Back To The Grind

First of all, "Heroes"(Monday NBC 8) on Monday was fantastic. The episode was packed with answers(how Bennet ended up with Claire and why Claude, the invisible man, was able to teach Peter) and gave us even more new questions(who was Claude protecting and who is really in charge of who). Heroes has been able to deliver consistently excellent episodes with great storylines that teach us more about the characters each week, while still keeping us in the dark. This show has taken the "slow reveal" format that made "Lost"(Wednesday ABC 9) so intriguing and greatly improved it (Heroes does have a lot more flexibility which makes it easier to pull of without getting boring). Heroes is a show that you must catch up with, now. If you can't stand watching all 17 episodes on your computer, then you should add the show to your Netflix queue so that you will be able to catch up when it comes out on DVD in September(?) and be ready for Season 2.

The first Sox spring training game was today, and thank god its just an exhibition. It feels good to have baseball back, but the first week of games are nothing more than dress rehearsal for a team of the White Sox caliber. It been, like months since we've won a championship!

The Discovery Channel is bringing us "The Lost Tomb of Jesus" on Sunday at 8. Read about it here, they believe they have found the tomb that belonged to the family of Jesus of Nazareth. Oh and James Cameron made the documentary. It should be very controversial, I can't wait.

About this whole Al Gore thing. I do wish he would use less power(he actually pays more each month because he is all Green and has offset his carbon footprint to zero), but my real problem is that this "argument" will distract many people from the actual problem and once again stop most from taking action. I love myself a good conspiracy theory, but this one sure seems like it could be all backed by the power and gas companies. The combination of An Inconvenient Truth winning best documentary and Leo's gushing at the Oscars were almost guaranteed to make a difference or at the very least, it was going to draw more attention to the climate crisis. Now the message has been lost and the power companies are laughing at us as we continue our dependence on them.

Could it really happen again? Could the extra storage space argument for Blu-Ray be equivalent to my "the screen is so clear when you pause" argument for Betamax? 2 Months ago I declared the High Definition DVD format war over and named Blu-Ray as the winner. My reasons at the time(which I didn't even mention because it wasn't an argument, it was a statement) were the extra storage space(30GB for HD DVD vs 50GB for Blu-ray), the support of 7 of the 8 major studios(Only Universal is exclusive to HD-DVD while Disney, Fox, Lionsgate, MGM and Sony are all exclusive to Blu-Ray), and the fact that Blu-Ray is built into the Playstation3 but the HD DVD player for Xbox360 is only offered as a $200 add on. But now I find out that DVDtalk.com(which is a site that I regularly use as a resource) is pushing the HD DVD format. I hope they are doing this just because of HD DVD's lower price for players, which in theory could lead to more sales of HD DVD movies.
I refuse to believe that Sony will allow their newest gaming system to become obsolete anytime soon. So unless there is a clear reason why HD DVD should win, Blu-ray is still the format to beat(Warning-I still think Betamax is the videotape format to beat).

If you missed "The Black Donnellys"(Monday NBC 9) don't forget about the replay Thursday at 9.

The last 24 Hours(actually more like 26)

If you are not a fan of "The Office"(Thursday NBC 7:30) by now, I may not be able to help you.
If you are a fan, you still may have missed Rainn Wilson's appearance on SNL last Saturday, and I can help you with that. His monologue was great, it had a hilarious office skit that you must see (Kristen Wiig and Jason Sudeikis start it off with perfect Pam and Jim impersonations).
Update 2/28: Here is the crazy Digital Short that Tim mentioned in the comments.

The Oscars were awfully scattered tonight, so to follow suit, my comments will also be scattered.
I can't believe Babel only got 1 award(original score) and Dreamgirls only got 2(Best Supporting Actress for Jennifer Hudson and Sound mixing) especially since they were nominated for 7 and 8 awards respectively.
I was disappointed that Eddie Murphy didn't win best supporting actor(especially after seeing his interview with Barbara Walters), but Alan Arkin was definitely deserving.
Al Gore was great, and I hope that the attention An Inconvenient Truth has been getting can actually change people's minds and force us into action.
Its about time Scorsese got his Oscar.
I haven't seen Germany's The Lives Of Others which won for best foreign language film, but I have seen Pan's Labyrinth and I thought it was fantastic and deserving of at least best foreign language film. Guillermo Del Toro created a rich and dark fantasy world that truly earned the Cinematography, Make-up and Art Direction awards.

