Glee Season Two, New York (episode 22)

Glee Season Two, New York

Glee managed to turn itself around in their season two's season finale, though it was too little too late. From the first shot of the episode, you know this was something special. New York is used nicely for the first half of the episode, giving the show a diverse sense of space and a well needed change of scenery. The cityscape did feel irrelevant though during the second half of the episode, the part that the season has been building up to, nationals, but more on that later. There was a nice playfulness that the episode had, playing up the New York setting, with a juxtaposition of kids from the middle of the country being in the big city. Exciting. 

The episode had a lot going on within it, almost too much for any episode, especially for a special season ending episode. I would have liked to see two episodes set in New York, one that dealt with the crew experiencing the city and the finale. But this worked for the most part. Part of the episode that felt a little mushed was the entire Finn and Rachel date that went on during the chaos of trying to write songs for nationals. And about that, I would think they would have started to work on the songs before they got to the big apple, but that's just me. The date was fine, but felt even more of a slap in the face because of the set up against the romantic comedies then the episode transformed into a romantic comedy.

Nationals themselves went very well. The group that sang 'Yeah' was amazing. Our Glee club did a nice job, the duet was very appropriate, hitting the nail on the head. Just a side note, I don't ever want to see the same shot of Rachel and Finn talking right before sectionals, regionals or nationals again. it is becoming too predictable at this point that the two of them will talk about their feelings for one another right before the big show. I enjoyed 'Light Up the World', it felt very old school Britney Spears and that's not a bad thing. I'm also glad that the group didn't win, or even place at nationals. It gives the team something to work towards during season three, and it was their first time there, so placing 12th isn't that bad. Kurt's retelling of what happened after the loss was clever, also a way to get his character in the episode with Rachel singing with him. Next was a reformation of Rachel and Finn, a declaration of love from Blaine to Kurt and Sam and Mercedes. I just hope that these couples stay together for some level of time next season, not just break up after 3 or 4 episodes. 

Rating: Watch

The Vampire Diaries Season One Thoughts

The Vampire Diaries Season One

This show really surprised me. No, really. I will get the number one problem I have with this show out of the way. Everyone is too good looking in this “town”. That’s the main problem I see with the show, one that can be easily overlooked (not really). But now to the good things about this show. I know that this show is based off of books, but after watching the bonus features on the season one DVD, I will never read the books because of the liberties the creative team has taken. Which is not to say taking creative liberties is a bad thing, on the contrary it can be a very good thing, or fail flat.

A quick example of taking creative liberties that fails. Season three of True Blood was bad. Bad for the story telling and bad for trying to stay with the plot of the books. The show had previously told the plot of the books while expanding the universe, and changed some plot points from the books, but for the most part told the same story. Season three was a mess of stories; nothing really came out of the season. There was even a special message at the end of the season telling viewers ‘sorry for the crap and next season will be better’.

Back to Vampire Diaries. Telling a story that embodies the ones told in the books while keeping itself fresh and new is a major plus for fans, but for people like me (who have never read the books), it also provides a good story and characters. The Vampire Diaries takes risks in their character development. Things aren’t always black and white in this universe, so many of the characters fall in the gray category. Even those who don’t live long enough to see a conclusion to their actions. And that is another big plus to the show; they are willing to kill off any character at any time. The body count is huge on this show. This surprise of anyone can die at any time (well except for the main three characters) brings a level of excitement and mystery to who will die when. This also keeps the rotation of characters that are interesting and new and killing out those who have become stale and boring.

This may go without saying, but this show is dark. Both thematically as well as the lighting. Dark shadows might as well be the fourth main lead in this show, and they work well. Back to my main problem with the show, the level of attractiveness of everyone in the show, leads nicely into the levels of sex that are seen in this show. Lots of people are getting it on (eye humping excluded, but lots of that as well).

Finally, the numerous plot twists that go on within a season of this show are staggering; especially for a show that sells itself more on their looks rather than their story. The twists come at nice intervals, giving the viewer’s time to take the twists in before another wave hit too soon. These are just a few things that are surprisingly good about this show, and if you can look past the extremely good looking cast, the show has something for everyone. 

