HIATUS

Hey, all.  This DV Rebel is taking a TV posting hiatus until the shows return from their midseason breaks in January.  At that point, I'll begin posting reviews from the first episode back.  I'm catching up now on all the shows I've missed, and, I've got to say, there are some really good ones this season.

Also, when I return, the rating system will be a little different, and I won't be watching the same shows as I was before, but otherwise things'll be mostly the same.  I'm also going to make a conscious effort to do a couple movie reviews a month, because this is a guide to television and movies.

I'll be back and better than ever in early January!

Mercy - Can We Get That Drink Now?

Network: NBC

Time: Wednesdays, 8:00-9:00pm

Cast: Taylor Schilling, Michelle Trachtenberg, Jaime Lee Kirchner, James Tupper, Diego Klattenhoff, Guillermo Diaz, James LeGros

Creator: Liz Heldon

Summary: With the cancellation of ER, NBC has decided that we need another medical show on television, so here it is.  Mercy follows three nurses who work at a hospital in Jersey City.  Each one of them has their baggage, of course, and the show tries to mix their personal lives with some medical miracles that might even impress Dr. House.

Review: Watching NBC struggle for quality programming is a constant source of amusement for me.  I feel like their strategy is to find a show that works and find a similar, but less good, version of it.  Mercy is no exception.  ABC found TV-ratings success with Grey's Anatomy, a soap opera-esque show about doctors (not to be confused with a medically focused show like ER).  NBC found Mercy, a soap opera-esque show about nurses.

If Grey's could spawn a slightly impaired clone, it would be Mercy.  Where the characters in Grey's are quirky in amusing ways (or at least they were when it started), the characters in Mercy are quirky in socially retarded ways.  The show focuses on three nurses.  There's Veronica, who was a nurse in Iraq and occasionally has these post traumatic flashbacks.  She's clearly not handling being back in the States too well.  Also, she had an affair with a doctor in Iraq who followed her back to New Jersey to be with her, only to have her reject him in favor of the husband she cheated on him with (hmm, shades of Meredith and Derek there).  Confused yet?  We're only getting started. 

There's also Sonia, who has some weeeeeeird view on relationships that I can only liken to Cristina Yang's view of them.  Sonia wants to find a man with money.  Instead, she falls for the cop who shows up in the ER with a wounded suspect.  She's sassy, with an attitude and a chip on her shoulder.

And there's Chloe, who's sweet and naive and really thinks she can make the world a better place, kind of like Izzie in the first season of Grey's (before they took her character, ran her through a blender, smashed her with a hammer and put her back together with the parts all looking funny).  She's played by Michelle Trachtenberg, who was my childhood idol as Harriet the Spy, and who was actually my main draw for watching this show.  And I have to admit... she doesn't deliver.  Out of all the nurses, none of whom I'm particularly wild about, Chloe annoys me the most.  She acts like she's never run into a difficult situation in her life before.  I know she's supposed to be from East Nowhere, Middle America, but come on.  She is just way too unrealistic.  At least Veronica and Sonia, for all their faults have a little bit of spunk.  Chloe just gets steamrolled by everyone.  And then she whines about it.

The guys are, for the moment, pretty unremarkable.  There's the pretty doctor who moved from California to New Jersey to be with Veronica.  Right now, his role seems to be confined to being the pretty doctor.  We'll see if he develops a character somewhere along the road.  There's Veronica's husband Mike, who is a struggling architect who's building their house.  Also, he and Veronica are trying to make their marriage work when she's, to put it quite simply, not putting in an effort.  Veronica has some brothers who I remember laughing at, but not much else.  Her parents are alcoholics, and she's not a big step away from it, which is more irritating than amusing.  It's one thing to have the characters drinking occasionally, like to unwind after a tough shift (for example, hanging out at the bar in Grey's after work sometimes).  It's another thing to go too far and have them just drink all the time, which Mercy was bordering on with Veronica's family.

Even the plot structure is pretty much a rip off of the early seasons of Grey's Anatomy (I only watched Grey's until season 3, so all my knowledge of that show is based on the early years).  There are three important medical cases, one for each nurse.  Somehow, these cases tie in with their personal life.  Like a formula.

I know I'm really ripping into this one, but it actually wasn't all bad.  There are certain aspects about Veronica and Sonia that I find intriguing, and I'm hoping to get to know a little more about them as the series goes on.  I am really interested in the idea of Veronica as a former military nurse.  I think that's an aspect of the show that hasn't been done before, and they could really run with it if they want to.  