"The Black Donnellys" premiere is tonight, and it is being heavily promoted by NBC(and by me, I highly recommend it), but commercials aren't the only thing they are counting on for a successful debut.
NBC is making it extremely easy for everyone to get in on the ground floor for this great new mob drama. The pilot episode will premiere tonight, Monday the 26th at 9, then reair on Thursday at 9(following new episodes of "Scrubs" and "30 Rock"), it has been available at Netflix for almost 2 months ago and you can watch it streaming on Yahoo TV. In addition to all that, the pilot will re air next Tuesday, March 6th, on USA at 11 PM and then the first 2 episodes will air back to back Sunday March 11th on Bravo at 3 PM.
Watch it.

Presidents' Day

I am still bitter that "Everwood" was canceled before its time, but supporting the excellent cast in their new roles makes me feel a little better. I thought Chris Pratt(Bright Abbott) was one of the few bright spots from the beginning of this season of "The O.C." as Che, and he was a part of one of the funniest scenes of the year("Ryan likes Journey" makes me laugh every time). We already saw Treat Williams(Dr. Andy Brown) on "Brothers & Sisters"(Sunday ABC 9) as a romantic interest for Sally Field, and now hopefully new series regular Emily VanCamp(Amy Abbott) has found a new home as half sister to the Walker crew.

Tonight's "Studio 60"(Monday NBC 9) could possibly be the last episode before the show gets canceled. 3 months ago I would have been extremely disappointed that yet another smart show wasn't given a real chance, but today I am ready to admit that the show needs work. Studio 60 looked like a sure winner, taking a large ensemble cast like"West Wing", the fast paced intelligent writing of Aaron Sorkin and adding in a "Sports Night"-like look behind the scenes look at a TV show.
The problem is at least partly the show within the show. While the Sports Night "broadcasts" were authentic and you believed that the whole crew actually worked on a show that was a competitor to "Sportscenter", I don't think that the Studio 60 crew would be able to produce a show that would even be in the same ballpark as "SNL"(which hasn't set the bar very high lately, other than the digital shorts). I am not looking for groundbreaking full sketches, but rather just a few hilarious jokes and funnier ideas for sketches. Aaron Sorkin needs to bring in a few really good sketch comedy writers, and let them be the voice of the "show". Unfortunately Studio 60 is probably too expensive for NBC to take a chance tinkering with, especially after the 15th episode.

The irony of seeing a 1.20.09 bumper sticker on Presidents' day was not lost on me, but it made we wonder just how much work it is going to take to make up for 8 years of Bush and his "puppet masters". Hopefully once the regime is out of power, the rest of the world will be able to forgive us for "choosing" the "we are not going to be nation-building"-guy instead of the boring, environment obsessed guy in 2000.
At least there is hope
Obama '08

Weekend update

I have mentioned "The Black Donnellys"(Monday NBC 9 premiering Feb.26) several times before, but I have to tell you about it again because there is a strong chance that this is the best new show of the year. If it can follow up a fantastic pilot episode with a season full of the same quality and great storytelling, we may finally have a series worthy of replacing "The Sopranos". NBC is doing a great job of promoting the show and I hope it will be able to capitalize on the attention "The Departed" will get at the Oscars on the 25th. If you are looking to continue with the gangster theme from Oscar night, check out this great show that looks and feels more like a movie than a TV show. Don't miss it, or if you are impatient like me, you can get it from Netflix.

I am really looking forward to the series finale of "The O.C."(Thursday FOX 8), and I love that they haven't held anything back(pregnancy, marriage, earthquakes and zombies) after they knew the show was ending. I think the past few episodes have been on par with the first season, and I can't wait to see how they tie up the show. The finale takes place 6 months after the earthquake, so we might see just about any or every possible "big event" from a birth to a death to everyone actually leaving Newport. But I am hoping that the episode will focus as much on the characters and their relationships(which is what made the show great) as it does on wrapping up the series with big dramatic moments. Also, how can you not love a show that is willing to admit the very real threat that zombies pose, seriously they're coming, Seth is just warning us.

