SNL - "Louis CK/fun."

Season 38, Episode 6

Let’s just get this out there: I’m extremely worried for how tonight’s SNL is going to turn out with Louis CK in the host’s chair. By his own admission, CK isn’t a very good actor, and he even admitted that he didn’t feel that confident about his job during rehearsals. Even though he did a pretty good job in the promos for this week (and the promos were well-written to work around him), CK’s acting range is very limited – mostly he just acts exasperated on Louie – and I can’t imagine the show trying to have him do the one thing he’s good at for all of the sketches of the night. But I guess we’ll see. And who knows – maybe we’ll get a short film from CK out of the whole ordeal.

Happy Endings - "Cazsh Dummy Spillionaires"/"Sabado Free-Gante"

Season 3, Episodes 1-2

When I first started writing about Happy Endings, I decried the show’s basic premise, claiming that rom-com histrionics like “man being left at the altar” didn’t fit with it’s fast-paced and emotion-eschewing humor. And when the rom-com heart reared its head halfway through last season, I was skeptical of the show’s ability to tell a tale of something so pure, and was later turned off by its inability to engage with what seemed like a serialized plot. By those standards, the idea of a continuing romance between Alex and Dave (which was introduced in the season finale back in April) would seem like a total misfire for the show. Over the first two episodes of the third season, however, it’s been proven that maybe that’s not such a bad idea after all.

SNL - "Daniel Craig/Muse"

Season 38, Episode 3

I’m not even going to pretend to write out an intro paragraph for tonight’s write-up. This is one of the worst SNL episodes in recent memory. Click through to find out why….

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.

Falling Skies - "The Price of Greatness"

Season 2, Episode 9

I’ve stopped being surprised when Falling Skies reaches for the easy cliché instead of trying to build on the potential-rich archetypes that make up the core of it’s show. It’s disheartening to see the show cycle through every post-apocalyptic plot that you’ve already seen three times before, but that’s just where the level of this particular writer’s room seems to be. So when I saw the promo for this week’s episode promised an episode where “not everything is as it seems” I groaned a little, knowing just what we were in store for. So colored me surprised to find out that “The Price of Greatness” is an hour that worked in a lot of predictable stuff, yes, but used it to solid effect to raise some interesting ideas.

Wilfred - "Avoidance"/"Truth"

Season 2, Episodes 7-8

If Wilfred were a more tightly plotted show, I might be more inclined to read into the fact that there existed back to back episodes with the titles “Avoidance” and “Truth”, which would seem to indicate thematic parallels, if not an outright two-parter. That of course wasn’t the case, but it is interesting to note how these two episodes served as a dialectic of the show’s two extremes: raunchy humor and high-minded storytelling.

Futurama - "Free Will Hunting"

Season 7, Episode 9

One of the things that I love about Futurama is that, especially in its original run on FOX, the show wasn’t afraid to tackle big issues or scientific principles and to build whole episodes around them. The show knew that there was a smart audience who would be willing to watch a comedy about high-minded ideas, and the audience in kind seemed to be thankful that there existed a show willing to do such storytelling in the first place. There’s hasn’t been as much of this time of story-telling since the show’s comeback, and it’s something that I missed. But after “Free Will Hunting”, I’m not sure the show should return to intellectual territory ever again.

Breaking Bad - "Madrigal"/"Hazard Pay"/"Fifty-One"

Season 5, Episodes 2-4

“We’re just getting started. Nothing stops this train. Nothing.”

“All Hail the King” goes the ad campaign for this season of Breaking Bad (or at least this first half of this season), and indeed there has existed an obsession in these first few episodes with power, who wields it, who wants to wield it, and how that effects those who don’t. Over the past three episodes, the show has taken a very character-based approach to the idea, roughly devoting one hour each to Mike, Walt, and Skyler, and how they are navigating their lives through the new power-vacuum that exists within the meth trade world.

Falling Skies - "Molon Labe"/"Death March"

Season 2, Episodes 7-8

I’ve written before about how Falling Skies is a show divided against itself – it’s very good at providing the action and sci-fi thrills (and sometimes chills), but doesn’t have quite the same level of skill when it comes to the other elements of the show, mostly the character-building and pathos. It often seems as if the show is begrudgingly doing the latter time as a way to bide time until and save money for the former, and the filler status would probably explain why it never feels as affecting as the action set-pieces. This contrast becomes even more apparent with “Molon Labe” and “Death March”, episodes that tackle only action and character building, respectively, to disorienting effect.

Futurama - "Fun on a Bun"

Season 7, Episode 8

“WE WERE GOING OUT!?”

