Friday Night Lights: Are you ready for Friday night?

I know, I know.  How did the girl who reviews America’s Next Top Model get the gig reviewing one of America’s favorite shows, Friday Night Lights?  Well, I don’t know either.  This should be interesting for all of us.

You should know – I’ve never watched the show before.  Don’t hold it against me.  There’s something about FNL that makes me think something bad is always about to happen.  I love the camera work and music, but it has such a sad tone to it.  Nevertheless, I will be unbiased (but judgmental – I mean, come on now), and will try to love the Panthers and Tim Riggins as much as the rest of you.  I certainly hope that by the end of the season, I’m as fanatical as the rest of you crazy fans.

And so – We open on the first day of school, as the Taylor family leaves home and heads for Dillon High School.  Principal Taylor argues with daughter Julie about class schedules and an after-school job, while Coach Taylor ignores them both.  Later, Coach gives a press conference to reporters in order to catch up the viewers.  In summation: The team needs quite a bit more practice; rebellious and unfocused Tim Riggins will replace the Amazing Smash; Saracen and Riggins have zero player chemistry; and young freshman JD McCoy threatens Saracen’s place as quarterback.

As the students arrive for an early morning pep rally, Landry tries to convince Saracen that senior year is about memories, and that’s about it.  I agree.  Who shows up to their senior year in high school planning to learn anything?  Apparently Tyra does.  Anything to escape Dillon.  At the pep rally, Buddy Garrity hints at some kind of “two game rumor deal,” and then Coach fires up the crowd.

Let the drama begin!  Spotted: Lyla Garrity and Tim Riggins doing the dirty in her bedroom, next to the kitchen, while Dad’s prepping breakfast.  Of course, it’s a secret, so Dad doesn’t know (giggling through the door aside), and neither does anyone at school.  Things get really awkward at school when Riggins’ new Rally Girl offers him her number, for anything he needs, whenever he wants it.  What kind of high school is this?

Coach Taylor works with the rehabilitating Smash in order to help Smash regain his scholarship.  Principal Taylor’s bubbly bubble bursts, thanks to Vice-Principal Trucks’ reality check.  Air conditioner’s broken and budgets are due.  The teachers don’t care that she’s there to support them, they just want money – for new textbooks, supplies, paper, and the return of laid off teachers.  Obviously, they’re asking too much.  I’m sure the kids don’t want any of these things.

On the football field, Coach must contend with a sloppy team and the “Stud of Suds,” Papa McCoy.  JD’s dad moved from Dallas to Dillon in order for Coach Taylor to build a team around his star quarterback son, who has the arm to back up his reputation.  Papa Stud sends an ice cream truck to practice during the week to give the team complimentary smoothies, infuriating Coach, who knows a bribe when he sees one, and he sends the truck on its merry way.  Any gal at a singles bar will tell you, though, that studs in general do not take no for an answer.  Not easily anyway, and it sometimes helps to have the bouncer nearby, or at least a bartender with some muscle.  Papa Stud pays Coach a visit and provides a high end bottle of scotch and Cuban cigars to apologize for the smoothies.  He tells Coach he’s got a franchise in JD, and he sure does hope JD will get some playing time on Friday.

Now here’s Tyra, whose visit with Vice Principal Reality Check, aka, Debbie Downer, doesn’t go so well.  She plans to apply to several area colleges, some of them long shots, but all hopefuls.  He tells her to be “realistic” and get over her “pipe dreams.”  After some calculations, she realizes that she can’t raise her GPA high enough by the end of the year for a decent school, so she does what any senior does in a moment of crisis: ditch school!  In the process, she rails into Principal Taylor, who filled her head with all those pipe dreams in the first place.

Buddy’s working overtime this week, as he attempts to woo Principal Taylor into buying a JumboTron for the football stadium.  He’s convinced this will make an excellent addition to the school, to which Tami can take all the credit.  “You and I are going to make a beautiful team together.”  Creepy.  I realize I don’t know him that well yet, but I am not a fan of Buddy Garrity.

Surprisingly Sensitive Tim Riggins frets that Lyla might not care about him.  At school, they argue about his turning into a dumb jock whenever he enters the building, and how she can’t take him seriously.  They both make dramatic, angst-ridden faces at each other, but naturally, can’t see eye to eye.

Smash visits the doctor and receives a clean bill of health, as well as the bad news that a clean bill of health doesn’t mean “as good as you used to be.”  So Smash can run and train all he wants, but he won’t ever get back to his peak condition, as he was before the injury, and that most likely will kill his chances at regaining a football scholarship.

At home, Julie Taylor successfully manipulates Coach into signing off on her new schedule, the one she knows Mom won’t like.  I’m fairly sure that Coach heard the argument, even though he was ignoring it, but he signs off on the schedule anyway.  And how annoying is Julie?  I’d sign the schedule too, just to shut her up.  What are the chances she’s hardly in this show?

Later, when Mama Taylor finds a copy of Julie’s new schedule, an argument starts between Mama and Julie, and it goes just as well as you’d think it would.  See, this is why I don’t watch this show.  I’ve been around this argument, and while I give the writers and actors credit for how realistic and how well-played the situation is, I’m just as aggravated at the end of the scene as I was in real life.  This isn’t escapism.  If I wanted to watch reality, I’d turn off reality television and pay more attention to my family.

Anyway, Coach Taylor’s the biggest idiot in the world for signing the form, or the most oblivious man ever.  Because he really didn’t see that coming?  Shouldn’t be allowed to coach his own team, that’s all I’m saying.

Back to Tyra, and after witnessing Billy propose to her sister Mindy, she freaks out and heads over to the Taylor home.  She wakes up Mama/Principal Taylor, and asks for help.  Tyra’s biggest fear is turning into her sister and then her mother.  And then, because it’s always easier to connect with someone else’s kid rather than your own, Mama Taylor invites Tyra in to work some nurturing magic.

On Friday, Smash shows up to let Coach down easy.  He needs to start living his life as “Brian,” not as Smash.  Since the actor was listed as guest starring at the top of the episode, I guess we’re not going to see much more of him.