I have just starting watching my second streaming movie on Netflix, I started with The Candidate and now I'm watching the 1991 Sean Astin classic Toy Soldiers. Both movies took a little over a minute to build a buffer and start playing, and while the quality is not great it is watchable. The selection of movies is underwhelming, with mostly older movies, but there are some good options including a few new movies like Sherrybaby, with others being added all the time. There's a section with suggestions based on your ratings as well as a list of movies that are in your Queue(although out of my queue of 140 movies only 3 are currently available). Right now it is setup so that you get 1 hour of instant viewing for every $1 you spend on your monthly plan, with no way to buy more time. So I am thinking of this as an easy way to sample movies to see if you should rent it instead of a good way to actually watch a whole movie.

I am not actually saying "Knights of Prosperity"(Wednesday ABC 7:30) is a good show, its actually pretty stupid, but the characters are hilarious and overall the show is very enjoyable. Donal Logue leads a group of seemingly normal honest guys who have bigger dreams than they can afford, so they decide to rob from the rich(in this case Mick Jagger) to give to themselves. It almost seems more like a sketch show, where each scene follows the dimwitted crew in different directions as they plan the perfect heist, but the show still somehow seems to work as a whole. The show will most likely be canceled soon, due to its quirky setup and a tough timeslot("Friday Night Lights" and "Jericho" are both on at 7 and I recommend both of them over Knights, and to make things worse "American Idol" will be on at the same time now with 2 hour episodes). But it is worth checking out online or when it comes out on DVD.

Why 8?

I was recently asked what my 8 favorite shows are. My response was The Office, My Name is Earl, Heroes, Friday Night Lights, How I Met Your Mother, 24, ER and Smallville.

Actually my first thought was "why only 8 shows?" but then I was just glad that I didn't have to think of 2 more shows on the spot to make it a top 10 list. I am not very good with best of lists, I always forget some of my favorites or panic and pick the first thing that comes to mind. With this list Smallville(while an excellent show) made my list as my number 8 pick, if I really thought about it I could have picked several other shows(Battlestar Galactica, Veronica Mars or The Black Donnelys) that could have filled that spot just as easily.
But the ingenious thing about a top 8 is that I don't really have to stretch to get 8 quality shows that I can highly recommend to everyone. My hope is that of my top 8 you are at least watching 3 of them. I also hope that by only giving everyone 5 shows that I think you should be watching, my knowledge and love for TV can be spread a little quicker.

So my official Top 8 list of the moment is:

1. The Office(Thursday NBC 7:30) This is the best show on TV. This show keeps getting better, if you aren't watching you need to start immediately.
2. My Name is Earl(Thursday NBC 7) This combined with "The Office" makes for the best hour of TV currently on, which is a pretty big statement. Earl at times this season has been perfect, and while still somewhat inconsistent, I think it is the second best comedy on TV.
3. Friday Night Lights(Wednesday NBC 7) This show is now going against American Idol, and the already low ratings will surely take a hit. Tell everyone you know about this show, spread the word, watch it online.
4. Heroes(Monday NBC 8) Honestly, I really don't work for NBC, they have just finally had some good luck with new shows. This show has a great ensemble cast and has endless possibilities with new heroes and villains.Plus it has already been picked up for a second season.
5. How I Met Your Mother(Monday CBS 7) Another example of a great cast with perfect characters. From time to time this show makes me question if it is better than Earl, especially the Super Bowl episode (After missing the game because of a funeral, they all try to avoid hearing anything about the game so that they can watch it Monday night. Ted and Marshall's prayer to TiVo to not mess up the recording of the game was hilarious and I think I may have said the exact same thing a time or two.)
6. 24(Monday Fox 8) I am still in shock over what has happened already this season, and I can't wait to see more of James Cromwell(Babe) acting evil as Jack's dad.
7. ER(Thursday NBC 9) It takes a great cast to be able to give up the spotlight to guest actors on a regular basis, yet never seem like supporting characters to the guests. Although ER still uses the crutch of a "big event" episode every now and then, the show has found much more subtle ways for us to learn about the characters on a personal level. I actually think the show will improve over the next year and half as the current cast(easily the best since Eric La Salle/Dr. Benton left, possibly the best this century) continues to define their characters.
8. Lost(Wednesday ABC 9) The new Desmond episode reminded me of how easily the show can tell a great story that completely pulls you in for an hour, while all the time playing with your mind. In one of the Lost recaps, it was said that the show could be watched on many levels(from the casual watcher who just enjoys the main story to the obsessive fan who hunts down every clue or easter egg in the show) but I think the show got too clever for their own good with multiple complex mysteries that were never fully explained. For awhile I thought Lost had lost its way, but this episode reminded me of just how great it can be on multiple levels.