I also really like that Veronica didn't get back together with the pretty doctor (Chris) when he moved to New Jersey.  I like that she's trying to make it work with her husband, and that the problems they're having aren't really related to the relationship she had with Chris.  They're more to do with Veronica's own issues after serving in Iraq.  I'm so sick of the shows where the main character throws away a perfectly good guy (or girl) for their "one true love."  I'm all for romance, but I'm sick of the predictability.  I'm glad Mercy is at least acting like they're going to be different.  We'll see if they doesn't do the Meredith-and-Derek-hooking-up-in-every-room-even-though-they're-not-together thing.

I'm going to give this one a shot, but I may drop off mid-season.   Life is too short to watch shows I don't like just so I can give them bad reviews.  For now:

Rating (this episode):
[1] Run in the other direction
[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do
[4] Definitely try it out
[5] A total keeper

Modern Family - Pilot

Network: ABC

Time: Wednesday, 9:00-9:30

Cast: Ed O'Neill, Sophia Vergara, Rico Rodriguez II, Julie Bowen, Ty Burrell, Sarah Hyland, Ariel Winter,

Creators: Christopher Lloyd, Steven Levitan

Summary: This show follows three individual families that make up one larger family.  There's one nuclear family: husband, wife, and three kids.  There's one gay family: two boyfriends and an adopted daughter.  And there's one divorcee who's now married to a much younger woman and raising her young son.  The story has a documentary feel to it, with all the characters doing confessionals and speaking to the camera either by themselves or with their spouses.

Review: As a general rule, I'm a much tougher critic of a one-hour show than a sitcom.  For a sitcom to be good for me, all it has to do is make me laugh a few times and not bore me.  I don't have to like the characters.  Oh, sure, it's nice when I do, but it's not essential.  Generally in a sitcom, characters are fairly static anyway.  Look at Friends or Seinfeld as an example.  The characters age, sure, but they don't actually *grow*.  There's little personality change between Chandler of season 1 and Chandler of season 10.  The audience expects their characters to be a certain way every time they watch the show.  Whereas the Josh Lyman in season 1 of the West Wing is a much more relaxed, humorous character than the Josh Lyman in season 7 who takes the weight of the world on his shoulders.

The point of that mini-rant is that, unlike dramatic television, a sitcom's greatest weapons and biggest liabilities are snappy dialogue and good jokes.  Without both of those, nothing else in the show matters.

Modern Family has the whole package.  Right from the start, you are walking into a funny show.  It's set up like a mock documentary (read: mockumentary), with The Office-style confessionals to the camera.  These confessionals can be solo, but usually each couple is together.  It's better that way because it allows them to play off each other.

And, boy, are they good at that.  I don't know who was in charge of casting for this show, but they managed to find a set of actors with the kind of chemistry most shows can only dream of (so good, infact, it made me end my sentence with a preposition).  From the first episode, we're supposed to believe all these people are related--a father and his two children from one marriage, each of their families (one heterosexual, one homosexual), his new wife (who's roughly his daughter's age) and her son from a previous marriage.

And I buy it.  For awhile we only see each individual family and their troubles.  There's Claire, who's trying to raise a teenage girl (Haley), a pre-teen girl (Alex), a pre-pre-teen boy (Luke), and a husband (Phil, who, frankly, is the least mature of all of them).  The entire family dynamic is real enough that I turned to my viewing partners and said, "If I had had an older sister, I'd have been exactly like Alex."  Sure, they're wittier and the comebacks are snappier than most families are, but, at least in the case of my family, it gives us something to aspire to.

Then there's Mitchell, who lives with his boyfriend Cam.  In the pilot episode, they just adopted a little girl from Vietnam, and they (read: Mitchell) are worried about how to tell his father, who's just accepted the fact that Mitchell is gay.  This is another realistic relationship.  They have their stereotypically gay quirks, but it's refreshing to see that even they know when they take it too far.  It seems that homosexuality is the new "in thing" to have in a television show.  See Glee for an example of what happens when all the gay characters are unashamedly flamboyant, and you'll see, as I do, that's it's refreshing to see a gay couple that acts more like real people.

Finally there's Jay, Mitchell and Claire's father, who lives with his new wife Gloria and her precocious grade-school son Manny.  This is a point to consider later, that Mitchell and Claire's stepmother is roughly their age, and their stepbrother is the same age as Claire's son.  Ed O'Neill is probably the only name I recognized going into this show, and he delivers spectacularly.  His wit is dry, his demeanor is gruff, and his bluntness is balanced with a dash of sweet. 