Tyra shows up to see VP RC with her college applications and her signed petition to run for Class President.  She then speechifies, all “Don’t tell me what I can’t do.”  She’s getting out of Dillon, by God!

Principal Taylor visits Coach in his office to apologize for her temper tantrum over the schedule, and notices his new networked computers and working air conditioning.  Three seasons in, and Tami’s only just realizing that the football team gets whatever it wants?  Oh, she is going to have a rough year as principal.  We are now also nicely set up for the impending, “I’m cutting the football team’s funding” argument, because she’s the principal, and he’s the coach, and get it?  How very dramatic.  I’m already bored by that argument.

Finally, it’s football time!  Riggins and team pummel the Tigers, 38 to 13 before Coach notices young JD sulking on the sidelines beside his cheering teammates.  Coach puts him in, and the kid nails two amazing throws, including a long one which flies all the way down the field “sailing on the wings of angels,” to another touchdown.  The team celebrates, as Saracen watches from his spot on the sideline, well aware of what this could mean for his senior year and playing time.  His grandmother watches from the stands.  Not cheering, but just as tense as her grandson.  A very nice, sad moment.

At the after-party, country music tortures us as Buddy introduces the JumboTron to a happy audience.  Tami pulls him aside to tell him that she plans to reallocate the JumboTron funds to academics.  Buddy tries to argue, but Principal Taylor lays down her own reality check and reminds him that this year, things are going to be different.

Over at the teen angst corner, Riggins somehow apologizes for being a screw up without copping to anything, and Lyla falls for it.  She makes a public declaration of their love by placing a hot wet one (kiss, that is) on Riggins in front of the whole party.  Daddy Garrity looks a little disturbed, but it doesn’t stop him from celebrating with a video montage of the team’s greatest hits.  The highlights of Smash get the Coach to thinking.

So he ditches his own party, and it’s off to the ice cream parlor where Smash works.  He picks the kid up and takes him out for some racquetball (huh?).  Smash calls it the whitest sport there is (actually, Smash, that’s curling – thanks, Canada).  Coach convinces Smash to change his game and humble himself.  If he still wants to play, Coach will claw and fight his way into finding Smash the chance, at another school with another scholarship.  Coach leaves, but Smash puts on his fierce face.  So this won’t be the last of him we see after all.

And there it is!  Friday Night Lights is back!  I don’t know, I don’t see what all the hype is about yet.  I mean, yes, Tim Riggins is definitely a hottie.  Thank god he’s really not seventeen, or you’d be calling me Liz Lemon.  I’m sure halfway through the season I’ll be as hooked as the rest of you crazy FNL’ers, but for now, I’m just hoping someone doesn’t get hit by a car, or overdoses on drugs or alcohol, or someone’s puppy doesn’t die suddenly.

I mean, please – like you weren’t waiting for Smash’s knee to blow out during that whole racquetball game.

Season 3, Episode 1: I Knew You When (originally aired October 1, 2008 on DIRECTV)

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

For more on Friday Night Lights, click here.

Fridays, 9/8C on NBC

Photographs courtesy of NBC

Battlestar Galactica: Frak Earth!

After four years the remains of humanity and their new Cylon rebel allies land on Earth and discover it is a wasteland, devoid of intelligent life, and certainly lacking in humans from the mythical Thirteenth Colony.  Fleet scientists confirm that the planet was nuked about 2,000 years ago.  This is not a happy day, to say the least, but it’s especially troubling for Dualla, who it seems was only carrying on in life with the hope of a normal life on Earth.  She ultimately takes her own life, after one last fun evening with her estranged husband, Lee.

As the Galactica crew learns the extent of the destruction on Earth, chaos and doubt set in.  President Roslin, still suffering from cancer, stops her treatment and begins burning pages from Pythia’s prophesy about the Thirteenth Colony, which is saying a lot for someone who considered herself a modern day prophet not too long ago.  Between Roslin’s breakdown, Dualla’s suicide, and the lingering doubt over his friendship with newly-revealed Cylon Saul Tigh, Adama suffers his own bout of despair and goes on a drinking bender that ends in a confrontation between Adama and Tigh.  In the end, though, Tigh sees through Adama’s trick to get Tigh to kill him, and they resolve to carry on together as they did when their journey began after the Colonies fell.

Meanwhile, strange things are happening on Earth.  Skeletal remains reveal that the Thirteenth Colony was made of humanoid Cylons, just like the Final Five and the other seven humanoid Cylon models who helped launch the attack on the Colonies.  This naturally baffles the crew and certainly me, but hey, that was a twist I did not see.  Accompanying the Cylon skeletons are Centurion models from the original Battlestar Galactica series, so now I’m really curious to see where this is going.

While walking around the remains of a city, Tyrol has a flashback to shopping in a market when the nuclear blast went off.  He realizes he’s been in that spot before; in fact, he lived in that city and the shadow burned onto the concrete wall was him.  How is that possible?  Anders also realizes he lived in that city and once played–on the remains of a Guitar Hero–the music that activated the Final Five’s Cylon identities back at the Ionian Nebula.  Oh and he played this music for his then-lover, Tory, who also shares this memory.  Freaky stuff.

Nearby, Kara and Leoben discover the source of the Colonial emergency distress signal–Kara’s destroyed viper, which inexplicably contains Kara’s charred remains, including her ring from Anders and her dog tags.  Kara wants no one to know of this until she figures out who or what she is, so hopefully no one saw the massive funeral pyre she gave herself alone in a field.

In the end Adama resumes command with Tigh at his side, and he orders the fleet to the closest G, F or K star system and attempts to rouse the morale of the fleet.  Plus their new Cylon friends, who apparently have nothing better to do, are going along for the ride.   As the crews pack up on Earth, Tigh is drawn to the sea, where he finds the door to a safe deposit box under the water.  He flashes back to the day of the attack on Earth: He’s in a bank searching for his wife who’s calling his name.  He tries to save her but she says, “It’s okay, everything is in place.  We’ll be reborn, again . . . together.”  And who, ladies and gentlemen was that woman?  Ellen. The same Ellen who was Tigh’s wife 2,000 years later and who he killed on New Caprica after she revealed secretive information to the Cylons.  Now that’s a pisser.

