So time has like, passed and whatnot…

My Name is Earl is off the DVR schedule. Sorry.
Bones is on the bubble. Zooey Deschanel is so cute, but her sister really bothers me for some reason.
How I Met Your Mother is as well. It’s funny, but it’s not Arrested Development or Scrubs.
The West Wing … I want to say “wow”, but at some point the bar has to be raised for a show. The season premiere, compared to other “shows”? Awesome. Compared to what I expect from WW? Average.
Supernatural continues to impress, it’s a nice little genre show – WATCH ME!
E-Ring is the new JAG, I wager I’ll follow the same pattern as with its predecessor. Watch until it jumps the shark and then bid it adeu. Kelly Rutherford though. God she’s still ridiculously hot. Nabbing that IMDB link reminded me of 2003′s Threat Matrix, in which she also starred. sadf^2.

Upcoming — Smallville starts tonight, Alias soon. huzzah, etc.

Oh, and SERENITY.

I’ve survived the opening slavos of fall premieres and damnation if there isn’t a crop of actual good shows! I can hardly believe it myself.

How I Met Your Mother (new)
pros: mostly funny, “fresh” talent, Doogie!
cons: mostly funny, “fresh” talent, Doogie.
verdict? It’s still on the DVR record schedule, time will tell.

Bones (new)
pros: David Boreanaz
cons: Fox, yet another forensic procedural, Fox.
verdict? Angel is playing a role he’s perfect for, he’s just got it down cold. I already can’t stand Emily Deschanel though. I guess you’re only allowed to hit the genetic lottery once per family? Again, it’ll keep being DVR’d until it bothers me enough to delete it.

Supernatural (new)
pros: genre show, good premise
cons: bad dialog
verdict? I can’t stress how bad the dialog in the premiere was. It was just plain ugly. I have no +/- feelings with the cast, both faces are familiar from solid runs on Smallville and Gilmore Girls so the acting part seems fine. I actually bumped the priority of this up on the DVR as I enjoyed the premiere quite a bit. But that dialog… oy. I’ll watch the second episode tomorrow sometime, hopefully it will improve.

Threshold (new)
pros: genre show in HD, Carla Gugino, Brent Spiner
cons: Weak scripting, bad pacing.
verdict: It’s in HD. I can’t tell you how much nicer the world is in HD. The premise of the show is solid, the acting is good and the production values are there, unfortunately even in the 2-hour premiere they spent so much time in bland exposition that it might as well came with an accompanying book report. Even WITH that they dropped the ball in some pretty sizable areas. It adds up to a lot of wasted screen time and a very akward flow. This will stay on the DVR until it forces me to remove it. HD mang. HD!

Prison Break (new)
pros: Dominic Purcell, great premise
cons: It’s dumb.
verdict: The one and only new show that I deleted from the DVR queue so far. I removed it after watching the 2nd episode but taped the 3rd just in case. Nope, still dumb. It’s a shame too, Dominc Purcell has some great acting chops. Maybe if Fox wouldn’t have fucked over John Doe… *sigh*

Gilmore Girls (returning)
pros: You’re kidding, right?
cons: None. Move along, jackass.
verdict? Is my girly side showing? I could give a damn. It’s hard enough finding shows that don’t treat the viewer like a slack-jawed simpleton, I’m not about to not watch this one because it revolves around the ladies. This is the show Sex and the City wished it could have someday been, but never came remotely close. Ever. Last season was phenomenal, truly exceptional television. This season is continuing on with those arcs and seems to have lost none of the luster. It’s smart, it’s witty and you should be watching it.

Arrested Development (returning)
pros: … fuck it, we’re going straight to verdict. The premiere was the funniest thing I’ve seen in a long time. The comedy is fresh and smart and the acting is top-notch. Even the pre-premiere bumps were inspired comedy. WATCH THIS SHOW.

Family Guy (returning)
I honestly didn’t enjoy last season much. I may have even missed a few episodes. Not so with this season. It’s back to what it was in the beginning and possibly even moreso.

American Dad (returning)
I saw maybe 4 episodes of this last season. Never struck me as all that great. After taking the first two hits from this season I can admit that I may have been … in error.

Battlestar Galactica (returning)
Season 2 doesn’t seem as “good” as season 1. Don’t know what it is. It’s still an exceptionally well-written, acted, produced and scored show. It’s just not ZOMG ZOMG BSG IS ON ZOMG! right now. Faith manages and all that.

Stargate SG-1 (returning)
Ben & Claudia, together again: Love it. I never gave the two of them enough credit in Farscape. I can see that now. The plot-lines this year have been clean and the writing has been good. I enjoy seeing an aging franchise use it’s history as a vehicle to tell stories and explore issues that a fledgling show would get beaten up over. Maybe I read too much into the current arcs because I’m a fan. It’s entirely possible I see subtle subtext and depth where none intentionally exists. Oh, and the rest of the cast is, you know, awesome too…even without Jack (two “l”s)

I’m heading back to the nest for a DU dinner shortly so I’ll cut this off here. West Wing, CSI and a host of other premieres should hit between now and my next ramble. Enjoy!

