TV Season 2010 Pulse Check

Back in September I wrote two blogs on my favorite new Dramas and Comedies of the 2010 season. It is now time for a pulse check - how are they doing so far, are they still beating or on life support?

Beating Strong - Raising Hope
This show still makes me laugh. When the scripts are good so are the episodes. There have been a few blah ones, but overall I am really enjoying this blue collar family and their hilarious predicaments. Jimmy is the underdog you want to root for. He isn't the smartest guy in the world but he puts his new daughter first. His parents aren't the best but they sure try hard and Maw Maw is priceless.

Having Heart Trouble - The Event and Outsourced
Unfortunately The Event is becoming a bore. It is falling into the same pattern of Flashforward where it starts out intriguing and then can't keep the excitement going. I still have a few episodes on the DVR and I'm not dying to watch them.
Outsourced has lost it's hilarity. The first few episodes were great, hilarious, but now the writing has faltered and they are no longer as funny as they were in the beginning. In fact, I have not finished watching the last two episodes. I turned them off mid show and deleted them. Meh.

On Life Support - Undercovers
I can't believe I am saying this but I have lost the desire to watch this show. It has nothing to do with the cast, they are great, it is the writing
(JJ Abrams is obviously busy doing other things and it shows, bummer). There is no urgency in their missions. There is nothing at stake. In Alias, the fate of the entire world was always at stake as well as Sydney's life. There was so much intrigue, twists and turns that if you missed an episode you had to find out what happened, asap. It was a huge water cooler show. The critics and network executives at NBC agree with me about Undercovers as the show was just cancelled for good this week. The ratings were low and with no huge stars to keep it afloat the network decided to take it out of it's misery.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Christmas is almost here, Time for Holiday cards!

My favorite holiday of the year is almost here and in preparation I am planning on ordering Christmas cards from Shutterfly.  There are so many great designs to choose from it is hard to decide which one but I am always partial to Snowflakes, of which they have quite a number to choose from.  So far these are my favorites, Family Snowfall, and Wisemen's Journey.  But if you just want to look at all of the photo cards, here is the link - Flat Photo Cards.  Another cool thing about these cards is the fact that Shutterfly is having a special offer for Bloggers, 50 free cards for blogging about Shutterfly.  How cool is that.  Here is the link if you want to join me, 50 Free Cards from Shutterfly.  So enjoy the holiday preparations, the time with family, and remember the gifts are not what is important, Jesus and his gift to us is the reason for the season.  Spend it with those you love and cherish your time together.

Fall TV Season 2010 - Comedy

I'm rather embarrassed to mention the two new comedies that I enjoyed during premiere week. They are quite irreverent and not very PC. I'm honestly not sure if these shows will last anyways, but their first episodes made me set the DVR to record them for the next few weeks. The first show is Outsourced on NBC. It airs right after The Office which is a great lead in to this politically incorrect show about a manager who is sent to India to handle a novelties call center. Everyone has called for help or been called by their credit card company from a call center in India. We all know the accents and the frustration. This show demonstrates the other side of that phone call. It's a job, with little pay and little understanding of American culture. Like The Office, the characters all represent people we have known in our own jobs taken to extreme comedic proportions. Manmeet uses the call center to pick up women. He spends his time telling overweight, 55 year olds who smoke how gorgeous they are instead of selling them products they don't need. Gupta is the annoying coworker who talks non-stop about things no one wants to hear and doesn't take any hints when people don't want him around. I was immediately hooked. The other comedy I enjoyed was Raising Hope. It's a white trash show like Roseanne but with a heart, as the main character ends up with a baby and he has no idea what to do with her. He does realize that he needs a car seat for her and sets out to pawn his possessions using his only form of transportation that is safe for her, a shopping cart. That is the "family shopping cart," the one they use over their fire pit when they grill outside for dinner. Once again the characters are what carry this show. The mother and grandmother, played by Martha Plimpton and Chloris Leachman respectively are superb. Leachman actually wears only a bra for most of the episode which is both gross and hilarious at the same time. And former Goonie, Plimpton, as irascible as ever, was a delight to see on the screen once again. My only concern is whether the show can stay funny beyond the first few episodes. Only time will tell.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Fall TV Season 2010 - Drama

The new TV season started this week and so far I liked the potential of The Event and Undercovers.  The Event has similarities to last years Flashforward in terms of plot (something/one trying to take over the world/government ) as well as its multiple characters/timelines to follow.  The main character, played by Jason Ritter (who looks more and more like his late father every year) was excellent in the role.  He drew me in immediately.  My only fear is that the show will fail to take cues from Lost and attempt to drag the story out instead of having set times for conclusions.  Viewers want things wrapped up, they don't want to be dragged on a wild goose chase for multiple episodes without some payoff.  Flashforward did not learn this lesson and was canceled, another great concept that went down in flames.  Undercovers, created by Alias director/producer JJ Abrams also caught my eye.  While JJ Abrams name alone made me watch the first episode, I will continue to watch because of the great casting of the main characters.  Two unknown actors fill the main roles of the husband and wife spying team of Steven and Samantha Bloom (Boris Kodjoe and Gugu Mbatha-Raw) and they are excellent, especially Boris (yummy).  Their boss is played by Gerald McRaney.  A TV staple for over 20 years, Gerald perfectly fits the role.  While the show is similar to the film Mr. and Mrs. Smith, I'm already attached to this cast more than I ever was to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.  Hopefully the plots will continue to live up to the history of JJ Abrams other projects (Lost, Alias, Fringe) so that I will have a new favorite show to add to my collection.  Another show that premiered this week titled The Chase also had enjoyable moments and a great cast.  However, it doesn't appear like it will be a show where you have to watch every episode to keep up, so I may just watch occasionally.  One of the supporting actors is a favorite of mine from Prison Break (Amaury Nolasco played Sucre) and another Prison Break alum, Robert Knepper (T-Bag) will be guest starring in an upcoming episode.  Despite all of the hype and critical acclaim, I hated Lonestar another new drama that premiered this week.  I found it slow and boring in places.  The main actor didn't carry the role the way I felt a leading man should and the concept of a man keeping two women in the dark about his duplicitous nature just rubbed me the wrong way.  I hated the fact that he was stringing these two women along and yet I was supposed to accept and like this aspect of his character.

Inception, Best Film of 2010?

Last night, I saw what is so far the best movie of 2010, Inception.  Wow, what an amazing film.  I was blown away by its complexity and genius storytelling.  Christopher Nolan wrote an amazing screenplay which held the viewers attention through its amazing twists and turns.  The plot could have gotten out of hand and lost the intended audience, but by using certain visual cues to help viewers remember which dream plane they were on, everything ended up making sense in the end.  The acting was excellent.  Joseph Gordon-Levett was amazing.  Every time I see him I always flash back to his 3rd Rock from the Sun character, which I didn't like.  In this film, however, he showed his acting chops and wow, I was impressed.  The only part that bothered me was the ending, which was left ambiguous.  I am one of those people who like happy endings.  I want the fairy tale.  Everything can go wrong during the course of the film but by the end I want everything to turn out ok.   I therefore choose to believe that at the end of Inception, (Spoiler Warning) Leo's character returns to the real world and his kids.  He is not still in a dream.