So I was completely wrong with my predictions, but that’s a good thing as this was far more interesting than what I thought would happen.  And through this episode, we learn once again that you’ll never get a spoiler out of me because I’m always wrong on the big plot guesses.  Anyway, all will be revealed in the last nine episodes and if this episode is any indicator, we’re off to a great end to this series.

Season 4, Episode 11: Sometimes a Great Notion (originally aired January 16, 2009)

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

For more on Battlestar Galactica, click here.

Sci Fi, Fridays at 10/9c

Photographs courtesy of Sci Fi and IMDbPro

Grey’s Anatomy: Mommy McDreamy

Now that’s what I’m talking about. After last week’s mediocre episode, Grey’s delivers the goods with the latest installment, “Sympathy for the Devil.”  Sometimes the show is ridiculously emo, but I have to admit it entertains me. Picking up with two storylines introduced last week, Bailey and the new resident Dr. Robbins continue to clash over the treatment of Bailey’s pediatric patient, Jackson.  He’s waiting for a liver and intestine transplant and he’s running out of time.  Meanwhile, Derek and Meredith continue to care for the serial killer awaiting execution in 5 days. He sustained massive brain contusions and refuses a life-saving surgery.  Derek correctly asserts that the man – played by Eric Stoltz in a nice departure from his perennial nice guy shtick – is trying to “beat” the system by avoiding execution and dying on his own terms rather than those of the state.  Derek despises the man for his crimes and assures him that he will receive excellent care and tells him that he has no intentions of allowing him to die on his watch.  The man goes one step further to offer his liver and intestines to Bailey’s patient, as a way to leave this world having done something right and good. I can only assume that he is the “devil” referenced in the episode’s title. Tempting as his offer may be, obviously that’s not the way it works in the medical field.  But of course, if Izzie can steal a heart for Denny, what’s to stop the writers from finding a way to allow the doctors of Seattle Grace to skirt medical ethics once again? Stay tuned for that one.

Grey’s always juxtaposes the principal new storyline involving patients with the continuing storylines involving the doctors.  Derek’s mother (played wonderfully by Tyne Daly) is in town and Meredith is predictably petrified.  Mark is also nervous about what Mrs. Shepherd will think of his cradle-robbing affair with Little Grey (Lexie).  Mama Shepherd is pretty cool though.  She warms to Meredith and counsels Mark.  The parting words she has for her son are a ringing endorsement of his relationship.

Revisiting the patients briefly, one of Callie’s needs to be treated for dangerously undergoing a leg-lengthening procedure in Hong Kong.  The man, accompanied by his brother, laments life as a short man.  He risked his life just to gain a mere two inches of height.  This was an interesting storyline to me, because the man practically acted as if he were physically deformed or disabled.  Instead of being grateful that he’d keep his legs (I thought for sure they’d need to be amputated), he complains about not getting the two inches and actually losing a quarter of an inch in height in the surgical repair of his damaged limbs.  I don’t know if people suffer from such a severe Napoleon complex in real life, but it was a reminder of how we focus on the physical aspects of human beings too often.

This episode marked a return to the excellent and challenging writing we’ve come to expect.  It ended with Eric Stoltz’ serial killer inflicting head trauma on himself in order to become a donor candidate for Jackson, whose initial transplant surgery was unsuccessful.  He decides to kill himself after Meredith slyly warns him that any blow to the head will end his life.  Then she walks out of the room.  It’s like telling a suicidal person, “hey the alcohol’s in the kitchen and the sleeping pills are in the cabinet.  I’ll be back in a couple of hours.” Unethical? Yes. Effective? Probably. I can’t wait to tune in next week to find out.

Season 5, Episode 12: Sympathy for the Devil (originally aired January 15, 2009)

Wanna know more about this episode of Grey’s?  Check out Inisia Lewis’s review, Sweeter Notes, here.

For more Grey’s Anatomy reviews, click here.

Thursdays 9/8c on ABC
Photographs courtesy of ABC

Damages: What’s your angle?

So, Purcell’s wife is dead.  Purcell tells the police that he dropped off his wife earlier, came back, and a man rushed by him out of his home, slamming him against the door.  The police ask him if there’s anyone he knows who would want to hurt him.  Purcell says no.  His pants don’t immediately catch on fire.

But Patty knows he’s lying.  After all, Purcell was just telling her last week that he was afraid for his family due to some research he was doing.  What we know is that Purcell developed a toxic chemical but doesn’t know what it was used for.  A report was commissioned about this chemical, but its results were doctored – but Purcell’s name is still on it.  Purcell asks Patty to “Burn it, shred it, I don’t care” which Patty does not do, because, you know, she’s Patty, and why destroy something that might be useful later?

So Patty gives it to a “friend,” Earl Jacoby from the EPA, a shady dude who’s totally in the pocket of the oil companies.  Jacoby then gives it to someone else, a dude whose name I haven’t caught, so I’m calling him Stalker Guy because he’s been following the folks at the firm, including Ellen.  Stalker Guy then takes it to a woman named Claire Maddox, who we will later find out is the corporate counsel for Ultimate National Resources, the third largest oil company in the world.  Yup, that’s right, the world.

So Claire goes to a judge, hands him a motion for replevin, and the judge, who apparently hates Patty – which I can’t blame him for, cause if I were a judge, I’d HATE Patty – signs it without even bothering to read it, and next thing you know, like, 20 cops are storming Patty’s office to get the super secret research documents back.  Really, I’m pretty sure only two cops at most were needed for the strenuous task of picking up a box and carrying it down the elevator.  Patty reads the warrant, sees Claire Maddox’s name, and, just like that, Patty finds out who commissioned the report.  If, by just like that, I meant starting a chain of events that had to go through three different layers and 20 cops potentially rooting through all of Patty’s firm’s files to find out information I’m pretty sure could have been revealed by a 17-year -old computer geek with some spare time.