All of this combines to give the first episode a lot of laughs and a heart-warming ending that makes you realize that all families are dysfunctional in their own way.  Because, when you get to it, all these related characters make up a pretty normal family.  They have their craziness, but, really, what's normal anyway?

Rating (this episode):
[1] Run in the other direction
[2] Don't bother
[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do
[4] Definitely try it out
[5] A total keeper

Glee - Pilot

Network: Fox
Time: Wednesday, 9:00-10:00pm
Cast: Matthew Morrison, Jane Lynch, Jayma Mays, Lea Michele, Cory Monteith, Amber Riley, Chris Colfer, Kevin McHale, Dianna Agron, and many more...
Creator: Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuck, Ian Brennan


Summary: To put it quite simply, this is a show about the Glee club in a fairly typical (though slightly insane) high school in America.  Will Schuester, a Spanish teacher and former Glee member, is trying to restore Glee to its former glory (his idea, not mine) by coaching them to win Nationals.  Meanwhile the high school hierarchy is conspiring against him to try to make him realize that, no matter what Glee does, they're still going to be the geeks of the school.


Review: You know how sometimes a show is just so absurd you can't stand it?  The characters seem forced instead of funny, the plot makes you roll your eyes and look away, and the jokes fall completely flat?  Well, that's not Glee.

Think about it: they created a show about a high school Glee club.  I'm looking forward to its spin-offs, the Marching Band and the Chess Club.  But, unlike Drumline--where the marching band was considered the cool thing to be a part of--Glee has much more realistic portrayal of its members.  In other words, they're geeks.

That may be what I appreciate most of this new show, this one inch of realism in what is otherwise an absurdly hilarious program.  Yes, kids who did Glee in high school were considered dorks.  They ranked somewhere above the marching band and somewhere below the soccer team (because, even though soccer is a popular sport everywhere else in the world, Americans scorn it for reasons no one's ever been particularly clear about).  Glee understands that. This show doesn't make the Glee club out to be the coolest thing since Justin Timberlake split from N*Sync.  And if anyone thinks differently, there are football players and cheerleaders (aptly called the Cheerios) who are more than willing to put them in their place.

Other than this smidgen of reality, however, Glee tries really hard to make everything else... completely implausible.  Let's start with Sue Sylvester, the head coach of the Cheerios.  Sue is mean.  Very, very mean.  She likes to win, and she doesn't care who she runs over in the process.  She doesn't seem to care thar she's working with children.  In fact, she doesn't even seem to LIKE children.  No real principal would ever let her stay employed.

Then there's Will Schuester, the main character.  Will is probably the only somewhat normal person, and even that's stretching it a little.  Will is a Glee-club graduates who's trying to relive his high school glory days--back when Glee was cool.  I don't know when exactly Glee was cool, but Will seems to think it was, and he's trying to get it back to that status.  Good luck with that.

Meanwhile, his wife--who is probably the most psychotic character on the show (and that's saying something)--is pregnant.  And instead of cutting back on expenses in preparation for the really expensive bundle of joy they're expecting, she pressures Will to quit Glee and get a better job to support her in the manner to which she hopes one day to become accustomed.

And then there's Emma, the OCD guidance counselor who's in love with Will.  There's not really much more that needs to be said about her.  That pretty much sums it up.

As for students, well, they're certainly... diverse.  There's Rachel, who believes she's the only good singer in the Glee club.  There's Finn, the high school quaterback who Will blackmails into becoming a singer as well.  His girlfriend Quinn (yes, Finn and Quinn... say that five times fast), who's the head Cheerio and never (I mean, never) takes her uniform off.  She and Finn are also the co-Presidents of McKinley High School's chastity club.  And there's effeminate Kurt; tough, gutsy Mercedes; stuttering Tina; crippled Artie; and a ton more.  I couldn't list them all if I tried.

Long (long, long) story short: this is definitely a show to check out.  It takes stereotypes and enhances them to the point of hilarity.  It is absurd, but in the best way possible.  For a change, absurdity actually makes the show funnier.  The characters all have their annoying quirks, but there's a little something about (almost) all of them that makes them really lovable despite their faults.  Plus, there's singing in every episode (this episode had a really great version of Don't Stop Believing by Journey).  And, really, what isn't made better by a musical number?

Rating (this episode):
[1] Run in the other direction
[2] Don't bother
[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do
[4] Definitely try it out
[5] A total keeper

The Forgotten - Pilot

Network: ABC
Time: 10:00-11:00pm
Cast: Christian Slater, Heather Stephens, Michelle Borth, Anthony Carrigan, Bob Stephenson, Rochelle Aytes
Creator: Jerry Bruckheimer

Summary: When the police can no longer spend their resources trying to find the identity of a dead body, they turn it over to a group of volunteers called the Forgotten Network. The Network uses its manpower and--let's face it--sheer determination to see if they can do better than the overextended police department. They rely mostly on the belief that people are inherently good and willing to help out, so if you're a cynic, you're going to have to suspend your disbelief here.