Summer TV

The TV season is coming to a close, and it is time again for the mixed bag of summer programming. I take summers to watch shows that I enjoy a lot, but can't seem to make it into my fall schedule. There are the few shows that come on only in summer, but most shows on network TV don't fill the TV void.

Shows that I hope to watch (repeats) from the fall season:

• Castle
• Bones
• Vampire Diaries (it is a good show, for many reasons. expect an entire editorial on this show)

Shows that are new for the summer season

• True Blood 
• Most of the USA lineup (White Collar, Burn Notice, Covert Affairs, etc)
• they really bring decent to good shows on during the summer, along with other cable networks (TNT, etc), nice to see the cable networks take chances on shows during the summer  

Guilty Pleasures - Prison Shows

Reality Prison Shows

Lockdown or Lockup are prime examples of these semi reality tv shows, more on the edge of a documentary but with the edge of a reality show. There is just something that gets me about these shows; some kind of twisted fascination with people's lived in prison. Most of the episodes are the same, repetitive in their level of fear and punishment that each facility imposes on their inmates, but it never gets old.

The different sections of these massive facilities are highlighted each episode, showing the different worlds that exist within one prison. Then there are the extreme lockdown sections of the prisons, the prison within the prison for those who violate the rules on a consistent basis. These are the sections of the prison where total isolation sinks in, bleeding over from the screen to whoever is watching. Trying to deal with the mind numbing boredom that life becomes in isolation must be agonizing, particularly for those who spend years living alone. But there is more than just punishment in these shows; they also highlight prisoners who do well, trying to reform themselves while doing their time. And they are normally rewarded by having more perks or even living in environments where freedoms are giving to them, but these inmates are still aware and even more heightened that they are living in prison, knowing that if they mess up at this point in their lives they will be sent back to main prison.

 That is one of the main things that hook me on these shows, showing punishment for those who have deserved it, and rewarding those in prison who are working within the system to reform themselves. 

Modern Family Season Two, See You Next Fall (episode 23)

Modern Family Season Two, See You Next Fall

            Modern Family continues to prove itself as one of the last family friendly comedies left on T.V. This episode gives each character a chance to shine, well maybe Manny didn’t have his normal sophisticated presence while drinking cups of coffee, but that can be over looked for now.

·         Jay dealt with a botched botox injection that left Manny and Gloria thinking that Jay had a stroke. Jay did this because he felt like the 40 year old inside of him was being trapped by his outer, older self.

·         Gloria had to deal with having large, ummmm, I mean God gifted assets in her life that prevented her from riding a crazy tandem bike.

·         Phil was worried because Claire normally freaks out during large events in her kids’ lives, in which the episode revolved around. So Phil was trying to have her meltdown today so he can go to Vagus with his cheerleading buddies from college.

·         Claire had to worry about Alex growing up and going to high school, the point in Haley’s life where she stopped being their little girl and started to rebel.

·         Luke thought he could move things with his mind. Classic Luke.

·         Alex was nervous about giving the speech as the Valedictorian of her middle school class. (Do middle schools’ really wear robes to their graduations?)

·         Haley fought with Alex over the content of the speech Alex was planning on giving because it bashed Alex’s classmates.

·         Cam and Mitchell dealt with their problems, as normal. Mitchell would laugh at the physical hijinks Cam would do (falling, etc). This one had the laughs but lacked something else. Bonus points for Cam calling it out when Phil and Claire fell down the hill during Alex’s speech)

At the heart of the episode was the family dealing with growing older. The subplot of jay getting botox to feel younger was discouraged by Gloria because she loves the man she married, not a younger version of him. Haley tried and succeeded in getting Alex to change the speech so that Alex could enjoy high school as part of the crowd rather than an outsider. But the main couple that this theme was present in was Clair and Phil, having to deal with another one of their kids growing up and being in high school. They were afraid of losing their little girl, remembering how Haley changed when she got into high school (and the stories they told each other about how Haley would come home and greet Phil was heartwarming and breaking at the same time). A nice blend of humor and heart at the same time.