But enough about Patty.  Let’s talk about Hot Guy From Go.

Remember how in Go, Timothy Olyphant was a smartass, potentially violent drug dealer?  So, he’s the same here.  Only not a smartass or a drug dealer.  Instead, he’s some guy who is harboring some serious weaponry in a locked closet in his home.  Seriously, I spotted an automatic machine gun and maybe even a machete.  Plus, he is apparently a collector of Arthur Frobisher news articles, particularly ones surrounding the big plaintiff’s action that Ellen worked on.  Oh, and likely relevant to the storyline?  A little article taped to the door that reads “Medical Student slaying still unsolved.”  We also got a little flash to the future that indicates that Ellen starts sleeping with him later on.  But, gotta say, this had red herring written all over it.  Remember last season, when there was that crazy lady obsessed with David and we thought she might have something to do with his death, but instead she was just, well, a crazy lady?  Methinks that Hot Guy From Go is just a crazy hot guy.

We also learn this week that Tom Chase, Patty’s go-to guy, will give Ellen the gun she uses to shoot someone (twice) later on.  Tom Chase is played by Tate Donovan, and Donovan is the kind of actor whose existence I am totally aware of, yet who I immediately forget about the minute the camera is off him.  This quality works well for him here, because Tom Chase is the kind of eager to please, wracked with insecurities, thoroughly sleazy schmuck who you just know was a middle child who never felt he got enough attention.  Now, Tom just wants to please Patty.  As a result of these qualities he almost gives a “client”  $60,000 to retain her in an infant mortality case that has been planted in the firm’s hands by the FBI.  At the last minute Patty pulls him away, leaving the FBI frustrated, and Tom Chase still relevant to the plot.

We also learn he’s going to be a dad, but I don’t really think that that’s important, plot-wise.

In other news, we learn that Ellen does her badass deeds of the future in Room 1910, one of the FBI guys who is working with Ellen to bring Patty down is going through a crappy divorce, and, judging by the look on Purcell’s face when he meets Patty’s son briefly, Patty and Purcell definitely got it on at some point.  The episode closes with Patty’s reminder to Ellen that “Everyone is looking to play an angle.”  And in case you, the audience, forgets, we quickly flash to Purcell and Claire Maddox, in a car, in the rain, and they have clearly been getting it on.

And I don’t think Patty’s going to be happy about that particular angle.

Season 2, Episode 2: Burn it, Shred it, I don’t care.  (originally aired January 14, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out Everyone Has an Angle by Kaitlyn Edsall.

For more on Damages, click here.

Wednesdays at 10pm E/P on FX

Photographs courtesy of FX and IMDbPro

American Idol: The Good, the Horrendous and the Strange

American Idol is back!  There are going to be a lot of changes this season, but I take each change as it comes.  Now we don’t have three judges since the lovely Ms. Kara DioGuardi is joining the panel.  From what I’ve seen so far during the auditions, she brings a needed kick to the panel whose hijinks were becoming slightly repetitive.  How often can Randy call someone his dawg or Paula talk about someone’s personality and good-natured attempt?  How long can we listen to Simon be a British d-bag but somehow always be right? Read more

Damages: Everyone Has an Angle

The lawyers at Hewes and Associates were working their angles hard this week as Damages continues to gain momentum and intrigue.  Flashing between the present day – where Ellen’s taking someone out – to six months ago, it’s still a mystery as to who’s at the end of Ellen’s two bullets, but this week helped wheedle down one potential victim.  Let’s narrow down the suspects …

Ellen continues to work her angle with the Feds against Patty this week with the infant mortality case.  But unfortunately, after Patty commits to defending Daniel Purcell, she drops the case and hands it off to Tom (Tate Donovan, who is sure aging well).  Ellen tries to get Patty back on the case, but it’s a no go.  So it’s Tom that takes the bait instead when their plaintiff asks for a little extra, totally illegal upfront money – just a meager $60,000.  At first Ellen is okay with setting up Tom, as long as he leads them to Patty, but she begins to have second thoughts after Tom announces his wife is pregnant again.  She tries to talk Tom out of giving the spy/plaintiff the money by appealing to his young daughter’s innate sense of justice, but Tom writes her off saying the world is much more complicated than that.  Sometimes justice requires some clawing.  Lucky for Tom, Patty has the conference rooms wired and learns that Tom was going to pay off his client.  She calls him and tells him to drop the infant mortality case at the last second.  She needs him to help her with the much larger Purcell case.  Tom walks away scot-free.  But he doesn’t keep himself completely clean of dirty deeds.  Flash to six months later and there’s Tom handing Ellen her shiny silver gun.  Looks like Tom’s not at the end of it.

Last week, I guessed it might be Ellen’s new buddy in grief, Wes, taking the shots, and this episode proved I might be on to something.  Ellen met with hottie Wes this week to confess that she saw her fiancé’s killer, but just walked away.  In no time flat, Wes puts the pieces together and realizes that the man Ellen wants revenge on is Arthur Frobisher.  Wes warns her not to mess with a guy like that.  He’s powerful and can come after her.  Ellen doesn’t seem to heed this warning much, so Arthur Frobisher could still very well be Ellen’s mysterious victim.  But at least Wes seems to care about her welfare.  Maybe I was at least right about him being a good love interest for Ellen.

Flash to six months later and there’s Ellen and Wes having a healthy romp in the sack. (Score one for me!) Ellen gets a phone call to meet someone in ten minutes and rushes off.  She won’t tell Wes who was on the phone and tells him he better not be there when she gets back.  Okay so maybe he’s less of a love interest and more of a lust interest?  Or maybe, he better get out of there before she returns and shoots him up for lying?

