The Greatest Show You're Not Watching

I know I’m the only person watching Veronica Mars because of Lost…but hey, due to the Lost repeat this week, VM did its best numbers ever!   And the show rocks!  Veronica’s best pal/sidekick, Wallace, had a tough week, with his real dad (or “bio dad” as Veronica called him) showing up, his mom being revealed as a liar (and having a falling out with Veronica’s dad), his girlfriend turning out to be a mean-spirited bee-yatch, etc.  Percy Daggs, who portrays Wallace, never struck me as the greatest actor last year, but he stepped up big time in this episode.  

I wish I could convey to everyone what’s so great about this show and why you should record it even though Lost is your first love.  The writing is just top-notch, and we keep learning more and more about the characters through brilliant plotting.  

Read what Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy, had to say about VM…

Also, you can read Joss’s Entertainment Weekly review of the Season 1 DVD here, and get other show info too.

Just believe me when I tell you that if you rent Season 1, you will not be sorry.  You will love it and then you will have the same conflict I do on Wednesday nights at 9:00!

I Remembered...

…the other thing that was inconsistent from this week’s Gilmore Girls!  I knew it would come to me…Emily told Richard that she walked in on Rory and Logan making out on the couch.  But that’s not what happened at all.  She knocked on the poolhouse door, which had a curtain over it so she couldn’t see in.  They got up, walked around the couch, and were standing by the door – but not even too near each other – when Rory let her in.  Maybe she noticed the cushions on the couch were messed up – but I didn’t notice that and I didn’t notice her noticing that.  Very annoying.  She SHOULD have just walked in on them, or else just told Richard that she thought they were spending too much time together alone in the poolhouse.  Sloppy.

Who's in the Basement

A quick word on this week’s Desperate Housewives – apparently the writers heard me complain about the women not getting together, because they did more than once this week.  And Bree lost it and her hair almost came out of the bun, so that was progress too.  The revelation about who’s in the basement at Alfre’s house was a bit of a disappointment, though.  The big, slow guy who accidentally kills someone…hmm…sounds familiar…I hope that story has some good twists to it.  

Fun Lost Stuff

Since there’s no new Lost episode tonight (sniff), I thought I’d throw together a few links to fun and interesting and odd Lost-related stuff.  

Interesting article from the Boston Globe last weekend…

Here’s a funny thing from the Lost message boards on ABC.com – supposedly this is the tag from Jack’s suitcase, and it shows the year as 2009. Much speculation rages as to whether this is actually the year of the plane crash.  Also note that the “numbers” appear on the tag.

Another topic of speculation – Jin’s resume and Boone’s driver’s license.  You can read about it on Fuselage.com – a poster asked the question and Javier Grillo-Marxuach (writer and supervising producer on Lost) responded.

Here’s something totally insane: someone who has kept a list of all numbers (not just “the numbers”) mentioned in the show.

That’s it for now – go forth and seek out more!

Rory's Birthday

Let’s start with the good things about this episode.  First of all, it was better than last week’s – although that’s not saying much.  But the best thing was that they actually showed us the conversation with Lorelai and Richard, essentially starting right from the point where last week left off.  I had really feared they wouldn’t show us that scene, which would be typical – so often the Palladinos leave us out of important moments.  And we needed to see how frustrated and upset Lorelai was for the rest of the episode to make sense.   I give her credit, for once she wasn’t selfish.  She didn’t gloat over the fact that Richard admitted his failure.  All she was thinking of was Rory.  Other good things – Paris!  Doyle!  Lane!  Although not enough of any of them.  Great scene when Paris tells Rory that she’s the new editor of the Yale Daily News.  Rory was so crushed, even though she has no one but herself to blame.  (and Logan).  (and Logan’s dad). I can’t believe Lane had never been to the Gilmore’s house, or met Logan.  Some best friend you are, Rory.  Best line of the ep: Luke’s comment, upon tasting a hideous pink drink that Emily had created in honor of Rory: “It tastes like My Little Pony.”  It was also really funny when Rory told the minister that the ship of her “virtue” had sailed long ago.  And I’m glad that there was some ice-thawing between Rory and Lorelai, although they both have a lot to say before it’s over.  Excellent scene with Richard, hiding out and brooding on his failure, and telling Emily that they’ve lost Rory. And Madeline Albright!  I knew she’d be in the ep, but didn’t expect her to be in Rory’s dream, recreating a scene from season 1.