Review: So I finally changed the channel from CBS to ABC's Cold Case-esque new show, The Forgotten. Out of everything I'm watching this season, this is the biggest uncertainty for me. Let's break it down.

First off, I love the premise. Unlike Cold Case or any of it's similar shows, we're not dealing with a branch of law enforcement. All the people in the Forgotten Network are volunteers, with real other jobs that they have to balance with this. Something a little different, it opens the door for some potentially interesting scenes where they try to balance their "real lives" with this incredibly important job. Also, I'm a sucker for those heartbreaking stories where they finally name the John or Jane Doe and their family can finally have closure.

Second, the voice over. Honestly, voice overs are usually cheesy, and I can only count a few shows that use them well (How I Met Your Mother, for example). This show uses it well. The Doe narrates the voice over, acting as both a storytelling mechanism and a lie detector. When the Forgotten Network gets a step closer to discovering who their Doe really is, the narrator steps in and gives the audience some more information about themselves. And then they end the episode by say their name, as if to say, "I've been found."

Third, I'm intrigued by the characters, though I'm not sold on them yet. Personally, I have many issues with Christian Slater. Mostly, he scares me. I don't care what role he's playing, he always looks like a scary elf to me. Joking aside, though, I don't feel very invested in his character Alex, despite finding out his personal crusade that led him initially to the Network. The only other character they really develop in the first episode is Tyler (Anthony Carrigan), the med school dropout who only joins the Network because he has to do community service. They turn him around quickly though, maybe a little too quickly. There's another guy Walter (Bob Stephenson) who is really enthusiastic about his volunteering. Don't know why he's so enthusiastic, but I guess that's never a bad thing. And then there are two women, Lindsey (Heather Stephens) and Candace (Michelle Borth), who I can't tell apart in looks or personality.

Fourth, it drags. Like The Good Wife, I feel like the actual story is shorter than the episode. They figured out who the Doe was pretty early in the episode. Then they found out they were wrong. OK, that's good. Gives us more time to investigate. Then they figured it out again. Then they spent time trying to find his killer. Up until that last bit, I was enjoying myself. But a network of volunteers shouldn't be investigating a murder, even if one is an ex-cop who's still buddies with the police chief. Not only is it unbelievable, but it's not interesting. They don't have any of the cool toys, they can't arrest people or legally kick their butts, and they sort of go into each interview with a, "I'm a good person volunteering to help a grieving family please tell me everything I need to know," attitude. And it works. At which point even I rolled my eyes and said, "Come on. No one's that helpful."

Like I said, I'm not sold yet. There's potential. And there's a strong opening and closing. I'll give it a few more weeks.

Rating (this episode):
[1] Run in the other direction
[2] Don't bother
[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do
[4] Definitely try it out
[5] A total keeper

The Good Wife - Pilot

Network: CBS

Time: 10:00-11:00pm

Cast: Julianna Margulies, Christine Baranski, Chris Noth, Josh Charles, Archie Panjabi, Matt Czuchry

Creator: Michelle King, Robert King

Summary: After she finds out about her politician husband's infidelity, Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) has to pick herself back up and find a job so she can support her kids while her husband Peter (Chris Noth) is in prison for allegedly abusing his office as Attorney General. So when her old boss Will (Josh Charles) offers her back her old job as a defense attorney, she takes it. Meanwhile, Peter is claiming he's innocent of the crimes he supposedly committed, though he admits to the infidelity. So Alicia's starting a new job, raising two kids, living with her mother-in-law, helping Peter sort out his mess, and still trying to be the good wife to the media. No pressure.

Review: Hello, Chris Noth. It's been a long time since I saw you play a sleazy guy who cheats on the woman he's with. Oh, wait. No, it hasn't. Luckily for The Good Wife, Chris Noth really isn't the focus of this show, Julianna Margulies is. And she's a much more likable character. There are positives and negatives for this new show, and I'm not entirely sure what side I'm going to come down on yet.

Positive: Decent cast. My affection for Josh Charles goes back to his Sports Night days, and Christine Baranski is a really stellar classic actress. Julianna Margulies is a work in progress to me, but she can carry the show, so I'm impressed. Matt Czuchry seems to be reprising his role as Logan in Gilmore Girls, but annoying creep works for him, so I say go for it. And I have no idea who Archie Panjabi is, but I love her character.