Flash back to six months ago and there’s doe-eyed Wes taking the article about Frobisher and pinning it up in his armoire, which is lined with articles on the dangerous billionaire and one article on Ellen’s dead fiancé.  Pan over, and lo and behold, the armoire holds some more secrets: a serious amount of weaponry.  Looks like Ellen and Wes’ meeting was no accident.  What angle are you playing sexy Wessy?

One thing’s for sure, on Damages even the victims are working angles.  Last week we left Patty with Daniel Purcell and his murdered wife.  Back at his townhouse this week, Purcell’s looking like the main suspect, especially since there’s no sign of entry and Purcell lies about being threatened at work.  Patty calls him on his lies, and he claims to be protecting his daughter.  He doesn’t want Patty pursuing it.  But since when does Patty listen?  She takes his incriminating documents to a scientist she knows will leak the info.  Quickly Doctor Sure-I’ll-Keep-This-Confidential runs off to Purcell’s scheming coworkers and tells them Patty Hewes has some incriminating documents.  Scheming coworker runs off to scheming lawyer, Claire Maddox (the fabulous Marcia Gay Harden – love the new short ‘do) who easily finds a judge with a grudge against Patty who signs a document allowing the cops to seize the stolen docs.  Purcell is furious when he finds out Patty leaked the docs, but soon changes his tune when Patty reveals that Claire Maddox is head counsel for a super powerful energy company.  That‘s who killed his wife, she tells him.  Daniel looks pleased.

But victims lie too.  Flash to a little later and there’s Purcell in a car with none other than Claire Maddox.  Did you tell anyone about us, asks Claire.  No, says Daniel.  Flash to Daniel burying something.  My oh my, what are you up to, Mr. Purcell?

Is it one of these two that gets shot courtesy of Ellen for telling too many lies?  Or is it Frobisher?  Or Wes?  Or Patty?  Or those unhelpful FBI agents?  One thing’s certain, it’s time to choose an angle.

Season 2, Episode 2: Burn It, Shred It, I Don’t Care (originally aired January 14, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out What’s Your Angle? by Alana D.

For more on Damages, click here.

Wednesdays at 10pm E/P on FX

Photographs courtesy of FX and IMDbPro

30 Rock: UR V8K8SH1 iz baqon

Zombies and 30 Rock?  Together?  Is it my birthday?  There are very few things I like better than vomiting zombies while I eat dinner.  But hold on to your lollipops, America, because it does get better – Dr. Spaceman returns!

But first!  We begin this week with a partially fake-tanned Liz arriving at work, psyched for vacation week, just a few days away.  Turns out, the writers and actors can leave for vacation, while the crew must continue working: “We gotta load out the sets, take them to storage, and at night I’ve got to drive around Newark looking for my runaway daughter.”

It doesn’t help that almost every member of the crew is sick or growing sicker.  Liz encounters a sneezing Kenneth.  She starts to freak out because she refuses to become ill before her vacation, at a wondrous place with soft-serve ice cream and which honors the French custom of wearing dark socks with sandals at the beach.  Side note: What is with the French?

But Kenneth has “the constitution of an ox,” so he’ll be all right.  Until he turns around and projectile vomits on the desk!  He must have ox fever!  Vomiting = funny.  He ignores Liz’s clarification that he actually has the flu, and also ignores her order to go home.  But it doesn’t matter, because Cerie informs Liz that her magical vacation is cancelled because the hotel is overbooked.

Meanwhile, Salma Hayek returns as Elisa, the lower class nurse and Jack’s new love interest.  She starts the show in scrubs, but later changes into a low cut leopard dress that’ll knock your socks off.  Really.  Hayek overacts her way through the entire episode, but even that cannot distract us from her bountiful, exposed breasts.  Look, I’m more of a Jason Statham fan, Perlow can attest (sadly, in his opinion), but even I have to admit, those things are magnificent.  Next award season, they should get their own Emmys for guest starring.

Anyway, where was I?  Geez, see how distracting they are?  Elisa works two jobs, preventing her and Jack from spending any real time together.  While receiving his flu shot from Dr. Spaceman – making a welcome return – Jack consults Liz, who suggests he put in a little more effort to make the relationship work.  At the same time, Liz refuses one of the last five flu shots available, since Jack and Dr. Spaceman are basically rationing out health care.  At her horror, Jack explains that “important people get better health care.  They also get better restaurant reservations, bigger seats in planes…”

“A more refined class of prostitute,” interrupts Dr. Spaceman.  New Yorkers have heard that before.  Liz takes a stand, and declares that out of fairness, if the crew doesn’t receive their flu shots, neither does she.  When the crew learns of her solidarity, they rally to her side, and Liz enjoys some unusual popularity.

Romantically, Jack takes Liz’s advice, and shows up at the apartment of Elisa’s second patient, Mr. Templeton.  He convinces Elisa to let him take her out.  So they dress up and go to a charity performance of The Lion King, drink wine and watch performance art, with Mr. Templeton the Vegetable right along side in his wheelchair, and a hilarious Michael Bublé ode to Mr. Templeton playing in the background.  Everybody enjoys themselves, including me.  Well, maybe not a confused Mr. Templeton, but whatever.

Back at the studio, enjoying the new love and respect of the crew, Cerie texts Liz that her V8K8SH1 iz baqon.  Vacation?  Filipino lovers?  Dark socks at the beach?  Liz is overjoyed, but then suddenly realizes she’s surrounded by sick people.  She can’t afford that!  But she swore not to get a flu shot … or did she really?

Begin the zombie parody!  Someone in the make up department had fun this week, as the crew turn into zombies, infected with the flu.  Liz races from the set (“Stay away, sick Lutz!”), chased by the workers, Lutz, a decaying Kenneth, and then a suddenly infected and transformed Hornberger.  She runs straight to Dr. Spaceman.  He tells her, “If you want a shot… you’re going to have to dance for it.”  Sadly, Liz does.  But she also gets her shot.

