PORTLAND: There was certainly a lot of talent and potential in this city, along with some of the usual hijinx from the judges, such as this nonsense gem from Steven Tyler: “I’m much too young to be this old.” I can definitely relate to that! Up first was 21 year old nanny Brittany Zika, who was unbelievably annoying and obnoxious when she spoke, but sang like an angel with one of the most beautiful tones I have EVER heard. Just please stop talking. Please.

We went from that to the most awkwardly strange guy in the universe, Ben Purdom, who had a horrible cold and kept blowing his nose and burping accidentally into the camera. He snapped his fingers annoyingly during his entire awful rendition of a Lady Gaga tune. I have no idea why they spent SO much time on this dork, but they did. I guess this is the type of thing that passes for humor these days on the show, since they have let go of the Simon Cowell erawhere they actually SHOWED the awful auditions and the hilarious judges’ reactions. Now, even when they show clips from past seasons, they cut out Simon Cowell, as if he was never even there. They actually showed a montage of the past 10 seasons, and every single clip was Randy Jackson laughing or reacting to the contestant. I guess he was the only judge on the show. Nobody else. Just him and his awful Bill Cosby sweaters.

Jermaine Jones was a large  6 foot 8 church singer who sang like Luther and sweated like a cracked-out Whitney. On the other end of the spectrum was country girl Britnee Kellogg, a 27 year old divorced mother of 2 boys, who was held back from chasing her dreams by her ex-husband. Her entire family came into the audition room with her, wearing supportive t-shirts and cheering behind her when she got through to Hollywood. David Weed has an unfortunate name, and a dorky persona to match. He works in a fast-food chain, and he looks like he works in a fast-food chain. The funniest part was that he sang Rush’s “Tom Sawyer” – possibly the oddest choice ever for his voice and personality. It was not good. He will be returning home and asking more people if they’d like fries with that.

There were two “tug at your heartstrings” numbers to make you want to jump off a bridge backstories in Portland. The first was Romeo Diahn, a Libyan who lived in a refugee camp during wartime as a child. He saw many deaths, but survived along with his family, who eventually moved to America for a better life. His vocals sounded very Bob Marley-ish and he had a nice raggae vibe. I don’t think he will be in the Top 12, but he was definitely talented. The second heartfelt story came from 25 year old Jessica Phillips, whose boyfriend suffered from a stroke at only age 25. He was in the hospital for a month, and couldn’t remember anyone, including Jessica. He is slowly improving, but Jessica is now his caretaker, and she says: “We still have life, and another chance to keep going.” Please excuse me whilst I go throw myself out a 9th floor window.

In between the two cities of auditions, we were treated to a preview of Madonna’s new song and video: “Give Me All Your Luvin,” which was pretty awesome! At 53, the singer seems to finally be having a blast in this latest video, instead of taking herself so seriously, as she often does with that fake British accent and talks of English tea and rose gardens. This is the Madonna I fell in love with when I was a teenager. This video is peppy, fun, and the song is very catchy and filled with pop! It also has a cheerleader-vibe to it, and was released just two days before her big Halftime performance at the upcoming Superbowl. Coincidence, or Madonna’s usual marketing genius? I think you know the answer . . .

ST. LOUIS: The show began in Missouri by showing clips of a smalltown girl from Oklahoma, getting ready for her big trip and audition for Idol, 8 years ago in St. Louis, Missouri. The show went on to show her audition, and everything that happened afterwards, including winning the show, and the numerous Grammys and other awards and endless fame. This person, is of course, Carrie Underwood. Would the next winner also come out of these St. Louis auditions? Let us find out . . .

John Keyser will be loved by women everywhere, because he is very cute and innocent looking. The 22 year old with a soulful, gorgeous voice was raised by his single dad, who was at the auditions and very proud of his son. Rachelle Lamb is yet another divorced mom with an a-hole ex who didn’t believe in her dream (Ladies – stop marrying assholes!). Bringing her little girl into the audition with her and belting out a Faith Hill song, this mom had an awesome and incredible sounding voice. Another great story was Ethan Jones, who is part of a father-son rock band. His dad, however, became a drug-addict and his family sent him to rehab for help. After getting through to Hollywood on his gritty, raspy, soulful sounding voice, Jones called his dad, who told him: “I’m clean and sober, son. And I’m so proud of you.” “I’m so proud of YOU, dad!” Cue the sappy music and bring out the tissues.

Last up is the singer who made one of the strongest impressions on the judges in a long while, which is saying a lot since it seems there is a ton of talent this year. Lauren Gray works in the One-Stop-Wedding Shop that her family owns and operates, and she is the singer in the family wedding band that performs at receptions. Her dad also sings and plays guitar in the band. She came in and sang Adele, and her voice was astoundingly different and more unique than most of the others we have heard so far. Sexy, raspy, simply breathtaking. It sounds like the voice of a large black woman, like an Aretha. Upon her exiting with a Golden Ticket, Jennifer Lopez predicted that Lauren might be the next winner.

Next week, the drama and tears begin in Hollywood . . .

For another take, read “One More Week Until Hollywood!”

Season 11, Episodes 6 & 7: Portland, OR & St. Louis, MO (originally aired February 1 & 2, 2012).

American Idol airs (usually) on Wednesdays/Thursdays at 8pm on FOX.

Follow @poptimal.  Follow @kelleyiskelley.  Read Kelley’s blog, RIP the life I Knew: the hilarious, awful truth about loving and losing my husband here.

For more American Idol coverage, click here.

Photographs courtesy of IMDbPro and FOX.

Each city seems to have their fill of larger than life characters and the baby-faced Ben Harrison was no exception. Claiming to have sung in a slew of rock bands, the twenty-eight year old just can’t catch a break because most of the ‘’old dudes” he’s played with can’t get past his boyish good looks and always give him the boot. Could it actually have something to do with his singing rather than kewpie doll resemblance? The judges enlightened Ben that it may be the latter, as his Freddie Mercury tribute just wasn’t up to Idol standards. That would be a “no” to Babyface Ben.

Just when you thought one Ben was enough, in came another, this time from the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia. But there was no love for the eighteen-year old when he took the stage with snotty rags and a congested head. He’d been sick for some time and it definitely affected his singing but even on his best day I’m pretty sure his nasally rendition of Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” would never be good enough to pry a golden ticket from the judges’ hands.

Just as there were two Bens, there was also another Brittany. This particular Portland native had dreams of sharing the stage with one of her musical heroes, Sara Bareilles, in a duet. No, she literally dreamt of doing this and, miraculously, she is one of the few human beings to be able bring her literal dreams to life. Attending one of Bareilles’ concerts and being pulled up on stage by the star was all the inspiration she needed to give American Idol a shot. A self-described hipster, Brittany sweet voice won the judges’ praise and she was sent through to Hollywood. Sara would have been proud.

Another great audition that is worth mentioning was when the six-foot-eight and a half (and don’t you take away his half!) set of pipes walked in. Jermaine Jones from New Jersey couldn’t escape his musical upbringing even if he wanted to. A momma’s boy at heart, Jermaine ate, slept, and breathed music, thanks to his mother, and the deep spiritual voice that erupted from him earned the gentle giant a place in Hollywood.

The next and final stop before Hollywood was St. Louis, Missouri, aka the town that started it all for season four Idol winner Carey Underwood. So many cities have a story or have produced an idol from seasons past so there was and always has been a lot for the contestants to compete with. Twenty-two year old John from Florida was not discouraged the least bit by that notion and why should he? Not only did he have the good looks down but also a surprisingly smooth voice so it’s no wonder the judges cheered him on to keep singing and singing- they couldn’t get enough! The way the judges talked him up, he may be one to keep an eye out for this season, so with that being said, it’s off to Hollywood for John.

Like Portland, a disturbing trend could be seen when another single mother had finally taken a hold of her destiny to prove what negative spouses thought in the past to be completely wrong. Twenty-six year old Rachelle is currently going through a divorce and, although she had been a professional singer before marriage, her other half never supported her musical dreams. Rachelle needed the confidence boost at this point in her life and so, with her little daughter Madison, she sang out to the judges what she’d been feeling for so long. Her vibrant energy, and maybe a little bit of Madison’s dance moves, moved the judges and another ticket to Hollywood was handed out.

Somewhere between the stellar auditions, a few of those wacky auditioneers that so many of us look forward to finally started to show up. Twenty-seven year old Oliver made it his business to bring tears to everyone’s eyes and bleeding to their ears with a horrific rendition of Seal’s “Kiss From A Rose”. There was also the group audition that seemed more like a horrible Glee parody than anything else. Just when things were getting progressively worse, the judges were joined by twenty-year old Reis. The St. Louis native had endured hard adolescent years when he was abruptly brought into a public high school from a smaller, Lutheran school. He became a target for bullying and ridicule until he joined the school choir where he was able to find some comfort and camaraderie with his fellow peers. Slowly, Reis gained more confidence, enough to stand up to the Idol judges. His sweet rendition of “Lean On Me” was actually so sweet that it made Steven tear up, and that was all the proof the judges needed to give Reis the big “yes!” he had been searching for.

Day two came around and everything was coming up roses as before. A young man by the name of Ethan had quite the personal story that really spoke to the judges, maybe Steven more so than anyone else. The twenty-two year old had become a high school dropout and was currently a full time musician with his father and the rest of the family band. Although his father was originally a part of the band, the musician is on a hiatus for drug and alcohol rehabilitation which you could see really pained Ethan. It’s never easy when someone you care about is down and out and all Ethan could do at this point was put all of his energy into his music and into this audition. His voice was extremely strong and impressive and with the conclusion of yet another tearful American Idol moment, Ethan was on his way to Hollywood.

So between all of the sappy feelings and awesome auditions, American Idol finally made good on their previous promises throughout the show to premiere the beginning of Madonna’s new music video for her song “Give Me All Your Luvin”. Where do I even start with this one? Luckily for everyone, it was literally seconds-long. Like, I don’t know, thirty to sixty seconds or so. It was a football themed video, for the upcoming Super Bowl more than likely, complete with ball players tossing an elderly Maddona up over their heads. Her supporting cheerleaders were played by M.I.A., who I happen to like, and Nicki Minaj, who is just awful. Like I said, it was a second long sneak peek and already I’ve given too much attention to this so, moving on.

The last contestant of the audition portion was twenty-two year old Lauren. Her family’s claim to fame in their local small town was running a one-stop wedding shop complete with floral designs and a banquet hall. But good weddings weren’t the only thing the family could produce judging by the bluesy voice that emerged from Lauren while belting out some Adele for the judging panel. She is currently in a southern rock band along with her father and the dream of becoming an American Idol was as much hers as it was her father’s. Regarding Lauren as “one of the best female voices we’ve heard” was quite the compliment and her singing closed the auditions on the highest note possible and with a shot in Hollywood.

So this is it. The hopefuls have officially been chosen and it’s off to the infamous Hollywood week where some people will thrive and others will fall (some quite literally as next week’s previews show). The pressure is on and now the real competition can begin!

Season 11, Episode 6 & 7: Portland, OR & St. Louis, MO (original air date February 1 & 2, 2012).

Images courtesy of American Idol.

This week’s episode instead began with good old Sheriff Forbes showing up at Elena’s door to inform her that her prints were found on the weapon that was used to kill the town’s medical examiner. And to make matters stranger, the weapon itself came from Alaric’s personal collection of vampire slaying tools. The sheriff quickly rules out Elena and Alaric as suspects (which probably makes her a horrible sheriff) and thus directs suspicion towards Alaric’s new lady friend, Dr. Meredith Fell.

We recently learned that Dr. Meredith likes to use vampire blood to heal her patients and did so to save Caroline’s father, which seemed just fine and dandy until Caroline and Elena stumble upon him stabbed to what appears to be death. Luckily for him though, he has vampire blood in his system which means he’ll rise again as a vampire. This also initially seems fine and dandy until we remember that dear old Dad is a notorious vampire hater who proves it by refusing to feed on blood to complete his transition and thus signs his own death certificate.

Caroline begs and pleads for her father to join her in a life as a vampire but he respectfully declines and passes away before the episode ends. This was a poignant little twist and provided Candice Accola some great scenes to deal with the impending loss, which further proved why she is one of my favorite actresses and characters on the show.

That same night Elena finds Alaric stabbed in their house and must ultimately kill him to save him. This works but makes Elena even more convinced that Meredith is behind it until the sheriff can confirm that Meredith did in fact have an alibi for the time Alaric was attacked. The mystery continues….

And if you were hoping that either Damon or Stefan would be around to help Elena cope with these latest tragedies, you’d be wrong. It is once again Matt the Boring Human who is there to comfort Elena and further confirm my suspicions that they will soon be a couple once again.

Damon and Stefan aren’t just twiddling their thumbs though. In the last episode, Damon revived the comatose Elijah from his slumber in hopes that he would join in their fight against Klaus. Both Damon and Klaus make compelling arguments for Elijah’s allegiance but we are left in the dark for what he’ll do for most of the episode until the two pairs of brothers meet for dinner under the guise of seeking a truce.

While the dinner proceeds Bonnie and her recently found mother, Abbey, try to use their magic to unlock the sealed coffin that may likely hold the key to defeating Klaus. They find a clue in a spell book that suggests working together will break the seal but with Abbey’s weakened power it doesn’t seem likely. That is until Bonnie gives one hell of a pep talk that suddenly makes momma powerful again and allows them to break the seal. But what was hidden inside gets out without their assistance and moves on to more important characters…

Meanwhile back at the dinner, Stefan gets saucy with Klaus who properly beats him and threatens to burn him alive unless Damon goes and retrieves the coffin. Damon is about to obey but then Elijah plays his cards and brings out his now revived three siblings, Rebekah, Kol, and Finn, to confront Klaus for betraying them all. Damon and Stefan are set free and we settle in prepared to see Klaus get a sound ass-whooping just as their mother storms in fresh from her locked coffin, tells Klaus she forgives him, and pleads to the whole brood, “I want us to be a family again.”

WHAT?!

I just…I can’t. I have no idea where this goes from here. Perhaps they’ll form a family band and travel around Partridge Family-style? Klaus totally has that Danny Bonaduce thing going for him so it could work…

Does anyone else have any thoughts about what this newly reformed family will be up to? Your guess is as good as mine!

The Vampire Diaries Season 3, Episode 13: “Bring Out the Dead” (Originally aired February 2, 2012)

Images courtesy of Quantrell D and The CW. 

“One bad apple does not spoil the applesauce,” says Phaedra about Marlo. Is that one even accurate? How big is the batch? Besides, Marlo’s more like a rotten egg in the applesauce, which she sets upon demonstrating immediately on the ride to the luxury hotel. First stating several times that she refuses to share a bathroom with anyone, she goes on to give an etiquette pop quiz because of some asinine book she read which tells you to pass the pepper as well when anyone asks for the salt and also eat your bread in delicate little buttered pieces so as not to be seen chomping down on entire slices like some sort of hopelessly undoable fatty. This is her idea of friendly conversation, I think. Plus, she doesn’t have anything else knocking around in that noggin at the moment, as she likely ran out of Chomsky references on the plane.

After walking through their beautiful sprawling penthouse as awe-stricken as if someone had just transported them there from a prison camp, the women settle in the kitchen to negotiate room assignments. Marlo instantly tries to claim the most desirable room, but Cynthia shoots her down. “Cynthia should watch out, because Marlo is moving in on her friend,” says Sheree, explaining the underlying tension between the Succubus and the Model. Though what happens next is completely outlandish, I promise I’m not making it up: Marlo asks the concierge for the names of each of the housekeeping staff that will be working on their apartment for the 36 hours of their visit, adding that she needs to be alerted by cell phone if anyone is sick during a shift. The other ladies have the good sense to look a bit embarrassed under their wooden smiles. I try my best not to shout at the screen a very ugly, very hateful, misogynistic word that I loathe. It’s harder than it sounds.

Eating a gourmet brunch on the balcony in their sleepwear the next morning, the group discusses their plans, noting that they’re only in South Africa for the day before heading on Safari. Marlo’s still spouting her etiquette tips, and but everyone is fed up. Kandi’s hilarious and spot-on impression of Marlo in her talking head is the only genuinely funny thing I’ve ever seen her do. Then, she makes a great point, saying “Marlo is constantly trying to erase her past and make herself into a new person.” Suddenly, I see Marlo for what she is: a weeping, self-loathing child huddled and trapped in a dusty corner inside an obsolete sex machine on autopilot. It’s probably not her fault, but there’s gotta be an escape route somewhere.

Two ensuing events are best seen in light of this new paradigm so that Marlo’s visible disappointment and hurt aren’t such a mystery. First, Phaedra hands out custom inscribed mirrors to her friends as a commemorative item, leaving Marlo out since her attendance was unexpected. Ever the classy lady, Phaedra promises to have an additional one delivered to Atlanta before they arrive home, since Marlo feels so excluded. “This is what happens when you casually Plus-One on a ten-day international vacation!” points out Phaedra to the camera. Next, Sheree announces that her gay (relevant later) friend Kevin is throwing a dinner party tonight, and only Phaedra and Kandi are invited, since NeNe probably wouldn’t feel comfortable around a friend of Sheree, anyway, and Cynthia is attached at the hip to NeNe. Cynthia is at least as hurt as Marlo in this situation, since she wants people to know she can get along without NeNe. She explains inside that she thought being in the Motherland would magically heal all wounds and dissipate the drama. She was wrong.

Back home in Atlanta, Ms. Kim Zolciak is missing out on the trip to shuffle around her mansion breastfeeding and eating her parents’ Italian food while Sweetie continues to be utterly useless at her job and Kroy runs around on a distant football field. Those seat edges won’t know what hit ‘em when Kim’s spin-off show finally premieres!

The women in Africa view the entire city from a yacht; Phaedra notes that it reminds her of San Francisco. Cynthia doesn’t think it looks like the same Cape Town from 25 years ago when she visited last, broke with no access to luxury anything. Kandi asks Phaedra if “this is where apartheid was,” and Phaedra is just impressed that someone brought up a historical event at all, considering how busy they are popping bottles and sighing in relief that their surroundings don’t look like those annoying late-night charity ads.

Seemingly out of nowhere, a few fertile seeds of drama are planted when Marlo claims that she saw Kandi at the mall recently and received only a perfunctory wave. Kandi insists she misread the interaction, and Cynthia takes the torch by accusing Phaedra of not being unapproachable in general. Remember how Cynthia and Phaedra already went on that double date and supposedly cleared everything up? Cynthia doesn’t. NeNe then asks for permission to clear the air, too, asking Phaedra why she’s so cold when Apollo always says hi. Phaedra promises to do better, but Cynthia isn’t done bringing the chaos, so she prods Sheree and NeNe to make up. Sheree responds with uncharacteristic maturity, saying they’re a work in progress. Finally having tossed the pink elephant a quick glance, the ladies have a laugh and resolve to be cordial for the rest of the trip. I think we all know just how fat that chance is.

At the penthouse, Sheree joins Phaedra and Kandi to start getting ready for the dinner party while gossipping about how dramatically sensitive Marlo is and how she needs to listen more than she talks. They laugh about how Marlo and Cynthia are NeNe’s “booty lickers” until Phaedra sees Cynthia’s shadow outside the door and starts to change her tune when asked what they were gabbing about. Phaedra says something along the lines of, “We were all just saying how glad we are that we cleared the air on the yacht,” and Cynthia invites the three of them to Nobu even though she knows they have their own party. Who goes to South Africa and dines at Nobu, of all places? Sheree responds to the invite by extending one to Cynthia for the dinner but clarifying that the other two women are still banned, and Cynthia sprints out the door and plops onto the bed where NeNe and Marlo sit to gush like a teenager about finally being invited to the exclusive event. Their initial expressions are ones of deep hurt; NeNe then pretends very loudly not to care one bit, but Marlo needs to go investigate for herself.

Here’s where everything falls apart. Once confronted by Marlo’s desperation to be a part of the gang, Sheree’s obsessive need to feel popular and highly envied explodes into a massive fireball of denial, contempt, and incomprehensible shouting between the two women. In one of the most candid scenes ever, they trade insults that are below the belt and true and very sad. Marlo attacks Sheree for being “ugly” and not having a man, thus having to resort to hanging around [insert the most awful slur for gay men here]. The fact that Sheree is literally at this moment on her way to the dinner party of one of her closest mutual friends of Dorothy is hilarious. Sheree counter-attacks, reminding Marlo that everything she owns is a result of sleeping with an 80 year-old white billionaire for awhile. Marlo is unashamed and continues to rattle off how much shit she has, completely oblivious to her own implicit admission to being a textbook prostitute.

As the shouting devolves into shrill gibberish, NeNe achieves a moment of enlightenment. “Is this what I look like when I fight? They look absolutely stupid!” Cynthia tells us she’d never have said anything if she knew her tattling would result in this massive battle, but I don’t believe her. In this moment, she gets to sit back and watch from the sidelines while NeNe plays peacemaker, while Sheree denies her well-documented money problems out of pride, Marlo expresses her personal hurt in the most degrading way possible, and the two wounded souls persist in launching arrows and shrieking and convulsing until the screen fades to black and promises us a continuation of the terrible spectacle in the following episode.

NEXT WEEK: The women head out to Safari and play with orphans. Sheree calls Marlo a “time bomb.”

Season 4, Episode 12: “South Africa: Just Like Home” (original airdate January 29, 2012)

The Real Housewives of Atlanta airs Sundays at 9/8c on Bravo.

Images courtesy of Nadine Hutton and Bravo.

Like the kids of McKinley High, I, too, can recall my first memory of Michael Jackson. I was a little over three years old and I recall running up and down my hallway singing “Man in the Mirror,” having no understanding that it was an empowering tune about changing yourself to help change the world, but loving every note. I may not have understood then, but it’s certainly one of my favorite songs now. In short, “Michael’ was one of the best episodes so far of Glee’s third season, and an utter joy to experience.

Sebastian and the Warblers made a much needed reappearance once Blaine spilled the beans that they wanted to add some Michael numbers to their Regionals set list. (Of course, we know that since they sang a ton of songs this week, that’s certainly not going to happen.) “ABC” helped them clinch Sectionals, so it was no surprise, but Kurt sure looked shocked to hear that Blaine was taking calls from his rival, even if it was only about learning how to remove red wine from his Dalton blazer. (FYI, the kid’s a serious lush.) This sparked a showdown between the two glee clubs that lasted the entire episode. Artie, Santana and Kurt were particularly incensed after Blaine took a rock salt-laced slushie to the face, resulting in a scratched cornea and eye surgery.

Rachel struggled with an answer to Finn’s left field proposal, all the while dealing with her feelings of uncertainty awaiting her post-graduation. Quinn learned she was accepted, early admission, to Yale due to her kick ass essay on how she overcame teen pregnancy adversity while maintaining straight As. Kurt was also notified of being a NYADA finalist. It was evident that her final acceptance of Finn’s proposal stemmed from the fact that she hadn’t received her letter yet, but of course, mere days later, she did get a yes to the final rounds. Hopefully, she doesn’t break that poor boy’s heart.

Now, typically, I’d launch into a supersized recap of the episode, but the story was not the star this time around. It was all about the music and the performances, so let’s get down to it.

“Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’,” performed by Blaine with New Directions B+
Broadway has proven that Darren Criss can dance his cute, little butt off, so it was no surprise that he could pull off this fun, easy number. The hallway scenes were a bit awkward, but once they hit the auditorium stage, the performance became a true Michael-style spectacle with costume homages and free-spirited, outlandish dancing. Blaine donned that glittery glove in the end, and it was on!

“Bad,” performed by Artie, Blaine and Santana with New Directions and the Warblers B+
I’m sure this will be a polarizing number for the viewers, as the glee club members took to the streets (actually, a parking lot) to recreate the infamous underground confrontation. Leather jackets against blue/red blazers. I found it to have all the extra pizazz and attitude needed, and to be truly exciting. The song was okay, but it was the actual choreography and the Warblers a cappella accompaniment that rocked.

“Scream,” performed by Artie and Mike A
Of all the numbers, this is the one of two I’m still humming. It was the closest recreation of the actual MJ music video, complete with the full set, walking on the ceiling, strange egg-shaped pods and the most uncomfortable looking latex shirts ever. What I remember most about this song was the dancing and that it was so full of angst and Artie played this perfectly, epitomizing how he felt after their group gets hated on, bullied and dismissed over and over and they always take the high road. Also, getting to see him dance was a treat for all of us, since he’s relegated to a wheelchair except for in certain fantasy segments. He’s certainly the best dancer after Harry Shum Jr. and Heather Morris. To top it off, goth Mike is quite the interesting look.

“Never Can Say Goodbye,” performed by Quinn B
Quinn always gets these R&B-style ballads, though I don’t think they truly fit her voice well. I see her more in the vein of a Madonna: self-empowered, fun to look at, but not musically deep. (See Season One’s “Papa Don’t Preach.”) Often her songs are the weakest of the bunch, though never horrible, and it was no different this week. The song’s sentiment oddly didn’t jive with the actual happenings of her life. She actually was saying goodbye, but I enjoyed the shimmery trip down relationship lane with her.

“Human Nature,” performed by Mercedes and Sam A+
Sam wanted to woo Mercedes back with their first duet, and the power of MJ made it quite easy to convince her. Their chemistry is growing so nicely, and their voices meshed unexpectedly well. Though I don’t condone cheating, I couldn’t help but squeal when they finally kissed. Mercedes and Sam are both made more interesting by each other. Though Sam left us at the end of last season, his return has contributed to one of the best emotional plot lines this season. I hope this one continues to grow organically, and he sticks around.

“Ben,” performed by Kurt, Rachel and Finn B-
Don’t get me wrong. This song sounds so sweet, but it’s still about a rat that killed a lot of people (Willard and Ben)! Connecting it to humans, especially ones not named Ben, will always seem odd to me. Also, Blaine had a scratched cornea! It was horrible the way he got it, but worthy of a sappy song? Not so much.

“Smooth Criminal,” performed by Sebastian and Santana with 2Cellos on accompaniment A-
I remember when I found Santana’s voice to be bland and generic, and over time, she’s really managed to add flavor and depth to it. She’s become one of my favorite voices to listen to, and that says a lot among this talented group of singers. Sebastian, still, is no Blaine when it comes to leading the Warblers vocally, but I love the antagonism he brings to the characters. It’s needed when so many others have grown out of their “mean” phases. The duel was a fun idea, but it was all about the 2Cellos (Luka Sulic and Stjepan Hauser) who’s arms strum as fast as a hummingbird’s wings flap. Seriously, these guys are ridiculous.

“I Just Can’t Stop Loving You,” performed by Rachel and Finn B
There had to be a love song, but man was this one a downer. I appreciated the consistency in maintaining the storyline, and it was pretty darn cute that Finn proposed in a grander way, since Rachel always “hears him better when he’s not talking” but instead through song. Something they’ll have to overcome to maintain a marriage, but pretty adorkable.