Negative: The characters. They fit into some pretty clear stereotypes: the abused wife (who wasn't physically abused, but more emotionally abused) who's picking herself back up, the sleazy politician who cheated on his wife, the compassionate boss torn between helping a friend and focusing on his job (that's a stretch because they really didn't give Will much of a storyline yet), the lawyer who's been there for awhile and is ruthless at her job, and the new associate who's desperate to prove himself.

Positive: The case work. I love good legal dramas, and this one's pretty good. There's plenty of court time, and the case was interesting enough to hold attention while still being believable. It is a bit of a stretch to believe that Alicia would take the lead on a case so quickly after being hired, but she was a defense attorney before she quit her job and became a politician's wife, and she did work for the same guy, so there's some plausibility there. There's also a bit of investigative work while Alicia acquaints herself with the case (also because it gives Panjabi's character Kalinda something to do; she is the in-house investigator).

Negative: It's slow. I don't know why I expected a fast-talking, quick-witted program, but I did, and I was disappointed that the Good Wife isn't that. Things drag out a little, and the overall effect was a feeling that the story was shorter than the show.

All in all, it's worth another few weeks at worst. I may be more receptive to it in the second week because I'm not expecting something different. Good characters are essential, so I hope they'll continue to develop them and give them personalities outside their stereotypes. The basics are there, and I see this as a show with a lot of potential.

Rating (this episode):

[1] Run in the other direction

[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do

[4] Definitely try it out

[5] A total keeper

NCIS: Los Angeles - Identity

Network: CBS

Time: 9:00-10:00pm

Cast: Chris O'Donnell, LL Cool J, Peter Cambor, Daniela Ruah, Adam Jamal Craig, Barrett Foa, Linda Hunt

Creator: Donald Bellisario, Shane Brennan

Summary: A spin-off of NCIS, this show focuses on the undercover operations department of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service based in Los Angeles. The show technically premiered as a two-part pilot in the sixth season of NCIS, when Gibbs and McGee go out to LA to investigate a potential terrorist sleeper cell. In this episode, what seems to be a kidnapping gone wrong turns out to be something completely different when Sam (LL Cool J) and Callen (O'Donnell) find out that the Navy officer in question was picked up and dropped off at home by his alleged kidnappers every day for a week.

Review: I'm going to to do my best not to give away too much about any episode of this show because half the fun is the twists and turns of the case work. Anyway, with a brand new show, I like to start with the characters and premise and work my way up to the plot.

Since NCIS: LA is a spin-off, it seems fitting that I should compare it to its parent show (not to be confused with its grandparent show, since the original NCIS was a spin-off of JAG). From the first episode, I already had some similarities and some differences. For one thing: team dynamic. Very similar, with a few mild differences. As much as I love the team in NCIS, I think I actually love the LA team more. Every single one of them is brilliant; they have street smarts and technological smarts. And it's a good thing, since the LA office is way more geek-chic than the DC office. They definitely got all the cool toys, and they all know how to use them.

Then there's the team itself. Sam and Callen are the lead guys, sort of the Gibbs and Tony of the show, but the lines aren't as clear. They're partners, not leader and sidekick. If I was pressed to say, Sam--a former Navy SEAL and all-around macho guy--would be Gibbs, and Callen--a joker with a vague past who tends to move frequently--would be Tony. But they're not carbon copies, so don't worry. Sam and Callen definitely have distinct personality traits that make them different from their predecessors. For example, Sam's way more fun than Gibbs is, and he's not above sharing a joke or a conversation with his colleagues. Callen doesn't do the playboy thing Tony does, and, while he is more of the joker than Sam, he's much more serious than Tony. The relationship between them is clearly the focal point of the show (anyone who watches the opening song can tell that). Unlike NCIS's ensemble cast feel, NCIS: LA is about Sam and Callen. The others are important, but clearly supporting, roles.

Kensi (Daniela Ruah) is the Kate/Ziva of the show. With both Kate and Ziva, there was definitely a warming period where I grew to like them. With Kensi however, I fell in love with her from the first episode. She's the only woman in this boys' club (with the exception of Hetty, who isn't an agent), and she handles herself with a self-deprecating humor and generally awesome attitude. Like Kate or Ziva, she can hold her own in a fight, both physically with the suspects and verbally with the guys. Unlike Ziva, she has a complete grasp of the English language and some quality that makes me really like her. She's the kind of agent I'd like to be if I ever became a fictional NCIS agent.