Bad things about the ep – inconsistency.  Like when Emily invited Rory for dinner, Rory said that the only meals she had for weeks were super-sized.  But in the previous scene, she and Logan had just been out for Sri Lankan food.  There was something else that bugged me but of course I can’t think of it now. Anyway, I hate to pick on the details, but it’s a show about a family who does that all the time!  Someone should tell Rory to stop pinning her bangs back.  We’re all so glad she finally got bangs – leave them alone!  I wish they had showed us the minister telling Emily and Richard that Rory is sleeping with Logan. I hated Lorelai’s outfit – what was that shrug thing doing?  And I missed seeing Paul Anka.

Previews – if Jess is what it takes to snap Rory out of her DAR-working, Logan-loving, poolhouse-living, non-Yale-attending ways, then so be it.

Excellent Laughs-to-Rabbits Ratio

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit was THE most fun I’ve had at the movies in a very long time.  It is now struggling with Grizzly Man for my movie of the year – talk about polar opposites!  Of course, there’s a million Oscar-contending movies coming out now, so the top ten list is far from written.  But W&G was so brilliant.  It had everything – comedy, drama, action, romance, horror – something for everyone!  Especially if you like bunnies – or cheese.  It is amazing the range of emotions that can be conveyed by a dog made out of clay.  I think that one of my favorite scenes involved Gromit trying to deal with all the rabbits that he and Wallace (as the well-known pest control team known as “Anti Pesto”) were storing in their house.  After he chopped up carrots and poured them down various chutes to the bunnies in the basement, he realized that a few bunnies had made it into the kitchen.  He opened a bread box labeled “Buns” and there were three little bunnies, each eating a pastry.  Priceless!  The bunnies, giggling madly, leaped away and shot into the refrigerator.  Gromit slowly opened the door and peered inside.  Cheese, but no bunnies.  Then we see that there’s a bunch of bunnies sitting in the refrigerator door like bottles of ketchup and mustard.  Very slowly, Gromit turns and sees them all staring back at him.  They leap all over him, laughing their little rabbit heads off.  I was right there with them.

Most Improved - Threshold

Threshold has now proven itself to me, and I’m definitely sticking with it.  Last Friday’s episode was really good, with each character having great dialogue for a change.  Except for the security/special forces guy, whatever his name is.  Cavanaugh. He is definitely the least interesting character.  I knew that one of the “Red Team” members was going to be killed off – and throughout the show I kept thinking, it can’t be Lucas, he’s the funny uptight guy, and it can’t be Ramsey, he’s the smart sarcastic one, and it can’t be Data, aka Brent Spiner, aka Fenway, because he’s just fabulous!  Fortunately, in a good plot twist, it turned out to be Diane Venora, and she was totally boring anyway, but the way she died was cool!  I had been worried after the third episode about the military academy, because that was just lame, but the show has really come together.  I am especially glad that the tech guys have been sent out into the field to deal with situations, rather than just stuck sitting in the lab in front of a computer screen – because we all know what fascinating television THAT is!

Lost...and Found

Three weeks until the next episode!!  Three weeks until we find out who dies!!  I can’t stand it.  Possibly they are doing this because the World Series will be on Fox, but it still makes no sense to me.  You’d think they’d want to keep the momentum going right into November sweeps.  Anyway, pins and needles time until November 9th.  I will be devastated no matter what character dies, unless it’s Shannon, I couldn’t care less about her.  But everyone else is so important and so great in their unique way.  I can’t imagine the show without Charlie, or Locke, or Sawyer, or Michael, or any of them.

Anyway – I felt like this show was a bit slow, overall – I didn’t feel like I learned a lot more.  I thought it was really funny that Sawyer speculated that Ana Lucia and her friends had eaten the other tail section survivors, since several people I know thought the same thing!  But I guess now we know that the others killed them, after Jin and Echo came across that body in the jungle.  

