Category: TV

All about what’s on the boob tube!

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Mad Men: “The Jet Set”

Wow. I really did not like this episode of Mad Men. I’ll explain why later… but first: the recap… which begins right now:

The episode starts off with Roger and Jane in bed at the Sherry-Netherland hotel. Jane is dressed only in a sheet. Jane writes poems about Roger. Roger proposes to Jane. Seriously. I’m still not buying it.

Meanwhile, Peggy leads a meeting about Right Guard deodorant, with Paul, Harry, Sal, Kurt and Smitty in attendance. Paul mentions a study that found that “80% of men say that Right Guard makes them feel more confident at work”. Wasn’t “confidence at work” at part of Right Guard’s advertising later on? At any rate, it’s clear that no one is very interested in working in Don’s absence: the meeting quickly turns to pop culture gossip: Sal asks if anyone saw The Loretta Young Show the previous night; he then says it was “awful” with “the aprons, the nauseating upholstery on the couch”. Upholstery, huh? Smitty asks if anyone’s heard from Paul Kinsey, who is at Ole Miss protesting on behalf of black student James Meredith (this dates the episode to around September 30, 1962). A conversation starts about prejudice but quickly turns to how the event will affect business. Kurt says the he has no idea what’s going on, since he doesn’t have a TV. Harry tells him that he must have a TV for his job. The guys ask Kurt what he does in his spare time instead of watching TV. He says that he goes to concerts, and Smitty mentions that Kurt recently saw Dylan. This sparks an interest in Peggy, who breaks the meeting up to flirt with Kurt, who asks her if she wants to go see Dylan with him.

Don and Pete have made it to Los Angeles. The airline has apparently lost Don’s luggage, so he’s stuck at the pool in a suit:

Pete wants to spend the day at the pool, but Don tells him to get out his list and get to work. Pete kind of mumbles for a few minutes, then Don snaps him to attention with the best line of the episode:

“Do you want to be on vacation, Pete? ‘Cos I can make that happen.” – Don Draper

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The Saddest Show on TV

Last week, I wrote this article about the return of the ABC show Pushing Daisies. In it, I quoted a poster from the DVD Talk forums who said: “I consider myself a highly cynical, pessimistic person, but there’s just something about this show that is able to give me the warm fuzzies. Every week I get to feel like the Grinch when he rediscovers he has a heart.”

It’s true! Pushing Daisies is like a comfy sweater or favorite pillow. You know the “cuteness” factor in the movie Amelie? Ratchet that up several notches and bring it into your living room ever week, and that’s Pushing Daisies. But it wasn’t until this week that I realized how totally, incredibly, and profoundly sad this show is, too. It makes me downright weepy! Yes, weepy!

This week, Chuck’s aunt Vivian stopped by The Pie Hole to pick up a pie. Since Olive is away at a convent, she hasn’t been able to deliver the pies that Chuck has been making for her aunts these past few months. And with Olive away and Ned and Emerson solving a case, that leaves only Chuck to man The Pie Hole. Vivian, missing the pies that Olive used to deliver, stopped by the restaurant to pick up a pie. But only Chuck is there, and she’s supposed to be dead. Vivian gives a little speech about her loneliness while Chuck hides from her. Chuck can only cry as the woman that reared her talks sadly.

Everyone in this show is terribly hurt in some way. Ned is lonely – not just because he cannot touch Chuck, but also because he misses his family. Chuck… well, Chuck is sad because she’s supposed to be dead and cannot tell her aunts that she is, in fact, alive. Olive is deeply in love with Ned, but Ned is deeply in love with Chuck. Olive also has many secrets she’s forced to bear. Emerson’s daughter is missing, so he makes a series of pop-up books in her honor, perhaps hoping she’ll read them and come home. Vivian is lonely because she misses Lilly. And because she’s nuts. And Lilly apparently has a closet full of secrets. Whew!

Thankfully, the show still brings the laughs, though. This week’s joke with the clown car was completely predicable… but freakin’ hilarious nevertheless!

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Life On Mars: What’d ya think?

So – last night was the debut of the American version of Life On Mars. For those of you that watched it: what did you think?

I myself was fairly pleased. Let me say this straight away: no remake of the show can be as good as the original. Full stop, period dot. Keeping that in mind, the American version is pretty faithful to the original.

Lisa Bonet plays Maya, Sam’s girlfriend. Changing her from Asian (Indian) to black makes sense, I suppose.

