SNL - "Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Mumford & Sons"

Season 38, Episode 2

For me, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (or JGL, for brevity’s sake) is an actor who just sort of…exists. It’s not that I actively dislike him, but I’ve never seen the appeal that drives so many people to swoon and whatever else it is they do at the mention of his name. (Note: This could all change if I ever get around to seeing Looper.) Will my ambivalence towards him transfer over to the show? Let’s find out.

SNL - "Seth McFarlane/Frank Ocean"

Season 38, Episode 1

Ah, there’s nothing like a new season, fresh with potential, to renew one’s faith in Saturday Night Live. Granted, these days it feels like any small change in the show’s line-up has the audience hoping that it will return the show to the quality of the halcyon days of the 70s/mid 80s/ early 90s (take your pick). But considering that the show has now lost Andy Samberg, Kristen Wiig, and Abby Elliot; has replaced Fred Armisen’s Obama impression with Jay Pharoah’s; and has three new featured players, it feels as if this would be as good of a time as any for the show to mount a mass improvement. And it’s that kind of potential that gives me hope, hope that not even Seth McFarlane’s job as host could possibly crush.

Right?

Fall 2012 Review Schedule

Things are going to be light this semester – or at least for the first half of it – as I am busy working on my thesis and that will take up a lot of my time and energy. Again, this list is tentative, and will change based on my school schedule and interest.

Mondays

How I Met Your Mother – CBS, September 24^th

Tuesdays

Happy Endings – ABC, October 23rd

Wednesdays

The Hour – BBC America, November

Thursdays

Parks and Recreation – NBC, September 20^th

Fridays

Community – NBC, October 19th

Fringe – FOX, September 29th

Saturdays

Doctor Who – BBC America, Ongoing

Saturday Night Live – NBC, September 15^th

*Drop-ins planned for: Glee, The Office, Modern Family, Sons of Anarchy, and The Walking Dead, based on time availability.

NBC's The New Normal

The pilot episode of The New Normal airs tonight at 10/9c, and the show resumes its normal slot Tuesday at 9:30/8:30c.

Over the years, and especially with three hit shows in the past decade (Nip/Tuck, Glee, American Horror Story), Ryan Murphy and his shows have developed something of a reputation. While they tend to be crowd pleasers, at least for their first few years of life, they also tend to grow into being sloppy, incoherent narrative messes, something that was made abundantly clear with AHS, which often felt like it was the show’s third or fourth go-around, not its first. Watching The New Normal, it’s clear that it’s a Ryan Murphy show, but – at least here at the beginning – it’s not because of the pilot’s narrative abilities. Rather, it’s because it displays that secondary Murphy trait – offensiveness in the face of a supposed strive for progressiveness.

Doctor Who - "Asylum of the Daleks"

Season 7, Episode 1

“Well, this is new.”

This is, by Steven Moffat’s own admission, supposed to be a “big” season for Doctor Who, one that plays down the serialization that became so frustrating at the end of last season and instead gives us lots of “blockbuster” type hours instead. And how does one go ahead and kick of such a season? By bringing back the Daleks, of course.