How weird was that when they hid and watched the others walk by?  I kept waiting for a scrawny pair of bare African American legs to walk by and Jin to want to jump out of the bushes to grab Walt.  But no…however, that teddy bear tied to a stick was creepy!  

Jin and Sun’s flashback was very nice – as usual, they are both tremendous actors and Sun especially is so graceful.  Poor Jin – that was so harsh when the guy he was interviewing with told him that he could smell the fish on him.  All he wanted was to escape his past and work hard for a better life.  Instead he has to open the door for people who wouldn’t stop to spit on him.  I did feel for a minute there like Sun’s boyfriend was really a decent guy – but when he told her he just wanted to use her as a cover, it was so sad.  Her dress in that scene was fabulous though!

And all her scenes with various people who talked to her about her lost ring – Jack, Locke, Hurley, and Kate – were great.  Poor Hurley – he tried so hard to make conversation with her!  And I thought what Locke had to say to her about his anger and frustration was interesting.  Always the philosopher…he found himself when he stopped looking.  Well, and when his plane crashed on a magical island and he was able to walk again!  That might have had something to do with it.  I love him though.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see…but meanwhile, lots to discuss!

Desperate Times

All the critics are harping on Desperate Housewives, complaining that it’s not as good as it was.  The gossip world says that Teri Hatcher is a big part of the problem, that the women aren’t getting along at all, and that the set is such a horrible place to be that the show’s creator, Marc Cherry, won’t even show up!  Who knows.  I agree that it’s a shame that the women don’t interact with each other more.  The fact that there was not a scene with all four of the main characters (or even Edie too), sitting together with Bree after Rex’s funeral, was mind-boggling.  Indeed, since the funeral, all the women have not been together in the same place once, and some of them have hardly interacted with each other at all.  It’s too bad.

Some aspects of the show are better than ever, though, like Lynette’s use of a rat to trick her husband into cleaning the house.  When she went out back and talked to the dead rat that Gay Matt had tossed into the garbage, the reason for her Emmy win was clear.  

The mystery of what Alfre Woodard has in her basement is good too, although for some reason she didn’t appear in last Sunday’s episode at all.  I hope they get some energy and momentum going with that story.

The question of how long it will be before Bree finds out that creepy George was the one poisoning Rex is definitely of interest.  Hopefully it’ll be before she sleeps with him!  He was pretty diabolical in tricking her son so that the poor gay kid would get sent away again.  I think Bree needs to take that painfully tight bun out of her hair and get a clue.

So – is the show perfect?  No.  But it’s still better than most of the new fall shows, and it still has genius moments, so I’m sticking with it.

From the Sublime to the Just Plain Awful

After all the zip and zing of last week's episode, this one was a real letdown.  In fact, I thought it was a dreadful episode.  I really had thought from the preview that Emily and Richard were going to bust in on Rory and Logan - and after what Rory told them during the episode about how the relationship wasn't serious, they'd be completely freaked to find out she was sleeping with him.  Instead, they spent half the episode talking about the damn Birkin bag.  The whole thing about renaming the streets was lame, and the part with Emily sending things to Lorelai made no sense - especially when Emily said she was getting rid of the dollhouse.  Why didn't Lorelai just tell her to ship it to her like she'd been doing with all the other junk?  The fact that Lorelai didn’t say that really bothered me.  Wouldn’t that have been the first thing she would have said?  The dialogue in this show is generally so precise that when it doesn’t make sense, it really stands out.  

And Rory just acted like an empty headed ditz throughout.  She and Logan have no chemistry at all, and this whole season he appears to be sleep-walking. Perhaps it’s the constant drinking.  The character seems very different from last year.  Is he supposed to be grumpy or depressed because he’s worried about Rory?  I definitely don’t get that impression.  But in his interactions with people that he certainly should know how to talk to (the DAR ladies, Emily and Richard) he acts like he’s never held a polite conversation before.  