“Black or White,” performed by Artie, Rachel, Santana, Kurt and Mercedes with New Directions B+
No, it didn’t really make sense to be talking about race when trying to out Sebastian for his nefarious slushie ways to his Warbler buddies, but somehow it fit. It’s a song about coming together, and New Directions wanted to share that sense of camaraderie with the Warblers before outing their captain who’s been acting in complete opposition to the theme of the song. Okay, so it’s a stretch, but the video morphing montage totally made up for it. (I still remember Tyra Banks from the original video. Check it out. She was just as crazy back then.) Overall, it was just a fantastic, happy way to end the episode. Sebastian should have gotten some consequences, but when does that ever happen on TV? Puck would still be stuck in juvie if that were the case. At least his friends looked at him with disgust in their eyes for about five seconds.

Memorable Moments

• Blaine: Okay, favorite Michael memory. Go.
  Artie: When I was one, my mom showed me the VHS tape of his Motown special, and when he did the moonwalk across the first stage for the first time in history, I uttered my first words, “Hot damn!”
  Kurt: I owe the King of Pop a deep debt of gratitude. He’s the first one to pull off the sequined military jacket, long before one, Kurt Hummel, made it iconic.
  Rachel: …I never really got what he was about.
  Kurt: Rachel, he’s best friends with Liza Minnelli and Liz Taylor.
• “Does he live here or something? Seriously, you are always here!” – Kurt at the coffee shop
• “Unless you want to join your relatives in prison, that’s probably not the best idea.  You see, my dad is sort of what you’d call a state’s attorney, but if you had a piñata you wanted delivered, I bet he could make sure that got to them.” – Sebastian
• “You told them what we were going to do. You’re like a modern day eggs benedict.” – Puck
• “Today’s your lucky day because Auntie Snicks just arrived on the Bitch Town Express. Now, my suggestions is that we drag him, bound and gagged, to a tattoo parlor for a tramp stamp that reads, ‘Tips Appreciated’ or ‘Congratulations! You’re my 1,000th customer.’”
• Sam actually putting Mercedes’ name up in lights.
• “You are unstoppable, Kurt. I am so proud to be your dad. They can never take this away from you. Right now, in this moment, on this day, you won.” – Burt to Kurt
• “Bummer about Blaine. He was pretty…” – Sebastian
• “You may look like the villain out of a cheesy 80s high school movie, but you should know that I am fully prepared to go all Danny Laruso on your ass.” – Santana
• Santana taping a recorder to her underboob.
• “This is what we call ‘taking the high road,’ which I was shocked to find out has nothing to do with marijuana.” – Puck

Season 3, Episode 11: “Michael” (originally aired January 31, 2012).

Images courtesy of Justin Lubin/FOX.

Fans of Body of Proof will recognize Mouser as Lacey Fleming, the formerly estranged teenage daughter of the brilliant but emotionally distant, Dr. Megan Hunt (played by Dana Delaney). Recently, Poptimal got the chance to catch up with the young actress in the midst of filming the back half of the show’s second season and in our interview the multi-talented star talks with us about her new Disney Channel movie Frenemies, an obsession with vampires, and what it’s like for her character to grow up among the dead.

She’s only 15 years old, but Mouser already has an impressive credit list behind her with roles in a number of TV series including Eloise, Life is Wild and NCIS as well as a number of movies. And this winter, Mouser added another network to her list working for the first time with the juggernaut of teen/tween television the Disney Channel in her new movie Frenemies.

Revolving around three groups of friends who dance along the fine line between friends and enemies, Mouser took on the dual role of lookalikes Emma and Savannah. When talking about her role, Mouser tells us how she didn’t actually think that she’d get the part. “When I did the first audition they only had me read one of the characters and not the other one. I was kind of disappointed because I thought I didn’t do well and started to question everything.”

But it would be at a later callback where she would get a last minute surprise that could potentially lock her into the role, “I was sitting in the call back room and they said by the way while you’re reading over it we’re just going to throw in, Emma has a British accent now.” A new twist to the game, but little did they know that Mouser was tailor made for this twist thanks to her love of Harry Potter as well as some help from her siblings. “My sister’s obsessed with British people who do vlogs, video blogs, so she talks in a British accent all the time as a joke and my brother’s friend Calvin talks in a British accent so I kind of had that down.” And the rest, as they say, is history.

Keshaunta Moton for Poptimal.com: What did you first think when you read the script for Frenemies?
Mouser: I thought it was really cute and I was really excited about it. A lot of things changed for me from the script that I got, to the script you guys saw on screen but I loved it all the way through since I first got the opportunity to read for it.

Poptimal: How was it for you acting in it and then watching yourself on screen?
Mouser: It was weird because when I was acting in it I could look at the other person and know that it wasn’t actually me standing there, it was my double. But watching it on screen there was like two of me, it was weird. I didn’t feel like I was actually watching me.

Poptimal: How was it working on set?
Mouser: It was a lot of fun. It was a totally new experience for me because I’ve always worked with adults so working with Disney, working with kids my age was totally new for me. It was a lot of fun, especially getting to play double characters and I got double the time getting to do what I love.

Poptimal: Do you think you’ll do more with Disney?
Mouser: I’d love to get another opportunity to do something like it.

Poptimal: If you had the chance, what Disney Channel show would you like to step into?
Mouser: Good Luck Charlie, I love that show. I think it’s the cutest Disney show. I love it so much, but of course to this day, I’m fifteen years old, but I’m a total Disney girl. I love everything about Disney.

Poptimal: How do you relate to the concept of Frenemies, is that something you’ve had to deal with in your personal life?
Mouser: I’m always careful to pick the people around me who really are there for me all the time, but I think every friendship has fights. I’ve definitely experienced little fights here and there because when you become really close with someone you can’t agree on everything. So it becomes easier to vent your feelings with the person when you’re closer to them. There does tend to be little fights here and there, but real friendships will power through it.

Poptimal: What would you do if you discovered you had a secret twin/doppelganger?
Mouser: I think I would probably have her switch places with me, a really simple thing, and just see how it went; if people believed it. I always wonder would my friends question it, would they think that that was me? You never really know. You know that your best friends know you but what if there was someone who looked just like you and they didn’t see it coming? What would they do? I think that would be really cool to find out.

Poptimal: You’re also on Body of Proof, can you tell us about that?
Mouser: I get to play Dana Delaney’s daughter on the show and it’s a huge thing for me. It’s my family. I was there on set yesterday and every time I walk on the set I find something that I love even more than I do the day before. I’m getting to do what I love every single day; it’s a huge deal for me. And the cast, they’re hilarious. They like to tease me with my vampire obsession. It’s fun and it’s a happy atmosphere that I’m so lucky to be a part of.

Poptimal: What do you mean by vampire obsession?
Mouser: I was kind of a huge Twilight fan, and still am. I also love The Vampire Diaries and pretty much anything of that genre. And so Nick [Bishop] loves to put on his best Edward impression and tease me about my love for sparkly vampires.

Poptimal: Is his impression good?
Mouser: It really is, actually. I told him he should do that voice as Peter sometimes, it would be hilarious.

Poptimal: How do you feel about Lacey’s progression as a character?
Mouser: I’m really excited about it. She’s become a lot like any teenager would be and more and more like me. It’s just really exciting because I love getting to be someone else, pretend to be someone else, be this character, this person that you created but I can still relate to Lacey in a lot of ways and that’s really exciting to me.

Poptimal: In what ways do you relate to Lacey?
Mouser: I think Lacey is growing up, she’s becoming more mature and handling more grown up things like I do on set, where I’m working with adults. Even when I’m working with other kids you have to be professional, you have to be ready to go on set and do your job and have fun with it at the same time. So Lacey’s growing up and becoming more mature and learning to handle all that stuff.

Poptimal: What do you think about the change in Megan and Lacey’s relationship?
Mouser: I think as this season has shown and as you see in the relationship, they’re always going to be who they are. They’re never fake to each other. They’re family, you know. They check each other. That’s who they are. I like that we’re becoming a little more open with each other and Lacey’s leaning really hard on her mom for support. She’s slowing but surely becoming more forgiving of her mother for everything that happened in the divorce from her father and she’s starting to lean on her and go to her for support which is great.

Poptimal: What’s been your favorite storyline/moment of the past two seasons?
Mouser: My two favorite episodes would have to be episode 2.06 and the second episode of season 1. Both episodes I got to be a part of the medical examiner’s office. And I just sort of step in and act with all the characters and see the dead bodies and things like that, it’s really fun for me.

Poptimal: The dead bodies?
Mouser: It’s a little crazy, right? It’s fun and it’s exciting and getting to see the behind the scenes kind of stuff is awesome. It’s really, really cool.

Poptimal: But there are no actual cadavers, right?
Mouser: No, they are not real dead bodies. A lot of them are actors and that’s really funny because they end up filming sometime and they’ll be doing an autopsy and the body is like snoring. And they have to wake him up during the scene. Imagine performing an autopsy on someone and going, “Oh yeah, they’re alive.”

Poptimal: Maybe I’m just a little squeamish.
Mouser: I was kind of freaked out seeing dead bodies walking around, but when you get to talk to them they’re completely normal people. You’re totally into the story and the tragic thing that happened to this person, and you’re like, “Wait a minute, no. This is completely a live person I’m talking to.”

Poptimal: What’s your inspiration as an actor?
Mouser: I’ve had a lot of inspirations growing up and acting, like the people that I look up to and it changes as I get older. I look up to now especially Dana [Delaney] because I get to learn from her so much, but also other actresses who are young actresses like Emma Stone and Ellen Page. I look up to them in a way that I want to have a career like that. Even people like Betty White. I want to be acting my whole life.

Poptimal: How did you first know you wanted to be an actor?
Mouser: I was 5 years old and we were on vacation in Pennsylvania and there was an open call. My mom’s friend lived there and she was like, “You should go in, they’re looking for a five-year-old girl,” and so we did. I ended up getting the photo double for Abigail Breslin in Signs. And from that moment forward, my parents were like, “Do you guys want to do this?” and we said yes so they got an apartment in New York and we just kind of started out there and got our agent and manager and they’ve been with us ever since. They told us to come out to California. And now we’re here.

Poptimal: What else do you have coming up?
Mouser: I’m finishing up season two of Body of Proof. We’re on our last episode right now for the season, so I guess I’m just giving my best shot at things I have coming and keeping my fingers crossed and praying for a third season for Body of Proof.

Poptimal: Can you give us a little tease?
Mouser: You see a little bit of who Lacey really is as she opens up to her mom, and who she’s becoming which I think is really fun and you start to kind of get into her head.

Poptimal: What do you like to do when you’re not working?
Mouser: I love to sing; I also read and write anything, literally anything. I would write a full page of nothingness just to write. And I’m learning guitar right now which I love.

Poptimal: What do you enjoy most about acting?
Mouser: There are a lot of aspects about acting that I find fascinating. I guess one of them would be becoming someone else because you get to create this entire personality. I mean, you grew up your whole life and you have memories, and you have favorite memories and favorite foods and favorite colors; things that you can completely create for this whole new person that you’re going to become and I find that really exciting. Even if you just have one scene in a TV show, one episode, you still get to be this person. And also I love the mechanics of it. I love getting to learn about the sound department and the camera and ask questions of everyone learn all about it.

For Mary acting’s in the blood, having both a brother and sister in the business. So, are we going to see a family reunion on screen someday? That’s the plan. “It’s something we’ve always dreamed about and talked about,” Mouser tells us. “I think it would be really fun to be able to do something together.” How about a musical? “My sister and I love to sing,” Mouser admits although stating that while it would be fun to do Broadway that’s quite a departure from what she’s used to so she’s going to leave that to more capable hands, “my sister is the one. She loves anything that involves acting and singing at the same time. From big theatre productions to a Hannah Montana kind of role is her dream.”

Mary Mouser’s Favorite 5:
TV Show: Doctor Who
Vampire: Edward Cullen
Song: “The First Day of My Life” by Bright Eyes.
Memory: “For Thanksgiving one year my sister, mom, and I went to Disney Land overnight and we woke up super early and went to Disney Land in the morning. It was so much fun. Disney Land’s like my happy place so that was definitely a fun memory for me.”
Book: Twilight or Harry Potter, though special shout out to The Hunger Games

Thanks Mary for talking with us. Catch Disney Channel for the next airing of Frenemies. Body of Proof airs Tuesdays at 10/9c on ABC.

Caleb is helping out the girls, but Hanna has no idea. So the group—minus Hanna—is with Caleb as he tries to dissect that video on “A”s phone.  But Hanna calls them all and Spencer answers. She lies at first, but some idiocy in the background makes it obvious she’s not really with her family. Poor Hanna.

Meanwhile, Caleb has found something.  Inside Ali’s box there is a fake ID, one featuring Ali with dark hair.  Mysterious!

Most of the subplots of this episode were a little repetitive and dull. Aria is still seeing Ezra, but she’s keeping it from everyone—even her friends—this time.  Meanwhile, she and Holden are becoming closer friends, but Holden clearly has his own dark secrets he’s hiding.  Emily tries to fix things between her mom and Maya, so they all go out to dinner and Maya is a little mean. Then she apologizes and tells Emily she loves her and Emily says it back and it’s cute and sweet.  Hanna’s stepsister Kate is in town and Spencer knows her from a summer camp story Melissa told her and threatens to embarrass her if she ever messes with Hanna. Blah blah—let’s get to the good stuff, shall we?

So Hanna is feeling all left out when she gets a text from “A” that tips her off to Caleb’s working with the other girls. Then she sees the picture of Ali’s fake ID on Spencer’s phone and the jig is up! Spencer confesses that Caleb is still working with them. Hanna is PISSED and storms out.

When Hanna confronts Caleb, he says he wants to protect her. She tells him about her mom stealing the money and she’s afraid of anyone finding out, something he can’t protect her from. She basically tells him about “A.” So what does he do? He goes to Jenna’s house to tell her to knock it off, assuming she is “A.” Stupid idea since Garrett is on patrol. He basically acts super creepy towards Caleb, and for a second I seriously thought he might run Caleb over with his car.  Gah, Caleb! This is why Hanna wanted you out of it!

Spencer apologizes to Hanna and they make up. Then she tells Hanna all about Ali’s dark-haired persona.  Turns out, Hanna has seen Ali with dark hair before. She remembers a run in with Ali two years before where Ali was wearing a brown wig and posing as Vivian Darkbloom. Ali made it out to Hanna as if this was just another game, so Hanna didn’t see the need to tell the others at the time.  Spencer recognizes that name, though.  Vivian Darkbloom is a pseudonym for Vladimir Nabokov, the author of Lolita.  Hanna has a copy of Lolita she took from Ali because Ali was always reading it.  And it turns out the fake ID in the picture does have the name Vivian Darkbloom on it.

Why Lolita? Because Ali dug older guys, like Ian? I’m not sure, but I’m curious.

Inside of Ali’s copy of Lolita they find a claim ticket to a store called J&L. Spencer calls them and it turns out they still have something that belongs to “Miss Darkbloom.”

The next day, back at school, a text is going around that is supposedly sent from Hanna. The next day, back at school, a text is going around that is supposedly sent from Hanna. It’s a provocative shot of Kate semi-nude in the locker room. Hanna swears she didn’t send it, but I bet Kate won’t see it that way.

So while the Aria and Emily subplots were a little lackluster, I’m glad we are getting somewhere with Ali. What is up with Lolita? That adds a whole new level of creepy for me.  But it seems like things are on the fast track to find out what is going on! And I’m very excited for that to happen.

Theories of the week!

“A” Is: Melissa (after all, it was Melissa’s picture of Kate from camp)
The Killer Is: Melissa
Who Will Die in the Finale?: Ella

Season 2, Episode 18: A Kiss Before Lying (originally aired January 30, 2012)

Watch Pretty Little Liars Mondays at 8/7c on ABC Family.

Images courtesy of Disney Enterprises, Inc. and ABC Family.

So it’s Blair’s wedding day, and Evil Priest Guy from the last episode wants Chuck to help him end the wedding. But Chuck is truly reformed. Instead he gives Evil Priest Guy food poisoning, letting him know that no one will ruin Blair’s day if this is really what she wants.  But it’s not what she wants. Everyone can see that—and I mean everyone—but Blair is set in her belief that being with Chuck will kill Chuck because of her pact with God (worst plot device ever) so she plans to go through with it.

Meanwhile, Georgina has heard of Blair’s nuptials and is determined to squash them. She and her husband crash the wedding so that Georgina can seduce Louis and destroy Blair’s day.  That doesn’t work out too well since Lily and Rufus catch her first. Whoops! But Georgina has a backup plan. No worries.

Chuck has no intention of going to the wedding at first. He’s tried to win Blair back and failed. Why spoil her day? Then Eleanor, Blair’s mother, arrives and basically tells him to make her end the wedding. She can tell this isn’t right and that Blair loves him, so why isn’t he doing something about it? With that prompting, Chuck decides to crash after all.

Right before the wedding, after learning about Blair’s pact with God from Serena, Chuck confronts Blair. He pretty much begs her not to go through with the wedding. She tells him she loves him—she will always love him—but they can’t be together. Then she’s beckoned away because it’s time for the wedding to start. Once Blair is gone, Georgina steps into the room—she’s recorded everything Blair just said and she hands the evidence to Chuck to do with it what he wants.

Just before the ceremony starts, Louis thanks Dan (who is now a groomsman) for pretending to date Serena. Dan realizes that everyone knew he and Serena were fake dating, so why are they still fake dating? He asks Serena this as they walk down the aisle together, but she diverts by saying she did a bad thing by telling Chuck the truth about Blair.

Then it’s time. Blair is by Louis’s side, having been escorted by both her father and Cyrus (super cute!), and the priest asks if anyone has objections. Everyone—and I mean everyone—looks to the back, where Chuck stands. But he doesn’t say a word.  Gossip Girl does, though.  Just then everyone gets a text (why are these people’s phones on during a wedding? Why are they checking them? So rude!) with a Gossip Girl update. The video of Blair telling Chuck she loves him is playing everywhere.

Blair runs off, and all of her friends turn on Georgina.  Georgina claims she didn’t do it and that is was Chuck (whatever, G). Despite all of this, Blair still wants to go through with the wedding (oh, so Chuck nearly dying is a sign you should marry Louis, but all of these signs NOT to marry him don’t matter?) so she apologizes to Louis and he accepts.  They go back out and they tie the knot.

This is when I started cussing at my TV screen.

At the reception, Serena admits to Dan that she loves him. She doesn’t expect an answer from him yet, but she wants him to know. Meanwhile, Blair dances her final dance with Louis before they leave for the honeymoon. As they dance, Louis tells Blair that they’re marriage will be loveless. He married her because his mother told him to forgive her. For the cameras they will smile and be happy, but in private they are strangers. He also admits that Dan wrote those lovely vows Blair adored.  Blair is devastated and she sneaks off to make a call. She tells whoever is on the other line that she needs help.

Chuck? It MUST be Chuck!

Nope.

She runs out to find Dan waiting for her in the getaway car.  They take off together. As lovers? As friends? Who knows? But Blair is a married woman, and it’s not to the right guy, no matter how you look at it.

But it was the last moment of the episode that probably garnered the most buzz. As the episode comes to a close, and Gossip Girl does her final monologue, the camera pans up from a computer to reveal . . . Georgina!  Georgina is Gossip Girl. Or so we are supposed to believe.

Oh yeah. Throughout this entire episode, Nate was flirting with the real Charlotte Rhodes who goes by Lola.  I almost forgot because it was so forgettable. Whoops.

Basically, I’m annoyed. I mean, it was a good episode, but I’m totally Team Chuck, and I’m so mad at Blair for being so stubborn and blind. I still hate the God pact plot device. On the other hand, Georgina makes everything better, so seeing her was nice.  The rest of this season will really make or break my feelings on this. We’ll see.

Best Storyline: Georgina being Gossip Girl. Supposedly.
Worst Storyline: Blair actually marrying Louis. WTF?
Want to See More Of: GEORGINA!
Want to See Less Of: Louis

Season 5, Episode 13: G.G. (original air date January 30, 2012)

Gossip Girl airs Monday nights at 8/7c on The CW.

Images courtesy of Giovanni Rufino, The CW and IMBbPro.

The Good

Artie gets to dance!

“Bad”

Santana’s “Smooth Criminal” outfit

Mercedes gives in to Sam’s flirting

I find Artie (Kevin McHale) to be an underappreciated character. He has a lot of great one-liners that get lost in the shuffle of the more flamboyant moments of the show. More importantly, he’s a killer performer who doesn’t get to show off due to his wheelchair-bound nature. But, as we saw in season one’s “Safety Dance” fantasy sequence, his moves are worth the wait. Not a fan of “Scream,” or the creepy video homage, but loved watching Mike Chang (Harry Shum, Jr.) and McHale knock that one out. Having Artie as the character that finally reaches a breaking point over the bullying in their lives was also a pretty great move.

The only song I honestly enjoyed in the whole episode was the duel between the incomparable Santana (Naya Rivera) and evil Warbler leader Sebastian (Grant Gustin). Sebastian, aiming for Kurt (Chris Colfer) with a slushie tainted with rock salt, hit Blaine (Darren Criss) instead , resulting in his need to be hospitalized and have eye surgery. Now, I tend to always side with the villain, but even I think rock salt in the face is a bit much. To coax out a confession, Santana suits up and the two have a pretty funky sing-off. Let me be honest though, I’d sign up to watch a series of Santana webisodes tomorrow. That character is gold.

Last episode, I was really pleased with Mercedes (Amber Riley) getting an intriguing storyline with Sam (Chord Overstreet). I’m glad it continued this week, as they shared a duet of “Human Nature,” but I hope it gets more attention in a future non-tribute episode.

The Bad

Too Many Songs

Rachel’s Getting Married

“Black or White”

Disappearing Group Members

I frequently think there are far too many songs per capita in any episode of Glee. Three to four’s a good number. Five is pushing it. Nine is altogether unnecessary. I get it was a tribute episode, but really? I’ve already copped to not being an MJ fan, but half of those songs I think I was hearing for the first time, and it did nothing to convert me to the cause. Also, is it just me, or did several numbers last night eliminate members of the group. I swear I couldn’t find Lea or Cory during “Bad,” and where were Sugar or The Glee Project winner Damian McGinty in some of them too? By the way, where are the Troubletone numbers we were promised?

So Rachel (Lea Michele) apparently only applied to one school? Do people really do that? I get that NYATA is her dream and all, but I don’t really think getting married is a good back up plan. Because maybe Finn’s (Cory Monteith) not going to be so excited to hear he’s your back up plan. Especially since it turns out you really are a NYATA finalist.

By far the lowest moment was toughing it out through “Black or White” just to see scenes from the next episode, which by the way I think looks far more fun. Not a bad song in its own right, “Black or White” was the number that felt the most out of place, paired with a big New Directions/Warblers blending to show we’re really all here to be good sports. It’s more than a little absurd because, at the end of the day, Blaine could still lose an eye.

The Quinn Fabray

I think one thing Glee has always done really well is present a balanced, yet satirical look at the diverse personalities and identities of high school students. No one single character represents this better than former Cheerio Quinn Fabray (Dianna Agron). She’s been a favorite of mine since the beginning of the series, going from high powered villain/president of the celibacy club to teen mom to ambitious social climber, and back around to reformed bad girl. A well-plotted character evolution for the first two seasons, I was dismayed at the way the character was treated for the first half of season three. But last night we all saw a character whose evolution held steady (which is more than I can say for Rachel or Mercedes) and allowed her to come into her own in a touching little bathroom monologue.

Quinn got into Yale and is really excited to go. Like a lot of high school students I knew, she’s thankful for the memories, but ready to move on and leave some things in the past. After some of the struggles she’s been through, it was nice to see her come out on top. She urged Rachel not to accept Finn’s proposal, because of what it means versus her rising potential, mirroring what she told her in season two when she said Rachel didn’t belong in Lima and had places to go. In a stealthy move, Agron is one of the few actors who hasn’t spoken at length about what role she may play next season. For the character’s sake, I hope she sticks with her plans.

What did you think of the tribute episode?

Season 3, Episode 11 “Michael” (Original airdate January 31, 2012)

Glee airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on FOX.

Are you a Gleek? Click here for more Poptimal coverage of Glee.

Images courtesy of FOX and IMDbPro

The gaggle of girls were put up at the relaxing W Retreat and Spa, however, the residue from the Courtney-Emily feud of episodes past could still be felt throughout the entire island. In a private interview, Courtney reiterated the situation by telling us that Emily was still on her shit list, she’s “dead to her” and my personal favorite Courtney quote, “You better check yourself, bitch.” Why wouldn’t Ben want to marry this gem?

The first date card arrived with a special message for Nicki that read,“ Let’s find new love in Old San Juan.“ The perky brunette could heave a sigh of relief but the rest of the bachelorettes continued to hold their breath until the remaining date cards would arrive. Ben picked Nicki because of her easygoing demeanor and playfulness which he admired most about her. The date was going off without a hitch as they strolled the streets of San Juan until a massive rain storm exploded over their heads and drenched them. A little rain is sometimes romantic but it was to the point where it just wasn’t cute anymore, so as a plan b, the two stopped off at some local clothiers to buy some authentic island gear. Although Ben had an all-white ensemble picked out to show off his “Latin swagger” he wound up looking a lot more like an old Florida retiree. Geriatric tendencies aside, love was certainly in the air that day when the two witnessed a grandiose wedding at an old chapel and later shared a bottle of wine on the beach together. Nicki opened up to Ben and let him play the twenty questions game about her past marriage and how everything has worked out for the better in the end. Nicki had worried that a previously failed marriage might be a deal-breaker for the bachelor but her honesty won him over entirely and she was given the date rose that night.

Back at the den, the second date card arrived, this one being the group date announcement. The card read, “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend!”, which by the way is a huge tease the room full of marriage-ready women. Nine names were written down meaning that the only girl’s name left out would obviously be going on the last one on one date of the trip and Elyse was the lucky winner there. The next day, the girls were bussed off to a secret location to meet up with Ben. Turns out they were dropped off at the door of the Roberto Clemente baseball stadium for another sweaty, dirty, outdoor date. I’m not entirely sure that baseball diamonds were what the ladies had in mind after that date card but they were all prepared to play a little hard ball to win Ben’s affection. After a series of drills, batting, and fielding (sounds like a nightmare), The Bachelor host Chris Harrison showed up with some interesting news for the women. There would be the expected evening cocktail date as always that night but only half of the bachelorettes would be able to attend. The winners of a proposed baseball game would be rewarded with an invite so the nine were split into two teams, with Lindzi being the odd man out and playing for both the red and blue teams. Lindzi was the only one guaranteed a spot for the promised beach party but it was up to the rest of them to duke it out on the field in a game to the bitter end and that they did. Courtney led the red team as captain and her unbridled determination must have rubbed off on her teammates because they kicked the blue team’s ass.

At the beach party that night, Courtney was up to her old tricks again. As she just can’t keep her stupid opinions to herself, she felt it was necessary to comment on how lame the other girls are and how none of them are right for Ben. She’s also been on to his secret feelings for Kacie B. and Court doesn’t like that at all. Kacie B. was given the date rose that night so Courtney was forced to step it up by stealing Ben for a private moment on the beach where she whispered sweet nothings and tempted him with the idea of skinny dipping.