The role of McGee would have to go to Eric (Barrett Foa), but it's only about half true. In a world of techies, Eric is the resident computer geek. He's always on a computer, or a handheld, or a handheld computer. All their information is sent back to him. He can hack, although he's not as good as McGee. But the similarities end there. Eric isn't a field agent. I think the team would be frightened to give him a gun. And he's a surfer (and how LA is it for the computer geek to also be a surfer dude?). That side of McGee's job description would probably go to Dominic (Adam Jamal Craig). Dom is the rookie agent, brand-spanking new in this first episode (he wasn't in the two-part NCIS episode). He's the team's probie, and he's just as nervous and hesitant as McGee ever was. But he seems to be coming into his own pretty quickly, so we'll see how his character develops as the show continues.

Nate (Peter Cambor) would be Ducky... ish. Because the LA branch of NCIS is primarily an undercover agency, they don't have autopsy. There is a coroner, but she's not part of their team; they just call on her when they need information. Nate is the operational psychologist instead, hired to profile suspects and victims to help the team solve crimes (and be better, more effective undercover agents). So he's got, like, half of Ducky's job. And, really, no other relation to Ducky. He's not old, he doesn't tell cool stories, and he doesn't act like a parental figure to the rest of the team. Those honors go to Hetty (Linda Hunt), who is the other half of Ducky. Hetty coordinates the undercover missions for the team, and she's responsible for wardrobe. She's 4'9" and the entire team is scared of getting on her bad side.

There's no Abby. Whether that's because the undercover unit has no forensic team, or Bellisario realized he couldn't possibly come up with anyone as cool as Abby, we may never know. Either way, there's no team member that can possibly be compared to her.

Whew. OK, that's all the characters. As for the plot, that's pretty similar to the original NCIS too. Solve cases. OK, got it. The difference is, I'm not entirely sure what the LA unit's responsibilities are. They're not like our major crime response team in DC, who go out whenever someone was killed (or occasionally abducted). They go undercover, but I'm not always sure for what purpose. And that's a flaw in this new show. I enjoyed the first episode, but it was confusing. I couldn't follow the case, and I couldn't figure out why anybody was doing what they were doing. As the show continues, if it hopes to make it past the first season, they need to better define the responsibilities of the team and better explain why they do the things they do.

Overall, it's a good watch. It has it's problems, like all new shows, but I think, like the original, it's a show that will get better with age. It already has a few advantages. It's a spin-off of an incredibly popular show. It was created by Donald Bellisario, who has a laundry list of prolific and successful shows that I couldn't begin to list here. It has a pretty great cast of characters who have good chemistry. With a little refining and a little time, I think this show has the potential to be a very good one.

Rating (this episode):

[1] Run in the other direction

[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do

[4] Definitely try it out

[5] A total keeper

NCIS - Truth or Consequences

Network: CBS

Time: Tuesdays, 8:00-9:00pm

Cast: Mark Harmon, Michael Weatherly, Cote de Pablo, Sean Murray, Pauley Perrette, David McCallum, Rocky Carroll

Creator: Donald Bellisario

Summary: When we last left our heroes, the team was in disarray. After finding out that Tony killed her boyfriend, a fellow Mossad operative, Ziva was called back to Israel to deal with the fallout. Gibbs, Tony and Director Vance followed. After several different confrontations, Ziva told Gibbs she could no longer work with Tony, and he had to choose which one of them to transfer. Gibbs looked very apologetic as he said goodbye to Ziva, and they returned to the States without her. Just when we thought it couldn't get worse than that, with moments left to the season finale, we found out Ziva was captured (somehow, somewhere, doing something), and she is now being tortured for information about NCIS.

Review: I'm going to start off with this: best NCIS episode ever. Having seen every episode at least twice, I can offer my expert opinion on this subject. Without a doubt, hands down, best episode.

Where should I start? Let's start with Tony. Michael Weatherly gave one of his best performances in this one. We got to see NCIS through Tony's eyes through a series of monologues and, let's face it, monologuing is hard. Actors feed off each other; that's why good dialogue works so well. Without having someone else's emotions and words to play off, Weatherly was forced to do it all himself. Not only did he have to keep his character recognizably Tony (after seven years, fans would be able to sense if he was out of character), but he had to act like all this information was being squeezed out of him by truth serum. And it worked, on all levels (especially when he was talking to Ziva towards the end and his voice got really high and tight like he was trying so hard to keep the words in).