It was too hot to do anything this weekend, so I cranked up the AC and watched the telly. Then I cranked up the AC in the car, sat in the glorious AC of the theater and watched a movie there. Back to the homestead, AC and more movies.

Chuck and the Chocolate Factory was a fine summer movie. I doubt it’ll find a place on my DVD wall of hugeness. It is far, FAR less creepy than the hype would have you believe and quite frankly I don’t find that to be a good thing. The production was high-quality througout and Roald Dahl gave this movie his complete support. I’ve never read the book, so take that for what it’s worth… Shocker, Johnny Depp does a good job playing an eccentric, larger-than-life lunatic.

On to the actual marathon…

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Alias was, bar-none, the best show on television this season. Disagree if you must, but that would make you an idiot. So don’t do it. Ass.

The entire season, from start to finish, was an amazing arc with superior acting and writing. I just watched my DVR’d copy of the season finale and I’m still a bit hopped up.

Lena Olin: You will guest star more often next season. Don’t question it woman, just do it.

Without rehashing the last 5 hours of the show I will jsut say this: Next season is going to be amazing.

Don’t change anything. I mean it, asswipes. CHANGE NOTHING.

Enterprise has come and gone with narry a whimper, let alone a bang. Why a cast of that quality (regardless of fame) bothered to even make that show past season two is beyond me. Manny Coto and Mike Sussman should have been given full control a long time ago. In A Mirrior, Darkly was the best Trek I’ve seen since DS9. Empress Sato. EMPRESS FRICKING SATO. ‘nuf said, no? Note: Call me Linda, I <3 u.

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Three years ago I got shot through a wormhole. I’m in a distant part of the universe aboard this living ship of escaped prisoners … my friends. I’ve made enemies … powerful, dangerous. Now all I want is to find a way home to warn Earth. Look upward and share the wonders I’ve seen.

It would take an impossible level of stupidity to cancel a show that garners more critical acclaim than any show in the history of your network. But by golly Bonnie Hammer will be damned if she didn’t make the impossible possible! Good work. You sure showed us.

In a show of support that can only accurately be characterized as complete, rabid fanaticism the fans rebelled against their oppressor and got what we, the cast, the crew and the show itself deserved in the first place – an ending. Who knew that crackers really did matter?

The Peacekeeper Wars was a superior weekend of television and brought into sharp relief that which we, the fans, had seen all along. Farscape was one of the best hours of television of this or any other era. Who’d have thunk it? Muppets act gud!

To put it another way…

I’m just a regular nerd from Wisconsin and I am Farscape.

So I unplugged last night and settled into the nice grooves on the couch for some must-see TV. With all the craptacular reality programming and mindless dren floating about the airwaves these days NBC has been one of the last bations of non-cable hope for those dwindling few of us who don’t mind thinking and/or having an emotional connection with a character. I have long feared that the quantity of garbage would continue to grow until achieving some sort of critical mass wherein cameras are simply installed in every living room in America just for the sake of convenience.
After the Friends finale and ER season finale (minus one) my typically dour outlook brightened. Considerably.

The first hour of the Friends series finale was one of those silly clip shows. For the life of me I can’t understand what the point of all that is. Do they honestly think anyone watching the series finale of a show ending its 10-year run needs a retrospective? We were there dumbasses. We remember just fine.

The actual hour-long finale episode was a peach. I caught myself laughing maniacally for just about the entire length. The writing was spot on and the cast clearly put everything they had into it. The story was essentially a 2-parter looking at Chandler and Monica’s incoming baby and the “about goddamned time” resolution to the whole Ross and Rachel thing.

It certainly was a significant improvement over the Seinfeld finale, and there’s no question which show I enjoyed more over the duration…

Leo Laporte is reporting that G4, the new owner of TechTV, gave everyone in San Francisco their walking papers. Between you, me and the fishes this has got to be one of the most inane decisions in media since Fox cancelled Firefly. I’m far from the target demographic for the shows but I have no problems whatsoever letting The Screen Savers play in the background while I work or flit around in whatever todays game du jour is.

Yes, yes, I realize that shows like TSS or TechLive have about as much replay ability as the last 10 minutes of CNN but they are still well done shows. If scheduled properly there’s no reason you can’t get 5 or 6 viable showings per each TSS episode in a 2-week period without sacrificing timeliness. Shows like Call For Help should last 2 or 3 times that before they lose their relevancy.

I direct your attention to this FAQ on the G4 site which pretty much spells out what the future holds. San Fran is kaput, anyone not willing to work in LA (assuming they’re even offered the chance) is boned. The only two TechTV shows listed in their proposed lineup are X-Play, TSS and Fresh Gear. Anyone have the odds on Fresh Gear becoming the on-air propaganda wing for worthless shit like the N-Gage or Phantom? No mention of some of TTV’s more off-beat titles like Big Thinkers or Nerd Nation.

Oh well, I guess some things have to be culled when you’re desperate to give shows like this to desperate and apparently net-retarded viewers what they “want”.

To the cast and crew of the various TechTV shows I’ve fancied over the last couple years – thanks.
I hope you land on your feet.