Day three arrived and Elyse was overjoyed with the idea of spending a whole day alone with Ben. Elyse had put everything on the line to join the competition, including quitting her job and declining an invite to her own best friend’s wedding, and was not leaving the show without a ring on her finger. Things went well for a bit when they cruised around in their mega-yacht and talked about the future until Elyse’s statement of already accomplishing everything she’d like to do in her life threw a red flag up in Ben’s head. It only got worse at their private dinner when she echoed her statement and then finished it off with some “I’m tired of being single” talk that made Ben question if she was really in it for him specifically or if maybe any old guy would do. Then things got super awkward and Ben had to let Elyse know out of pure honesty that he couldn’t connect with her and couldn’t see a relationship forming at all. Ben refused her the date rose and a sobbing and very pained Elyse had to go home.

The news of Elyse was music to Courtney’s ears and she immediately seized the opportunity to break The Bachelor rules and meet Ben at his room to make good on her skinny dipping promises. His initial thoughts were that it probably wasn’t a good idea, BUT he should take the opportunity to get to know her better, right? Suuuure. In an instant the two were bare and getting frisky in the ocean while the rest of the ladies sat in their rooms completely unaware of the debauchery going on mere feet from their doorstep.

At the pre-rose ceremony cocktail party, Ben made sure to spend a little time with each of the bachelorettes. He made a point to reconnect with Jennifer, whom he’d had a spectacular one on one date with back in Park City. Blakely especially needed a few moments with Ben as her insecurity really came out in this episode. She was on the losing team during the baseball game and it really got to her. She unloaded emotionally on Ben and her willingness to be completely open, a trait Ben harps on constantly, really reinforced his feelings for her. Meanwhile, Courtney was so proud of her skinny dipping secret that she was practically beaming with self-pride. Somehow she was able to keep her big mouth zipped even though it was completely obvious that she desperately wanted to slam the news into everyone’s faces. Emily is still feeling the sting from Courtney’s bad attitude and from the last rose ceremony that she just barely skated by in. When Ben pulled her aside, she apologized for bringing up the Courtney drama and they agreed to wipe the slate clean. Courtney must have really pulled some voodoo on Emily, though, because within seconds she was back to debating with Ben over what a fake weirdo Courtney really is. This confused Ben and worried Emily; she knew she had screwed up once again and she was on thin ice.

At the rose ceremony, Ben had made a comment that this had been one of the most pivotal weeks for him in Bachelor history thus far. One girl would be going home tonight and everyone had decided that they’d just absolutely die (literally) if it was them. Courtney was called to receive a rose early in the ceremony, as well as Casey S., for reasons unknown really. I think I’ve all about forgotten who she was, other than being Courtney’s best friend in the house and that’s nothing to boast about. Blakely was seconds away from having a full blown anxiety attack before she was called for a rose so her therapy session with Ben really paid off. And then there were two: Emily and Jennifer. This was it; Courtney was about to get her wish of watching Emily get kicked to the curb but, in a shocking twist, Ben called Emily to receive a rose. I don’t think any of the women saw this coming, nor did any of the viewers. After having such a killer date with Jennifer back in Utah, I guess there still wasn’t as strong a bond as he made it out to seem. Maybe he’s wising up and realizing that Emily is on his side and she should be given a chance, even if it’s just one more.

Season 16, Episode 5: Puerto Rico (original air date January 30, 2012)

Images courtesy of ABC.

At the Burke’s home, Peter is playing with some surveillance equipment, which is picking up the neighbors conversations. Peter heads to the office and leaves the equipment, which he accidentally left turned on. The noise bothers Satchmo and before turning it off, Elizabeth hears two men suspiciously discussing what sounds like a robbery.

At the FBI office, Peter reprimands Neal for not writing his own case files when Elizabeth calls to tell him what she overheard. He agrees to check out her possible lead. Later at the address, there is no sign of any crimes. Peter believes that perhaps Elizabeth is paranoid since Keller kidnapped her. Elizabeth shows up and is disappointed that both Neal and Peter seem to doubt her.

Back home, Elizabeth is determined to find someone who will believe her and calls her perfect partner Mozzie. The pair begins to listen to the scanner and finally hear the voices El heard earlier. Moz records it but they realize the one voice/man is outside on the street. They watch him (Joe Manganiello) take a duffle bag from a car and head into a nearby house. Elizabeth thinks he has a gun but Mozzie quips that it could be a Tony award. Elizabeth then enlists Neal’s help because she doesn’t want to tell Peter unless she has substantial information. Neal and Mozzie agree to take a look around the neighbor’s house.

Elizabeth: “Wait, we aren’t talking about breaking or entering.”

Mozzie: “Of course not. There won’t be any breaking.”

Neal: “Or entering.”

Meanwhile, Jones and Diana report into Peter. They found nothing suspicious at the address Elizabeth overheard except phone lines going down briefly and a malfunctioning ATM machine. In a very unlike Peter Burke response he says, “from the looks of it, it’s all good in my hood.” Jones and Diana chide him and tell him that he can’t pull that off.

Neal and Mozzie commence their snooping at the neighbor’s home. Through a window, Neal sees the duffel bag and an elite lock pick set just as the neighbor walks back into the room and Neal has to hide. After the coast is clear, Neal and Moz report in with Elizabeth. They explain that the lock pick set is illegal and if Peter sees it he can get a warrant to search the rest of the house.

In hopes of getting Peter into the neighbor’s house, Elizabeth brings a housewarming gift, home grown peas, to meet the neighbors (Ben and Rebecca Ryan), lies about their kitchen being redone and gets invited over for dinner. Later that day, Peter isn’t too thrilled about dinner with the neighbors but goes along with it. At the Ryan’s, El notices Ben hide the duffle bag in an upstairs room. Meanwhile, Mozzie and Neal are doing surveillance outside in the car. Mrs. Suit packed them a meal and Neal mentions how it is different than stakeouts with Peter. Moz responds that these stakeouts could be over soon but Neal doesn’t seem like he wants them to end.

Back inside, Peter struggles to eat the healthy meal and the couples make small talk about work. El excuses herself to use the bathroom but really to snoop around. Ben hears a noise upstairs (Elizabeth) and goes to check. She is looking in the duffle bag but then hides in the closet. Unfortunately, Ben locks the door and El in the room. She waves out the window to get help from Neal, who in a fun scene walks Elizabeth through picking the lock on the door. Peter wonders what is keeping Elizabeth and goes to check on her. He is not happy when he finds El picking the lock and discovers why they are there. Peter tells Neal to meet back at the Burke’s home. Peter and Elizabeth make excuses to the Ryans and head back home. Elizabeth, Neal and Mozzie sit on the sofa like three naughty children as Peter demands to know what is going on. Elizabeth explains about hearing the men again and seeing Ben, possibly with a gun, across the street. She also says she saw a phone company uniform and repair equipment inside the duffle bag. Peter remembers that Jones told him that some phone lines went down and Neal explains that some security systems are connected to phone lines. Looks like Mrs. Suit maybe on to something.

The next day, Diana greets Peter at the office:

Diana: “Returning the surveillance gear?”

Peter: “Because of this my CI spent an evening teaching my wife the finer points of lock picking and B&E.”

She then goes over Ben Ryan’s rap sheet with Peter. Neal also reveals that it is a two-man job to shut off the phone system so Ben has to have a partner. Meanwhile, Ben shows up at the Burke’s home to return a dish to Elizabeth and realizes she lied about having their kitchen redone. She says, “Ben I’m not looking for trouble” and he responds, “people never are.” After he leaves, a shaken up Elizabeth calls Peter, who is pissed that Ben threatened his wife. Neal calls Mozzie to request that he go keep El company.

Agent Jones begins to tail Ben and sees him with Connor Bailey, who they believe is his partner. Since Connor is a criminal, this is a violation of his parole. Peter will call his P.O. and Neal will pose as a criminal to try to befriend Ben. At the P.O.’s office, Ben is reprimanded for meeting with Connor. Neal pretends he is annoyed with his P.O. and initiates a convo with Ben. Also, holy hotness—Matt Bomer and Joe Manganiello together. Two very, very good-looking men! Back to the recap, they head to a strip joint, Stardust Revue. Ben receives a call and writes down a number onto a napkin. He excuses himself to go talk to Connor, who happens to be the daytime manager of Stardust. A crafty Neal buys eye shadow from a stripper and uses it to trace indentations on another napkin that was below Ben’s napkin.

Back at the FBI office, we learn the number was a work order from the telephone company. Peter tells Neal, “I think you and your eye shadow may have cracked this case.” Neal and Peter surmise that Ben and Connor need the work order to appear as legitimate telephone company employees to gain access and then pull off their job. Back on the street, Peter notices tarps covered in paint, the same color that was on Ben’s hands at dinner, which connects with a hotel that was recently painted. Peter and Neal head into the hotel to find Ben and Connor getting away with the hotel safe that contained $7.5 million.

Neal and Peter regroup at the FBI office. They know they need to catch Ben and Connor with the money. Peter calls Elizabeth and tells her to keep an eye on the house. El looks outside, sees Rebecca is leaving and tells Mozzie they are going to follow her. They tail her to the Stardust Revue and call Peter. Neal believes they are going to divvy up the money and disappear. Peter tells El to leave and he will take care of it but Elizabeth is determined to stay and stall them until Peter arrives. Mozzie protests:

Mozzie: “But the Suit said to leave.”

Elizabeth: “Are you going to bow to the will of the establishment?”

Mozzie: “No…Yes.”

Elizabeth and Mozzie pose as FBI agents and confront Connor, who goes in a back room where Ben and Rebecca are counting the money. The trio sees Moz and El on a monitor. Mozzie tries to buy them some time by announcing free dances in the backroom, which causes some commotion. El and Mozzie rush outside to find the waiting FBI, who arrests the thieving trio.

At home that night, Peter is making a map of the rest of the neighbors and says:

Peter: “You help put dangerous folks behind bars today. Congratulations on closing your first case.”

Elizabeth: “They don’t call me Mrs. Suit for nothing.”

The episode comes to a close with the Burkes then celebrating her successful first case in the boudoir.

Peter and Neal are one of my favorite partnerships on television but the new crime-fighting duo that emerged in this episode, Elizabeth and Mozzie, are now a close second. Loved all the quips between Mozzie and Elizabeth. Great job writers! Hoping to see them take on another case in the future. Collars, what did you think of Mrs. Suit’s first case?

Season 3, Episode 13: “Neighborhood Watch” (original airdate January 31, 2012.)

White Collar airs Tuesdays at 10/9c on USA Network.

Images courtesy of David Giesbrecht and USA Network.

Josh (Sam Huntington), trying to be better prepared for all things werewolf, rented two storage units for himself and Nora (Kristen Hager) to change in during the full moon. She’s not a huge fan of the idea, adding it to the stack of her adjustment issues since her first transformation. Nora thinks they’d be better off running free in the woods, but Josh worries about what her wolf might do, having seen her kill once already. That night, she experiences her heightened wolf senses for the first time, discovering smells and also hearing Aidan get it on with new doctor Julia in the next room. She climbs on Josh, starting what Sally (Meaghan Rath) will later describe as a “bang-off.”

The next morning, Josh and Nora are having breakfast with Sally when Aidan (Sam Witwer) comes down for some brief discussion before Julia makes her way in. In a twist that I honestly didn’t see coming, turns out Julia is Josh’s former fiancée whom he ran out on. Aidan jumps away from her and she runs out of the house, Josh goes after her to see what she’s doing in town, learning of her new position at the hospital.

At work, Nora tries to make nice and, to Julia’s credit, she seems pretty okay with Josh’s new girl, just not the fact that he left her without any explanation. Nora doesn’t want to change in the storage locker anymore, but Josh warns her that he’s already seen her kill. Turns out, she remembers, and has a bit of a killer instinct. She follows Julia home, partially consumed by the wolf in an eerie sequence that leads her to realize she needs the locker after all.

Aidan starts this episode hoping to stave off his bloodlust by continuing to sleep with Julia, but his hunger is only aggravated by the fact the hospital has put a new security check in place preventing stealing bagged blood. Of course, sometimes the two needs aggravate each other, so before they start going at it in his room, he runs downstairs for a drink. Julia’s response? “You keep your condoms in the kitchen? That’s just inefficient.” Both Josh and Sally are excited for him until the revelation about who she is. He and Josh share words, Aidan promising it’s all over and he didn’t know, Josh irrationally upset with him about it happening at all.

Later at work, Aidan and Julia share an “it’s complicated” moment. Aidan starts to spiral because of his thirst, talking with Sally about how bad it can get. Refusing to hit up a sponsored blood den, he heads to an old contact, a prostitute of sorts who, with a bodyguard in the room, apparently charges $300 cash for a drink from her. Aidan indulges, and his crazy face comes out.

In ghost news, Sally meets a nurse this week who can see her kind, and actually help save near-death newborns by matching up ghosts with them for reincarnation. The actual nature of this reincarnation, and if the newborns are dying before, during, or as a cause of it, really isn’t explained in full, but the nurse admits she doesn’t have all of the answers. Impulsive as ever, Sally wants to be reincarnated, which leads to some words with her roommates during the relevatory Julia breakfast, and follows with her interrupting Aidan and Josh’s fight. “Dawson, Pacey. Forget about Joey and get your A games on,” she says, prepping them for the nurse’s visit for an interview.

After talking with her roommates, the nurse doesn’t think Sally’s the right fit for reincarnation. It’s hard to tell what a right fit might be, but the two swap stories during the episode about the paranormalcy of their situations. Sally opens up about her dream of the door and the shadowy figure on the other side. While visiting the nursery at the end of the episode, she encounters the figure again, who she thinks is trying to take one of the newborns.

The reincarnation concept was a nice addition to Sally’s storyline, but I’d like to see it more fleshed out in future episodes. Really, I don’t know why, but I’m super curious about how the two spirits exist in the one body and what makes that different from the possession we saw last week. Aidan’s downhill spiral is starting a lot sooner than expected, but I for one am excited to see the evil Aidan we’ve heard so much about.

Nora remains a refreshing piece of the quartet, normalizing the whole experience for me by not accepting it all outright. None of this is normal, and she should be freaked out by all of the changes she’s going through. For Josh’s part, it’s interesting that after his family last season and now Julia, why has he decided to stay in Boston? I mean, I get it, he has roots again and they may not be optimal, but they are the best chance he’s got right now. Maybe the better question is, why didn’t he run farther away in the first place?

What did you all think of this week’s episode?

Season 2, Episode 3: “All Out of Blood” (Original airdate January 30, 2012)

Being Human airs Mondays at 9/8c on Syfy

Find more Poptimal coverage of Being Human here.

Images courtesy of Syfy

If the new offerings could offer just as much imagination and chemistry as NBC’s Grimm or ABC’s Once Upon a Time, we TV viewers could be in for a season of spoiling. I’m personally not holding out too much hope for that (what are the odds we could be so lucky?), but if there’s anything to be grateful for it’s that Grimm and Once Upon a Time lead the pack.

Poptimal.com had the chance to participate in a Q&A with Jim Kouf and David Greenwalt co-creators (with Stephen Carpenter) and executive producers of the wonderfully moody and suspenseful series Grimm. During the call, the two talked about their series, fracturing the fairytales, and what fans can look forward to from Grimm.

Starring David Giuntoli and Russell Hornsby, Grimm follows the life of Nick Burkhardt, a homicide detective who learns that he is the descendant of hunters of the supernatural, known as Grimms. Along with his partner Hank (played by Hornsby) and his supernatural informant Monroe (Silas Weir Mitchell), Nick must work to protect mankind from the dangerous supernatural creatures of the world. But as we learn from Greenwalt and Kouf, humans aren’t the only ones who need protection. In the upcoming episodes, good Grimm creatures, also known as Wesen, get caught up with some really bad humans. The Grimm creatures are in trouble. But don’t worry, they will have their champion as in a reversal of fortunes the producers reveal that several “downtrodden” creatures will finally get their day in court.

About Giuntoli and Hornsby, Greenwalt and Kouf had only nice things to say. Saying that Hornsby had something “very special, really cool but warm” to the casting call, the two said they fell in love with him and that he brings authority to the role. Speaking of Guintoli, they tell us that it was hard to find someone in the right age range, yet fresh faced and with enough talent and work history to shoulder a whole show. Overall, they said that they got really lucky with the cast.

When asked about what they think of the sudden influx of fairytale related shows, Greenwalt tell us it’s all a simple case of public domain; they’re stories that everyone already knows.

“People love these stories,” he said, “There’s a reason they’ve been handed down both in written and oral form for all these hundreds and hundreds of years. They still have an appeal.”

Though Grimm is based mainly on the Grimm Brothers Fairytales the two tell us that not every story can translate into an episode, and some are harder than others to adapt. Greenwalt and Kouf also tell us that they’re having fun fracturing the fairytales, taking the old stories and adding a twist, as well as creating new fairytales based on what’s going on today by putting it in fairytale context, such as the case of the child molester transformed into the big bad wolf.

One of the greatest things about Grimm, they tell us, is the creative freedom to depart from reality which makes the series more fun to write. Kouf adds that one of the purposes is to “explain human behavior in a bizarre way.” When asked about the challenges of creating the series, Kouf tells us that for him producing every show is a challenge, describing it as “writing movies, and producing on a TV schedule.” But in the end, the payoff is watching a dark and psychological episode.

So what’s coming up on Grimm? Azura Sky will guest star in an episode as “a bird like creature with many given talents and gifts.” Hank will prepare to get his world rocked by an unnamed woman. Amy Acker will guest star as a “black widow like you’ve never seen before.” And an epic fight is coming up in an episode titled “Last Grimm Standing” which they call a “monster” to shoot. The guys still haven’t heard whether Grimm has been picked up for a second season, but say it’s “not unpromising.” Keep your fingers and toes crossed that NBC does keep this fantastic series going, because as we’ve seen they’re not making the best decisions lately (cough, Community) and need I mention Whitney?

Grimm airs on Fridays at 9/8c on NBC.

Images courtesy of Eric Ogden and Scott Green/NBC.

In the film adaptation of the first of Janet Evanovich’s massively popular novel series, Heigl stars and produces the film which is leaps and bounds better than her most recent works, even though it never manages to raise itself above cookie cutter rom-com fare. One For the Money is a decent film that will never win any awards, may not drive new fans to the series, but could go a short way to proving to audiences that Heigl is potentially tolerable.

In One For The Money, Katherine Heigl stars as Stephanie Plum, a recently divorced 30-something-year-old former lingerie store manager who’s out of a job, out of a car, and past due on her rent. Her mom thinks she’s in need of a good man, her grandmom thinks she’s in need of a thong, but Stephanie really just wants a job so that she can get back on her feet. She turns to her cousin Vinnie, a bail bondsman, who hooks her up with a job as a recovery agent, because apparently three years in lingerie in Jersey is adequate training to prepare one for a life of chasing fugitives.

Stephanie’s first case is to bring in Joe Morelli, a former cop wanted for murder who also happens to be her first… you know, one night stand. Armed with desperation, attitude, and pepper spray, Stephanie must root out Joe while digging through the mystery of dead bodies that seem to pile up along the way.

I haven’t read One for The Money, but the funny thing is, before this movie it was on my to-do list. Two hours later, it’s not. And that’s not because the movie is bad; it’s just forgettable, and while having a sound premise, offers no interesting characters. I suppose there’s a reason why a woman who has no background in law enforcement feels fully capable of tracking down dangerous fugitives of the law, but if there is, I’m pretty sure Heigl doesn’t know what it is. There’s an attitude there, there’s a story that’s fully missing from this character that seems to have no real depth beyond the Jersey girl persona who shrugs her shoulders and tosses out half-witty one liners. Heigl doesn’t come across as anything special in this film. That doesn’t hurt the movie too much, but completely demolishes the desire to pick up the book. With that being said, she does an adequate job as a protagonist in a role that seems to signify a future career spent making cookie cut-out, though worthless, comedies.

One for the Money also stars Jason O’Mara, who is solid as Joe Morelli. Daniel Sunjata is mesmerizing as the enigmatic Ranger, a bounty hunter who for some inexplicable reason takes Stephanie under his wing. Debbie Reynolds is over the top as Grandma Mazur while Sherri Shepherd is one note as Lula, a prostitute with a love of snacks. Leonardo Nam gives a dazzling, though short performance as stoner John Cho, and  John Leguizamo is here, and – well, I don’t quite know what to say about him. Money also stars Patrick Fischler, Gavin-Keith Umeh, Debra Monk and Luis Mustillo.

It’s hard to imagine that this movie’s been in production for 13 years and this is the lackluster result of that. It’s inoffensive, has a pretty cast, but was nothing special or even recommendable. Then again, given two hours and a free ticket, I’d definitely watch it again.

Rent it.

Images courtesy of Ron Batzdorff/Lionsgate.

Truthfully, I have never been interested in dancing of any sort. My only knowledge of dancing came from movies, television shows, and the endless amount of Bollywood movies my family made me suffer through as a child. I’m not sure if people would count the bountiful hours of Dance Dance Revolution from my teenage years as dancing experience either.

What drove me to accept the assignment to cover auditions for So You Think You Can Dance? I have absolutely no idea. But after leaving the Brooklyn Academy of Music, where New Yorkers came to share their moves with the judges, I couldn’t help but feel wowed.

Crowds of dancers were lined up outside waiting for their turn to audition as I arrived. Even more were waiting patiently inside.

On stage during a break from filming, I had the opportunity to talk to judges Nigel Lythgoe, Mary Murphy, and Tyce Diorio about what exactly they’re looking for in dancers that come to audition for the reality show.

After interviewing the judges, I grabbed a seat to see what the New York crowd would deliver. I never expected to be emotionally moved by someone dancing. I didn’t think it was possible. Yet there I was, feeling vulnerable after one dance, while laughing at a comedic routine of another.

Watching the auditions, it really became tough for me to distinguish how the judges were picking apart what seemed to be amazing performances. My sentiments seemed to resonate amongst fellow audience members as boos and jeers were hurled toward the judges when it came time to decide whether the performer was going to Vegas or not.

Earlier on stage, Nigel had spoken about he was looking for from an audition. His answer shocked me. “Arrogance,” he said with a deadpan face. There seemed to be no hint of sarcasm or a joke coming from his stature. “I need you to be arrogant because I want you to believe you are the best dancer in the world when you are up on that stage. But then, you have to prove it.”

“You only get one chance to prove yourself and that was it,” Nigel said to a returning dancer who had progressed to the later rounds in an earlier season. Unfortunately, there was no second chance for the contestant. ”Starpower is magnetism. It’s charisma. It is somebody that connects with an audience, but makes it feel like you know them, like you want to know them, like you want to be their best friend. It’s not something everyone has. It is God-given to a certain degree. You can’t really put that into somebody. It’s in their eyes. It’s in their soul. It’s magic.”

So You Think You Can Dance will return to Fox with a new season this summer.

Images property of Poptimal, LLC.

The town’s journalist, Sidney Glass (Giancarlo Esposito), has been disgraced and fired by the mayor after he failed to win the sheriff election against Emma Swan (Jennifer Morrison). Intent on exacting revenge, he goes to Emma with some information – Mayor Regina (Lana Parrilla) took over $50K from the town treasury for an undisclosed reason. Emma is reluctant at first, but after Regina bulldozes her special place with Henry (Jared Gilmore) and steals his book of fairytales, she changes her mind. Emma does insist on keeping the investigation on the high road…at least at first.

Once she discovers someone tampered with the brakes on her car, Emma decides – with a little nudge from Mary Margaret (Ginnifer Goodwin), who is spending illicit time with David (Josh Dallas) and looking to assuage her own guilty conscience – to take Regina down no matter how low she has to stoop to make that happen.

Bad decision. First of all, you can’t stoop to Regina’s level, because no one else can sink that low. Second, I thought Emma learned her lesson a few weeks ago after her run in with Mr. Gold (Robert Carlyle), but her need to protect Henry and beat Regina wins out. I’m a little surprised how disappointed I felt about her failure, given that Emma is probably my least favorite (and typically the least interesting, at least so far) character on the show.

Meanwhile, in the land of fairytales and happy endings, we meet Snow White’s father (Richard Schiff) for the first time when he plucks a lamp from a riverbed. A quick rub produces a genie (played by Giancarlo Esposito a.k.a. Sidney Glass), who offers to grant the man three wishes. Of course King Leopold is a man who raised a gentle, sensitive daughter like Snow White, and he’s too wise to desire anything other than the happiness of his subjects. Instead he uses one wish to set the genie free, and a second to give his third to the genie. The genie, having seen wishes destroy lives without exception, claims his only wish is to find true love.

King Leopold invites the genie back to the castle, where he meets Snow and Queen Regina for the first time. The King dotes on his daughter (of course, she’s Snow White!), and has never gotten over the death of his first wife, his one true love, leaving poor Regina feeling unloved and lonely. The genie falls madly in love with the sad Queen, gifting her a mirror to remind her what a beautiful woman she is, but the King soon becomes aware that his wife’s affections have strayed.

The genie has grand dreams of finding a way to free the poor queen from the clutches of her horrible life, and the answer arrives in the form of her father (and we know exactly what kind of jerkface that guy is), who gives him a box to present to Regina. Inside is a two-headed viper from the genie’s homeland, and after some master manipulation (no, I never doubted for a moment that Regina had her own designs from the start), the genie murders the king.

And get this. After the Queen reveals she never cared for him but only wanted someone to do her dirty work and then take the blame, the genie uses his final wish to ensure he’ll always be by her side.

And into the mirror he goes.

The origin of the Magic Mirror! Seriously superb imagination, writers. Seriously. SUPERB.

Back in Storybrooke (and I saw this coming too), we learn Sidney Glass has been working with Regina all the time (he just can’t quit her), and they’re going to be dogging Emma’s every move. Regina has forbidden her to see Henry, who is forlorn over the loss of his book…which it turns out his mother didn’t steal.

Because, you see, we’ve almost forgotten about our mysterious stranger (Eion Bailey). It turns out he has Henry’s book, and the only question burning hotter than his identity is still (for me) what exactly Snow White did to the Queen to earn eternal hatred.

Rumplestilskin is still trying to talk Emma into an alliance, which while I know is a poor idea, also intrigues me because I want badly to figure out his angle. I loved the backstory this week; the origin of the Magic Mirror is one of the more imaginative concepts we’ve seen so far.

Much to my dismay, I have a bad feeling about how this thing with David and Mary Margaret is going to end, and after the stranger stole Henry’s book of tales, I’ve got a bad feeling about him too. Next week we’ll be treated to a Beauty (Emilie de Ravin) and the Beast story…with Rumplestilskin as the Beast.

Here’s hoping the magic continues!

Season 1, Episode 11 “Fruit of the Poisonous Tree” (originally aired January 29, 2012)

Once Upon A Time airs Sunday nights at 8/7c on ABC.

Images courtesy of Jack Rowand and ABC.