Richard and Emily did make me laugh a couple of times – as when he pointed out to her that when she snooped in Lorelai’s room back in the day, she should have looked under the Tootsie Rolls she found.  But after their brilliance of last week, they just didn’t have a chance to shine.

The one good moment was at the end, when Richard brought Lorelai the dollhouse and wanted to talk.  I just hope they don’t cheat us out of actually seeing that conversation!

I hope the Rory birthday episode is a heck of a lot better.  

Rory at the USO

GREAT episode of Gilmore Girls last week, except for the boring part about Luke and Lorelai disagreeing about whether or not h e should go camping.  This is the extent of their conflict these days??  Please.  And Kirk doing the quirky dance – well, what else is new?  Not nearly as clever as his scam to get old ladies’ rings in the season premiere.  Plus, we’ve seen Kirk do a quirky dance before, when they showed his black-and-white film at the annual film festival, which was utterly hilarious.  In another case of the current writers clearly not having seen all the previous seasons of the show, Paris is suddenly broke and says that she has never had a job or done anything except achieve academically, which is total crap.  In I think perhaps a second season ep, Paris tells Rory that the only way to get into Harvard is to have done more than achieve academically – you have to have tons of activities on your resume.  Paris reels off a long list of things she’s done outside of school, including training seeing eye dogs and working at a food pantry.  So, her sudden lack of ability to do anything but study is seriously lame.  However, she was a major bright light in the episode – especially her rants about “The Man” and her realization that Karl Marx might have really been on to something!  When she tells Rory, “A hard rain’s gonna fall, you know what I’m sayin’?” I thought I would die laughing.  

The other bright light was Emily and Richard – realizing that putting faith in the Huntzbergers, as opposed to believing what Lorelai told them about these people and how they treated Rory, was a horrible miscalculation.  Emily’s ripping apart, in her oh-so-gently-malicious way, of Sherry Huntzberger, was Emmy-winning.  And Richard’s devastation, written all over his face, as he watches Rory at the microphone and realizes all that she has given up and how much damage has been done, was gut-wrenching.

It looks like Emily and Richard may kick Logan’s butt next week – I can hardly wait!

Everybody Hates Hugo

Sorry for not blogging sooner on last week’s Lost – stupid “real-world” responsibilities.  Loved the ep, love Hurley.  His terror at losing his friends, at having people’s perception of him change, the way it had when he won the lottery, was so palpable.  The scene when his best friend realizes that Hurley kept the secret of his winning lottery ticket from him, and everything changes between them as they stare at each other, was masterfully acted and directed.  And Hurley’s solution about the inventory of food – to have a great feast shared among all the castaways – was so perfect, both for his character and for the show overall – finally a moment of relaxation and even joy for the “lost” people.  When Charlie hugged Hurley, and Hurley’s face just glowed with relief and happiness – it was a definite “I’ve got something in my eye” moment.

As was the moment when Bernard, Rose’s missing husband from the back of the plane, thanked Michael for the news that Rose is okay.  I love that actor, Sam Anderson, well-known from a million supporting roles (including a stint on Angel, although he didn’t overlap with Daniel Dae Kim, aka Jin), and I can already hardly wait for his reunion with Rose.  It was great to have her back – and the show’s producers say that we will see much more of her this season.

Meanwhile, more questions – if there were 23 survivors from the back of the plane, how come there are only a few left now?  Since these people we thought were the others are not the others, who are the others and where are they?  

Oh, and the small scenes – when Claire, blissfully enjoying the sun and the water, finds the message bottle from the raft – then when she and Shannon bring the bottle to Sun, and then finally when Sun buries the bottle without telling anyone else that it washed ashore…sniff…

The Swan

My favorite line of this episode came after Jack and Locke watched that mind-boggling film strip.   Locke: We're going to need to watch that again.

He’s right though, I AM going to need to watch that again.  The whole Dharma project – what’s up with that?  Loved the polar bears.  I think Jack was right when he said to Desmond that it’s all an experiment.  It even worked on Jack, he was afraid to find out what would happen if the execute button wasn't pushed.  I’m not sure what it all says about human psychology but it's pretty darn interesting.