P.S. Major props to Don Bellisario and the writing staff for recapping everything we already know and making it fresh with a first person point of view instead of our usual omniscient third person. It had the dual benefits of keeping it interesting (and entertaining!) and drawing us deeper into the story than we usually are when we're objective observers.

Let's talk about the McGee/DiNozzo relationship for a few minutes, shall we? Being down a team member has clearly been good to McGee. Sometime over the summer, he grew a pair and became a much better developed character than we've ever seen before. Fans of the show are used to the nervous, stuttering McGee, who still--five/six years later--gets easily duped by Tony. And, yes, he's been growing up steadily since he first became a member of the team all those years ago. But this first episode showed a brand new side to him. He's not Tony's probie anymore, despite was DiNozzo still calls him. They're much more like equals, and it's a welcome change. Not only does it open the door to some funny situations, but the chemistry between them is better than ever before. Weatherly and Sean Murray have always worked well together, but it seemed like they were their best yet in this episode.

And, for once, an episode with great character interaction and dialogue was not lacking in plot. There's a whole terrorist thing going on in this one, and I actually managed to follow it! One of my long-time problems with NCIS has been that they have two settings: super-easy and way-too-complicated. Either I figure out the cases in the first fifteen minutes, or I can't figure them out after having watched them two or three times. It's okay, because I didn't fall in love with this show because of the plots; I fell in love with the characters and their interaction with each other. As long as that is working, everything else is gravy. But this was one of the few episodes that kept me interested in both the plot and the characters, and that's why I think it was the best episode yet.

NCIS is one of the few shows I've seen that has gotten better with age. Most shows start dying out around or slightly before season 7 (if they make it this far). If they last much past this, their audience usually shrinks. But the NCIS audience is growing, and it's for good reason. This show was too complicated in the first couple seasons, trying to explain all these complex characters and their relationships while still maintaining crime-solving plot lines. Persistence paid off though, because eventually we fell in love with the characters. After that, the rest started to click into place.

This is my most highly anticipated show of the season. I like the other things I'm watching, but I don't feel the same compulsion to watch any of them as I do NCIS. In fact, I haven't felt this way since 2005, when Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip aired its lone season (and talk about a show that got canceled prematurely! But that's a conversation for a different time and place). I'm excited to see where this season will take us.

Rating (this episode):

[1] Run in the other direction

[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do

[4] Definitely try it out

[5] A total keeper

Big Bang Theory - The Electric Can Opener Fluctuation

Network: CBS

Time: Mondays, 9:30-10:00pm

Cast: Johnny Galecki, Jim Parsons, Kaley Cuoco, Simon Helberg, Kunal Nayyar

Creator: Chuck Lorre, Bill Prady

Summary: At the end of season two, the boys left for a research study in the Arctic. Before they went, however, Leonard and Penny shared a moment, and Penny realized how much she was going to miss him.

Review: Season 3 of Big Bang is off to a, well, bang. The guys are back from the Arctic, and they're finding their own ways to keep warm. There are some mild spoilers ahead, but nothing you don't find out in the first five minutes of the episode.

Spoiler/Major Plot Device #1 - Sheldon. Turns out, the guys lied to him about the results they were finding on his study. In other words, he had squat. Too bad he'd already told everyone about his miraculous findings. Oops. Well, after he finds out his friends had destroyed his dreams of a Nobel Prize, he takes off running all the way to the opposite of the Arctic. That's right, Sheldon goes home to Mama Cooper.

Spoiler/Major Plot Device #2 - Leonard and Penny. That's right, 'shippers, it's finally happened. Leonard comes back from the frozen tundra of the Arctic circle to see that Penny's clearly missed him... a lot.

Now, I'm as big a fan of Leonard and Penny as anyone, and I've certainly been rooting for their relationship since episode 1, but I had some problems with that aspect of this episode. When the boys left, there was a moment. You remember, Penny shut the door to her apartment and said, "Don't go," to the air? And then they've probably had no contact for three or four months while Leonard was in his own personal frozen hell? Then... they're making out? It seemed a little fast to me, despite the fact that we've been waiting for this for two years. And then, to make matters worse, it's awkward. For a fan who's been anticipating this relationship, the actual situation was a bit of a let down.

However, there were certainly more positives than negatives about this episode. The writing, as always, was stellar. The timing between the actors was great, and Sheldon, as usual, could not be matched. Jim Parsons has a way of taking already-good dialogue and pushing it up a notch with his spectacular grasp of Sheldon's character. In this episode, he alternated between the affronted, superior scientist who looked down on his friends, and the teenage boy he must have once been when dealing with his mother. Parsons played both parts brilliantly.