If two audition episodes per week just isn’t enough Idol for you, then you got lucky this week. This week, the show aired 3 times! THREE! Personally, I thought it to be a tad overkill, but hey, what goes better with some playoff football, chili, and hoagies than 30,000 annoying kids singing? Right.  Auditions took place in three locations this week: San Deigo, Aspen, and Galveston. Here are just a few of the memorable moments from this week’s fiasco:

SAN DIEGO: The highlight of this city’s auditions was the numerous noises and sounds made by the U.S.S. Midway ship – the Pride of the U.S. Navy, which acted as the backdrop and audition site for the show. With constant horns blaring, planes flying overhead, and more, it’s a wonder anyone could get through a song, which was sometimes a good thing. This was certainly the case with the annoying and obnoxious 19 year old Jennifer Diley, who showed up in an all-American bikini top and short shorts. The show spent way too much time on her, due to the “perfect” body she had. Thankfully, they did not put her through to Hollywood.

Single mom and D.J. Ashley Robles stood out for her wonderful control, range, and very nice tone, although I could have done without all the snapping she kept doing in her audition. STOP SNAPPING!!! More annoying than that was the extremely odd, way too talkative Jayrah Gibson, who wrote a song for J.Lo called “Shake Your Money Maker,” and then sang some irritating R&B that was filled with runs and riffing. The judges loved him and put him through. I did not.

One of my personal favorites in San Diego was the jazzy vocals of 20 year old receptionist Aubree Dieckmeyer, who had quite possibly the most obnoxious baby voice on earth when she spoke. However, when she sang Buble’s “Feelin Good,” I could have listened to her forever. Gorgeous.

Ali Shields lives in a universe all her own, and I hope she never invites me into her little bubble of a life, because she annoys the crap out of me. She was pulled out of the audience during a taping of Ellen, because she had written the host a letter saying she really wanted to meet her in person. Not only did she meet her, but Ellen sent her off to do some red-carpet interviewing for a major Awards show, where she got to exchange witty banter with just about every celebrity on earth. During her Idol audition, she did some bizarre “ghetto dance,” laughed obnoxiously, and generally tried way too hard to be wacky and silly. Apparently it worked, because the judges loved her (they love everyone – let’s be honest here. There is zero trace of Simon Cowell’s legacy left on this show). I, on the other hand, wanted to throw her into the nearest lake. ANNOYING!

On the opposite of the annoying spectrum was a soulful and genuine young man named Jason “The Wolf” Hamlon, who played a guitar-fiddle combo called a “Git Fiddle” that was made by his late father, a guitar-builder. When he sang his first song, I really liked him. But when he picked up that git fiddle and strummed while singing Johny Cash’s “Folsom Blues”; that is when I fell in love.

Last but certainly not least in the memorable category of San Diego is the daughter of actor Jim Carrey, Jane Carrey. Really? I mean . . . come on. Seriously? Could Jim Carrey be any MORE famous? Couldn’t he maybe, like, help you out a little bit? Get you some nice performing gigs somewhere? I just dont really understand why the daughter of somebody with that much pull feels the need to audition for American Idol. In some ways, I don’t really care. In other ways, it bothers me because I feel that shows like this should be reserved for unknown people; people like Jason Hamlon who are just normal, regular, blue-collar workers and need a chance. People who NEED an opportunity. Somehow, when you are born into a family of opportunity, it just doesnt feel right that you should be in the same audition room as these other unknowns. Maybe it’s just me. Perhaps I am bitter. She had a pretty voice, and of course, they put her through. Let’s see what happens.

ASPEN:

First of all, the state of Colorado is absolutely breathtaking. I have been there, but it was years ago , and just watching annoying Seacrest walk along the streets and mountain backdrops filled with nature and beauty, I was reminded of how intensely gorgeous of a place it really is. Seacrest’s gay, orange,  caked-on face foundation looked even more phony next to the natural beauty of Colorado.

Something strange was happening in Aspen, despite the mystifying mountains and beautiful skies. Randy and Steven were turning down a lot of good, talented voices, and J.Lo felt as if she was going insane because she kept saying YES to some good talent, while they both kept saying No. I could feel her frustrations, especially on one or two singers that were clearly very good, and yet got sent packing. Randy Jackson continued to make irrelevant and pointless comments that make no sense, such as randomly shouting: “What IS this show?”, or “What is this? What is going on?” You tell me, Randy. Nice sweater.

Remember when I said that Ali Shields was quite possibly the most annoying person on earth and I wanted to throw her into a lake? Yeah, well, I take that back. Not the lake part. Jenni Schick is the most annoying person on the planet earth. I dont think she ever stopped moving or talking the entire time she was in the audition room. Overly-energetic and extremely hyper, she managed to get a kiss from Steven Tyler (cuz he will kiss anything that’s under 16 and in heels), and a trip to Hollywood. Yuck-a-roo!

Haley Smith and Shelby Twenton both had interesting backstories and beautiful, unique voices. Haley, an 18 yr old with a 1970′s hippy vibe, is a vegetarian who works in a Meat-Packing Plant. She is a strange character, but her voice soared with soul on Chaka Khan’s “Tell Me Somethin Good.” Steven Tyler absolutely loved her vocals, as did I. Shelby Twenton, a 17 yr old from Minnesota who struggles with bipolar disorder, had an incredibly moving and gorgeous, natural vocal. I hope both of these unique girls go far.

GALVESTON:

The show spent quite a bit of time, too much time really, on some weirdo named Alejandro Cezares, who kept shouting nonsense about starting a revolution; screaming at everyone and nobody in particular: “I am the Revolution!” This man was not all there in the head, and you could tell that the show was spotlighting him in order to make fun of him. They do this very well. It’s manipulative as hell, but it’s well done. Seacrest always interviews these types: the true wackjobs, so he can ask them questions that feed into their oddness, and then make subtle perplexed expressions as they give their bizarre, nonsense responses. In the end, there was no revolution, as the poor guy was led out by security as he kneeled on the floor begging them to please take him to Hollywood. Sad.

A few standouts on the positive side included Skylar Massey, Bailey Brian, and Kristine Osorio. Skylar, a young deer hunter who works in her familys food store, had a gorgeous voice that resembled a younger Reba McIntyre. Bailey had auditioned once before, at age 16, and got cut in Hollywood round. Her voice had improved and she sounded great this time around. Kristine, being at the cut-off age of 28, is a divorced mom of 3 kids who used her “divorce lawyer money” to buy a plane ticket to the auditions. For all three, the sacrifices paid off, as they were put through to the next round.

Closing out the Texas auditions was a really nice , heartwarming story about a worship leader named Ramiro Garcia, who was born with no ears and no eardrums. Doctors thought he would be mute and deaf, and unable to hear or sing; but after years and several complex surgeries, Garcia began to hear. And sing. His voice was really gritty and genuine and came from somewhere real. His mom and very emotional dad awaited in the hallway with Seacrest, and when their boy came out with that Golden Ticket, I will admit to shedding a tear or ten. When that dad started crying as he said: “I remember when the doctors say . . . he no speak. He no hear” – put a fork in me, cuz I was done. Incredibly sweet story.

To end this review, here is a random, deep thought by Steven Tyler: “As my dad used to say . . . don’t sweat the petty things, and don’t pet the sweaty things.” Well okay then Steven. I guess that means I cannot pet Jennifer Lopez’s face. Oh well. Maybe next week.

See you then, Idol-worshippers!

American Idol airs  on Wednesdays/Thursdays at 8pm on FOX.

Follow @poptimal.  Follow @kelleyiskelley.  Read Kelley’s blog here.

For more American Idol coverage, click here.  For another review of this episode, read “Negative, Ghost Rider, The Auditions Are Full” by Desiree Neal.

Photographs courtesy of IMDbPro and FOX.

Mike returns after his brief disappearance, and he explains to the The Meatballs that he is sensitive and his feelings were hurt about his birthday.  Unbeknownst to him, the girls have been planning a surprise birthday party for him and Pauly.  Mike and Pauly’s birthdays are a welcomed distraction for the house, as everyone has been moping around since Vinny’s departure.  They are truly miserable without him, especially Pauly.  Deena calls Vin and asks if he’ll make it to the party, but he tells her that he can’t be there.  His absence is also felt at the t-shirt shop, where the manager has begun looking to hire a replacement.  He posts a Help Wanted sign and applicants start to trickle in, much to the chagrin of Jenni and the rest of the gang.  They don’t want a new roommate and vow to be hostile to any new people.  Jenni even goes so far as to take down the sign the manager posted.  I think everyone needs to chill out and grow up.  I know they miss their friend, but life goes on.

Mike and Pauly’s surprise party is a success and they are genuinely thrilled with their custom made naughty cakes and strippers.  They both try to hook up at the end of the night, but only Pauly is successful.  When he takes a woman home, Mike usually gives the lucky lady a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt to put on, but this particular girl (the stripper who performed for him) was fixated on finding the perfect pair of socks.  When he gave her a pair that didn’t match, she made a fuss.  Who cares about socks when you’re about to get in your birthday suit anyway??  For once Mike makes a good point.  But no, she wants matching socks, so he gives her another pair – only for her to point out that one of the socks has a hole.  At this point Mike isn’t even interested in smushing anymore.  He falls asleep and promptly calls a cab for the girl the next morning.  Looks like Pauly wins again for his birthday, while Sitch comes up short.

As I said before, the house is miserable without Vinny.  Pauly really misses his bestie and decides that enough is enough.  He suggests that they go to Staten Island and kidnap Vinny.  I wasn’t sure if Vin would be willing to return or not.  It’s only been a week since he left, and he seemed to need real psychological help when he left.  I’m not sure what could have changed in a week, but surprisingly he is ready to return and doesn’t need much persuasion.  He got a new tattoo and seems rejuvenated and more positive, though he admits that he hasn’t completely healed and that recovery must continue in Seaside.  It wouldn’t be Jersey Shore without Vinny, so I’m glad he’s back.  It will also put an end to the incessant whining from everyone, so that’s a good thing.  Party On.

For another take on this week’s episode check out “Whips and Tails” by Lauren Tyree.

Season 5, Episode 4: “Free Vinny” (original air date January 26, 2012).

Jersey Shore airs Thursdays at 10/9c on MTV.

Images courtesy of MTV.

Seriously, this isn’t a horrible idea for a movie, but the execution is nothing more than mediocre and even I, a girl who purchases advanced tickets for the release of every Nicholas Sparks movie adaptation, couldn’t get through the cheesetastic ending without copious eye-rolling.

The film begins with – you guessed it – a man named Nick Cassidy (Sam Worthington) climbing onto a ledge after enjoying a rather indulgent breakfast. Within minutes he’s spotted and the police are called to the scene. While they scramble to try and figure out who Nick is, we’re treated to a flashback that shows us that he’s an escaped convict who’s also an ex-cop, one who swears he’s innocent of the massive diamond heist that put him behind bars. By all appearances, everyone but his partner Mike (Anthony Mackie) has abandoned him. His father is dead, and his little brother hates him enough to kick his ass at the funeral.

But things are not always as they seem. If they were, this would have been a very short movie.

As Nick stalls the cops by requesting a specific negotiator (who wouldn’t want a hot lady cop instead of Edward Burns?), his brother Joey (Jamie Bell) and Joey’s girlfriend Angie (Genesis Rodriguez) break into the jewelry store across the street. Their goal is to prove the diamond was never stolen from the richest asshole of them all, David Englander (Ed Harris), but is instead still in his vault. Nick believes Englander faked the entire theft and collected the insurance money, which he needed after the real estate collapse. The reasoning behind all of this is handed to us in a neat little package with a bow on top about 2/3 of the way through the film.

The negotiator is Lydia Mercer (Elizabeth Banks), who has had a rough patch as of late. Because she knows what it’s like to have everyone turn their back, Nick figures she’s his best chance at getting someone to believe his story. She starts to do just that, and puts some calls in to Internal Affairs to find out what other cops moonlighted for Englander, because Nick believes some of New York’s finest helped the real estate mogul ruin his life.

For my money, Jamie Bell and Genesis Rodriguez are the best, most surprising part of the movie and I’d love (and expect) to see more of both of them in the future. They provided some comedy, and were some of the only believable characters in the film. Which is odd, considering they’re normal people who pull of feats generally assigned to Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible with absolutely no training whatsoever.

Yeah. It’s a little unbelievable to me that Nick’s brother and girlfriend can break into a highly guarded, armed, and alarmed vault containing a forty million dollar diamond.

But they do just that, after a couple of close calls and some much needed lighthearted relationship banter (which is what we’d all be doing while breaking into a safe!), and end up stealing the diamond back from Englander.

Things begin to go awry at this point, when Joey and Angie are busted. They already managed to smuggle the diamond back to Nick, but Englander has a few more tricks up his sleeve. Luckily for our ledge-jumping hero, he has Lydia Mercer on his side, and she learns who betrayed him and saves the day like any good woman who barely knows you.

I’m not going to post any spoilers in this review, but if you haven’t figured out who the dirty cops are by fifteen minutes into the film…you should probably watch more movies.

Man on a Ledge is predictable and languishes in the land of lazy writing. Worthington and Banks, who I love to itty bitty pieces, phone in nothing more than adequate performances. There are some decent action scenes, but not one single surprise. Like I said, Bell and Rodriguez save the film from being a complete snooze fest, but the too neat and pretty ending left me annoyed.

Honestly, it would have been a more interesting movie if someone other than the bad guys ended up dead.

Was that a spoiler?

Oops.

Wait for video. You’ll probably forget I said that by then.

Images courtesy of Myles Aronowitz and Summit Entertainment.

I got it all, and I am one happy Fringe fan.

This episode, which was for the most part a standalone, worked on a lot of levels. Over the past several months, these stories that take a step back from the larger narrative have given us some of the most heartfelt scripts and standout guest performances of the series, and this week is no exception.

Well, it’s kind of an exception, because I wasn’t enamored with the portrayal of Emily, the clairvoyant teenage girl, but aside from that.

Since Emily (Alexis Raich) was eleven years old, she occasionally hears a hum, then sees a series of events in her mind. They always lead to death, no matter how hard she tries to issue a warning or save their life. Her prediction of a random death earns the attention of our team, and the particular interest of Olivia (Anna Torv) after an Observer (Michael Cerveris) told her a couple of week ago that, no matter how the future unfolds, she will have to die.

This weighs on her mind, obviously. The FBI is aware of the Observers but haven’t interacted with them as they did in the previous timelines, since instead of intervening and saving Peter, they let him drown. It seems like a no-brainer that Olivia, Broyles (Lance Reddick), or Lincoln (Seth Gabel) would have figured out, after Peter (Joshua Jackson) has saved their hides with his unique set of information, that they should ask him about the mysterious men, but no one does until the very end of the night.

At any rate, Emily’s family has spent their life on the run since doctors and scientists got wind of her abilities. They’ve been harassed by people who want to study the girl, turn her into some kind of lab rat and steal her childhood, which her parents are valiantly trying to give back to her. Which is great, except they can’t. She sees visions of people dying, and she has to live with the knowledge that there’s nothing she can do to save them – that kind of thing is bound to steal someone’s childhood, whether it’s spent in a laboratory or not.

I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that a company like Massive Dynamic, with it’s rich history of not giving a rat’s patootie what’s good for the children, was also in the hunt for the chance to study Emily.

When Olivia confronts Nina (Blair Brown) about the case, the flippant response to harassing and abusing a young girl sends Olivia into a fit of disbelief and rage (as well it should) and we hope for a moment that she’s going to see Nina for who she truly is.

Not that we know who that is, but we do know she’s bad. Right? Maybe.

Back to the case.

Emily decides to trust Olivia, hoping to stop a mass death she glimpsed in one of her visions. Walter (John Noble) does his thing in the lab, but his usual techniques fail to extract anything helpful. Peter encourages him to hypnotize Emily to gather more information, and when Walter expresses uncertainty over his ability to do so, Peter assures him that he’s seen Walter do it before.

The scenes in the lab were fantastic, and I’ve missed the playful moments between Walter and Astrid (Jasika Nicole), as well as seeing Walter in his relaxed, unagitated state. And effective, because while under hypnosis Emily realizes that the man she saw die is not only a victim in the crime, but the perpetrator. He recently lost his children in a court case, and has plans to bomb the courthouse in the pursuit of revenge.

The FBI tracks him down and evacuates the building, though there are a couple of tense moments when they realize there’s no time to dismantle the bomb and the bomber appears ready to die and take everyone with him. Olivia is the one who talks him out of it, appealing to his humanity, even as she wonders if today will be the day the Observer’s prophecy comes true.

In the end it’s Emily who’s time is up. She foresees her own death, and goes peacefully when her brain can no longer handle the overload of electrical information that result from her visions.

Olivia and Nina make amends for their earlier argument, and if Nina really turns out to be an evil turncoat, Olivia is going to regret the touchy feely mom-daughter moment in this episode.

We still don’t know what Nina is up to or why Olivia is having migraines. Olivia does ask Peter about the Observers, and he tells her how they exist outside time. When she asks whether or not they could be wrong about the future he responds no (which doesn’t make a lot of sense, considering one of them altered the future more than once in his case), and then she lies about one of them speaking to her.

Next week looks like a treasure trove of wonderful possibilities, as the characters from both universes are forced to work side-by-side. I’m desperate for some of the humor lent to the show by Altlivia and Alternate Lincoln, and am curious to watch Peter interact with the woman who, somewhere, is the mother of his child.

What did you think? Was this week as nice a step forward for you as it was for me?

Season 4, Episode 10 “Forced Perspective” (originally aired January 27^th, 2012)

Fringe airs Friday nights at 9/8c on Fox.

Images courtesy of Fox.

Of course, The Situation wanders in mere minutes after Danny’s departure, looking like he just took a walk to the corner store for penny candy before hurrying home. Why this little field trip registered on anyone’s radar is beyond me. Mike mopes around the house, visiting Jenni in the kitchen and Snooki and Deena out back, fishing for clues about how much he was missed. As Mike reports to the camera, he sometimes hides out on his birthday to see who among the crowd will chase after him and lovingly coax him back into the spotlight, since he’s so sensitive and easily wounded.

Poor Mike and the massive heart on his sleeve are actually in luck this time, because we’re not done celebrating birthdays. One sunny afternoon, Sammi and JWoww are joined by Deena and Snooki at Karma, where they meet with a gentleman called The Wizard of Ass in order to discuss hiring a couple of his most gifted strippers/sex partners for the guys’ epic blowout. During their brainstorming session with The Wiz, the women agree on handcuffs, wheelchairs, and playful butt-whippings for the boys but not the forcible pulling down of pants, because that would be in awfully poor taste, and what if ladies are present?

We know that Manager Danny isn’t authorized to appoint a couple new cast members simply by putting up some sloppily-typed Help Wanted, See Manager!!!! sign on the door, quickly eyeballing the tacky randoms who walk in, and using his best judgment, but someone at the studio’s writing table thought it’d be fun for us to watch. They were wrong. When Jenni rips down the sign during her shift at work because she hates the idea of new housemates, her boss forces her to create and hang a new one. She and Ronnie are like, legit terrified of Danny’s power, quaking in their flip flops about who might move in and try to ruin their dysfunctional and freakishly codependent “family.” Ronnie promises to make life hell for whoever makes the attempt.

Before we know it, it’s the night of the secret birthday party. Even though everyone in the house is completely decked out and bronzed, super pumped to visit Karma for drinks and fist-pumping, silly Mike has no idea it’s a special occasion and not just any old night like all the other ones that seem exactly the same, and Pauly doesn’t suspect a thing, either. Sammi pats herself on the back for orchestrating such a devilishly clever plan. “I don’t think Mike has a clue what’s going on!,” she grins.

Indeed, the boys are gleefully surprised upon receiving the warm greeting of a large crowd gathered at Karma. Pauly thought they were done with the birthday festivities, but he’s pleased as a peach to have been wrong. The place looks like a cross between a local crab shack and an Ed Hardy store, thanks to the girls’ custom decorating. The two flesh-toned cakes are literally molded into the shape of tits and ass; the two exotic dancers and their actual tits and ass are wheeled out in more traditionally-shaped cakes, which are made of plastic or cardboard and look like they’ve been in use since Great-Grandpa Wizard of Ass owned the strip joint and made everything from his own two hands. Mike is cool with grabbing the blond stripper to take home, but Pauly gets all fancy and picks a random sorta pretty brunette whose boobs he hasn’t yet seen.

At home, Mike is fed up with his tiny dancer as soon as she asks for matching socks instead of the two odd white ones he throws in her lap. Maybe she thinks being fashion-obsessed is a cute, girlie affectation that will make Mike forget she was just peeling off glittery spandex in front of him about thirty minutes ago. It doesn’t work. They end up not having sex on account of Sitch being too “turned off,” but he lets her stay until morning, when her unreasonable demands for breakfast and a cigarette land her outside pathetically waiting for her cab to arrive. Here’s yet another chick who hasn’t memorized the grenade handbook. For those unfamiliar, it reads in its entirety: “Go inside, don smelly t-shirt, wait silently for half a ham sandwich, eat, smoke, smush, and show yourself out before the sun awakes to reveal last night’s mascara on your cheeks.” It’s easy to forget when you’ve had a few too many vodka crans, I hear.

The next night at Club Bamboo, Pauly spots Sammi in a vicious fight, rolling around on the floor with some stranger and trying to throw ‘bows while bystanders struggle to stop the action. It’s intense, but she’s okay after exiting the front door, where Ronnie asks what happened. The fight was unavoidable, you see, since Sammi got her hair pulled by some girl she never met and was thus forced to toss her drink in the girl’s face. “You don’t yank my newly weave [sic] that I just got,” she tells the camera with attitude. “I was always taught to, like, self-defend myself!” A Sammi who’d been left to actually see the fight through to its end instead of promptly being pried off and slung outside might not have as much swagger.

Once home from Bamboo, Mike and his date Paula settle into bed after Sitch thoughtfully drenches the sheets in what is no doubt a canister of Axe Body Spray, taking care to spritz his groin as well. It turns out all his grooming was for naught when the two end up cuddling and drifting to sleep with no playtime first, marking the second time in a row Mike hasn’t taken advantage of the availability of lady bits under his own covers. See? He’s so straight he doesn’t even give a second thought to those ridiculous gay rumors! In the morning, he further proves his masculinity by calling Paula a cab instead of kindly driving her home like some sort of sissy whipped puppy would do, even though he thinks she has a “100% chance” of getting a second date and claims to really like her. It’s not like they’re married or something.

Everyone’s been in a funk since Vinny left. Ronnie and Deena stayed up late crying and drunk dialing him one night just to get his voicemail. Deena and Snooki had to cheer themselves up by purchasing huge, heavy bunny costumes for prank-playing purposes. Pauly’s been missing his baby and feeling more directionless than usual. So today, it’s time to take a stand. Hungover and bored and unimaginative and heartbroken after a night of partying, the whole gang decides to go to the Shore Store to create custom Vinny-related shirts before heading to Staten Island for their very own kidnapping caper.

Pounding on the door and barging into their lost roommate’s house and then his bedroom, yelling and screeching the whole way, Sammi, Deena, Ronnie, JWoww, Snooki, Pauly, and Mike all tackle Vinny to the ground and implore him to come back home. He readily complies while his mom stands by looking shocked and crying. Maybe it’s the overwhelming emotion in the atmosphere, maybe she’s touched to see that her baby boy has real friends who care, or maybe she’s sad to see him go. But I think she was probably just chopping some onions for the special lasagna Vinny woke her up to request as a midnight snack.

And just like that, Vinny’s back. It’s only been a week since he left, but he’s rocking a sick tan and much more defined abs, in addition to a brand new hideous chest tattoo that says Let Go, Let God. He admits to not feeling entirely better yet but wanting to give things another go, anyway. “I’ll be working hard at recovering at the Shore,” he tells us in a talking head before announcing in the van that his first priority is to get laid. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, eh, Vin?

NEXT WEEK: Snooki appears to be peeing in her own backyard and humping people in her bunny suit, and Mike seems to be up to his old tricks.

For another take on this week’s episode check out “Free Vinny” by Tanya Lane.

Season 5, Episode 4: “Free Vinny” (original airdate January 26, 2011)

Jersey Shore airs Thursdays at 10/9c on MTV.

Images courtesy of MTV.

We started with this week’s Quickfire Challenge – the chefs were split into teams of two, Chris and Grayson, Paul and Ed, and Lindsay and Sarah. Each team had 40 minutes to shuck corn, peel/de-vein shrimp, make a pound of fettuccine and then use all the ingredients to make a dish of their choice. Sarah and Lindsay proved to be the team who worked the best with the time constraints. Paul continued to be bad luck for Ed as he completely spaced putting shrimp on the plate, which automatically disqualified them. Chris and Grayson are chaos together – Grayson is yelling at Chris to shuck faster, meanwhile, she’s hopelessly trying to get noodles through a noodle-maker. Padma (in a sleeveless Paul Bunyan long lumberjack shirt cinched at the waist) and badass Cat Cora were the judges for the Quickfire. In the end, Grayson and Chris took home the big win. Sarah was her typical high-horse self believing that she and Lindsay’ would’ve won but for Cat Cora’s beef with tarragon. Sure Sarah. First it was that the judges didn’t have a refined enough palate for your risotto and now its that tarragon is public enemy number one? Puh-lease.

For the Elimination Challenge, each team of chefs was asked to prepare a dish for 200 people at a block party. Then, Padma added the rub. The dish each team chose would have to be cooked healthy. Chris and Grayson had chosen chicken salad (snooze), Sarah and Lindsay chose meatballs (bigger snooze) and Ed and Paul chose kalbi with pickled veggies. Then, Padma added the second rub, the teammates would be competing against each other. Shocker!

As I pouted about earlier, the challenge itself just wasn’t that interesting. It was 6 chefs running around, chopping up a storm, plating up a storm and serving their creations to throngs of people in 105-degree weather. The only somewhat exciting moment was when Chris declared his fear of bees. They were circling around his blender and he just couldn’t get over it.

After listening to a bunch of block party-goers give their meaningless opinions (e.g. This was good, I liked this, This is the best), The judges had their crack. First up was the kalbi made by both Paul and Ed. While Paul’s rocked his white peach kimchi and ssam with turkey, Ed’s chewy short-rib on a white bun left less to the imagination and more on the hips. Second, we have Grayson and Chris. Both tried their hand at a chicken salad sandwich and both were mediocre. Grayson came out a little ahead as her sandwiches were made to order so everything seemed more fresh, as opposed to Chris’s pre-made fare, which dried out in the sun and heat. Lastly, we have the match-up of meatballs. Lindsay’s meatball was made from lamb and veal accented with Greek yogurt. The judges thought it was perfection. Sarah’s turkey meatball also impressed the judges. Thank goodness because I was going to get overheated had Sarah played the victim card AGAIN.

In the end, Lindsay, Paul and Grayson all won their head to head match-ups. Lindsay took hope top honors with the overall win. Grayson got into it a little with Tom when he implied that her chicken salad was boring. “WHAT??” she yelled. “And meatballs are for thrill-seekers???” she yelled again. I have to agree. She had a point and Tom looked a little frazzled that his critique was shot right back in his face.