Unlike that godawful pilot episode leaked earlier this year, the “new and improved” Life On Mars US features Michael Imperioli as Ray Carling and Jonathan Murphy as Chris Skelton – two characters completely absent from the first pilot. I’m not sure that I’m digging either character at this moment – for some reason, Imperioli’s sarcastic Carling just rubs me the wrong way, but not in the same way that the original Ray did.

Annie Cartwright’s character was played by Rachelle Lefèvre in the failed pilot. Her version of Annie was an already street-smart detective that got a fair amount of acclaim from her co-workers. Lefèvre was dumped for Gretchen Mol, who plays Annie Norris (no idea about the name change), a meek character far closer to the “original” Annie. You know – a smart girl trapped in the “Womens Police Force”, busy making coffee and cleaning the station houses than doing actual police work. While Mol’s acting is fine, I’m not sure I buy her as Annie Cartwright. She’s too pretty. Liz White is the type of girl that really isn’t immediately pretty, but after watching several episodes, she sort of slowly “gets pretty”. At any rate, at least they’ve brought back the “suffering Annie” plotline. The whole basis of Sam and Annie’s relationship is that she’s smart as a whip, but trapped in a “housekeeping” job, and that Sam is the only one that appreciates her intellect. With that dynamic gone in the original pilot, the plot suffered terribly. I’m glad it’s back.

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Life On Mars debuts tonight!

Holy crap! I almost forgot to remind you guys: the series premiere of Life On Mars is tonight at 10pm eastern on ABC. I can’t speak for the new American version, but the British original was one of my all-time favorite TV shows… ever! So set that TiVo and check it out!

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Mad Men: “The Inheritance”

This episode kicks off with Pete reading a list of companies that will have a presence at an aerospace convention in Los Angeles. Sterling Cooper will have a presence there, too. Don says that “every engineer, scientist, and general will be there trying to figure out how to put a man on the moon… or blow up Moscow, whichever one costs more.” Don appoints Pete to be the Talker and Paul to be the Listener. They are not only to look for “traditional” advertising business, but also to look for Congressmen trying to get funding for projects. Sterling Cooper will gladly help members of Congress in “selling” their plans to the public. Awesome. He then blasts Paul and Pete for not reading the material that Peggy had put together. “Maybe I should send her”, Don laments.

Later that night, Trudy begs Pete to take her to Los Angeles with him. Pete declines, to which Trudy says that she will go to her parent’s home in Rehoboth (Delaware?) while he is away. Pete asks why, and Trudy says that her parents are concerned… thus, bringing up the whole “baby thing” again. If I were Pete, I guess I’d be ticked off, too. I mean, sure… Trudy is pretty hot, in an “Emmy Rossum is hot” kind of way… but the constant nagging about having a baby would drive me crazy too! Trudy brings up adoption, while Pete decries as “unnatural”.

At around the same time, Betty calls Don at his hotel. Betty’s father has had a stroke. He’s “up and around and talking”, but Betty’s relatives refused to put him on the phone. Don says that he’ll come get her that moment. Betty refuses, saying that she doesn’t want to wake the kids. Don says that everything will be OK, and that he’ll pick her up at 8am the next morning.

The next morning, the Drapers arrive at her father’s house a few minutes ahead of her brother William. Betty’s father Gene initially recognizes Betty and Don. In fact, he seems almost completely normal. That is, until Betty mentions that they should have called her (Betty) earlier, as Don knows some great doctors in New York. This causes William to roll his eyes and talk about “oh yes, the great doctors in New York, where everything’s better”. It also causes Gene to mistake Betty for Ruthie, his deceased wife (and Betty’s mother). Betty then asks Gene what the doctors said, to which her dad says “ah, it’s just like last time”. Betty, who had no idea that he’d had one before, freaks. Gene tells her that it’s just “a couple of little strokes” and that it’s not a big deal.

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The Riches: Canceled

The Riches, FX’s dark comedy starring Eddie Izzard and Minnie Driver as grifters who assume the identity of a rich family after being involved in their accidental deaths, has been canceled.

This news is not completely surprising. The show never pulled in the numbers FX wanted, especially given the show’s hefty price tag. Although I’ll miss the show, I’m not too broken up about it: there are far too many other great shows on TV these days.

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Hooray! Daisies is back!

Banks might be collapsing, Wall Street may be crumbling… but all is well now that Pushing Daisies is back on ABC!