In my review of the season premiere, I brought up one of pet peeves with Futurama, the show’s inability (especially in the sixth season) to maintain a logical throughline to the Fry/Leela relationship. This doesn’t mean that I expected the show to always address the existence of a relationship from episode to episode, but rather to at least have it follow on a consistent line and give tacit acknowledgement when the relationship status changes. Given how many times over the seasons that the show has asked that we care about these two as a couple, it only seems right that the show treats the actual relationships with the same respect and effort that was given to the courtship. If not, then suddenly it seems as if none of it matters.

Futurama - "The Six Million Dollar Mon"

Season 7, Episode 7

There’s an obvious character hierarchy to Futurama, even if the show can at times function ensemble piece. Fry, Leela, and Bender function as the three principal characters, and Amy, Hermes, Zoidberg, and Professor Farnsworth tend to serve in secondary roles. Sure, those four can and have taken the spotlight for certain episodes, but these tend to lead to some mixed results, and there have never been enough of them to feel as if the series is truly egalitarian with all of it’s characters. As such, the secondary four often tend to be more emotionally static that the primary three, which can lead to some unmotivated episodes. However this isn’t always the case, and sometimes this can lead to surprising little episodes that deliver a wallop of insight into previously barely-explored characters, as it did tonight.

Breaking Bad - "Live Free or Die"

Season 5, Episode 1

 “We’re done…when I say we’re done.”

Few shows can raise the sort of pre-air anticipation like Breaking Bad can. The show, which at its heights delivers some of the most visceral and adrenaline pumping moments ever to be aired on the small-screen, has a public perception that’s based around those highs. Yet the show’s season premieres, while still awesome, tend to work on a lower key than the heights that the show is capable of, and as such tend to be slower and more taxing than what we as viewers are used to. (The first third of season four, anyone?) Even as tonight’s season premiere had those same premiere issues in setting up the next batch of episodes (be it the first 8 of the season, or the whole 16, we’ve yet to know), it also gave us perhaps the most fun hour the show has ever produced.

Falling Skies - "Love and Other Acts of Courage"/"Homecoming"

Season 2, Episodes 5-6

“You can join us and survive, or fight alone and die.”

Let’s just get this out in the open: Falling Skies is far from an original show. Part of that comes from the fact that it works in an archetypal framework; alien invasion stories have a long history, and at this point coming up with new stories to tell within the genre has got to be difficult. But I also get the feeling that the writers and producers aren’t really aiming to take their show to new heights, and that they’re happy to tell those familiar comfortable stories. (And TNT and the audience are happy to receive them, so it’s not like they have any incentive to change things up.) But even by that low clearance bar, there are two marks that the show should be able clear, yet over the past couple of weeks has failed to do so: unpredictability and the ability to generate new story lines.

Wilfred - "Letting Go"/"Dignity"

Season 2, Episodes 2-3

It now becomes pretty clear why the episode of Wilfred that aired two weeks ago was hidden, promoted only as a “special preview episode”, while last week’s episode was labeled as the season premiere. (At least that’s what my cable box guide referred to it as.) Even though the show originally premiered to some of FX’s highest numbers, it quickly lost a large portion of its audience, perhaps the result of being too weird. “Progress” was too weird to bring back any viewers who had left the show in season one, and it certainly wouldn’t appeal to any first-timers. Yet while it might be tempting to see the show as selling out or chasing the broader audience (especially in light of the audience boost theshow got last week thanks to the premiere of Anger Management), it’s important to note the subtle changes that exist in the second and third episodes of the season, and how they point a way forward for the show.

Futurama - "The Thief of Baghead"

Season 7, Episode 4

One of the biggest, knottiest question that I try to tackle with these reviews is just what makes for a “good” episode of Futurama. Obviously the ones that are big on the moments of pathos are winners, and I know I’ve put a lot of words down about what makes for a bad episode. But there always seems to be a je ne sais quoi to the proceedings, an X-factor that pulls everything together and makes it all work as a whole. Or at least that’s my new theory, as I’m having a hard time figuring out how tonight’s episode, which had a lot of things that I like, somehow left me feeling as if something was missing.

Falling Skies - "Young Bloods"

Season 2, Episode 4

Perhaps my biggest problem with Falling Skies first season was its tendency toward the maudlin, to fill up on those sappy moments that are supposed to move us simply because. My go-to mental reference point to this is that episode that ended with the whole of the 2^nd Mass. sitting down to have a meal together, but there were many others along the way, and it’s probably for the best that I’ve forgotten about them. Such the curse of a show that seeks to have a family angle to it, that it feels it must use those relationships and feelings to fuel its stories, regardless if it’s really warranted or not. (Some say that this is more likely due to Spielberg’s producer role, but it’s hard to know exactly how much say he has over scripts and the like.) So it was that this week’s episode turned to one of the most predictably and manipulative family element: the children.