Poor Chris was on the losing end this week. His dry chicken salad sandwich did nothing for the judges and he and his ponytail for sent home. I think Tom said it best when he described Chris as being an excellent ideas guy but not great at execution. Truth – the cigars and sweet potato fences come to mind.

In LCK this week, Beverly beat Chris with a mystery box challenge. She now has a 2 game wining streak going. She needs to win next week’s LCK to get right back into the Top Chef competition. I am rooting for her and I have to retract my earlier disdain for LCK in general. I think it’s actually pretty exciting to watch and Tom’s a great host for it.

Season 9, Episode 12: Block Party (original air date January 25, 2012)

For more food intrigue tune in to Bravo TV Wednesdays 10/9 central.

Images courtesy of Bravo TV.

One of the hands down best auditions of the day was eighteen-year old Haylee Smith. She was a mountain girl for sure, living in a log cabin and being absolutely a product of the majestic Colorado scenery. Haylee had a cool demeanor and seventies inspired flavor about her, not to mention an incredibly soulful voice, the likes I don’t think the show has seen in ages. The judges would have been insane not to give her a golden ticket so off she was to Hollywood.

Although this leg of the journey saw its fair share of talent, there was still a mass of completely inept people that rolled through. It’s always amazing to think that some of these people are so comically unaware of how their singing in the car along to the radio differs from singing with the big dogs on the Idol stage. When nineteen-year old Tealana walked in, she made it known that she’d been living in her more talented twin sister’s shadow for too long and had something to prove. Then Steven asked her if she had ever recorded her voice and listened to it, which should be a mandatory task for anyone trying out for American Idol anyway. Tealana wasn’t put through to Hollywood but she did successfully break the winning streak the judges were on that day. She wasn’t the only one turned away, however. The final contestant for the Aspen run was the enigmatic Magic Cyclops (real name and age remain unknown) from Davenport, Iowa. His trailer park-chic style and boasting of owning eleven-thousand air guitars was obviously impressive, as was his attempt at keeping up his British accent the entire time. He got points for trying to be hilarious but that was all, and even a classic Neil Diamond song couldn’t convince any of the judges to take him seriously. I still can’t figure out why. Well, it was a big, fat “no” from the judges again and that concluded the American Idol Colorado stop.

The second day of auditions this week was held in Texas, the same state American Idol discovered the now famous Kelly Clarkson. With that being said, would the lone star state be able to compete with that? No one could hold a candle to the very first contestant that auditioned that day, but unfortunately not in a good way. Twenty-five-year old Phong was, let’s say…interesting. So emotional and excited to be a part of the Idol fanfare, Phong was looking to be the next phenomenon with an ear piercing rendition of Toni Braxton’s “Unbreak My Heart”. The judges simply couldn’t handle his diva-esque self-described “iconic moves” alone and Phong was the first to get the axe that day.

The first horrific audition of the day paved the way for a slew of more tone deaf screamers and McCreery impersonators that didn’t have a chance of receiving a golden ticket. Thank God for the deer hunting country girl, seventeen-year old Skylar, because her beautiful audition finally restored some faith to the seemingly doomed Houston stop. Soon after, the Idol tide changed and the ladies started picking up more and more Hollywood passes. An old season six alum named Baylie was back to try out again after making it to the Hollywood round once before. Her voice had gotten even better with age and she was sent through to have another go at fame. Twenty-eight-year old Kristine was given a golden ticket, too. The mother of three is currently going through a divorce but believed in her abilities so much that the loan she took out to pay for her lawyer went straight to a plane ticket to Houston instead. Now we wait and see if the chancy decision pays off for her.

Throughout the audition process, we sometimes see the judges disagree but what we see all too much of is the gender barrier. Just like with judges of Idol’s past, a two against one controversy surfaces, this time Jennifer against the boys. I’m pretty critical when it comes to a lot of the contestants; I’d be the judge from Hell, honestly, but I have to say I agreed with a lot of what Miss Lopez was saying. When a “singer” came through that was overtly offensive to the ears, somehow Randy and Steven didn’t notice. Because it only takes two votes to send someone through, Jennifer was outnumbered for several auditions. Not to mention some of the ones that were actually quite good were rejected by the guys. It was like an episode of Bizarro American Idol.

No one’s ears could deceive them when twenty-six-year old Alejandro commanded attention. The aspiring singer riled up the audition waiting room with promises of standing up for the underdogs of the world. He spent so much time ranting about “the revolution” that he forgot to hone his vocal expertise. Alejandro’s rabble rousing (and singing) meant nothing to the judges who tried to quickly dismiss him amidst his begging for another chance and eventual escorting out by security. The revolution will have to remain buried underground where it belongs for now.

Luckily, the last Houston contestant made up for all the day’s misfortune. A twenty-four-year old man by the name of Ramiro was there to show that you can overcome the impossible and he was living, breathing proof. Now a worship leader at a church, Ramiro’s life was challenging from day one. He was born with no ears, something you wouldn’t expect a singer or musician to reveal. Ramiro’s parents were told that their son would never hear, never speak, and that his future may be a grim one. At the age of four he started undergoing reconstructive surgeries for his ears where they miraculously found that he in fact had eardrums and a canal and the rest is history. Ramiro’s audition had the judges impressed and in awe of what he had become with a strong, vibrant singing voice to boot. He was given the final golden ticket to Hollywood that day and the Houston auditions ended unquestionably on a high note.

Season 11, Episode 4 & 5: Aspen, CO & Houston, TX (original airdate January 25 & 26, 2012)

For more music and drama tune in Wednesdays & Thursdays 8/7 central on FOX.

Images courtesy of American Idol. 

Once bitter after losing out on the Thomas Haden Church role in Sideways, Clooney got over his grudge just in time to participate in Payne’s newest tragicomedy masterpiece as real estate heir Matt King. “In this career, you always want to be working toward a next level that makes you uncomfortable,” the actor said about his role as an out-of-touch father dealing with the imminent death of his wife. Describing his character as “a fuckup from Day One,” Clooney joked that the most challenging part of the process was “tucking that Hawaiian shirt into the khakis and then pulling those khakis up to the armpits.”

Mr. Clooney, as exceedingly charming and impeccably styled as I’d have expected, took every opportunity to display his famous sense of humor, adopting a serious tone only to express his admiration of the project and its creator. “You can get a bad movie from a good script, but you can’t get a good movie from a bad script,” he explained, admitting he himself had been in a few clunkers in his day. The foundational integrity of any good film project must be matched by a careful attention to detail, and Burke was quick to point out Payne’s personal investment in his work. “He’s at every casting session,” Burke told us. “Alexander takes a good long time in casting. The great thing about him is that everybody who walks in the door as an equal shot. If you’re right for the part, you get cast. You don’t have to be a superstar.”

As the teen with a troubled past and an uncommon measure of maturity, Shailene Woodley was deeply affecting and original. Describing her time in Hawaii as educational, she spoke about what went into filming one of the movie’s more gutting moments, in which she hears of her mother’s terrible fate while taking a dip in the pool. “In Hawaii, they have a saying that you learn to swim before you learn to walk,” she revealed, noting the aptness of the scene and her character’s ability to be vulnerable while submerged in water. Facing her father poolside was the less comfortable alternative. “It’s really hard to cry in front of people you know well.”

How did Woodley prepare for her momentary breakdown? “I think that sort of emotion kind of naturally gets evoked. It was really easy to imagine having a mom who had been a best friend and a dad who took his dinner plate to the office each night.” Thankfully, her emotionally-distant onscreen father was more supportive between takes. “George is genuinely one of the kindest, most generous people I’ve ever met, which is weird to say, since he’s sitting right here,” the young actress laughed. “He went out of his way to make me comfortable on-set.”

The adorable and talented Amara Miller played Woodley’s little sister Scottie in a part that remained uncast until about ten days before the start of filming. As Burke explained, she was hired on the basis of an audition tape recorded on an iPhone. Clooney recalled taking the time to “hang out” with his onscreen daughters, though he can’t claim to have been perfectly professional in his role as experienced guide. “Amara had never worked before! It’s remarkable. She had no idea about doing 13 or 14 takes, so [in one scene], she’s just pounding down ice cream. I just let her eat,” said the actor with a mischievous grin. “She called in sick the next day.”

It might as well have been Judy Greer’s first time on a movie set, too, as the director was wholly unaware of her comedic background. “This was not really what I usually do, but I just really wanted to meet Alexander Payne,” Greer gushed. “I usually get cut out of movies, and I kind of thought I would get cut out of this one.” It’s impossible to imagine the film without Greer’s tearful monologue to Matt’s comatose wife, who had engaged in an affair with her character’s husband before the boating accident that injured her. Butting in to add that Greer “didn’t know until the first screening that the monologue was comedy,” Clooney told us she “left the theater and cried” upon hearing laughter. Finally realizing the unique impact and tension-breaking nature of her performance, Greer now embraces the happy accident and thanks Payne for giving her a chance. “Alexander was not familiar with my work, and he might not have cast me if he had been,” said Greer. “He’s really good at that- separating each person from what they did in the past.”

Before being invited to play Greer’s onscreen philanderer of a husband, Matthew Lillard didn’t like his chances. “I’m not a piece of ass, and I auditioned against five of the most beautiful men in the world,” he said about the stressful day in front of Payne. Now, entering into a new chapter of his career, Lillard is enjoying the credibility. “My wife likes me again. I walk down the street, and people shake my hand. I stole Clooney’s wife; it’s the greatest role in movie history. It’ll never happen again, and it was me!” Lillard was just as eager as his peers to praise the project, which he saw a welcome change of pace from “taking jobs out of necessity just to feed the family.” His next movie role is opposite Clint Eastwood.

Echoing the enthusiasm of the others, veteran performer Robert Forster told us he just couldn’t say no to the role as Matt’s disapproving father-in-law Scott, who makes a powerful and poignant impression in his short time in front of the camera. “It started out as one scene, so I said ‘yes, indeed.’ I have four kids and two ex-wives!” he cracked, adding that his habit of wearing “shorts and long socks” is one he picked up in Hawaii.

As with the rest, Forster’s time on the tropical island was well-spent. The Descendants is recognized in five Academy Awards categories this year, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Film Editing. Make sure to see it in theaters while you still can.

Images courtesy of Fox Searchlight.

One (1) grand prize winner will receive:

• $50 Visa Cash Card
• Cash Cab board game

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Deadline to enter: February 5, 2012*

The funniest game show on TV, Cash Cab combines elements of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Family Feud and Candid Camera as taxi driver/comedian Ben Bailey picks up unsuspecting people hailing a cab and gives them a chance to win thousands. To find out where Cash Cab is playing in your area, visit http://cashcab.mgm.com.

*Board games are $19.99 each. Giveaway open to U.S. mailing addresses only.

Whiffs of the sorry state of the Academy could be smelled way back in 2005 when the over-hyped, over-rated, and over-the-top Million Dollar Baby won for Best Picture. The reign of Paul Haggis continued the following year when Crash won, demonstrating that the Academy thought they were awarding the movie that was most challenging and artistic when really, Million Dollar Baby was just a soap opera-stylized Rocky and Crash was as heavy-handed as any PSA on racism, just dressed in dirtier clothes. And where is Paul Haggis’s heavy-hand now? His last two films (In the Valley of Elah and The Last Three Days) were critical and commercial stinkers and the TV adaptation of his Oscar winner Crash was quickly put out to pasture. There is no longevity in a film like Crash. Even now, only six years on, it feels as dated as Driving Miss Daisy.

Voters redeemed themselves in years that followed, giving trophies to The Departed and No Country for Old Men in separate years and nominating one of the most challenging and artistically unique films of the last decade, There Will Be Blood. There, at least, are three films and filmmakers that have and do stand the test of time. But unfortunately this is more the exception rather than the norm. For every No Country For Old Men, there is a The Hurt Locker or a The King’s Speech. This year is yet another reflection of that same tired mentality, though it seems magnified to an extreme more than any other year. Take The Artist, for example; a fine, lovely film, but one that is classic catnip for the Academy; it is uplifting and feels original even though it’s really not (let’s be fair – Quentin Tarantino and Paul Thomas Anderson have been doing these types of “throwback” films, harkening to older styles of filmmaking, their entire career; the main difference being it is expected of them because they consistently raise the bar with each film they complete). Same goes for The Help, which thematically is merely the much-maligned Crash for the Soccer Mom set, stuffed into an easy-to-swallow caplet.

And what of Demian Bichir, who is a great actor in his own right (his performance in In the Time of the Butterflies is not easily forgotten), but seems to have come out of nowhere to steal the last Best Actor slot from the likes of Ryan Gosling and Michael Fassbender, two actors who have delivered a pair of shining performances in two of the year’s best films (Drive and Shame, respectively), neither of which were nominated for much of anything this year. Which really is the core of what is wrong with the Oscars this year – the snubs tend to speak more toward the sad state of affairs than the nominees themselves.

While Gosling and Fassbender’s snubs are disappointing, there are larger, more inexcusable disses this year than ever before. Nick Nolte has been recognized for his work in Warrior, but what of the rest of the cast, or the entire movie itself. Creatively, Warrior was quick to take down and submit The Fighter, a best picture nominee last year that somehow caught mad fire while adding nothing of value to the boxing movie archetype. Warrior is everything that The Fighter should have been and what is its reward for all that hard work? A single nod. But perhaps the biggest snub of the year is for Drive, which is easily the most original, most unique, and best reviewed movie of the year. It currently sits at a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes, an 80 on Metacritic, and is one of the few films this year to be listed in the Top 250 on IMDB along with The Artist and Hugo, and for its originality, it is not given a single nomination in any of the big categories. In its stead, a middling melodrama about a boy trying to reconnect with his father who died on 9/11. When you say it like that, it’s understandable why Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close connected with Academy members, whose average age is around 60 years old. Knowing that, it’s a small miracle that movies as forward thinking as The Social Network or There Will Be Blood are even recognized at all.

While the Academy has always been known for its “safe” choices, awarding Dances With Wolves over Goodfellas or Shakespeare in Love over Saving Private Ryan, their arbitrary choices and old-school tastes seem to be rotting the foundation from the inside out, pushing it ever further toward the irrelevant circle-jerk that the Golden Globes have become. While the prestige of an Oscar will never tarnish, enthusiasm will continue to erode until the whole song and dance becomes nothing more than a glorified Secret Santa office party, with everyone patting each other on the back, giving awards for “Most Enthusiastic” and “Favorite Lunch Friend.” Until then, we can only hope that the Oscars get put into a forced turnaround which will give them time to reevaluate their choices and how they will look in the pantheon of other Oscar winners of years past, the ones that were truly deserving of those shiny gold statues and not just the flavor of the week.

Bask in the self-congratulation of this year’s Oscars telecast, Sunday, February 26 at 7/6c on ABC

Stick with Poptimal for more coverage of the 2012 Academy Awards

Images courtesy of Warner Bros., FilmDistrict, Lionsgate, Dreamworks and IMDbPro

“There’s always a question of, you know, on this show characters literally get the ax,” DeKnight said when asked about deciding who lives on for future stories. “It comes from the story, how is the story best served by a character death.” If you’ve seen the first season, you know almost no one makes it out of that finale alive. The emotional ramifications are felt by viewers with each loss, in different ways of course, enhancing Spartacus’ own journey, a skill he admits he honed working under former mentor Joss Whedon.

But, there are actors DeKnight and Co. miss when they’re gone, first among them John Hannah, who portrayed the owner of the ludus where Spartacus resides in the first season. “His presence was just so fantastic,” DeKnight said. “He had to go, but that was a painful one.”

Coming back for another season without most of the original cast is one thing; having to recast the title role was quite an additional burden. DeKnight didn’t try to duplicate Whitfield, but looked for the same base qualities the character needed in his new Spartacus. He noted compassion was important, because even though Spartacus might fly into a rage, he never comes from a place of anger, always from a wounded heart. “Liam captured that essence,” he said.

This season sees Spartacus continue on his journey of redemption for the death of his wife, feeling responsible for it in some way, and furthering his acts of vengeance. DeKnight said we’ll see the character transition into more of a leadership role for the freed army of slaves and gladiators he’s building. “It’s a very, very bumpy ride for him to go from someone that we see in season one, he’s a good man, but he is much more concerned about himself and his wife,” he added, noting that putting the needs of the group first is a new ideal for a lot of the characters.

“I think the show just welcomes criticism,” DeKnight said of comments on everything from the admittedly weak first episode of season one to the few gay characters who inhabit the House of Batiatus. He added that early on, “We took a lot of criticism for too much sex, too much violence, everybody hated the language, not the cursing, but the actual language for the show. It just took a while for everybody to warm up to it.” DeKnight refused to change the dialogue, which is a highlight for me, flowing poetically and quite unnaturally out of any character’s mouth.

While not based on the Latin spoken at the time, DeKnight notes that in Shakespearean times no one spoke in iambic pentameter either. If you’ve seen the show, the influence is clear, maybe not so much on expletives like “Jupiter’s cock,” but you have to give the man creative license somewhere.

Speaking of historical accuracy, DeKnight does employ two historical consultants. “They give us copious notes and we always say on Spartacus that we want to be respectful to history, but our first goal is to be entertaining to the audience.” He was quick to note that, even though you may think you know how the story of Spartacus ends, there’s a lot to learn on the way. “One of the great things about the story of Spartacus is that there’s only fragments left in history,” he said. “Most of those talk about who won the battle, so there’s no emotional detail in it.” He pointed out Titanic as an example of how telling a good story makes you ignore the fact you know how it ends.

One reporter asked a very unique question: if gladiators are such macho men, why do they shave their bodies?  DeKnight, well schooled from his consultants, was quick to note that ancient Romans considered body hair a barbaric trait, and while it can be debated if gladiators were exempt, the Romans certainly employed grooming. “They had waxers and pluckers,” he said, also noting an aesthetic value it brings to the show, highlighting muscular frames which play into a number of scenarios on the series.

Moving into this new season has given DeKnight more time to spend with characters who haven’t been given a spotlight yet. Former trainer Oenomaus gets an origin episode this go around. “[He] was the one that we felt was underutilized at first and we tried to bring him more to the forefront,” DeKnight said. Gods of the Arena protagonist Gannicus, who was last seen setting off on his own after earning his freedom, will pop up midseason.

Spartacus’ love interest, Mira, from season one will return. “They have moved into a quasi-relationship,” DeKnight said, “but it’s a relationship that’s very bumpy and rocky and may or may not work out in the end.” Lucretia, lone survivor of the ludus massacre of season one and played by genre staple Lucy Lawless, is back and completely off her rocker. “Last we saw her, she got stabbed in the stomach and sure she was twitching at the very end, but how is it possible she survived,” teased DeKnight, not wanting to give away too much. Glaber, a villain only seen in two episodes of the first season, returns in a much larger role this year. “Historically, he’s the next guy that was sent after Spartacus,” DeKnight said. “He’s going to be Spartacus’ arch nemesis, nipping at his heels for the entire season.”

While early pick-ups have been common for the series, there’s no confirmation yet that Spartacus will return for a third (or is it technically fourth?) adventure. Still, DeKnight is already at work writing the outline for the next season. He’s also planning something for next year’s Comic Con.  “Coming up I think next month is when we start kicking around what we’re doing,” he said. “I always love being at Comic Con. With us it’s a little trickier since we shoot in New Zealand, we have to actually shut down for a week to be able to get people there.” The show has been each year preceding the coming season, with lead cast members and DeKnight himself participating as panelists. “It’s such a great event and we always love coming there.” Hopefully this means there will be more Spartacus to look forward to in the future.

Spartacus: Vengeance premieres Friday, January 27 at 10 on Starz.

Stick with Poptimal for further Spartacus news and coverage.

Images courtesy of Starz and IMDbPro

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island
Saturday, February 4
10:30 am
AMC Tysons Corner
McLean, VA
In Theaters February 10

Please note, tickets do not guarantee admittance. Seating is first come, first served.

Fill out the form below for a chance to win. (No Purchase Necessary) *** If you are on Twitter, you can get extra entries by following us at @Poptimal and send the following tweet: “Chances to win tickets to an Advance Screening of Journey 2: The Mysterious Island – http://ht.ly/8GJrH Thanks @Poptimal” You will receive additional entries (limit one per day) to win the above prize.

The new 3D family adventure “Journey 2: The Mysterious Island” begins when seventeen-year-old Sean Anderson (Josh Hutcherson) receives a coded distress signal from a mysterious island where no island should exist.

Unable to stop him from tracking the signal to its source, Sean’s new stepfather, Hank (Dwayne Johnson), joins the quest that will take them first to the South Pacific, and then to a place few people have ever seen.  Or lived to tell about.   It’s a place of stunning beauty, strange and threatening life forms, volcanoes, mountains of gold and more than one astonishing secret.

Together with Gabato (Luis Guzmán), the only helicopter pilot willing to risk the trip, and Gabato’s beautiful, strong-willed daughter Kailani (Vanessa Hudgens), they set out to find the island, rescue its lone human inhabitant and escape before seismic shockwaves force the island underwater and bury its treasures forever, in this follow-up to the 2008 worldwide hit “Journey to the Center of the Earth.”

“Journey 2: The Mysterious Island” also stars Michael Caine as Sean’s grandfather, Alexander, the stranded traveler they’re seeking, and Kristin Davis as Sean’s mother, Liz.

Shot in 3D, the film is directed by Brad Peyton from a screenplay by Brian Gunn & Mark Gunn, story by Richard Outten and Brian Gunn & Mark Gunn.   It is produced by Beau Flynn and Tripp Vinson, and Charlotte Huggins, who previously collaborated on “Journey to the Center of the Earth.”   Richard Brener, Michael Disco, Samuel J. Brown, Marcus Viscidi, Michael Bostick and Evan Turner serve as executive producers.

The behind-the-scenes creative filmmaking team includes director of photography David Tattersall, production designer Bill Boes, editor David Rennie, costume designer Denise Wingate and Academy Award®-nominated visual effects supervisor Boyd Shermis.  The music is composed by Andrew Lockington.

“Journey 2: The Mysterious Island” is a New Line Cinema presentation of a Contrafilm production and will be distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company.

Concurrently with its nationwide theatrical distribution, the film will be released in IMAX® theatres worldwide.

This film is rated PG for some adventure action and brief, mild language.

www.themysteriousisland.com

For some stupid reason, NeNe believes Marlo merits immediate biffle status on account of the fact that they both like labels and shopping. I’ll admit, I can’t imagine how difficult it must be for a vain reality show star to find friends who share her crazy niche interest in expensive shoes and clothes, but isn’t it a little early to be cozying up like this? By all indications, Marlo is nuttier than Skippy Super Chunk, and that’s before you factor in the multiple mug shots. For now, NeNe doesn’t care. Showing up at Marlo’s place to squeal at her full closets one afternoon, NeNe receives a new Chanel bag as a gift upon admiring it. As her mind is flooded with visions of the future- a movie titled Marlo and Me and a jointly-owned shoe store called Sole Mates- NeNe imagines a life with her new best friend and embraces her over-sized Chanel with a grin.

Is it standard to require your at-home personal chef to wear his official white uniform while on duty? I feel like the other women haven’t been doing it, but Marlo’s staff is all decked out and probably terrified to look her in the eyes, so they mostly stay silent as NeNe discusses the Africa trip with her new bestie in the kitchen. Marlo, tactful as always, pretty much invites herself along when NeNe complains that she doesn’t want to travel with Phaedra or Sheree. This scene is supposed to convince us that the decision for NeNe to “surprise the girls” with Marlo’s presence on the trip is totally organic, which is not likely.

Both Kandi and Kim want to slim down and tighten up a bit, so the editors have spliced together scenes of the two women illustrating their different approaches to the task. Silly Kandi goes the exhausting route and does actual physical exercise with her trainer in a gym before an intense outdoor obstacle course, while Kim is smart enough to pay someone a buttload of money to wrap her entire body in some kind of white gauze and anti-aging minerals and have her hop on a trampoline a few times. Doesn’t Kandi know rich people aren’t supposed to break a sweat? Besides, Kandi’s trainer is all mean and stuff, advising her not to eat deep-fried foods anymore if she wants to lose the weight. At home in her own backyard, Kim teases her husband even as holds their baby and watches her slowly turn into a walking mummy, and we know they’ll order pizza afterward. For Kim, there’s no one to be accountable to, no one who offers a challenge or any measure of discipline, and isn’t that the point of having lots of money, after all?

At Casa de Peter (and Cynthia), the happy couple is talking about the trip. Cynthia tells us she can’t wait to have the full Africa experience, with authentic food and dancing and clothes. Yeah, that sounds pretty full to me, since my mind is blanking on anything else she might encounter on the continent. Next to Peter at home, she can’t stop beaming about her 10-day vacation with her friends. Peter is upset that they never had a honeymoon and tries to guilt Cynthia about leaving her “husband and kid” alone. I admire her for not hiding her excitement about escaping for a little while. She’s positively glowing, and Peter claims he’s never seen her this happy. Unfortunately, Cynthia thinks the trip will do some kind of voodoo magic, making her thrilled to see Peter again when the plane lands in Atlanta. I’ve always wondered, what exactly does absence do to the wounded narcissist’s ego in lieu of a heart?

Over at Phaedra’s place, Apollo promises unconvincingly that he can take care of their toddler while the woman of the house is gone for more than a week. While knocking around in the kitchen, Phaedra brings up Marlo’s seven mugshots to Apollo’s shock and tells the camera she doesn’t typically hang around women with long rap sheets, so she’s scared the gold-digging socialite might try something sneaky. But she still obliviously thinks NeNe will be their biggest problem, since Marlo’s invitation is a secret. Joking that maybe they’ll luck out and NeNe will be kidnapped by an assailant from the brush, Phaedra hides her seething resentment under a layer of strong desire to witness some drama, which is thinly disguised by good-natured quips. It’s what any decent Southern belle would do.

The NFL lockout is over all of a sudden, and Family Man Kroy has to haul ass to training camp in the morning. Kim wasn’t prepared, so she’s emotional over their final dinner together before a month-long separation. That sounds horrible following the recent birth of a baby. Drinking margaritas (supposedly Kim’s first dose of alcohol since before the pregnancy), the lovers lament their predicament and move on to debating about Kim’s assistant Sweetie. Kroy isn’t so hopeful that Sweetie will help hold down the house while he’s away, confirming my long-held suspicion that she’s less than competent in her role. Kim trusts Sweetie to “step up her game” and contribute to the mission of averting chaos, but I think even she knows what a tall order that is. Before they head home for a surprise Kim has arranged on Kroy’s last night home, Kroy explains how he’s got the mansion’s security cameras streaming to his phone, laptop, and iPad, so he’ll be able to keep an eye on Kim whenever he wants. Also, there will be no naughty Skyping, since he’ll have roommates. Wow, this all sounds really fun for his wife!