If you’ve never seen the show, the plot is like this: Ned is a man with a special gift: he can bring the dead back to life. There are two caveats to his power, however: 1) the dead can only be alive for 1 minute, or else something else of equal “life value” dies; and 2) once Ned touches a dead person twice, that person is dead forever. Ned discovered his gift in his hometown of Coeur d’Coeurs when his golden retriever Digby accidentally runs into the path of an 18 wheeler. Later that same day, Ned’s mother dies of an aneurysm. Ned touches her, which brings her back to life. Unfortunately, in doing so he kills the father of Charlotte Charles (“Chuck”), his next door neighbor and childhood sweetheart. Ned also accidentally discovers caveat #2 when his mother kisses him goodnight that same evening, killing her forever. Ned’s father then sends him away to the Longborough School for Boys, where, in bouts of loneliness and depression, Ned tries to “recreate” his mother’s love by baking pies. Ned eventually turns this talent into “The Pie Hole”, a pie restaurant in an unnamed city. There he employs a waitress named Olive Snook, a tiny blonde that’s secretly in love with Ned. Unfortunately, The Pie Hole doesn’t make a lot of money, so Ned has teams up with Emerson Cod, a private investigator. Ned and Emerson go to morgues and funeral homes, where Ned touches dead people to find out who killed them. Emerson then collects the reward money and splits it with Ned. In the pilot episode, Emerson and Ned find out that Chuck has been murdered whilst on a cruise. Ned touches her just to talk to her, and can’t bring himself to touch her again, causing the corrupt funeral home director to drop dead. Ned and Chuck live happily ever after… even though they can never touch again, and even though the two have some serious secrets between each other.

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Mad Men: “Six Month Leave”

Marilyn Monroe has died. Don learned about it the following morning thanks to the newspaper left at the door of his room in the Roosevelt Hotel… so no, Betty hasn’t let him come home yet.

At the office, all the “girls” are weepy about Marilyn’s death. Peggy, who took the elevator up with Don, says that she’s glad Playtex didn’t go with the “Jackie\Marilyn” campaign, since Sterling Cooper would have to do some massive damage control. Don agrees.

At his first meeting of the day, Don listens as Ken, Paul, Sal and Harry discuss that day’s blood drive. Interestingly, Don is all for the drive, and even gives Paul some pointers to help increase the number of people participating. One of Don’s ideas is a cash bounty… which causes Paul to ask if the bounty is for him or for the people giving blood. “This is for mankind, Kinsey”, Don says. At that same meeting, Harry invites Don and Betty to a Mitch Miller concert hosted by NBC. Don declines (being on the outs with Betty), saying that one of his kids is sick.

Back at his office, Jane gives Don the rest of his schedule for the day, then admits to screwing up: Sally called the office yesterday, wanting to know when Daddy would “come home from his business trip”. Jane, not knowing what to say, told her Wednesday. Don quietly lets Jane know that the matter is personal, and that he doesn’t want her getting involved in his life in any way. He doesn’t even want her giving him concerned looks:

Meanwhile, Pete, Peggy and Sal are in Freddy’s office having a walkthrough of the presentation they’re about to give to Samsonite. Freddy, who is such an alcoholic that no one even notices he’s drunk anymore, turns away from the other workers and then pees in his pants… just before passing out at his desk. Pete and Peggy take control of the situation: Peggy will do the pitch, Pete tells Sal to go to the conference room and look as if he’s been waiting, and also tells Peggy to tell “Freddy’s girl” about the situation.

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Catch Up with AMC

If you haven’t been paying attention lately, AMC has two of the best shows on TV right now: Mad Men and Breaking Bad.

If you read this site at all, you probably already know all about my obsession with Mad Men, a show based in a New York advertising agency in the 1960s. So I won’t waste your time. Just click the “Mad Men” category on the sidebar to learn all you could ever want to know about the show.

I haven’t said nearly as much about Breaking Bad, which features Bryan Cranston (the dad from Malcolm in the Middle) as a high school chemistry teacher who finds out that he has inoperable cancer. He wants to take care of his family financially after he dies, so he teams up with a former student to sell the best crystal meth known to man. It sounds serious (and it is), but the show has lots of humor to take the sting out of Cranston’s situation. Cranston, for example, is as square as they come… so even though he knows everything he needs to know about actually making the drug, he has no idea how to sell it… which leads to a lot of “fish out of water” humor. It’s a great show, and one totally worth watching.

I mention all this because AMC is running marathons of both Mad Men and Breaking Bad in the next few days. The network will run the first 8 episodes of Mad Men season 2 today, starting at 4pm. Next Wednesday, AMC will run the all 7 episodes of the first season of Breaking Bad starting at 8pm.

Look, folks… this is great TV. Mad Men just won the “Best Drama” Emmy, and Cranston just won the “Best Actor” Emmy for Breaking Bad. It’s incredible stuff… so check it out!