Why not 8?

Some highlights of the week past

"Friday Night Lights"(Wednesday NBC 7PM) I have enjoyed this one more and more as the season goes on and I highly recommend you catch up with this one(if not now get it on DVD before the next season starts). Riggins is one of the funniest characters on TV right now(especially since I started thinking of him as Pacey if Dawson were a star quarterback). The show has been able to combine many elements easily and keep the show fun and interesting.

"Ugly Betty" I may have just happened to choose the worst 2 episodes to watch, but they were stupid enough to reaffirm my hatred of the show. I know hate seems strong, but I really don't want to see soaps make a primetime return (Desperate Housewives has already over stayed its welcome). During Thursday's "30 Rock"(Thursday NBC 8:30) Tina Fey tried to sneak out of a room by crawling(when she could have easily walked out) when she got caught she said that it would have worked on Ugly Betty. I hope more people are realizing how bad the show is, but the real problem is getting them to stop watching.

"ER"(Thursday NBC 9) promises a great episode next week. The nice thing about a great ER preview nowadays is that there is a very good chance that the actual episode will be even better. For a few years the best thing about an episode of ER was the preview for next week, with only the occasional "very special" or "event" episode being good. It has been almost 3 straight years of good episodes(with only minimal repeat story lines) with a great cast and some outstanding guest performances.

"Heroes"(Monday NBC 8) has also had some great previews(they smartly use the same versatile voice over guy that ER does). The show has been building at a great pace while weaving together a large ensemble cast as they slowly meet and learn more about their powers. This week 2 Heroes face off. Have I told you before that you can watch every episode of this show online before?

"Lost"(Wednesday ABC 9) returned and I don't feel any different. I remember when I just had to talk about Lost on Thursday and I couldn't wait for the next episode. I liked the episode, and the preview got me excited to return to the full cast, but its just not the same. This may have happened because the great new shows this year have made me a little less dependent on Lost, or it may be that the show is losing some of what made it so great as more is revealed.

Why this site sucks

Even though there may be long stretches of time without any "featured articles", there are always fun things to check out here.

1. Google calendar - This is not only a great way to keep your life organized, but this online calendar lets you share events or entire calendars with anyone you want. If you click on the Google calendar button on the right, you can subscribe to my TV calendar. With the calendar you get listings of when your favorite shows are airing new episodes(actually its the shows I think should be your favorites) and hopefully suggestions for many other shows.
2. Shows available online for free - This is a list of shows that have episodes available for free. Click on the show name and the link will take you right to the latest episode.
   
3. Netflix suggestions - I will try and keep this updated with both new releases and some classics. Clicking these links will take you to the movie's Netflix page.
   
4. Music and movies that I blah, blah, blah - yet another quick way to get some of the information that you no doubt find so vital.
5. #5 is, of course, the life lessons that I teach everyday - Whether with my kind words, my straightforwardness, my hilarious sacrcasm or just my little suggestions throughout the site, I think that you will always learn something(even if it is just that "this guy sucks")

My grandma always used to tell me that I suck.
I think it is now time that we, along with her, take back "suck". You see, back in the day if you said "this sucks" it meant that it was good, but somewhere the phrase lost its original meaning. "Sucking" or to "suck" are now considered bad, but that is only because*(according to my sources) the evil Rock n' Roll came around and stole its meaning(back when the phrase "this rocks" meant nothing unless it was followed by "heavy" or "gray").
The first day something rocked was also the last day something good sucked.
I think it is time we reclaim all "sucks" for the good side of descriptions. It appears that many are already prefollowing my lead, I've already heard people saying "Rex sucks" and "Lost sucks" so it appears to have pre-caught on.

After taking back all forms of "suck", the title of this entry should read "Why this site is good" and I believe Rex is our quarterback but I think Lost needs to get back to the main characters soon or it might suck, like old school suck.