Could somebody please explain how it’s not humiliating for Kim’s parents to be working alongside Sweetie back at the house, helping her prepare a romantic sex sanctuary for their daughter and her jock husband by filling the tub with bubble bath? Of course, by the time the happy twosome returns, Sweetie is still not done lighting candles and tossing flower petals around, so she makes them wait outside at the door, even though Kim tried calling thrice to warn her to be ready. Having had his surprise totally ruined, Kroy now realizes he is to wait patiently while Sweetie and the ‘rents finish readying the scene for his entrance. I imagine it’s considerably less sexy, especially when Kim’s father decides to greet Kroy and warn him about safe sex before awkwardly slinking out the bathroom door to leave them to it.

For the women who aren’t playing housewife with quite as much zeal as Kim is lately, it’s flight day. Phaedra and Kandi are the first to arrive at the airport after saying goodbye to Apollo and Mama Joyce respectively (with inappropriately lusty tongue kisses and warm hugs, respectively).  As on her blind dates, Sheree arrives with an absurd amount of baggage in tow, with sunshades and a whining complaint to get things rolling. She hopes she doesn’t “run into a mosquito,” she says, because that’s a reasonable request in her mind.

Cynthia arrives with no-muss, no-fuss braids for the trip, which is wise. Just when the women are wondering who else will actually show up, NeNe enters the building and dramatically tells them to wait a moment so that Marlo can make her climactic entrance from the limo. As the group takes turns greeting her, they do very little to conceal their revulsion. No one looks remotely happy to see Marlo, but she decides to make it even more weird by asking them to assure her that they’re glad she’s tagging along. Phaedra introduces the latest in a long line of food-related colloquialisms in a talking head, where she smiles and refers to the surprise as “a little more spice for the gumbo,” but Kandi’s assessment is positively eye-opening. “Last year, NeNe brought Diana to Miami, and this year she’s bringing Marlo to Africa,” she reminds us. “She needs her muscle with her, and with Marlo’s record, she’s good muscle.” Kandi has never been more insightful in her life.

NEXT WEEK: The safari animals aren’t the only ones on a rampage as dancing, drinking, and good cheer devolve into screaming matches and hurtful insults between the women as they enjoy the Motherland.

Season 4, Episode 11: “Shaping Up and Shipping Out” (original airdate January 22, 2012)

The Real Housewives of Atlanta airs Sundays at 9/8c on Bravo.

Images courtesy of Wilford Harewood and Bravo.

Hanna is still freaking out because Caleb is working on “A”’s phone, which means he is potentially in danger if “A” finds out. But he’s manage to pull some videos from the phone, including one that shows Ian secretly video taping Garret and Jenna in Ali’s room. This seems like nothing new to me—like Hanna points out, its all the usual suspects in one placing talking about how much they hate Ali. Nothing new there. Meanwhile, the girls find the notes Ali got on Hallowee—“It’s my turn to torture you.” Creepy, but also not new.  Now, what is new news is that one note left for Ali was signed by “A”, making it clear that “A” was after Alison before her death.

Meanwhile, Spencer is stressing about her love life.  Toby is trying to get her back, but she’s desperate to keep him safe, even if it means not being with him. But when Toby is injured while falling off some scaffolding, Spencer rushes to see him. Guess who his doctor is, though? Yep, it’s Wren, her sister’s ex-fiancé. The one she kissed. Spencer sees this as an opportunity and asks Emily to tell Toby about her and Wren, hoping it will keep him away from her, for his own good. This seemed a little contrived to me, but okay. Whatever.  Personally, I think Toby is too good for all of them. Sadly, however, at the end of the episode, he leaves town. COME BACK!

Hanna is trying to keep her lover-boy safe, too. When Caleb finds more videos, she destroys the files and they get into a fight because she refuses to tell him the truth. But she’s also distracted by trying to console Mona, who has recently been dumped by Noel. (Who, by the way, is a total asshole.) Hanna takes Mona out to help her get over the drama, and while she’s out she sees Noel with Jenna. Uh-oh. It’s getting creepier.

Aria is the only one not pushing her boyfriend away. In fact, she’s trying to get him back. Once again, Holden helps her fake a date so she can sneak out and try to see Ezra. She calls him and asks him to meet her at the clock tower. Holden sneaks off to see someone secret (he swears he’s not gay, so who is this mystery girl?) and eventually Ezra shows up. The two kiss and make up and decide they have to find a way to make things work.  Yay! I love Ezria.

Caleb turns to Emily and Spencer after his fight with Hanna. He’d saved the documents on another thumb drive and he says he’ll hand it over if they will give him some answers, even if that means lying to Hanna. They agree, and the video they find, a continuation of the first, reveals what they think may be the last few moments of Ali’s life, only it cuts off too soon to know for sure.

As the episode closes, we see “A”s gloved hands taking down a photo of Aria and Ezra, cutting it in half, and burning Ezra’s half. Uh-oh. Look out, Ezra!

So I didn’t dislike this episode or anything, I just felt like there was nothing new.  Am I alone in this belief? I’m just ready to see things speed up! No information! New suspects! MORE MORE MORE!

Okay, time for this week’s theories.

“A” Is: Melissa
The Killer Is: Melissa
Who Will Die in the Finale?: Still thinking Ella.

Season 2, Episode 17: Blond Leading the Blind (originally aired January 23, 2012)

Watch Pretty Little Liars Mondays at 8/7c on ABC Family.

Images courtesy of Disney Enterprises, Inc., ABC Family, Eric McCandless and IMDbPro.

But let’s talk about this week first, shall we?

Serena’s column is about to launch, and the first entry is all about her new relationship with Dan—her fake relationship with Dan. But the publicity may backfire on Dan. His agent fears his publisher will only want a sequel to Inside, which Dan is not interested in writing. He asks Serena to take his name out of the column, and at first she agrees. No problem.

But there’s Nate. Nate has made a deal with the devil—well, actually, make that Gossip Girl.  She’s providing him with info about the night Chuck and Blair’s car crashed, a car that had been meant for Nate. In return, he pulls Serena’s column at the last minute.  When Serena realizes why, she is pissed and puts the column up anyway, Dan’s name included. Across town at Simon and Schuster, Dan’s editors have already read the article and, as predicted, they are craving a sequel to Inside.

 When Nate confronts Serena about launching her column without his permission, he tells her that Tripp, his cousin, was responsible for the accident. Serena doesn’t believe him and confronts Tripp, warning him about Nate’s theories. Tripp attempts to blame it on Maureen. But did Tripp really think Serena would believe him over Nate? Turns out Nate and his grandfather were listening, and Tripp is a big fat liar because Maureen has an airtight alibi—she was filing for divorce. Tripp has been caught red handed.

Meanwhile, Blair is preparing for her bachelorette party. Her soon-to-be sister-in-law, Princess Beatrice, is assisting her. Beatrice may seem like she’s had a change of heart about Blair, but appearances can be deceiving. Turns out the priest Blair is confessing to is actually Princess Sophie’s royal advisor, and Beatrice’s boy-toy. That’s not very holy.  After confessing to him, while thinking he’s Father Smythe, that she’s still in love with Chuck, Evil Priest Guy tells Beatrice that to end the wedding she needs to get Blair drunk and alone with Chuck. That will end the wedding for sure.

Chuck has been following Blair, determined to find out why she walked away from their plan to run away together. Blair tells Beatrice that she’s cool with getting drunk and partying, but she needs to be far from anywhere Chuck would ever go—meaning somewhere only the common folk go. Blair gets quite wasted, but because of a tip from the Evil Priest Guy, Chuck is there to. Blair ends up getting arrested for smoking a joint in public.

After Blair is arrested, Beatrice buys all the pictures from civilians, covering up the scandal. Seems she really has had a change of heart after partying with Blair for the night. She tells Evil Priest Guy that the plan is over, but he’s not willing to sacrifice his spot as the royal advisor. He has Beatrice’s mother ship her off to Africa, reminding her that her mother will never believe her if she tells him they had an affair. Evil Priest Guy is determined to end the wedding, so he turns to Chuck and the two team up. Chuck working with a priest?  Never saw that coming.

The next morning, Blair is very, very hung over, but she’s also sure she and Louis are in a good place, so she gives Serena permission to end her fake relationship with Dan. That’s not Serena’s plan, though. She tells Dan later that Blair asked them to keep fake-dating until the wedding. Lies, lies, lies.

Nate is the one with the most growth, though. After the Tripp confrontation, Nate stands up to his grandfather, telling him that he is ready to stand on his own. His investors will be buying grandpa out of the magazine.

Overall, the episode was kind of lackluster. Parts were fun—like Drunk Blair—but it was mostly just filler. Next week’s episode is what we’re really waiting for. Can it be Monday yet?

Best Storyline: Drunk Blair. Lot’s of laughing!
Worst Storyline: Dan’s book drama. I just . . . don’t care.
Want to See More Of: Evil Priest Guy. He’s kind of cute!
Want to See Less Of: Serena. Ugh.

Season 5, Episode 12: Father and the Bride (original air date January 23, 2012)

Gossip Girl airs Monday nights at 8/7c on The CW.

Images courtesy of David Giesbrecht, The CW Network, and IMDbPro.

Josh (Sam Huntington) awoke the morning after the full moon, having been saved from Hegeman’s bullet by Nora (Kristen Hager) who, in a surprise to no one but her, underwent her first werewolf transformation. Josh finds her sitting on the steps of his house, a little shaken, not really remembering anything that happened. Throughout the episode, their relationship spirals somewhat, Josh dealing with the fact he’s accidentally turned his lover into a monster, and Nora, in a great display of realism in a surreal scenario, is just not handling it well.

They decide to go to Josh’s med school mixer, since he’s re-enrolled and doesn’t want to alienate himself from this new part of his life so quickly. After a few too many drinks, Nora makes an embarrassing display as she cracks about losing the baby and her future chances at having anything normal. Josh wants to drop out and search for a cure, but Nora doesn’t want that responsibility on her shoulders.

Aidan (Sam Witwer) has unearthed Suren (Dichen Lachman), Mother’s daughter and the new ruler of the Boston family. She knows Aidan from the 30s and is expecting the ravager she’s familiar with, and is let down when she learns he’s basically gone vegetarian on her. They argue over with whom to replace Bishop (Mark Pellegrino) at the police department, knowing they need someone to cover up future messes. Suren also knows about Mother’s orders to eliminate Josh, and holds Hegeman’s death over Aidan’s head.

When not dealing with vampire business, Aidan meets a new young doctor interviewing at the hospital for her residency. They reconnect at a bar later, thinking the interview didn’t go so well, and hook up in a back room where Aidan fights a losing battle with his urge to feed.

Sally (Meaghan Rath) starts hanging out with some adolescent ghosts, who show her there are more ways to live than just her newfound dream abilities. They go clubbing and show her how to “take.” Her high school friend warns her that it changes people, and that he has sworn it off. She does it anyway, and gets a taste of what it’s like to feel again. Things go a little too far when one of the other ghosts starts making out with her, and she tries to shove him off, not wanting to abuse this person’s body. Her high school friend rips them both out, because it’s apparently harder to leave than enter, and somehow destroys the other ghost, leaving Sally weakened and gray.

A lot of things came to a point quickly in the first few minutes of this episode. Nora could see Sally now. Sally’s new friends took the house as their hang out spot, with great reactions from Aidan and Josh. Josh owing his life to Nora’s wolf instincts.

Speaking of Nora, it was refreshing to see her newfound plight not go so well. Genre shows have a tendency to rush through the adjustment period, but this is a show about trying to be normal, so it would make sense for her to react in a not-so-positive way. Blurring it with her miscarriage from the end of the first season, an issue she put off dealing with thanks to the revelation her baby’s daddy is a werewolf, who happens to live with other supernatural elements she didn’t think existed, and just scratched her. The revelation that she also remembers her wolf actions may have a bigger role to play as the season goes on. Either way, I’m excited she can see Sally and the two can now interact.

Dichen Lachman plays Suren with a fun, kind of mad vibe reminiscent of Buffy’s Drusilla. She should be good times to watch as her plans for Boston and history with Aidan come to the forefront of things.

Sally’s story was the most intriguing for me, raising all kinds of questions about consent and actions. It’s easy to see how you might become addicted to simple sensations again after losing them, but what lines are okay to cross? Plus, can ghosts still die?

Season 2, Episode 2: “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?” (Original airdate January 23, 2012)

Being Human airs Mondays at 9/8c on Syfy.

Find more Poptimal coverage of Being Human here.

Images courtesy of Philippe Bosse for Syfy and IMDbPro

And when you put six of the hottest boys the network can muster on one stage, what do you get?

A gorgeous panel called The Badass Boys of The CW. And lots of laughter.

The boys, Kristoffer Poloha (Henry Butler on “Ringer”), Wilson Bethel (Wade Kinsella on “Hart of Dixie”), Jared Padalecki  (Sam Winchester on “Supernatural”), Ed Westwick (Chuck Bass on “Gossip Girl”), Joseph Morgan (Klaus on “The Vampire Diaries”), and Shane West (Michael on “Nikita”), answered questions and bantered with each other about their characters’ badassery as well as their own.

Joseph Morgan told the audience that his two new brothers on The Vampire Diaries are “badasses in training”—they’re not quite as badass as Klaus, but they’ll get there. Also, when the panel was asked if anyone had any real life heroes, Joseph immediately said, “I think Gordon Ramsey’s pretty badass.”

Yes. Gordon Ramsey. Well, He does know how to wield a knife. That’s fairly badass. And he’s Scottish. That has to count for something on the International Scale of Badassery. Or at least the international scale of something.

However, according to Jared Padalecki, the soldiers around the world keeping us safe are pretty badass. He also said that in a fight between him and Jensen Ackles, he would totally take Jensen. Of course, seeing as how Jensen was not there to defend his badassness, we’ll have to take Jared’s word for it. Oh, and he hopes that the “boyish excitement” he has over his soon-to-be-born baby doesn’t bleed over into his work—making him less of a badass. Although, I must say, I think he’ll be an awesome.

Apparently taking your shirt off is also considered badass. At one point, Wilson Bethel was asked if he just expects that he’ll take his shirt off at least once in every episode.

“I’m pretty sure it’ll be a bad sign for my career when they tell me to stop taking my shirt off,” he replied. “I’ll take that as an indication that my time with The CW is short-lived.” (Jared interjected that he’d stop watching if that ever happens.)

But don’t fret, Wilson’s badassery doesn’t stop there—he’s also a poet. Just to make sure we all know exactly how badass he is, he clarified that he writes his poetry while riding his motorcycle. Smoking weed. Chasing rattlesnakes. Yes, Wilson, you are a badass.

After that panel, they introduced a new show to The CW called Remodeled which follows world-renowned modeling agent Paul Fisher as he transforms independent modeling agencies across the country. They showed some clips from the show (in which he reminded me of some of the badasses from the first panel, and not exactly in a good way), then took questions.

I am torn on this show, because while I thought he came across as a jerk on screen, and has a long-standing reputation for being a jerk (by the way, I’m using “jerk” very loosely here), some of the things he said in the panel surprised me. For instance, he’s promoting a body conscious program along with the show in which he attempts to get the modeling industry to take responsibility for the media and the images they are releasing into the world.  Ten years ago, the modeling industry was about 8% off what was considered “normal” body type, but now, it’s about 23% off the average size. He wants to change this, which I think is a very good thing, however, I have a hard time reconciling that with his… brashness.

The last event of the day was the cocktail reception celebrating the final season of One Tree Hill. In addition to the cast, all of the participants from the earlier panels were there so I was able to speak with Wilson Bethel, Jared Padalecki, and Joseph Morgan individually to ask more specific questions.

First off, let me tell you that Wilson Bethel is one of the nicest (and yes, hottest) guys I’ve had the opportunity to meet. And I can confirm that any stain he had on the front of his pants that night was, indeed, wine. *nods* Scout’s honor. I even have video proof of said spillage. We chatted a bit about some of the shows he watches, including “Friday Night Lights”, “The League”, and “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”. I also asked him about his character, Wade, on “Hart of Dixie”:

ME: What about your character has surprised you the most? Because you seem like such a bad boy, but there’re always new facets and layers popping up.

WILSON: I’m just surprised that they keep giving me the opportunities to explore all these different facets. You know, I think it’s such a wonderful example of writers really putting faith in an actor and in a character that Wade kind of was introduced into the script without people really having a reason necessarily to invest in him. Partly through what I’ve brought to the character and partly through what the writers continue to bring to the character, we continually are exploring new places to go with it, so you have all those layers that kind of beg to be explored because people have shown interest. I think that’s really the best affirmation you can get of your work—that people are interested enough in the job that you’re doing that they want to know more about you. And I think the writers are responding to that appropriately. They’re writing great material for Wade, stuff that I think people will really respond to both on the level of the kind of badass character, but also as the really soulful, sweet, endearing character.

Just in case you guys were wondering if Jared Padalecki is a really sweet, down-to-earth, super nice guy – he is. He was pretty much surrounded by people interviewing him all night, and I happened to be there when he answered a great question:

 INTERVIEWER: Who’s been your favorite foil—your favorite villain to go up against?

JARED: Ruby! [insert laughter here] Off camera… No, just kidding. I want to say that my favorite foil has probably been… Um…  You know what? Honestly? Maybe Ruby. I mean, other than the obvious, I think what’s amazing is that I didn’t know until the very end of the season, maybe the last two or three episodes, whether she was going to be good or evil. I had no effing clue. It was so well orchestrated by Kripkey (LOOK UP) and by the other writers and the directors and Gen, that the audience didn’t know. You were like, ‘I love you, but I think I hate you, but you’re helping me do what I want to do, but you saved me, but I don’t know what to do.” It was this conundrum, and I loved it. And it kept me going. It wasn’t boring for me; it wasn’t boring for the—not like it’s ever been boring, but I couldn’t wait to read the episodes and find out what was happening, find out what was the next crazy problem that would happen, what she would do. I was trying to read into is she good? Is she evil? Is she going to be good or bad? So I want to say I had a lot of fun with Ruby. Obviously.

Joseph Morgan was also surrounded by people most of the night, but I was able to sit in on an interview with him as well. And yes, he is also an incredibly sweet and nice guy. And he has a very sexy—er… nice accent.

INTERVIEWER: One of the best episodes this season involves flashbacks. What was it like to do the flashbacks, and are there more flashbacks coming up?

JOSEPH: Which one do you think was the best episode?

INTERVIEWER: The 1920s.

JOSEPH: I agree. That was one of my favorite episodes to film. […] It was a tremendous amount of fun. I’ve never—I’ve done a lot of period drama, you know, being from Britain—we love it there, but the 1920s Chicago, I’ve never done. It was tremendous, the costumes, the hairstyles. It was so much fun, and so yeah, I really, really enjoyed it. What other show do you get to do kind of modern and period? You know, it’s a real blessing. You know, I think they average three or four flashbacks a season, so we will have more flashbacks. And they’re always going to visit eras we haven’t seen before; they want to keep it interesting. I’m not sure which eras, which one we’re going to visit next. We did the Viking times. I’d like to see us visit … Britain World War I—would be lovely. That would be interesting. But I just don’t know. You know, that’s the interesting thing: we know, we have a rough idea sometimes where our characters are going, but none of that is definitive, and they can throw a script at you, and you’re like ‘Oh!’ Like my first script I got, and I opened it up and I was like ‘I’m a hybrid?! Wait a second!’ So yeah, you never really know where they’re going to go, which keeps it interesting for us as well.

So who’s your favorite badass boy? And what do you think makes them so badass?

Images courtesy Joe Magnani, The CW, and Poptimal.com (all rights reserved)

Before work, Neal (Matt Bomer) meets up with Peter and attempts to make amends for Elizabeth’s kidnapping with coffee and great Yankees tickets. But Peter insists they should just focus on work. When they get to the FBI office, Evan, a bright high school student from Manhattan Prep, is waiting for them. Evan’s financial aid package is being revoked and he believes that Andy Woods, a member of the board of trustees, is embezzling from the school’s endowment fund. Woods, also has a daughter, Chloe, at the school, who Evan has a crush on. Evan has even created an impressive visual aid packet for Neal and Peter to support his claims. Peter is skeptical at first but explains that Andy Woods is suspected to be a dirty financier.

To begin the investigation, Peter and Neal plot to go undercover. Neal, “the alias savant,” suggests that Peter will pose as a wealthy potential parent looking to enroll his son while Neal will be his assistant.

At Manhattan Prep, Peter first meets with the headmaster, Graham Slater, and then Andy Woods. So he leaves Neal on a bench outside the headmaster’s office with a student, who is in trouble. Neal, of course, gives the little boy some advice on how to appear innocent before he is mistaken as a substitute teacher for a poetry class. Neal goes along with the mistake, especially after he notices that Wood’s daughter, Chloe, is in the class. Neal is not just a pretty face. He immediately charms the students, especially the females, and shows off his high poetry IQ. I think I’d have enjoyed my high school poetry class more if my teacher looked like Prince Charming.

Meanwhile, Peter is busy chatting with Woods about the school and questions Woods about possible donations to the school and endowment fund. Woods then brings Peter to the wood shop classroom to question him about not being seen at the hotel where he is supposedly staying. It is clear that Woods is trying to intimidate Peter who covers by saying he is staying with a girlfriend, of whom his wife is unaware, which is why his bags weren’t at the hotel. After this, Peter meets up with Neal and finds him teaching a class. After class, Peter reprimands Neal saying, “I said sit on a bench not reenact the Dead Poets Society.”

Back at his apartment, Neal and Mozzie (Willie Garson) discuss winning Peter over so he does not tell the FBI about their involvement with the treasure. Neal also fills Moz in about the case and Evan’s crush on Chloe. The two plot how they can bring the two teenagers together but they are interrupted by a text from Peter telling Neal to come back into the office. Once there, Peter informs Neal that he believes the principal, Slater, is in on embezzling the scholarship fund. Peter then says he’s allowing Neal to go back undercover as the teacher but “only for the good of the case.”

At home, Peter and Elizabeth discuss the case, Neal posing as the teacher and that Peter must give his account of what happened with Keller and the treasure. Peter explains if he agrees with Keller’s confession then the art is returned, Keller remains in prison but Neal gets away with it. Elizabeth thinks this is okay and wants to give Neal the benefit of the doubt since he gave up the treasure for them.

The next day, after Peter drops Neal off for school (10 blocks away), Neal notices the headmaster slipping a letter into Chloe Woods’ locker. The only way to get to it is to pick the lock—so Peter reluctantly pulls the fire alarm to empty the school giving Neal time to retrieve the letter. It turns out the letter is an early look at financial numbers from the headmaster so Woods knows how much money he can embezzle. Meanwhile, Chloe approaches Neal about tutoring her. Neal agrees, with Peter’s approval, since this maybe an opportunity to search Woods’ home. But Neal’s caveat with Chloe—she must invite Evan.

Back at the FBI, Peter and Woods plan a dinner at Woods’ home at the same time as Neal’s tutoring session. The glitch is that Woods wants Peter to bring his girlfriend along. The always-dependable Diana (Marsha Thomason) steps up to go undercover as Peter’s girlfriend. The plan is for Neal to get into Woods’ office and copy his laptop’s hard drive while Peter gets the alarm system in the apartment shut off.

Evan shows up at Neal’s apartment for a pre-tutoring session. Mozzie and Neal aim to give him “game to get the girl.” Neal and Mozzie prep him—giving him some advice and making him fix the cardigan sweater combo he’s wearing. Mozzie sends him off with final advice, “carpe diem Evan. Carpe diem.”

At the Woods home, Neal begins the tutoring and matchmaking session with Chloe and Evan. Meanwhile, Peter and Diana show up for dinner. To get the alarm system turned off so Neal can enter Woods’ office, Peter must open a door to set off alarm and get Woods to turn off the alarm. Diana comes to the rescue as Peter’s “girlfriend” by picking a fight with him claiming that she is pregnant, which causes a scene and allows Peter to open the door setting off the alarm. Woods shuts it off at the same time that Neal sneaks into the office and copies the hard drive. But there’s a snag in the plan—Chloe leaves Evan to follow Neal and flirt with him. With her cell in her back pocket, she pocket dials her dad, who answers, overhears the conversation and rushes in to find out what is going on. This looks like it is going to end badly but Evan covers for them all saying he wanted to see a map of Paris in the office. For this, Chloe is appreciative and even acknowledges his presence by saying goodbye.

Afterwards, Peter discusses with Neal that he must soon give his statement on Keller and the treasure. Neal doesn’t want Peter to lie but just not tell the whole truth. Peter makes no promises and leaves. Our matchmakers, Neal and Mozzie, plot how to take advantage of Evan’s momentum with Chloe with the “grand romantic gesture.” Mozzie wants to see the “little guy get the girl” so he will write a poem for her from Evan.

Next, at Manhattan Prep, Peter is going to meet with the Headmaster again. At the same time, Neal runs into Evan, who is shaken up. Woods realized Evan accessed the financial documents and threatened to expel him. Unfortunately, Evan also blew Peter’s cover. Woods confronts Peter and takes him to the woodshop classroom to interrogate and threaten him. Meanwhile, Mozzie is doing the “equivalent of hoisting the boom box” by putting the poem in Chloe’s locker on Evan’s behalf. Who knew Moz was such a romantic? Then, Neal calls Mozzie for help because Peter is in trouble and needs a distraction. While waiting for Mozzie’s distraction, Neal runs into Chloe and uses this to his advantage. He offers to give her his phone number but really calls her dad, who assumes she pocket dialed him. Woods listens to their conversation about Chloe meeting up with Evan, who is in Neal’s classroom. Woods leaves Peter alone with his bodyguard to go find Chloe. By this time, Mozzie has finished his distraction, a smoke bomb that Neal uses in the woodshop classroom. This allows for Peter and Neal to get the upper hand on the bodyguard. Cut to Woods rushing into Neal’s classroom where Evan and Chloe are. But Neal and Peter with Diana as backup show up and arrest Woods.

After the arrest, Neal walks with Chloe and gives her some advice. He says this is a “chance to start over. Maybe live the life you really want. I got that chance and it’s the best thing that ever happened to me.” Peter also overhears this. At Chloe’s locker, Evan apologizes for everything that happened with her Dad and says he’s there if she ever needs someone to talk to. She thanks him and opens her locker to be surprised by a lot of red roses that fall out. Way to go Mozzie! She grabs his hand and they walk away.

The episode concludes with Neal returning to the FBI office to see Peter finishing up his statement about Keller and the treasure. Peter decided to protect Neal and not tell the whole truth because as he explains to Neal, “What you did on this case, how you carried yourself, makes me believe this partnership can work.” Peter returns the Yankees tickets to Neal saying that his actions mean more. Neal gives the tickets to Jones who immediately invites Peter, who then agrees to go to the game.

This episode’s report card—an A from me. Collars, see you next week!

Season 3, Episode 12 “Upper West Side Story” (original airdate January 24, 2011.)

White Collar airs Tuesdays at 10/9c on USA Network.

Images courtesy of David Giesbrecht and USA Network.