The next day, Jack visits Elisa and Mr. Templeton to take them out for the evening.  Mr. Templeton’s son arrives unexpectedly, forcing Jack to hide.  If Mr. Templeton Junior catches Elisa with guests while working, she’ll lose her job.  Mr. Templeton Senior tries to tell his son about Jack: “A man comes at night!  He comes to the house and takes me.  He made me watch a giraffe with the legs of a man.  He ate a plate of fire!”  Once he settles down and sleeps, Jack tries to slip out, but the senior Templeton catches him.  Jack explains to the old man his deep, deep affection for Elisa (“is that the Puerto Rican?”).  Mr. Templeton Senior agrees to keep things quiet, as long as they go to Washington Square Park on their next excursion, and then hit up a Negro bar.  Aren’t old people funny?

Back at the studio, the tell-tale rash at the site of the flu shot injection exposes Liz as a liar, and the crew returns to hating her.  Later, Jack tries to cheer her up, encouraging her to keep her plans to “go to St. Bartleby’s and get whatever’s left of your groove back.”  She buys into his elitist rhetoric, because hey, we all deserve a vacation.  And if there’s a chance of running into Taye Diggs in order to get my groove back, I say, suck it, monkeys, I’m going corporate! on a vacation!  As they part ways, they are both suddenly struck by some digestive discomfort, which turns into the first signs of the flu.  Uh oh!  We all part ways as they race to the bathrooms!  Vacation, shmacation!

But I was totally right about Salma’s breasts, right?

Season 3, Episode 8: Flu Shot (originally aired January 15, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out Embrace Your Elitism by Robin Reed.

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

For more on 30 Rock, click here.

Thursdays at 9:30/8:30C on NBC

Photographs courtesy of NBC

30 Rock: Embrace Your Elitism

It’s flu season at 30 Rock, and fittingly, love is in the air.  Jack and Salma Hayek are still hot and heavy, and Liz is headed to her annual vacation at “St. Bartleby’s,” where this year, she’s aspiring to get whatever’s left of her groove back by wearing a swimsuit modeled in US Weekly by Judi Dench’s mother and making a certain young Filipino gentleman into her island lover.

But their dreams are nearly dashed.  To finance her grandmother’s online poker habit, Salma works too much to spend quality time with Jack, and Liz’s vacation is threatened by the TGS crew (who spend their evenings driving around Newark looking for their runaway daughters).  They’ve all come down with a hardcore flu, but are working anyway, because sometimes working in TV sucks.  Liz doesn’t care, as long as they don’t infect her and ruin her vacation.

But it’s okay, because Dr. Spaceman is back!  He’s busy, though, giving out flu shots and lollipops to the upper crust of 30 Rock, forcing Liz to do the robot, and offering up gems like “When is modern science gonna find a cure for a woman’s mouth?”  Liz is ready to shoot up with the vaccine, until she learns that there are only five shots left, and Jack is rationing them out to the people he considers worthy.  Liz, bless her heart, is genuinely aghast about this for a while, and refuses to get a shot on principle.  This makes her a hero to the crew – until, following a horror-movie sequence and a fever-dream sequence and a series of unintelligible text messages about hotel bookings from Cerie, she changes her mind and reveals her true elitist colors.

Fortunately, Jack is there to deliver the moral of the story: Not everyone gets to get flu shots and go to the Caribbean, but Liz does, because she’s better than other people.  Lesson learned, people, lesson learned.

And Jack knows his stuff on this front, because he and Salma have spent the episode toting around one of Nurse Salma’s unwitting patients while they go on dates.  In the end, the patient – a Mr. Templeton, who’s in a vegetative state and has a beak on his foot and has always dreamed of going to a “Negro bar” (and yes, I went through some internal debate before typing that, but I figure if Tina Fey can type it, I can too) – almost outs Jack and Salma to his bow-tied Londoner son.  But Jack cuts a deal with him, because Jack can cut deals with anyone, regardless of vegetation.  Also, we get to hear an awesome montage song about Mr. Templeton, which I suspect will be next year’s Emmy winner (following in the great comedy-song tradition of Justin Timberlake and Sarah Silverman).

Other things we learned this week:

• Howie Mandel has his own reality show now.
• Upon their deaths, Parcell men are traditionally wrapped in Confederate flags, fried and fed to dogs.  (Does anyone else think Kenneth and Dwight are probably related?  Sure, Dwight’s from Pennsylvania and Kenneth’s from Kentucky or something, but the hick diaspora is wider than you’d guess.)
• Important people get better health care, better restaurant reservations, bigger seats in planes, and a more refined class of prostitute.
• Alec Baldwin tiptoes awesomely.

Season 3, Episode 8: Flu Shot (originally aired January 15, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out UR V8K8SH1 iz baqon by Jaimie Campos.

For more on 30 Rock, click here.

Thursdays at 9:30/8:30C on NBC

Photographs courtesy of NBC

Top Chef: Very Fast and Hung

You know why I love when it’s time to declare our bets for the contestants who will reach the Top Four?   Because Perlow always ends up owing me appletinis.  Dr. Chase better come through and knock Hosea out, because Mama is thirsty.

We open with Gladware product placement.  Also, Leah’s disappointment that Boring Melissa (who?) and Eugene are gone.  Elimination “just sucks.”  Meanwhile, Stefan “gets under [Hosea's] skin” for being a winning, pompous ass, and we are reminded that this is a competition, not somewhere to make friends, Leah.  Or psuedo-showmance-boyfriends, Leah.  Look, folks, if you really don’t want the crown, go home!  But please add a little high school drama before you go, okay, Leah?

Quickfire.  Guest judge: Hung!  God, I hated this guy.  But ironically, Hosea has always reminded me of CJ, who is also from Season 3.  Interesting.  Hung is known for being fast and using fish.  There’s a dirty joke in there I won’t make, but feel free.  The chefs must make a delicious dish without fresh ingredients (i.e., mostly canned and all pre-packaged), in only fifteen minutes.

Non-fresh ingredients, by the way, are disparagingly referred to as “garbage … stuff that a lot of chefs would not use” (Chase), and fake, “canned, aged ingredients, something a housewife with little time would use” (Radhika).  Housewives everywhere exclaim, “WTF?”