Rating: Watch 

Cougar Town Season Two, Free Falling, Episode 19

Cougar Town Season Two, Free Falling

            I’ve just started to watch Cougar Town again, and I’m sad that I’ve missed most of the season. This show is the ABC equivalent to Community on NBC, an off the wall, inside jokes kind of work that works very well. The show dealt with three main story lines in the episode, with the Travis being forced to make big choices in his life the only meaningful of the three, but none the less the show delivered on the laughs.

There were far too many jokes to get across in a review, but me try to focus on a few major joke related plot lines.

• ·        Jules and Bobby having an awesome handshake / celebratory parenting chant for them working together in regards to Travis. It never got old and more of these are needed (if there are more, I’ve missed out).
• ·        The Penny Can game that Bobby, Andy and Laurie played. Well more of the rules that went along with the game rather than the game itself, throwing a penny into a can off of Bobby’s boat. And Bobby really should cut his witch nail, because if he can flick someone and draw blood, that’s a problem.
• ·        Grayson and Ellie dealing with the Children of the Corn kids who do chalk drawings that are extremely disturbing in a stick figure kind of way, that also happen to be on fire and one missing a head (Oh, there it is) worked well and gave the neighborhood some mythology to it, in a crazy way.

The character that worked his way into two of the three stories and ultimately progressed the story for future episodes was Bobby. Even though he didn’t want to sell out on his Penny Can game, the money helped him move out of his boat and get an apartment. But no one told him to keep Travis out, which led to Travis living in the boat, a progression for the characters in Cougar Town. And that’s what I enjoyed the most, some satisfaction for watching the episode with a level of progression that happened for these extremely funny and interesting characters.

Rating: Watch 

Glee Season Two, Funeral (episode, 21)

Glee Season Two, Funeral (21)

This week Glee fell flat, very flat. The only saving grace was Sue’s story line and the amazing acting that Jane Lynch can bring to the table. Next to this, the episode fell into the cliché that Glee has created for itself: think about changing but ending up the same in the end.

First the highlight of the episode. Sue was back this week with a character building episode that saves her character from last week. Sue’s emotions felt real in the reaction to the [spoiler] death of her sister in a very Sue way, detached and unemotional while she mourned inside. Her speech she tried to deliver at the funeral was the climax of this emotional buildup, showing that Sue is more than the one dimensional character that is shown on Glee most weeks. This also shows that Lynch can do the funny, absurd and serious not only in a season, but also in one episode.

Everything else in this episode was fluff, badly done, boring fluff. For a show that only has one more episode of the season, Glee should not be shoving fluff into their viewers this late in the game. The show should be wrapping up storylines and building up to the shows finale rather than an episode that is completely forgettable, except for Sue’s performance. Having Jesse St. James be an advisor to the group works, and having the blub fight with one another over who should be the solo singer at nationals sounds good, but Glee dropped the ball in the presentation of this idea. Having all the tryouts back to back slowed the episode down. The momentum of the episode died half way through (that’s really dark for an episode that also dealt with death), with the only thing getting me through the numbers was guessing when the cuts were coming while, whoever on stage, was singing. Not to say that the singing was bad, but Glee needs to push the story as well as the singing in the show. Ultimately Schuester decided that the club should not change and stick to what 
has gotten them this far, being themselves.

There was no pay off in this episode. I wouldn’t have disliked this episode so much if someone was picked to be the soloist in the next episode, but wait nothing changed. Nothing. The show has been on for two seasons now and not much has changed for these characters. The relationships that these characters’ have seem meaningless, with people breaking up with one another almost every week and wanting to be with their exes the next only to realize that they don’t want to be with either, Rinse and repeat several times over and there is the relationship arch for all most every character on the show. Glee needs to find a roadmap for season three and stick to it, something that is dynamic and changes the relationship for the club rather than meaningless episodes that don’t pay off in the end.

Rating: Pass

            Just watch Sue giving her speech at the funeral and turn off the episode before you die of boredom. Please let the finale be good, at least as good if not better than the Prom episode was. Thanks.