Ben and Rachel start their date off with a helicopter ride over the majestic mountains of Park City followed by a lakeside picnic. I suppose the call of the wild wasn’t enough to evoke any feelings out of Rachel, hence the awkward pauses and bumpy conversation. Ben had a hell of a time trying to connect with her for most of the date and things were starting to look iffy, however, she was able to redeem herself at their evening dinner date when she finally enlightened Ben on her long, sad history as a horrible communicator. Gentle Ben melts instantly and gives her another shot by giving her the date rose.

Meanwhile, the second date card arrives at the homestead. A group date of eight ladies is announced and immediately everyone begins to overanalyze the situation: “When will I get a private date? What is Ben looking for specifically? I need constant reassurance!” It never ends. Nothing could stop the ladies from swooning over their bachelor, though, when he rode up the next day on a horse for their date. It was an adventurous day of getting their hands dirty with a little horseback riding and fly fishing, which seemed like a lot of fun for a bunch of high maintenance women. Most of these girls are doing what has to be done to make it in this competition so slapping on a smile and giggling over how awesome fly fishing can be is what most of them did. The most hated woman in the house, Courtney, has made it known from the start that she’d be calling the shots when it came to Ben and that she did. She and her unibrow made sure to steal him away for private time and even impressed him by catching the only fish of the day. Would this be a metaphor for how the rest of the day would play out? The answer is yes. Yes it would.

At the group cocktail party that evening, each girl was dead set on receiving the date rose, but before deciding who to keep, Ben had to decide to let one go, and quite abruptly. Samantha, who I honestly hadn’t even noticed was there, pulled Ben aside to challenge him, or maybe just complain, about why she had not yet been invited on a private date. She made it clear she was over the group date situation so Ben made it just as clear that he didn’t see a future with her at all. And just like that, she was tossed out on the street! Maybe he’s not as gullible as he leads me to believe after all…

The rest of the single girls are more than obviously irritated with Courtney’s two-faced demeanor and that beotch was going to step on anyone that night to get the date rose. Unibrow’s game playing tactic was to make Ben feel guilty for not spending enough time with her. With every word it sounded as if she was giving him an ultimatum, like she just might walk if he’s not careful, and he totally fell for it! Back to being clueless, I guess. Even after pulling Kacie B. aside to give her the much needed support she demanded, as well as telling her he was falling for her a bit, he still gave the date rose to Courtney.

Sometime during the night, the last date card surfaced with a private date invitation for the shy red-head, Jennifer. In guy fashion once again, Ben planned a rough and rugged manly date of hiking followed by repelling into a crater full of water. And like so many of the other women, Jennifer is deathly afraid of heights. But Ben doesn’t care; he sees the extreme sport dates where everyone’s nerves get rattled as a trust exercise and I, personally, am a little tired of his testing of the ladies. Miraculously, Jennifer gets through the date and is rewarded with not only a private dinner and the date rose but also a concert with country singer Clay Walker. Jennifer’s date actually turned out to be one of the most romantic so far this season.

Back at the bachelorette den, silent tension between Courtney and the rest of the house had been building all day but, of course, Courtney thrives off of this. At the final cocktail party before the rose ceremony, Emily lets the situation get the best of her and is completely ready to call Unibrow out on her shit. When she tries to bring up to Ben that one of the housemates may not be quite who she seems, he shuts her down quickly, refusing to fan any of the flames. And then things got super awkward. Emily was already starting to question if she’d be receiving a rose that night and then Courtney stirred up a little confrontation to really get into Emily’s head. “I don’t start fights, I finish them,” boasted Courtney. That’s nice. She also keeps using the term “winning” quite frequently. If that doesn’t say something about her, then I don’t know what does.

The final rose ceremony commenced and of the twelve remaining, one would be going home. Unfortunately, Monica was given the boot this week, although I can’t say I’m too surprised. She never seemed fully invested in the game despite the waterworks upon leaving that night. I think Monica was just starting to grow on us, too. To keep Emily in suspense, she was the last one to be handed a rose by Ben but, hey, a rose is still a rose! Emily seems like a good egg and tattling on Courtney did seem like the noble thing to do at the time, but I think from here on out, she’ll choose her battles more wisely. As for Courtney, I’m sure she’ll continue to stay classy.

Season 16, Episode 4: Park City, Utah (originally aired 1/23/2012)

For more dating drama tune in to ABC Mondays 8/7 central. 

Images courtesy of ABC.

My strength is that I am open and honest with my readers and Jone Dome podcast listeners.  Whether it is reviewing a movie or TV show, or hating on Kanye West & Kim Khardashian.  My tweets are replete with disdain for celebrities pushing a bunch a useless crap on those “As Seen On TV” type ads that they don’t even use.  I would be a hypocrite to do the same.

That is why I was so surprised the “powers at be” asked me to write this article.  What do I say?  What the hell is the  Walgreens Prescription Savings Club  and why do I care?  After some investigation I found out that what it is is a great deal.  Essentially, for a very little annual cost you can get big savings for the entire family.  *Rip . . . Rip* That’s the sound of me tearing up my CVS Card. 

Here is what I learned.

What is the Prescription Savings Club?

The Prescription Savings Club is for those people that lack or have insufficient drug coverage, then join our 2 million members for discount pricing on your medications.  The membership is risk free and better yet, if don’t save more than the cost of your membership during the course of the year of your membership, the Walgreens will refund the difference.

What is the cost?

For a limited time, Walgreens is offering a special discount on annual membership.  For $10 a year, a family membership covers everyone in your immediate family, including a spouse, dependents 22 and younger and pets. Individuals may join for $5.

Is this a good deal?

In short, I think so because you get the following benefits without much downside:

• discount prices on your prescriptions.
• Savings on more than 8,000 brand-name and all generic medications
• Discounts on flu shots, pet prescriptions, nebulizers and diabetic supplies
• Bonuses when you purchase Walgreens brand products and photofinishing services

To find out more about the Prescription Savings Club and this special discount, be sure to visit their website at Walgreens Prescription Savings Club, like Walgreens on Facebook, and follow Walgreens on Twitter.

Idol threw us a meager bone, though, when first contestant, nineteen-year-old Jennifer, came out. The real life Amazon woman tried to put her best four-inch heels forward by singing a Jessica Simpson tune (unsuccessfully), but what had the judges more engrossed was her choice of patriotic wear. Simply being clad in spandex blue jean short-shorts and a red and white striped bikini tube top was not enough to divert attention away from her mediocre voice, nor compensate, despite the male judges’ ogling eyes. Yeah, that’s gonna be a big ol’ “no” for Jennifer.

Always trying to out-do themselves every year, the audition stage was set aboard the famous USS Midway aircraft carrier, which is actually very cool. It was the Top Gun movie theme song on constant loop being beat into our heads along with the sound of perpetual air traffic noise (the Midway is literally next door to San Diego International Airport) that became more than an annoyance. Luckily, a wave of harmonious voices rose up just in time to drown out the commotion of the harbor area. One of the more significant contestants was twenty-six-year-old single mother, Ashley. Her impressive rendition of Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” was so concise that it was like listening to a carbon copy of the diva. This young lady clearly puts as much as she does into her voice as she does providing for her daughter (mentioning that she has worked as many as five jobs at one time to make ends meet) and those are the traits the next Idol must possess.

More folks showed up to amaze the judges with unexpected voices. There was Aubree, a twenty-year-old receptionist who covered a breathy but smooth version of a Michael Buble song. Kyle, the nineteen-year-old college frat boy and self-proclaimed ladies’ man, had us all a little nervous until he belted out an old Monica song dedicated to Miss Lopez that the judges began to wake up. He had been the best male voice the crew had heard in a long time and before he knew it, Kyle was on his way to Hollywood.

Two of the San Diego audition’s last contestants were the most energizing of all. Twenty-four-year-old waitress and mother, Jane Carrey, walked in with not just a stellar voice but also some feelings of nostalgia for Jennifer. Jane was there to find her own place in the world and come out from beneath the enormous shadow of her famous father, Jim Carrey. What was hilarious was that most of us had really forgotten about Jennifer’s fly girl dancer days although she remembered her early start along with Jim on the show In Living Color and even remembered a young baby Jane from back in the day. The American Idol audition was the first step for Jane to become more than just Jim Carrey’s daughter and her golden ticket will give her the opportunity to take it to the next level.

The last contestant to grace the Midway stage was Jason, better known as Wolf, the twenty-four-year-old golf course mechanic. Wolf’s gruff biker-like exterior was simply just the cover on this book because his strong, gravelly country sound took over and overwhelmed the judging panel. Armed with his git-fiddle, aka guitar, he roared out two tunes that earned him a golden ticket and a spot in Hollywood with the other fifty-two San Diegans that had been chosen that day.

American Idol continues to be off to a miraculously smooth start, but what goes up must come down, right? Next week’s auditions take place in Aspen where I expect to see the altitude take its amusing toll on the contestants and judges alike.

Season 11, Episode 3: San Diego, CA (originally aired January 22, 2012)

Images courtesy of American Idol.

The plot of We Need to Talk About Kevin concerns a disturbed boy who grew up with an exhausted mother (Tilda Swinton as Eva) and an oblivious father (John C. Reilly as Franklin) and is currently serving jail time for committing a high school massacre. Kevin, played as a kid by Jasper Newell and in present-day by Ezra Miller, is more than a problem child. He’s a bad seed. He refuses to comply from the moment he’s born, he shows no signs of love or affection toward his mom and dad unless he’s manipulating them, and he wears diapers at least until grade school. He’s insufferable and aggressively nihilistic, stubborn for sport and sarcastic to the point of numbness. He’s probably a sociopath, and he’s definitely cruel to animals and his innocent little sister.

Long before his crime, Kevin’s unrelenting efforts to undermine and shame his mother have succeeded; Eva looks as if she’s been drained of her will to live halfway into her son’s infancy. I realize this happens to many mothers, but Eva is moping around in a permanent state of post-pardum depression with no hope of recovery. It’s not a good look, and anyone who knew her before the massacre should have intervened based on her facial expressions alone. At no point does Eva think of sending the boy to a psych ward or shipping him off to some unsuspecting couple looking to adopt. She endures her fate, accepts her lot, and trudges on with the false hope that her terrifying offspring will one day turn into a functional human being. We know it can’t happen, but she is blinded by her own biological impulses to keep trying.

The psychological underpinnings of Kevin’s behavior are not explored or explained; he might as well be the spawn of Satan for all we know about him. (He’s certainly stereotypically evil enough to fit the bill.) In some ways, this movie is a modern-day version of Rosemary’s Baby, and on one level it functions as a thriller. Swinton, an actor without borders if there ever was one, does a fine job of conveying the nail-biting tension running under the surface like a purring locomotive headed toward a brick wall. She’s depicted in flashbacks having to deal with her little monster and in pitifully sad scenes showcasing the current aftermath of his actions. We the viewers piece together the chopped-up timeline by monitoring the length of Eva’s hair. (It was well-conditioned and chic before the kid came into the picture.)

We never see Kevin and Eva exchanging tender human sentiments or gestures. We never see them enjoying a meal together without some sort of unpleasant conversation on the side. We don’t know Kevin as a human, we aren’t shown any hint of vulnerability or need or longing in him. Nothing is seen through his eyes. He’s something to be gawked and gasped at, which is what he wants. Far into the movie, Kevin’s personal manifesto tells us that the public needs entertaining villains to watch. The bloodbath he creates is a show he puts on for a starving viewership.

Are all people who shoot down their schoolmates natural-born psychos? Probably not. Are they all by default cold, clinical, and lacking in any human emotion, or are they hypersensitive beings with such deep wounds that their response is self-loathing and inhumane aggression? It’s worth debating. I can’t speak for its source material, but this film doesn’t seem to want to ask too many questions. It’s easier to depict the assailant as an uncrackable code, an enigma. In this case, not even his own mother knows what to think, so we can’t take our cues from her. As Eva ignores classic signs of sociopathy and destructive tendencies even to the point of absurdity, we must assume she’s struggling with a crippling inner conflict. We see her paralysis but not her battle, which is not Swinton’s fault.

The film could have been about an ambivalent mother’s realization of her own limits as an empathetic person and capable guardian. It could have been about the ambiguity of personality disorders, the psychology of youth violence, or the confusing cultural messages that compel us to seek meaning in a materialistic simulacrum of life. Instead, it dabbles in all of the above and ends up not being about much of anything. In that way, it’s like Kevin himself, I suppose.

With all that said, the movie is worth seeing for its visual style and performances alone. Miller is fun to watch as the recklessly wicked, heroin-thin troublemaker without remorse, and even the minor characters are perfectly-cast and fit the measured tone (I always love seeing Siobhan Fallon anywhere.) The film itself is a collection of details, close-up shots and lingering looks, and its use of color is striking. I’ll remember many of the visuals for a good long while, and that’s rare to be able to say these days.

Seek out We Need to Talk About Kevin if you’re in the mood for something artistically daring but are feeling intellectually lazy. You won’t have a horrible time, and you may get a thrill or two, with your feathers relatively unruffled by the end.

Images courtesy of Oscilloscope Pictures.

I could be biased, but I’m guessing I’m not the only person falling in love with the destiny filled past of Snow White and Prince Charming.

This week, the writers treated us to a whole hour filled with longing and heartbreak and sweet admissions of love. Good heavens, does that ever sound cheesy when I type it out.

In other news, the stranger (Eion Bailey) who arrived in town at the end of last week’s episode talks to Henry (Jared Gilmore), which makes Regina (Lana Parrilla) nervous. She asks Emma to check him out, but he seems to reveal only what he wants to be known, and at the moment that isn’t a whole lot.

He’s a writer. He finds Storybrooke inspiring, but won’t say whether or not he’s visited previously. Oh, and he wants to buy Emma (Jennifer Morrison) a drink. I’m trying to figure out which fairy tale he might belong to, along with how exactly he’s able to come and go from Storybrooke since no one else seems to accomplish that. We’re going to have to wait longer to learn the answers to those questions.

Mary Margaret (Ginnifer Goodwin) is sneaking out to be at the coffee shop at 7:15 every morning, which is exactly when David (Josh Dallas) shows up for his morning cup. She knows it’s pathetic, but she can’t seem to get him out of her mind. When she finds an injured dove and makes a trip into the woods to reunite it with its flock, David follows. It’s a good thing too, because she almost plunges over a cliff to her death – but he’s there to save her, like he always is. They end up in a cabin, alone in the woods, where she breaks down and admits she still has feelings for him. David confesses he goes to the diner every morning at 7:15 to see her, but when they almost kiss Mary Margaret tells him they can’t…because his wife Kathryn (Anastasia Griffith) might be pregnant. They decide, for at least the tenth time now, that they need to forget each other.

Meanwhile, in fairy tale land, Snow White goes to find Rumplestilskin (who is quite famous for making problems disappear) and asks how to get rid of the love she feels for Prince Charming, since he’s getting married in a couple of days. In return, the crackpot wish-granter gives her a potion that will cure her love – by making her forget she ever knew him. As Snow’s about to take the draught, a dove arrives with a message from the Prince. He can’t forget her either, and if she feels the same she should come to the palace and they would run away together.

Of course she goes (have you seen the man?) but is captured upon her arrival. The king, who is pretty much a dirt bag, gives her an ultimatum. Tell Prince Charming she doesn’t love him and never will, or he’ll have the Prince murdered. She goes in there and breaks his heart, and her own, then meets the seven dwarfs on the road home.

Aside: She saved Grumpy’s life earlier that night after he helped break her out of a prison cell. It was a lovely meet-cute for a lady and her future dwarf roommates.

At first Grumpy (Lee Arenberg) convinces her that her pain, her memories, make her who she is and the potion isn’t the way to deal with it. The next day the Prince rides in search of her, having called off his wedding, but when he arrives the dwarves find Snow has taken the potion – she has no memory of her Prince Charming.

In Storybrooke, David and Mary Margaret both change their schedules so they won’t run into one another at the diner, but end up there at the same time anyway. The little glimpse of fate is all it takes, and they share a wonderful, heartbreaking kiss that can make even cynical me believe that some loves are real.

Unfortunately, Regina witnesses the kiss (rule #1 of kissing a married man should be not kissing him on the street in a small town), and we can only assume she’s going to do something about it.  After all, the point of the curse is to eliminate happy endings, and Snow and Charming were first on her *hit list.

I loved this episode. Last week’s was weak, with no discernable link to any overarching themes. It gave us no reason why the Queen would care about Hansel, Gretel, or their father at all. We didn’t learn how the apple came about or why the blind witch would want to keep it from the Queen. The Storybrooke side of the story was so sweet it made me simultaneously roll my eyes and gag, which is not an easy feat, let me tell you.

They are back on point this week, and while I’ve quite enjoyed all of the episodes and glimpses into the genesis of various characters, the story of Snow and Charming has settled deep in my heart.

Which means, of course, we’ll be waiting a good long time to see their happy ending.

Season 1, Episode 10 “7:15 A.M.” (originally aired January 22, 2012)

For more on Once Upon A Time, check out other reviews here.

Once Upon A Time airs Sunday nights at 8/7c on ABC.

Images courtesy of Jack Rowand and ABC.

Everything seems to be getting better in Camelot – it’s Arthur’s birthday and King Uther is about to make his first public appearance since Morgana’s betrayal. Everyone is laughing and having a good time. Arthur even  shows off his bravery by participating as the prop in a knife throwing game. Two evil jesters, sent by a rival king, are doing the knife throwing and plan to murder Arthur – but not with the knives. They have put a sedative in the apple they shoved in Arthur’s mouth to keep him quiet during the game.

The sedative begins to take effect, but Arthur decides he ought to go pay his father a visit. It’s during this visit that the evil jester shows up to finish Arthur off. While Arthur staggers around with his sword, poorly defending himself thanks to the sedative, Uther jumps into action and reminds everyone why he’s king. Uther’s victorious, but at a severe price – he’s been stabbed and is bleeding internally.

Arthur holds his dying father in his arms in a heartbreaking scene. Uther is at peace with his passing, but Arthur reverts to a childlike state. “I’m not ready,” Arthur replies when Uther tells him he’ll be a great king. Shortly after, Uther falls unconscious.

Have I mentioned this has all happened within the first 10 minutes?

Arthur is desperate to save his father, even though Gaius has said there’s nothing he can do.  He’s desperate enough to turn toward magic. This could be a real turning point for Arthur and the future of the kingdom. Merlin is convinced that if he can save Uther, Arthur will see that magic can also be a force for good.

Merlin disguises as the old wizard (Emyrus) and agrees to resuscitate Uther. Meanwhile, word has gotten back to Morgana about Arthur’s plans. She instructs Agravaine to place a cursed necklace around Uther’s neck. The necklace will prevent any spell from healing the king.

So it’s no surprise – even though I was crossing my fingers and hoping the writer’s would pull a trick out their hat – that when Merlin/Emyrus performs the spell, it doesn’t work. Actually, that’s not true: it works for a few seconds. Uther regains consciousness and father and son have a few more seconds to see each other and speak before the necklace’s curse cripples Uther and kills him for good. The king is dead. (And no more Anthony Head; this makes me doubly sad.)

The remainder of the episode deals with the repercussions of using magic to try and heal Uther and Arthur mourning the loss of his father. Merlin’s plan utterly failed, thanks to Morgana, and Arthur has come to the conclusion there is absolutely nothing good about magic. “I”ve lost both my parents to magic,” he says. “Magic is pure evil. I’ll never lose sight of that again.”

Sigh. And how does one even follow-up that statement, just when things were looking so cheery? Merlin took a huge gamble using magic and it didn’t work. And the king is now dead. I kept expecting a twist somewhere, like “Pysch! We can save Uther this way!” as the writers have done in seasons past. But this is the real deal, everyone. Next week we see Arthur face his first real challenge as King of Camelot and the rest of the season will no doubt focus on his transition; what I particularly want to know now also is where does the relationship with Gwen go from here?

It’s still early in the season, so there’s plenty of time for things to develop. All that needs to be said now is: Long live King Arthur!

Sesason 4, Episode 3: “The Wicked Day” (originally aired January 20, 2012)

For more on Merlin, click here.

Merlin airs Fridays at 10/9c on Syfy.

Images courtesy of Shine Ltd. & FremantleMedia Enterprises.

Underworld: Awakening does not begin that descent, however.  In fact, if anything, it’s an improvement.  And I think the reason for this is how fresh and different this film feels from its predecessors. While Kate Beckinsale returns as Selene, the badass vampire, little else remains the same. We’re in a new world and there’s a completely new story unfolding for us.

After the events of Underworld: Evolution, something terrible happened. Humans found out about the existence of vampires and Lycans (werewolves) and the Purge began – a mass genocide of all the non-humans. Selene and her boyfriend, a vampire-Lycan hybrid named Michael (Scott Speedman) tried to escape, but they were captured. Twelve years later, Selene awakens. She has been cryogenically frozen by scientists and set free by someone whose eyes she can sometimes see through. Believing it is Michael, Selene escapes from her chamber and goes in search of him. Instead she finds a girl, Eve (India Eisley), a young hybrid who claims to be Selene’s daughter.

With the help of a vampire named David (Theo James), Selene and her daughter escape. But both humans and Lycans are after the girl, the first hybrid child, because they want her DNA. Selene has to protect her and search for Michael at the same time, with plenty of gun shooting and bad guy killing along the way.

The introduction of humans into the story added a new layer to the plot that previous installments have lacked, and yet it did still feel like an Underworld movie. We were also introduced to some interesting new characters—like Selene’s daughter and David, who are sure to be featured in another inevitable sequel (which I am, admittedly, quite excited for).

The plot was well paced and easy to follow while still maintaining a few good twists, and the action was top-notch.  Not only did this film not disappoint me; I actually liked it even more than Underworld: Evolution, which felt dragged out to me.  This movie keeps it short (around an hour and a half) and still manages to tell a full, enjoyable story.  And, as always, Beckinsale is awesome as Selene, managing to be both tough and, in one memorable scene in this film, entirely vulnerable and sincere.

So if you were hesitating to see this movie because of its sequel-status, don’t worry. Fans of the previous Underworld films will not be disappointed.  This is an exciting and fun action-flick that lives up to—and maybe even surpasses—its predecessors.

Images courtesy of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Inc., Screen Gems, Inc., and IMDbPro.

“Let me have war, say I; it exceeds peace as far as day does night; it’s spritely, waking, audible, and full of vent. Peace is very apoplexy, lethargy: mulled, deaf, sleepy, insensible; a getter of more bastard children than war’s a destroyer of men.” – Coriolanus

Just a few months ago I reviewed one filmmaker’s effort to show us a fictionalized account of William Shakespeare’s life with Anonymous, but now I come to you with something more challenging and ultimately more effective – a modern day adaptation of one of the Bard’s lesser known works, Coriolanus. We’ve seen this done before with movies like Ten Things I Hate About You, O, and Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet (which had the gal to retain Shakespeare’s original language), but rarely do we get film adaptations of the less popular titles in a film business that relies all too much on name recognition. And let’s be honest, Coriolanus doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue now, does it?

So leave it to Voldemort himself, Ralph Fiennes, to make his film directorial debut with this particular play in its original language. Sure, he probably cut out a good hour or more to get it down to a manageable running time, but I bow down before him for the effort. You, sir, have balls.

But we’re not here to talk about his balls or his anus. Instead, we must focus on his Coriolanus. And that, my friends, is mostly a thing of beauty. Set in a war-torn, famine-ridden, modern day Rome, Fiennes’s Coriolanus introduces us to a great warrior named Caius Martius (played by Fiennes himself) who stands strong with his country’s government in putting down insurrections and invasions as they come. One day he’s verbally beating down the restless protesters begging for bread and the next he is personally leading his men through an enemy stronghold. It’s like Black Hawk Down meets Hamlet. And sue me for wanting Samuel L. Jackson to pop out and say something like, “I doth busteth this cap in yo ass!”

And though Martius can be easily said to love war (see quote at the top of this article), he also has personal reasons for his rampage beyond duty to his country. His sworn blood enemy in life, Tullus Aufidius (Gerard Butler), is the commander of the invading army and Martius lives to fight him to the death. They do end up meeting in vicious hand-to-hand combat but the fight is interrupted by explosions and their respective lieutenants pull them away to safety.

Martius returns to Rome a hero and is given the additional surname of Coriolanus as a sign of his might. With this sign though, his proud and militaristic mother (played superbly by Vanessa Redgrave) pushes him to run for Consul of Rome, which he easily wins due to his popularity in the Senate. His fate changes quickly though when two conspiring tribunes, Brutus and Sicinius (James Nesbitt and Paul Jesson) turn the public against him and have him banished from Rome. 

Once banished, Martius joins forces with his sworn enemy, Aufidius, and leads his former enemies back to conquer Rome where his mother is forced to intervene in hope of peace. I won’t spoil how it all turns out but this is a Shakespeare tragedy so you know that some bodies will be hitting the floor before all is said and done.

Any cinematic venture like this is fruitless without the strength of a great cast to pull it off and Fiennes has assembled a fantastic one for this effort. In addition to the names mentioned already, there is also current it-girl Jessica Chastain as Martius’s worried wife and Brian Cox as Menenius, a powerful senator who is both an adviser and father figure to Martius on his doomed journey. Everyone gives their full strength to pulling off the Shakespearean language and once you surrender yourself to the film’s flow you hardly notice how wildly different the speech is from our own modern English. The theater I was in had a few walk-outs early on for what I’m assuming was the language barrier, but I’m assuming these are the same people who asked for their money back at The Artist for not knowing it was a silent film. In other words, good riddance.

In addition to the fine acting on display, the film benefits from Fiennes’s skill behind the camera as director. He wisely treats it as the war drama that it is and his shaky-cam use during the battle scenes is appropriate and effective even if not entirely original. The film loses a little bit of steam in the second half, but I’d say that’s more due to Shakespeare’s original story rather than any pacing fault of Fiennes’s work.

What’s most interesting about Coriolanus though is the way it so easily applies to our modern day world. Fiennes often shows events in the movie through the lens of cable news and the depiction is spot on. Martius is a character who, like many of our own political leaders, rides a roller coaster of appreciation from the general public. One day they love him as a hero and the next day they hate him as a tyrant and then back again. The public is pushed and poked towards these emotions by the harping of rival politicians and commentators and we see little evidence that anyone is doing even a little bit of independent thought. The people are indeed a “many headed multitude” as the film proclaims and you almost have to sympathize for those who are at the mercy of it because it seems like they can never really win. See also: Obama, Barack.

Ultimately Coriolanus provides us the intriguing first look at what could be a fascinating directorial career from Ralph Fiennes. I, for one, hopes he continues to explore this skill-set, so show your support and give this effort a chance. And even if the language barrier makes you nervous, suck it up: a little culture never hurt nobody.

Grade: B+

Images courtesy of Larry D. Horricks/The Weinstein Company. 

Some of the noteworthy celebs that strolled into the party were an always exuberant Zachary Levi along with a few fellow Chuck cast mates. The show, now in its final season, is leaving its loyal fan base feeling a little down and out, but the cast is feeling the pain right along with them. Actress MeKenna Melvin, who plays character Alex McHugh, turned up a bit later in the night and even made mention on how sad it was for the whole Chuck family to inevitably be splitting up. Adam Levine was another face that caught massive attention at the press line. The Maroon 5 front man is now gaining even more popularity as a team coach on NBC’s The Voice with other musical co-hosts Christina Aguilera, Cee Lo Green and Blake Shelton.