Poor Locke, he was so emotional in this episode.  I was glad to see that he does have self-doubt, when he broke down crying and was shouting, “What am I supposed to do?”  And when he told Jack that he didn't want to do it alone.  He IS vulnerable, and not just obsessed with how right he is about destiny.

From next week’s previews – Jin speaks English!!  It turns everything upside down, if Jin's always been able to speak English. But, if he can - when he came running out onto the beach, why didn't he speak English to Sawyer and Michael?  You'd think that of all times he'd want to communicate what was happening....or, as a friend of mine pointed out, when he and Michael fought last year and he was handcuffed to the plane wreckage.  That might have been a good time to speak up.

That’s it for now, just some random thoughts.  Too busy for a full recap – maybe next week!

Rory, Wake Up and Smell the Salmon Puffs

OK, Logan is so tired.  I can’t believe Rory puts up with his crap – then again, she did date Jess.  He shows up at the DAR party where she’s trying to be nice to people, and acts like a jerk.  He invites his loser jerk friends over to her house while she’s busy, and continuously drinks like a fish (and then drives, apparently).  And when she calls him after a trying ordeal with her mother, he whines about his responsibility as a Huntzberger, then suggests that they spontaneously drop everything and run off.  Yeah, because that worked out so well with the whole yacht incident.  And Rory goes along with it all!  Bangs or no bangs, she is making bad choices.

Sometimes this show bugs me because of what they don’t show, rather than what they do.  For example, I would have wanted to see the conversation when Sookie called Rory (or, I guess, when Rory saw a note from her grandmother – who I thought was in Finland, and who certainly never appeared in the episode, sadly enough – and then called Sookie back) – what did Sookie say, and how did Rory respond when she found out Lorelai was the other godmother?  

And I think it would have been really hilarious to see Jackson actually get baptized.  The minister putting water on his head, etc.  They set us up for the humiliation – with gleeful joy from Sookie – and then there was no follow-through.  

Why wasn’t Luke at the baptism?  Why wasn’t Paris in this episode?  Emily?  Richard?  Doyle?  At least Lane was back – and she and Rory managed all right once they got over the awkward part.  AND she noted Rory’s bangs!  Thank you, Lane.  Now why didn’t you tell Rory that she needed bangs about five years ago?

I did enjoy Lorelai’s depression over not being able to watch that horrid Rosie O’Donnell movie with Rory.  That rang true – plus - funny.  And I also cracked up over her feeding Paul Anka – when she said that his food was in the yellow bowl that he picked out, I just pictured them at the Petsmart!

Surface - Off the List!

OK, the first casualty of the new season happened for me last night.  I crossed Surface off my list.  Had to do it!  I actually missed the second episode, but had hopes for the third one.  Sadly, I was almost immediately bored. First of all, it’s just stupid.  But if the acting and writing was great, I could overlook that!  Sadly, it’s not.  None of the actors have any charisma or any real ability.  I watched the kid with the pet sea monster (lame) and thought of how much better Malcolm David Kelly (Walt) on Lost is as a child actor.  And the adult actors just don’t hold the screen – you’re not riveted by them, you don’t believe in them, and you especially don’t care what happens to them.  Some actors are just born for TV – Jensen Ackles (see my earlier blog on Supernatural), Jimmy Smits, Mariska Hargitay – and not just because they are extremely attractive.  Plenty of attractive people have no chemistry on TV.  It’s because you just can’t stop watching them. You want to know what they’re going to do or say next.  You feel what they feel.  You care about what they care about.

Surface, unfortunately, has no actors like this – plus a dumb story and weak writing.  It doesn’t add up – and I don’t have time to waste watching it, especially when I have great shows piling up in my TIVO!

One more note – these new shows are all ripping off Lost’s opening title and it stinks.  Threshold, Surface, and Invasion are all doing it – the name of the show comes up after the opening and fades out, just like Lost.  In an industry that’s supposed to be creative, you’d think these show runners could come up with a new and fresh idea.  Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery – but it usually makes the imitators suffer by comparison.