Criminal Minds’ changing of the guard
Today’s Guest-clacker is JJ, who lives in Austin, TX and is a Systems Engineer. He claims he watches waaaayyyy too much TV and he’s always looking for the next “better” show. To date, he’s never found anything better than Showtime’s Brotherhood.
First off I think I should preface by saying I’m a pretty big fan of Criminal Minds. I started watching it religiously, probably back mid-season two, and have watched Aaron Hotchner (Thomas Gibson) grow as a leader then turn around and fall as a failure. This episode is the first episode where Hotchner is no longer the team lead and in the “changing of the guards” Derek Morgan (Shemar Moore) becomes the lead FBI agent.
This episode is pretty straight forward; it’s focused on the new leadership style of Morgan and didn’t have many — if any — twists in the episode, which is very unlike Criminal Minds. It had the typical start of the dark and depressing “killer beginning” attempting to set the mood of the episode, but honestly feels as if it fell short.
I did notice something that isn’t very typical for Criminal Minds which is we actually see a majority of the killer’s face in the first few scenes; the show usually attempts to hide the killer with overcasting shadows. This actually turned me off from the episode almost instantly because unlike the norm for the show, they concentrated on the character development instead of the crime.
TNT: The little network with the smart decisions
I adore TNT. For me, they seem to have come out of nowhere when Leverage boomed onto the scene (I know, I’m a late bloomer), but I’ve been keeping a good eye on them since then, and every decision they have made has been a winner.
Before Leverage, TNT was going strong with The Closer and Saving Grace, two unique series driven by strong women. Nothing bad about that angle! Since then they’ve realized their original programming is kind of kick-ass, so they’ve debuted Dark Blue and HawthoRNe. It’s like watching a good game of poker, as Kenny Rogers said: “You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em (Leverage), know when to fold ‘em (Trust Me), know when to walk away (Saving Grace being allowed to finish out), know when to run (*cough*Trust Me*cough*)….”
The Practice virgin’s diary – George Vogelman, in a nun’s habit, with a butcher’s knife
(Season 4, Episodes 1-3)
I’m still trying to figure out the timeline of the beginning of this season versus the end of the last. It’s long enough that Lindsay’s out of the hospital, but short enough that she’s still feeling the physical scars of her attack. Considering that the perpetrator is still out there, and that this was a crime that involved an ADA’s best friend, the arrest of a judge, and the death of a known criminal, hopefully they didn’t just wait the four month summer hiatus to pick things up again. Can we trust that the criminal justice system in Boston is more efficient than that?
4.1 “Free Dental”
Only Fonzie (Henry Winkler) could be sympathetic as a dentist with a bug fetish, accused of murdering a patient. Well, maybe not sympathetic, but less than cringe-worthy, so at least a step in the right direction that no one else could have managed. The entire case was a bit odd for a season premiere (and what was with the grape jelly angle?), and I wasn’t quite sure why Bobby AND Lindsay had to be there to help Jimmy. Do they just always come as a pair now? Read the rest of this entry »
Diary of a Carnivale virgin – The relationship merry-go-round
(Season 1, Episodes 10-11)
I’m just about through with the first season of Carnivale, and I’m finding it hard to believe that that means I’m nearly halfway through the entire series. How did this show only get two seasons? I’ve admitted that it may not be quite as good as some of the classic HBO shows that were on around the same time, but it is still a great show.
That’s just the way things go sometimes, I suppose. I can’t really make any judgement calls on the cancellation until I finish up the series. Maybe it fell apart during the second season.
Behind-the-scenes footage, a contest, and a video vixen – Medium Roundup
Each week, I slave over a hot laptop to bring Medium fans news, promos, and other goodies associated with the show. These are some of the highlights from the past week at Medium Dreams. Enjoy!
- My “Bite Me” review pretty much agrees with Brett’s: The Night of the Living Dead stuff was fun, but the main mystery was pretty easy to figure out.
- Here are some behind-the scenes videos of the Night of the Living Dead episode, including some of Patricia Arquette being inserted into the film.
- CBS is running a contest where you can win a trip to L.A. to visit the set of Medium.
- This “Trip Down Memory Lane” involves Patricia Arquette as a video vixen. She appeared in The Rolling Stones’ video for “Just Like a Rolling Stone.” She plays a junkie!
- Here’s the press release for this week’s episode of Medium, “New Terrain.” Allison seems to be involved in yet another car accident.
- Yet another “Trip Down Memory Lane” brings us a couple of Medium parodies that MadTV did a few years back. The first one is hysterical.
Too much of Gordon Ramsay is not a good thing
Currently, we have superstar chef Gordon Ramsay as host and berater of FOX’s Hell’s Kitchen and Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. We also have him as host of the British version of Kitchen Nightmares and Gordon Ramsay’s F Word on BBC America. So, do we need to see any more of the verbally abusive chef who we never see actually cook anything?
Apparently we do. FOX has decided to bring over the Masterchef concept from jolly ol’ England to air in America because, frankly, we don’t have enough cooking shows out there that start or end with Master. The show will be hosted by Ramsay, who will challenge everyday backyard BBQers, homemakers, and folks who can’t boil water to prepare delicious dishes on their way to becoming a MasterChef. As with Ramsay’s 500 other shows, he’ll gently put these innocent folks through their paces to create amazing, culinary creations. That, or he’ll make them crying heaps of Jello.
Undeclared – CliqueClack Flashback
Undeclared is the best show about school ever made. Cliqueclack Flashback = DONE.
Judd Apatow’s quickly-canceled college follow-up to his quickly-canceled high school series, Freaks and Geeks, was released my junior year of college. I hadn’t seen Freaks and Geeks at the time, so I had no idea who Seth Rogen, Jason Segel, or any of the other now-familiar faces in the cast were. I just knew that it was the funniest and most painfully-realistic portrayal of college life that I had ever seen.
The cast looked, dressed and sounded like actual college students– not 30-year-old hookers, which is a feat that has not been accomplished since. The guys were odd looking– a fact that was freely mentioned, and even the hot girls looked like normal hot college girls, not model/actresses. It was this realism that allowed the writing to shine and allowed the viewers to identify with every single thing these people were going through.
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