Fans of the new show Grimm would have been pleased to see a few of their favorite cast members take a walk down the after party carpet. Bitsie Tulloch and Sasha Roiz were there in support of fellow actors and movies up for Golden Globe nominations. Tulloch herself was a supporting actress in one of the most recognized movies of the year, The Artist, which was awarded best motion picture in the comedy or musical category that night. The pair stopped off to discuss for a moment their enthusiasm for Grimm but still commenting that an order for a second season has yet to be decided.

E! Entertainment Television showed a strong presence this year, more so in the fashion department. George Kotsiopoulos of Fashion Police, among many other personal stylists that graced the carpet that night, chatted away about fashion tips and tricks along with which celebs they thought stunned at the awards ceremony that evening. Perhaps two of E! Entertainment’s biggest personalities, Kendra and husband Hank Baskett, also made an appearance and hammed it up for photographers while stopping for interviews along their way into the exclusive NBC party.

The Beverly Hilton was a sea of talented and influential people that night. There were emotional wins and disappointing losses but the night was overall designated for simple fun. It was the glitz, glamour and gowns that one would expect for a relaxed night of schmoozing and boozing in the infamous town of Hollywood.

Images courtesy of Keith Kuramoto and Poptimal.com. 

Lucas’s interpretation of this narrative is struck from the same idealistic mold as Star Wars, which will either work for the viewer or won’t, depending on their perspective. The story centers around Joe “Lighting” Little (David Oyelowo) and Marty “Easy” Julian (Nate Parker), two friends and fighter pilots within the Tuskegee program. Easy is the squad leader and plays everything straight and smart. Flying in the face of Easy’s by-the-bookness, Lightning plays by his own rules, a dichotomy that is made alarmingly clear during a routine strafing run on a train early in the movie. They, along with their fellow pilots, are tired of the constant stream of back-water missions they receive; everything from escort missions far from enemy danger, to destroying defenseless targets in the middle of nowhere. In short, they get no action simply because they are black.

Fighting to get a chance for his boys to prove themselves to the brass, Colonel A.J. Bullard (Terrence Howard) takes his conflict to the Pentagon where he asks with great frustration for frontline missions, newer aircraft, better equipment; general provisions that would be deserving of any soldier, but something that the Tuskegee Airmen sadly must consider a privilege. The dissent is finally heard and the squad is given Operation Shingle, a mission that finds the pilots providing air support and cover for a beach landing of ground forces. The mission is all or nothing and failure will be the fuel that certain close-minded officers need to shut down the Tuskegee program for good. Regardless of the mounting pressure, the squad takes to the sky in one of many harrowing dogfight sequences that shows, regardless of color, the black pilots are total badasses.

As Easy and Lightning have differing ideals and methods by which they approach conflict on the ground, so do they in the air; so much so that the two characters begin to represent an X/MLK separation of ideals, particularly when dealing with the constant cloud of racism and segregation during the arduous trials of war. With the knock-out success of Operation Shingle, the Tuskegee program is kept alive and the squad is set up with further missions that continue to test their mettle, culminating in a climactic dogfight which finds them outgunned by new German jet fighters.

Lucas’s films are deliriously old school and the period of Red Tails is a good match for his tastes. The film ends up being more Hell’s Angels than Saving Private Ryan and while both tones would have worked, it’s interesting to see this particular story told through an Old Hollywood lens. While this probably seems like justification for the flaws of the film it’s not; the dialogue clunks from time to time, and the acting is as stiff as any Star Wars movie, but therein lies the rub. When people argue that the acting and dialogue is bad in a George Lucas movie (most notably Star Wars), the thing that I constantly remind them about is the consistency of it all – it’s clearly done purposefully and with intent to feel melodramatic with a small side of cheese. Red Tails is just as consistent in this regard, which can be seen most distinctly in any of the off-the-air-base scenes including Lighting’s romance with an Italian girl and an almost completely random POW sequence that seems to belong in another film altogether, which ends up being the main thing that ultimately weighs the film down; it is overstuffed with content. Lucas’s passion for the story is inspired, but at the end of the day, he doesn’t know when to say when. Midway through the movie, the narrative almost totally disappears and all we are left with is watching the pilots live and fly day after day, which is interesting but ultimately can’t help but feel slow and listless. The narrative structure employed here would have been better suited for a mini-series a la Band of Brothers, but there is still worth in exploring it as a feature film. Those wooden performances are passable given the stage that has been set for them, though some of the tertiary squadron pilots are painful to watch. Beware of Ne-Yo’s hackneyed southern accent which is so blazingly awful and hammy that it would be better suited on an episode of Family Guy than in a period drama, but there it is, in all its shameful glory.

That said, the merits of the film are where you would expect them to be. The dogfights are glorious and harrowing and while they don’t aid in getting to the heart of what the film is about, they show the sheer heroism and bravery of the Tuskegee Airmen, who willfully asked for dangerous assignments and risked their lives to prove their worth. Anthony Hemingway is the film’s credited director, but Lucas’s presence can be felt in every unspooled frame of film here. He would later supervise reshoots while Hemingway was filming the Showtime series Treme and it’s in those reshoots where that classic sheen of Lucas cheese has been dolloped onto the movie, which, when all is said and done, is really okay. At the very least, the story of the Tuskegee Airmen, as compelling as any filmed World War II epic, has finally been told with an scope that would make the likes of John Wayne, David Lean, and Howard Hughes proud.

Images courtesy of Industrial Light & Magic, Lucasfilm, and IMDbPro

Teddy (Kim Raver) has stopped torturing Cristina (Sandra Oh) and now the two are on a surgical tear.  They have been relentless, and it’s obvious that Teddy is escaping her pain by throwing herself into her job.  Cristina still feels guilty and indebted to Teddy, plus she really does enjoy all the surgeries.  It’s a match made in heaven for them, but hell for Owen.  When they try to horn in on someone else’s cardio patient, he has to intervene.  He orders the pair of them to take a break and get some rest because they are a liability issue if they are running on fumes.  Teddy and Cristina defy his wishes, and this leads to a huge fight between Cristina and Owen.  More on that later.

Meredith is the only fifth year resident who hasn’t decided on an area of practice.  Everyone is encouraging her to follow in the footsteps of her legendary mother, renowned surgeon Ellis Grey.  Bailey makes her pitch for general surgery, because that way Meredith wouldn’t be limited to just one organ or area of the body.   Webber (James Pickens Jr.) is performing a liver transplant, and Meredith will assist him in the procedure involving two bickering sisters.  He’s celebrating a great milestone: his 10,000^th surgery.  The transplant surgery is very special, but things take an unexpected turn when his wife Adele (Loretta Devine) shows up unannounced at the hospital.  Her Alzheimer’s has worsened, and she was found wandering by a neighbor.  April tries to soothe Adele, but she is agitated and demanding to see her husband.

April ends up taking her to the surgical gallery so she can see Webber, but she turns on the speaker and interrupts the procedure.  I though Kepner should have handled the situation more effectively instead of potentially distracting Richard with a personal and very distressful domestic situation.  Kepner is still very underwhelming as Chief Resident, because she’s not tough enough.  Fortunately, Meredith (having lots of experience dealing with her mother) was able to advise Webber of how to calm Adele, who is hysterical at this point.  He recalls a positive memory they share and begins singing “My Funny Valentine,” as he did on their wedding day.  In a touching scene, she sings along with him and is comforted.

The aforementioned scene normally would have made me cry, but mercifully my tear ducts remained dry.  I mentioned earlier that Owen (Kevin McKidd) and Cristina had a major difference of professional opinion regarding Cristina and Teddy’s surgical binge.  They defied his orders and laughed behind his back, and Owen tries to put his foot down by banning Cristina from Teddy’s surgical rotation.  She is vehemently against the idea, and an argument ensus.  The problem is that they decide to have this discussion at Zola’s first birthday party.

Cristina blasts Owen, telling him that his mishandling of Henry’s death is the reason they are in this position in the first place, and that Teddy gets whatever she wants.  Owen charges that Cristina is selfish and always gets her way, and their tempers really start to flare.  As Owen details her past selfish behavior he does the unthinkable: he brings up the abortion.  He yells at Cristina that she killed their baby, and her jaw nearly hits the floor.  This makes perfect sense though.  Owen was extremely hurt by their decision, mainly because his input seemed insignificant.  He tried to stand behind his wife through a decision that he opposed with every fiber of his being.  It looks like he has repressed his feelings all this time and that he and Cristina may be in real trouble.  I can’t WAIT to see what happens next week!

Season 8, Episode 12: “Hope for the Hopeless” (original air date January 19, 2012).

Grey’s Anatomy airs on Thursdays at 9/8c on ABC.

Images courtesy of ABC and Randy Holmes.

I’m just saying – their story is interesting, but it’s old news.

The bright, shiny news is the return of David Robert Jones (Jared Harris).

At the end of last week’s episode, Altlivia (Anna Torv) and Alternate Lincoln Lee (Seth Gabel) were on their way to the warehouse where Jones is making his shapeshifters. He’d been warned of their arrival by Alternate Broyles (Lance Reddick), who is either working for Jones or is a shapeshifter himself. I’m guessing the latter, but we’ll have to wait to find out if I’m right.

When they arrive they find Jones waiting for them, but with no intentions of putting up a fight. He admits to creating the shapeshifters, then kills one of his creations to demonstrate what a monster he is, what he’s capable of. Then he asks to be taken back to the Department of Defense.

In the meantime, Alternate Evil Broyles has learned where Lincoln Lee is being held, and is on his way to get him (kill him?) when he’s interrupted by Walternate and Peter (Joshua Jackson). Once reunited, Lincoln demands they stay and help solve the mystery of Jones, but Peter wants to get home and hold up his end of the bargain so that Walternate will keep his – and help Peter figure out how to get home. Once Peter lays eyes on Jones, though, the defeat is clear on his face. He’s the only one who knows Jones, his background, and his intentions. Peter is not the type of person to stand by and watch when he could help take this mad man off the streets. Again.

Jones, for his part, demands to be released and promises to kill large groups of random civilians every quarter hour until he is. When Peter speaks to him, Jones is visibly unnerved at meeting someone who knows him, and when they let him go the Fringe Division hopes they’ll be able to stay one step ahead.

They might be able to, except for one little problem. Alternate Broyles is a traitor, and he’s informing Jones of each move before his team makes it. Jones makes preparations to escape to our universe,  a few minutes before Peter and Lincoln return home to is as well.

Olivia’s in trouble over helping them cross into the other universe. She and Broyles, along with Peter and Lincoln, head out to try to stop Jones when he arrives, but are a few minutes late and end up in a gun fight instead. Olivia chases Jones toward the hole between universes, stopping only when Peter frantically warns her she could be killed. In a sweet moment, she thanks him later for saving her life.

One of my favorite things about Joshua Jackson’s acting is how simple it is to see every emotion he has flicker through his eyes. In the moments he stares at Olivia (then later with Walter) we see the surprise, followed by hope, longing, and finally resignation, and he doesn’t have to say a single word.

At the end of the day Jones escapes, and the universes agree that in order to catch him, they’ll have to work together. Peter offers to stay and help them, believing he’s an asset due to the fact that he’s helped catch Jones before, and also because he’s an unknown entity.

Walternate admits he’s studied the machine but doesn’t see how it’s capable of wrenching a boy out of a timeline, or a way to use it to pop him back in, so Alternate Elizabeth goes to see Walter. She convinces him to help this version of Peter get home.

It’s a nice scene, but like I said, this storyline is played out, at least for me.

We end the episode with Jones communicating with a partner. He wants to know how soon they begin phase two, and the response is that “she” will be ready soon.

The partner? Nina Sharp (Blair Brown).

I just KNEW she was evil.

And the “she” is, I’m guessing, Olivia. Remember the fall finale, with the gas and the injections and the headaches? Could they be slowing turning Olivia into a shapeshifter? Or are they messing with her abilities in order to use them, or steal them?

Next week Peter will tell Olivia about the Observers, and it looks like we’ll get to address the rather large and disturbing fact that they think Olivia will have to die.

I’d love to see the writers drop the Walter/Elizabeth/Walternate/Peter angle for a few weeks. Peter’s promised to stay and help them with Jones, and in my mind the far more interesting mysteries now surround Olivia – her past, her future, and her connection to Nina Sharp and Massive Dynamic. In addition, Anna Torv is a fantastic actress and capable of much more than the sideline stories they’ve given her so far in Season 4. I’d love nothing more than for them to give her some real meat to this new and different Olivia, and watch her dig in.

Yes. Let’s have more of that, please.

Season 4, Episode 9 “Enemy of My Enemy” (original airdate January 20, 2012)

Fringe airs Friday nights at 9/8c on Fox.

Images courtesy of Fox.

No one is more affected by Vinny’s absence than Pauly.  When they go out clubbing and he sees a girl that is totally Vinny’s type, he decides that he must smash, because it’s what Vinny would want.  Excuse me, WHAT?  Pauly’s behavior was very homoerotic and I wondered for a second if he was thinking about Vinny a little too much.  Like, are you with this girl or are you pretending Vinny is here watching, or what?  Creepy.  Pauly has been down in the dumps, but it’s his birthday and his family decided to surprise him with a visit.  About 12 relatives and friends show up with gifts.  His favorite gift is his barber, who arrives to give him a fresh cut for his b-day.  Now Pauly is all smiles and I’m reminded of just how adorable he is.  I had no idea he was 31 though, that’s a lot older than some of the other cast members.  He’s only one year younger than I am, so I’m surprised that he hangs out with such younger people.  I’m 32 and there’s no way I could hang out with twenty-somethings all the time; they’d drive me crazy.  I digress.  It’s also Mike’s birthday, except no one gives a damn.  He has no visitors and barely gets acknowledged.  Meanwhile, Pauly’s family pulls out all the stops and the girls even bake him a birthday cake.  Mike’s feelings are extremely hurt, and I almost feel sorry for him.  Almost.

Mike has no one to blame for his thoughtless treatment but himself.  If he weren’t such a petty, immature and vindictive person maybe people would care about celebrating his birthday.  Just in this past episode alone he once again toyed with the idea of exposing Snooki to Jionni.  The Unit made another appearance, and whenever the two of them get together Mike wants to tell Jionni about how he and Snooki hooked up and The Unit saw it all.  The Situation is disgusting, and I’ve seen very few redeeming qualities over the past few seasons.  Yet somehow he has managed to nearly snag himself a girlfriend, a brunette who is always ready and willing.  He doesn’t want to commit just yet, but admits that he could possibly let her “wife him up.”  What a douche.  By episode’s end, he too had left the Jersey Shore house.

Vinny had personal issues to work through and had the support of his friends when he left.  Mike feels unwanted, like the house villain.  He leaves the house, but unlike when Vinny left: no one cares.  I think it’s a shameless ploy for attention and I have no doubt that he will return shortly.  Stay tuned.

Best of the episode: Pauly’s surprise party.

Worst of the episode: Mike, as always.

What to watch for next: Mike’s return?

For another take on this week’s episode check out “In Memoriam” by Lauren Tyree.

Season 5, Episode 3: “Dropping Like Flies” (original airdate January 19, 2011)

Jersey Shore airs Thursdays at 10/9c on MTV.

Images courtesy of MTV.

Having arrived home safely all by his big boy self, Vinny greets his mama and tells her how anxious and exhausted he is, and how dangerous and scary that party house was with all the cameras and dirty people. Mama coos soothingly, strokes Vinny’s face, fiddles with his gold chain, and ushers him to his room to take a nap. The camera cuts away here, but we can assume she goes on to put the finishing touches on the five-course Italian feast she started whipping up before Vinny said “goodbye” on the phone.

Deena couldn’t possibly be more adversely affected by Vinny’s absence, and she’s acting out in all those typical ways we tend to show grief. There’s the inevitable handful of vodka shots upon waking, the enlistment of an equally fragile female friend to go outside dressed in the most cheaply degrading of outfits to get even more wasted, and the classic “fall down drunk in the middle of a crowded boardwalk club at least twice before sunset” move, leading to an almost-bald Deena when it’s all said and done. You see, Deena’s head is covered in a clumped mess of knotty hair, long extensions cemented in place months ago, flakes of gel and mousse, cigarette smoke, and debris from recent tumbles on the cement. Because JWoww is an all-around great friend, she deep-conditions Deena’s hair and saved her from what would have been, as Snooki pointed out, her “Britney Spears” moment.

Since Vinny left, the roomies have been honoring his memory by partying just as he hated to do toward the end. As a self-sacrificial tribute, each of the housemates resolve to get decked out and party at one of their usual spots, where Mike the Situation unironically uses the phrase “grab some real estate” while scoping out the place and Pauly picks up a woman he thinks Vinny may have been attracted to if he were here. Yes, Pauly’s plan is to smush this heavily-inked blond cougar in Vinny’s bed, out of… some sort of respect or sentimentality or something having to do with guys? I wish I knew how this stuff worked.

Meanwhile, Mike is still losing it, and the powers that be are still trying to make the blackmail plot line happen. After Pauly’s carted his woman off to the house, the Situation decides to grab his friend Unit and go stalking Snooki back at the club, where she’s walking around with Jionni and trying to avoid getting caught. “It’s Gym, Tan, The Truth Will Set You Free,” says Mike to the camera, later adding that they were getting ready for “Gym, Tan, Tell the Truth.” This guy doesn’t say anything unless he can picture the words printed on a T-Shirt at a gas station gift shop. Luckily for Snooki, an unrelated physical fight breaks out, giving her a diversion for escaping with Jionni for a shame-packed smush sesh at home.

In one of the only sweet, human moments thus far in the series, Ronnie and the rest gather around the duck phone to call Vinny and lament about how much he’s been missed. Everyone seems genuinely affected by his absence; he really was the center of sanity in the house, and it’ll be interesting to see what happens without him there. Immediately after the phone call, it’s time yet again to party, but tonight it’s a special occasion. On the eve of Pauly’s birthday, they hit up the club, where Mike is confronted by a cute young lady of Bosnian heritage whom he’d previously met at the Shore Store. She’s got her eyes set, for whatever reason, on the Situation.

Sadly for the Bosnian, Paula is also at the club, and Mike could never resist that guaranteed lay in his life. Though Mike tries to “pass the torch” to Pauly, Miss Bosnia only flirts with him in exchange for access to the infamous abode, where she quickly heads to the kitchen to make herself comfortable and chat with the girls. Pauly ain’t havin’ it. Walking into the kitchen with a scowl that makes me hate him forever, he snarls at Bosnia, “Hey, you can come to bed, or I can call you a cab. What do you want to do?” When she offers to come to bed just to talk, Pauly responds, “I’ll call you a cab.” Indefensible, disgusting, and outrageously pitiful as it is, Sammi is more appalled by the fact that a random girl dared to deny DJ Pauly D intercourse so close to his birthday. Minutes after being sent out the door, however, Bosnia returns for more antics, saying she wants to hang out with Mike, since she “didn’t want to leave yet.”

What’s up with these clueless women? Yes, it’s horrendous that they’re immediately rendered voiceless receptacles for sexual and psychic chauvinistic release upon entering the home of these assholes, but don’t they know what to expect?

The Bosnian finds Mike in the backyard, where she learns Paula is currently in the shower prepping for another night of numbness and mental fog. Mike doesn’t know how to explain himself when asked why he likes Paula so much. The most he can say is that she’s an easy piece, and she happens to be a cool girl, too. Not wanting to limit his options, and because he’s really attracted to her, Mike kisses Bosnia on the cheek and hints that he made the wrong choice in picking Paula. But not tonight, though. Paula’s the perfect choice for tonight, but maybe I’ll hit you up sometime, Bosnia! As she leaves, Mike’s talking head refers to Paula again. He explains that he just can’t get rid of her, and he doesn’t want to.

Maybe Sammi’s right when she teases Mike for actually liking Paula, deep down. Maybe he really does desire a serious relationship instead of a meaningless series of convenient hookups, I think. But when he goes on to refer to Paula as “Triple-A,” since she “always comes” when he calls, of course, I remember what we’re dealing with and conquer my empathetic impulses.

I can’t feel too bad about what happens the next day. It’s officially Pauly’s birthday, but Mike’s birthday is coming up, and this is supposed to be a joint celebration. However, all the focus is on Pauly D as his entire clan from home shows up, brings his favorite barber to deliver a much-needed haircut, and watches him get trimmed as he grins like a child. Everyone is crowded around Pauly as they dine on complex carbohydrates and carve a small cake and make general merriment at that Italian restaurant they all love. When Sammi bakes Pauly his second cake of the day and Sitch notices there’s nothing prepared for him, it’s the last straw. Having already prematurely sulked out of the restaurant in front of Pauly’s family, he now storms out of the house to go kick his feet and sit down to cry. I want to feel some sort of compassion, and I want to believe he just needs friends and is confused about why his tender heart gets crushed so often, just like he tells us. But Mike’s tears smell suspiciously of alligator, and he’s mugging harder than a soap opera veteran. Like most sociopaths, this guy has skills.

Snooki thinks Situation’s lack of cake is due to him being an effing “douchebag.” Though the label is apt, don’t his roomies derive any satisfaction from acting superior, taking the high road, being the bigger people? Is the offering of a birthday cake just one olive branch too many at this point? I can’t imagine having to live with Mike; he’s a wounded, battered soul with little-to-no hope of redemption (which may not be entirely his fault), but my patience would be gone on Day One, and there aren’t enough tequila shots in the world. That said, come on, folks! This is all he’s got. No one wants anything to do with Mike the Situation outside of this franchise. At the close of the episode, there’s a dangerously loose cannon walking outside into the horizon, and no one is stopping him. They’re confused by his habit of alienating himself from the group, his defensiveness, his insecurity. Mike’s equally confused, unsure of whether he’ll stay gone, unsure of what his peers in this experiment are thinking or whether he has any existential purpose beyond the trap he walked into years ago without the luxury of foresight or a stable sense of self. Oh, well. A nice, cold Red Bull should set everything straight, for now.

NEXT WEEK: The gang hears they may need a new roommate or two to round out the cast, Pauly gets yet another birthday celebration, and everyone embarks on a trip to visit Vinny.

For another take on this week’s episode check out “Dropping Like Flies” by Tanya Lane.

Season 5, Episode 3: “Dropping Like Flies” (original airdate January 19, 2011)

Jersey Shore airs Thursdays at 10/9c on MTV.

Images courtesy of MTV.

Anyhow, the auditions were off to a surprisingly positive start with a slew of talent peppered with only a few delusional people. There was the baby-faced Mr. Steal Your Girl, aka seventeen-year-old David, whose claim to fame was once being in a local singing contest with last year’s Idol winner, Scotty McCreery. A voice that can contend with Scotty’s, I suppose, deserves to go to Hollywood so the judges sent him through. There was the tap dancing master, sixteen-year-old Gabby, and a sporty volley ball enthusiast, fifteen year old Shannon, both of which made it through round one. But just when things were going way too smoothly, Jessica showed up. Her alleged background in singing made her sound as though she had this one in the bag, but the peculiar tonal sounds that came from her throat were only enough to place her first in a Kermit the Frog impersonation contest. Are you starting to see the theme here? It was big, fat unanimous “no” for Jessica, but don’t worry, she left on the threat that we’ll see her again at the auditions in Texas. Yaaaaay!

Then there was Shawn whose biggest accomplishment in life so far has been as a successful doppelganger of Ryan Seacrest. The resemblance and near identical voice to boot had the judges absolutely tickled. However, becoming a Seacrest clone will have to remain his only calling as his singing abilities were crap. A few more bad auditions went on throughout the day but we were left with mostly positive results. Among the some of the best, the judges decided to take Amy, the twenty-four-year-old living in a tent in the woods due to hard times, along with brother and sister duo, Schyler and Colton, along for the ride to Hollywood with the rest of the ticket winners. When day two of auditions sprung up, things only got slightly worse. More people were turned away, like Erica Nowak who had an unusual school girl crush on Steven Tyler, as was African contestant Mawuena whose horrific audition had the judges blown away in a negative kind of way. The saving grace from all of the disaster turned out to be a young pawn shop worker, Phillip Phillips, Jr. Phil busted out some Stevie Wonder for the judges before transitioning into some Michael Jackson, putting his own spin on the famous song “Thriller” with the help of his acoustic guitar. It was the perfect way to end the day and he received a passing ticket.

Episode two took us to Pittsburgh, also known as “The City of Champions”, so the city had a lot to live up to with that moniker. So in walks the very first audition for day one- Heejun Han. The Korean native had some bizarre eccentric qualities going on. He liked making seemingly randomized comments to the Idol staff, at one point even commenting on the size of Ryan Seacrest’s “tiny head”. Despite the oddball behavior, Heejun had a real voice hiding inside and belted out some Michael Bolton near perfectly. It was a surprise to everyone, especially the judges, who sent him through to Hollywood.

Again, it was another two days of surprisingly smooth auditions as more and more were given tickets to continue on, including one young man who had been in his family band since the age of two. Yup, you heard right, a family band complete with mother, father, sisters and brothers- the whole gang! With twenty-some years of practice, it only makes sense that he would find it easy to impress the judges. If you’re not the best singer in the world, you can always try to win them over with everyone’s new favorite fad: planking. “Professional” planker Patricia Bell showed up in support of her sister, Samantha, who was the one auditioning that day, along with a substantial amount of family and friends to rally and, what else? Collectively plank! I’m not really sure how this helps anything, but okay, I’ll roll with it. Samantha proved her actual talent to the judges and was sent through.

A young Justin Beiber look-alike, Eben, made it through the auditions, as did a New York City street performer, Creighton, and Erika the wedding singer. The judges took pity on a seventeen-year-old Travis, who had tried out at last year’s auditions. We were introduced to Travis’ story of being abandoned by a parent, living in a shelter, and dropping out of high school, and although no one on the judging panel seemed to really be behind him, they offered him a big opportunity and sent him through. American Idol loves good heart wrenching stories and dramatic tales of overcoming huge hardships, so they saved one of the bigger ones for last. Hallie Day, whose unique name the judges just couldn’t get over, told her story of leaving home for New York at the age of fifteen, trying to make it in an all-girl band, her bout with depression, the events that led to her attempt at suicide, and how her current husband saved her life. The twenty-four-year-old’s soulful sound earned her a golden ticket and was an appropriate end to the Pittsburgh run.

This is just the beginning of the infamous Idol auditions. The premiere weeks started off smoothly which is great, depending on how you look at it I guess. For me, it was a little too quiet and just a little blasé. Some talented people came around, no doubt, but I have yet to feel the real excitement. And where are all the crazies? I think that’s the best part of American Idol auditions, right? Let’s hope that this Sunday’s episode brings a little more energy to the table.

Season 11, Episodes 1&2: North Charleston, South Carolina & Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (originally aired January 18 & 19, 2012)

Images courtesy of American Idol.