

Okay, maybe it qualifies as a guilty pleasure. I liked the Smallville premiere, and I'm not ashamed! Give me the Evil Clark and a motocycle and I'm pretty happy. Throw in Lex in a full, sweaty malaria-induced rage and I'm sold. Wait, you say that Clark's dad can now kick his ass? I'm there!

Angel. Well I loved Harmony and I can't wait to see what Spike brings to the mix, but I couldn't help thinking that the writers were scrambling to put a new show with a new premise together in one day. The whole 'guy in the white room' thing, this silly idea that they are handed the keys to a law firm makes me shudder and hope we won't be watching some weird LA Law with vampires sort of thing. But who knows? It might work. If someone had told me ten years ago about Buffy, I would have laughed and given it a week to be cancelled. You never can tell.

Thursdays

[dindin.livejournal.com]

You should be spending your Thursdays on CBS, truly. Survivor looks to be quite good this season, but it's not the reason to watch. Your new must-see TV is CSI and Without a Trace. CSI suffered it's sophmore slump in its third season, but all evidence points toward a return to it's prime second season. Cool special effects, interesting plots, and subtle you-have-to-want-to-see-it character developments all brought to you by some seriously fine looking men and women in Sin City, baby.

Without a Trace should be TV Guide's "The Best Show You're Not Watching", except that the shows normally picked for that moniker usually suck, and people are watching it. By the end of last season, its first, it was coming close to or beating ER in the ratings. Not that ER is good anymore, but there's been nothing to compete with it. Again, you've got your subtle character development brought to you by some damn fine looking people, this time FBI agents in New York City.

Trust me, I hang with cool TV people. They know. Tape your shows for a week or so and give CBS a try. Don't know what time the kid goes to bed or if she's allowed to watch tv in the eves, but these shows are not for her, so tape CBS if you must, but do try it.

Re: Thursdays

[yendi]

I've heard enough good things about CSI that I may have to check it out (at least for one of the Mindy Clarke episodes). I don't tend to follow cop shows regularly (not counting this summer's Keen Eddie), but I don't tend to mind them, either (of course, I've added Karen Sisco and The Handler to my Tivo list this season, but those are both unusual circumstances). I'll definitely nab an episode or three of the shows you mention, though (and Miss Kid's bedtime is 8, so no worries there, especially with Tivo).

Re: Thursdays

[dindin.livejournal.com]

Oh, dear lord. Don't watch it for the 2 Mindy Clarke episodes, I beg of you. Or watch it initially for that if that's the only thing that will get you to tune in. Hopefully she won't be back this season. What you have to understand about her character was that people either loved her or hated her. Obviously, you know which camp I'm in. :)

Re: Thursdays

[yendi]

I've just been a fan of hers since Return of the Living Dead 3. But since she's on The O.C. this year (something I tried largely because of her, and can't stand), I doubt she'll be on any other shows.

smallville and angel

[pinballsorceror.livejournal.com]

Smallville I liked at first and then I stopped watching because while it had a good direction at first, the fact that it is penned by either super-conservatives or people trying to please super-conservatives really wore on me after a while. At first the thing with Whitney going into the military was treated with unneccessary flag-waving, but when the shapeshifter came back in his stead with her big crush on Lana... They used choice words like "Homosexual Freak" to describe her and that combined with some other indications disheartened me a bit. Then it seemed to just degenerate into a bunch of similar stories. I just caught the season finale courtesy of bittorrent and I have to say it was a little encouraging, but I don't plan on watching the premier(it debuts here tonight).
Angel on the other hand I am all attenuated for. But according to me Joss Whedon will never do anything badly... unless of course he commits mass genocide.