All things considered, Big Bang is clearly making a move to become a top-rated CBS sitcom. Up until now, Two and a Half Men and How I Met Your Mother have been the Monday night draws. Big Bang Theory was something you watched because it was in between (well, not me, but, you know, other people). But with the new time change came a new attitude, and Big Bang clearly wants to be a ratings frontrunner now. Personally, I think they've got a good chance. For a program about really smart people (which, let's face it, is rarely a selling point for a sitcom), there is something about this show that appeals to people of all intellects... whether you understand the geek-speak or not.

Rating (for this episode):

[1] Run in the other direction

[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do

[4] Definitely try it out

[5] A total keeper

Accidentally on Purpose - Pilot

Network: CBS

Time: Mondays, 8:30-9:00pm

Cast: Jenna Elfman, Jon Foster, Ashley Jensen, Lennon Parham, Grant Show, Nicolas Wright

Creator: Claudia Lonow

Based on memoir by Mary F. Pols

Summary: Accidentally on Purpose is a new sitcom on CBS starring Jenna Elfman and Jon Foster. Billie (Elfman), a thirty-something newspaper film critic, meets Zack (Foster) one night in a bar. Long story short, they have the one-night stand that every 22-year-old wannabe chef has nightmares about--the kind that gets the girl pregnant. Billie decides she's going to keep the baby, and Zack decides he's going to man up and be a father. So he moves into her house, and they begin their life as platonic friends who happen to be having a baby together.

Review: Because I didn't want to start with a bad review of Fame, I'll make my first post about the pilot episode of a brand new series, Accidentally on Purpose. Now, if you're anything like me, you watched the previews for and read the synopsis of this show and went, "What a stupid idea. The concept is totally overdone, and the premise is both unbelievable and cliched at the same time."

Or maybe that was just me.

Either way, I only watched this show because it was on between How I Met Your Mother and Two and a Half Men (and kudos to CBS for its good scheduling there). I'm the first to admit I went in skeptical, and I certainly wasn't prepared to give it its fair chance. Fortunately, it was good enough to surprise me.

Let's start with the main character. Billie isn't the typical thirty-something as portrayed in other shows. Yes, her biological clock is ticking (which is sort of what gets her in this mess to begin with). Yes, she's a bit neurotic sometimes. But all in all, she's got a good job; she's confident in herself as an employee, a woman, and a friend; and she's very grounded. She's exactly the kind of woman I'd like to be in my 30s. And, most importantly, she's exactly the kind of woman you like. Which is good for Claudia Lenow, the creator of Accidentally on Purpose, because it means more of us are going to keep watching it.

So then there's Zack. Now, in most sitcoms, he'd be the classic underachiever who hooked up with an older woman and now got himself into a mess, right? Well... he did hook up with an older woman. And I guess he got himself into a mess. But underachiever? No way. Zack handles this situation like any woman would die for. He decides right away that he wants to be a father for his child, which means being there for Billie during her pregnancy. And he's smart. In so many situations like this, the young dad-to-be has utterly no concept of what pregnancy is. He asks stupid questions and makes completely inappropriate comments. Not Zack (that dubious honor is reserved for his best friend, the underachieving slacker named Davis (Nicolas Wright) who's futon was the site of conception). Zack is sweet and sensible and shows a level of commitment that Billie couldn't hope for from most of the older men she knows.

Now, the main characters are great, but any viewer knows that it's the supporting cast that really makes a show, especially a sitcom. And Accidentally on Purpose has that in droves. There's Billie's best friend Olivia (Ashley Jensen), who is the Sex and the City-generation's answer to the thirty-something, and whose often not-great advice contributes to Billie's situation. There's Billie's sister Abby (Lennon Parham), who may not have gotten the brains in the family, but she seems to have the relationship skills. There's Zack's best friend Davis, who I spoke about earlier, and whose relationship with Billie may actually be funnier than any other relationship combination in the show.

And of course there has to be the drama. We'll call him James (Grant Show). James is Billie's boss. I mean, ex-boyfriend. I mean, love interest. I mean... well, you get the point. He's the wedge that drives the potential Zack and Billie relationship apart, at least for now.

What made this pilot so good? I don't know. It could be the great characters that just beg you to like them. It could be the snappy dialogue and the one-liners that had me laughing until my sides hurt. Or it could just be the wonderfully real relationships that develop as a result of this baby. No matter what it is, I know where I'm going to be on Mondays at 8:30 for awhile.

Rating:

[1] Run in the other direction

[2] Don't bother

[3] Worth a watch if you've got nothing better to do

[4] Definitely try it out

[5] A total keeper