Of note during the challenge, Fabio won’t share his artichokes with Hosea, who in turn chooses to share his Spam with Stefan, only to regret it because now Hosea’s forgotten what the word “competition” means (see here, Hosea).  He’s spending too much time with Leah, as I’m sure Hosea’s girlfriend can attest to.

After the tasting, Hung chooses Jamie, Leah, and Radhika as his least favorites, and Hosea, Stefan, and Dr. Chase as his top choices.  Ultimately, Stefan wins immunity, and Hosea kicks himself for helping his competitor.  Stefan easily pats himself on the back, and laughs maniacally.

Elimination challenge.  The chefs divide into three teams of three.  They must create a seasonal meal based around a main protein: chicken, pig or lamb.  Their food will be served family style meal for 16 people, to include dessert.

Jamie (Team Chicken) complains about teaming with Stefan, because he’s “a know-it-all.”  She thinks it will be difficult for her and Crazy Carla.  Well yes.  But Stefan loves the lesbians, so what’s the problem, Jamie?  He thinks she’s “so friggin cute” when she’s angry and “loves” it.  I love that he’s torturing her.  Crazy Carla “can’t create” in the energy of Jamie and Stefan’s friction.  By friction, she means arguing and angry, folks.  Gay and straight tendencies aside, these two can’t communicate at all.

Hosea, Leah, and Ariane of Team Lamb divide into two camps: Hosea and Leah, and Ariane.  Because they’re “lovebirds” and she’s just a cougar.  A cougar relegated to cooking the meat, since Ariane’s won that way before.

Fabio leads Team Pork (Fabio, Chase and Radhika) through the menu of a simple, non-ethnic lunch.  I’m beginning to like Fabio more and more, as he seems to be the most down-to-earth (ego aside) and practical, while still being knowledgeable.  I dare to call him charming.

Later, Jamie and Carla brainstorm out a new menu, concerned that Stefan’s choices don’t meet the challenge requirements.  Not to mention, he has immunity, of which Jamie reminds him.  It’s their asses on the line, and holy cow, I actually agree with Jamie on something.  Yikes!  The ladies approach him, but Stefan is an Immovable.  Names like douche bag are thrown around, resulting in no changes to the menu and Jamie storming away.

The next morning, the chefs trek out to Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture.  Dan Barber greets them.  The food for the challenge will come from the farm, and then the chefs will cook in Dan’s restaurant (Blue Hill at Stone Barn) for Stone Barn’s farmers and chefs, and their families.

The teams separate to explore the farm and livestock.  Menus are altered based on the new food options offered, including a fried green tomato dish Chase’s southern background screams for him to prepare.  Relax, Jessica Tandy.

Into the kitchen to start working.  Team Chicken and Team Pig make the necessary menu adjustments, but trouble lies ahead for Team Lamb.  Ariane’s never cooked a baby lamb (me neither) but she’ll make the most of it.  Hosea takes the lead, which leaves Leah in charge of a salad and dessert, and she’s feeling slighted.  Well, stand up to your boyfriend, girl!  Also, maybe you shouldn’t have played it safe by sticking Ariane with the protein.  If she’s won with it, so can you.  Hop to it!

Radhika’s slow pace frustrates Fabio, and is noticed by Colicchio when he pays the kitchen a visit.  Tom notes that Team Lamb is not making the most of their protein.  Team Chicken’s soup may be a bad choice on such a warm weather day.  Other than Radhika’s non-urgency, Colicchio can’t find much fault with Team Pig.

Teams Pig and Chicken worry a bit, but we all know the losers here are Team Lamb, where Ariane doesn’t know how to tie a roast, even though she’s cooking it.  Leah takes over tying, but admits she could have done a better job.

The food is served!  Team Chicken’s soup predictably scores no points in the 85 degree warmth.  Their other two chicken dishes do well.  The judges call the lamb “a mess.”  The sides, courtesy of the lovebirds, please the judges, but the other diners can’t get past the poorly cooked and prepared lamb.  Team Pig also disappoints: the pesto on Fabio’s ravioli takes away from the pork flavor.  However, Chase’s fried green tomatoes save his team.

For dessert, Carla’s nectarine and strawberry tartlet beats out the other teams.  Pig’s crème brûlée is too sweet, but Lamb’s summer berry trifle was “unappealing” and compared to airplane food.

Judges’ Table.  Padma announces Team Chicken as the winners.  The three gloss over all of the leadership issues in the kitchen to accept the single crown as a team.  Yawn!

In come the losers, as all six of the remaining chefs step up for judgment.  Colicchio calls Radhika out for contributing less than her teammates.  Ariane’s butchering ruined the lamb, then Leah and Hosea take heat for not helping Ariane enough.  Leah tries to deflect the blame back to Ariane, but none of the judges are fooled.  I like that the judges on this show don’t take shit, see right through the lies, and take the dodging into account.

Over deliberation, we must note four things:

1. Radhika’s on the chopping block because she’s lazy.
2. Leah’s on the chopping block because she’s lazy and a blamer.
3. Ariane’s on the chopping block because she’s doesn’t know how to wield a butcher’s knife.
4. New judge, Toby, declares, “When faced with a beautiful, well reared piece of meat, I don’t want to stand back and admire it, I want to have full blown, unprotected sex.”  How irresponsible!  No one should have unprotected sex anymore, it doesn’t matter what the protein is!

Line them back up, and Ariane takes the bullet for her team and packs her knives.  She’s unhappy with her teammates, and that’s fair.  Ariane was just a matter of time, but her lovebirds were a little uncool about the situation.  I’d be pissed too.

But the highlight for me is knowing that one of Perlow’s Top Four is sent packing.  Let’s all keep our fingers crossed that Hosea goes home in a few weeks and that Dr. Chase knocks him out.  Though with Fabio consistently making the bottom, I’m beginning to wonder about him.  Well, we’ll soon find out who takes home the princess!

Next time: Restaurant Wars!

Season 5, Episode 8: Down on the Farm (originally aired January 14, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out Petting Zoo by J.B. Perlow.

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

For more on Top Chef, click here.

Wednesdays at 10/9C, Bravo

Photographs courtesy of Bravo

Top Chef: Petting Zoo

Last time two people who sucked went home for sucking but we were stuck with new judge Toby Young, who also sucks.  Speaking of sucking, this season ranks up there.  But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Quickfire.  Hung, winner of Season Three, is back as Padma tells them, with the usual hyperbole, they need to make the “most delicious dish” they can from a pile of canned goods.  So why is Hung there?  I’d say to show these contestant someone with skill but Padma says that Hung was “the fastest contestant ever in the history of the show,” so they only have 15 minutes to make their dishes.  They all freak out and Stefan rebels by cutting open a can with a knife.  Hosea and Stefan bicker over sharing Spam and Hosea makes a childish comment about Stefan and Fabio being boyfriends.

Hung reviews the troops, decreeing that Leah’s waffles were disappointing, Radhika’s seasoned canned beans also sucked, and Jamie was equally uninspiring.  He liked Hosea’s split pea and Spam soup, Stefan’s soup also with Spam, and Jeff’s fried conch (who knew that came in canned form?).  The winner is Stefan who gets immunity, which makes Hosea regret sharing his Spam with Stefan.  And no, I’m not really paraphrasing..

Elimination Challenge.  Padma announces a return to basics as the chefs draw knives with different types of meat on them (labels of meat, not actual flesh).  They form three different teams: lamb, chicken, and pork.  Of note, Ariane is uncomfortable being on a team with Leah and Hosea, or as she called them, “the love birds.”  Anyway, they are to cook a seasonal meal around their team’s protein; the meals will be served at a family style lunch the next day.

We cut to the apartment where Stefan is being a jerk with Jamie, but it’s because he has a crush on her and the only way to express that is by acting like an elementary school kid, especially when she’s not interested . . . at a minimum because she’s a lesbian.  Carla thinks it’s killing the vibe on their team, but later she and Jamie approach Stefan about changing the menu, but Stefan just laughs in her face.  Smooth move, ex-lax.

The next morning they drive to Dan Barber‘s Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture (and Petting Zoo).  At the Center, Dan Barber tells them to collect their food from the farm and prepare it on the farm for the farmers.  I hope we get to see a slaughter.  They start picking foods and then we see folks petting a lamb, named Dinner, as Fabio sings, “Circle of Life,” while discussing the need to respect pigs even if we eat them.  Very true.  Jamie plays with some chickens and Stefan holds the only cock in the stall.  Again, I’m barely paraphrasing here.

As they cook, Fabio is concerned that Radhika took so long to shuck and peel corn.  It’s not Top Corn!   Leah is concerned that Ariane doesn’t know how to tie a roast properly, but she doesn’t say this to anyone except in her sidebar interview.

All teams serve at the same time and I think for the first time the food is looking good.  The diners like the hot consommé even though it’s the summer . . . wait, I thought it was just Christmas.  I’m so confused.  The lamb roast, however, is a mess due to improper butchering and slicing.  There’s too much pesto on Team Pork’s ravioli.  It’s a big bad wolf blowing all over the place or something per anti-judge Toby.  Seriously, what is he adding to this show?  The desserts are simple, but once again Carla makes a good crust and the crème brûlée stinks.

Judges’ Table.  They call in Team Chicken (Jamie, Stefan, Carla) to say they were the best and Carla thankfully survives another day–to her credit, the judges thought her dessert was the best.  There’s some banter about some dispute between Jamie and Stefan but no one cares because they won.  The judges cop out and give them all the win, which is a first in Top Chef history.  Years from now people will look back at this moment, and who am I kidding, no one cares.

They call in the two other teams: Pork (Jeff, Radhika, Fabio) and Lamb (Ariane, Leah, Hosea).  Jeff took too much fat off of the pork.  Fabio’s pesto was too heavy.  Radhika made a salad and helped with the dessert and that’s about it; Tom calls her on not doing much for three hours.  (Thank you!)  Tom asks why Team Lamb bothered to pound out their lamb and roll it up.  Ariane reveals her inexperience (or at least that’s what we’re supposed to believe) by explaining they wanted to tenderize the meat.  Dan rightfully notes that baby lamb is naturally tender.  It then comes out that Ariane worked alone on the lamb, that she didn’t know what she was doing, that she told the others about her concerns, but that they did not listen to her . . . probably because they were making out or something.  Ariane is sort of throwing Leah under the bus when Hosea offers that he’s butchered and tied before, which only leads Tom to say he should have stepped up and done it this time as well.

Deliberations.  Padma thinks several of them could go home tonight.  Tom is amazed at how they destroyed these great ingredients.  Toby talks about having unprotected sex with the pork, but we all know that’s how you get trichinosis.  Tom suggests Radhika go home for doing nothing but at the same time he thinks Ariane should know how to butcher a leg of lamb.  Toby thinks Ariane can’t cook.  Padma defends Ariane for stepping up and notes that she’s cooked before.  Toby throws the competition rules back in Padma’s face and says they’re supposed to judge based only on what’s before them that week.  I can’t believe this aired because in past episodes, it’s appeared that they’ve gone light on some contestants who’ve previously done well.  But look at me suggesting there’s consistency.

Tom calls them back in and again tells them about his disappointment, which seems to be the recurring theme this season.  He repeats the individual defects but says that Team Pork is safe.  Ariane is going home and, like a good Jersey girl, trashes Leah and Hosea on her way out.  Cat sound!

Next week: Here’s five dollars, go see a Restaurant War.  And Leah uses Hosea as a pillow but they’re both in relationships with other people.  Don’t judge!

Season 5, Episode 8: Down on the Farm (originally aired January 14, 2009)

For another take on this episode, check out Very Fast and Hung by Jaimie Campos.

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

For more on Top Chef, click here.

Wednesdays at 10/9C, Bravo

Photographs courtesy of Bravo

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