Perfect Harmony Review

When "Perfect Harmony" and "Sunnyside" both premiered this Fall, I had a hunch only one of the shows would survive due to NBC's penchant for cancelling promising shows (I still haven't forgiven the network for the double whammy of "Go On" and "The New Normal" circa 2013). I got an essay published on this at The Federalist but originally submitted it before "Sunnyside" got cancelled (fortunately, it's been picked up by Hulu). As a result, I cut out the "Perfect Harmony" part of the essay and focused solely on "Sunnyside." Here's the leftover "Perfect Harmony" stuff:

"Perfect Harmony" is an odd couple pairing between an uptight Princeton music professor (Brad Whitford) and the populace of a small Kentucky town. The (extremely laborious) premise for the set-up is that the professor has just been fired and is on his way to bury his dead wife and subsequently commit suicide when he hears a church choir singing awful music and decides on instinct to give them some quick pointers before pulling the trigger. He then decides to stay alive a few days longer through a choir competition against his new mortal enemy and things roll from there.

More than anything else, "Perfect Harmony" is a red-state/blue-state clash of values and the sentimental highs it hopes to produce are from people overcoming their differences and meeting in the middle. The show portrays the small-town characters as eccentric, the viewer loyalty generally leans towards the red state mannerisms of the locals as they are portrayed as far more emotionally open and genuine.

Recent Emmy winner Brad Whitford is far too grumpy to be interesting. Like Danny and Matt in
"Studio 60", Whitford's Dr. Cochran's genius is portrayed as something that goes hand-in-hand with being a 40-year-old trapped in an 80-year-old curmudgeon's body. In truth, it just comes off as annoying.  

Sadly, the show does have a star in Anna Camp who is somewhat of an original character with her perkiness, Spring beauty, and an internal battle between restrained Southern charm and frustration-driven id. Sadly, the show puts too much emphasis on Whitford who doesn't have much going for him. So far, the show pedals in broad characters with friends/roommates Dwayne and Wayne serving as a redneck tweedle-dee/tweedle-dum of sorts (though Dwayne has hidden dimensions), diva Adams Adams who owns the local restaurant. I have a soft spot for Rizwan Manji who has alternately played genuinely nice people and passive-aggressive social climbers ("Outsourced" "Arrested Development") in equal measure.

Not sure where the show is going, but let's hope it doesn't get cancelled as well. (Although, good news! Sunnyside got picked up by Hulu)

Rise Episode 3 Review: What Flowers May Bloom

Credit: Vulture

In the melodramatic version of high school presented by Rise, there are two polar archetypes of “Manhood” with a capital “M”: football and theater. 

Theater guys tend to talk about their feelings whereas football players tend to bury it away because it supposedly gets in the way of glorious character-building manly labor.  Theater guys are comfortable with all manners of non-straightness and might even be somewhere on the LGBQT spectrum, whereas football guys are too busy dealing with their magnetic allure to the opposite sex to notice such things.

Granted, "Rise" didn’t invent these stereotypes, but the show seems too lazy at times to portray its world any other way. This thematic axis guides the development of nearly everything in the world. The show’s alpha male characters, Mr. Mazzou and Robbie discover their self-actualization in the world of theater which refines their more masculine edges. It’s here that they both get in touch with their feminine sides (primarily being empathetic) needed to navigate all the challenges in their lives that require feelings and all that gooey stuff.

Mr. Mazzou needs to recognize Mrs. Wolfe as an asset and find the words needed to communicate with Simon's about why their son should stay in Staunton. One might call his two encounters with Mr. and Mrs. Saunders an arc of sorts: In the first encounter, he tries to us his masculinity to stake out his territory and puts his foot in the door when Simon’s mom tries to close it. But he lacks the words to follow through. Later, he’s miraculously granted the words (supposedly by being humbled by Mrs. Wolfe). Similarly, Robbie doesn’t yet have the words to put his crush at ease that he would be faithful to her but he’s getting there.

For the show’s reductive dichotomy of manhood, it at least gets credit for not villainizing the school of Strickland completely. Gordy, who’s been overly feminized in the world of theater, finds the lack of conversation with Strickland therapeutic in dealing with his punishment. Of course, there’s a separate conversation to be had over whether the punishment fits the crime in terms of drug offenses, but we’ll save that for another day. Interestingly enough, Strickland lacks the words to express what he needs to say to Vanessa so he has the same problems as Robbie and Mr. Mazzou. But Strickland has presumably gotten as far as he has in connecting with Vanessa because he’s capable of showing what he means through gestures. A cell phone cover doesn’t really fall under the category of Valentine’s gifts, but whatever floats your boat, Vanessa.

Beyond the character arcs themselves, there’s a lot to appreciate about the way Rise as a whole shows without words. Consider how well the interactions between Robbie and Lilliean encapsulate the sweetness of being out with your crush and the visceral awkwardness of feeling out your potential partner.  This is also a week where (as far as we know), Simon might be saying goodbye to the theater program that has given him so much. The sadness behind Simon’s eyes as he announces his departure to the group and that tear-swelling hug with Mrs. Wolfe are both well-deserved moments. True, the music’s a little sappy but it’s hard to understate the emotional impact of these moments. One might call it a masculine touch on a traditionally feminime genre, but if you throw the dichotomy away, it’s a visually poetic and effective way of storytelling.

Getting "Bent": A look at NBC's promising Spring pilot

"Bent" is a sitcom about a womanizing half-baked handyman repairing the home of a high-strung lawyer in sunny California. The high-strung lawyer is played by Amanda Peet who sells the content self-assured woman so well, she could potentially be her own TV show genre. You could almost say "It's a show about a handyman and Amanda Peet" when pitching a sitcom and a network executive would know exactly how to picture that

You could call the show a romantic comedy (and coincidentally that's what the show IS being called) but there's nothing to indicate that the two leads will get together other than our expectations of what should happen in a sitcom if a) the two principal characters are male and female b) within 20 years of each other in age and c) neither character is hideously ugly.

In the pilot episode, Amanda Peet fires the handsome womanizing contractor when he canoodles (60% of the artistry in blogging is finding the best, most appropriate euphemism for sex) the maid. It was a moment in which Amanda Peete's character really established herself as she stood up and said "you're fired" to him.

For the handsome handyman guy (yes, I should look up the character's name or even the actor's name, I suppose), it should have been a big "oh sh--, what have I done" moment before moving onto someone else where the series should ideally start with another contractor who'd hire him with a tempting maid that he'd be making actual effort to resist.

Unfortunately, the plot loses me when she agrees to rehire him. I realize that this was a necessary move so that we'd have an episode two.

But this was the wrong course of action. I'm not suggesting that if it were a real life situation but that's what is truest to the characters.

I understand how this guy's narrative arc is to meet a woman different from him who challenges him but I don't see any glue that would keep them together past the length of the contractor job. Even worse I can't buy that he would even be in her life for said contracting job because a) she fired him and b) his firing was the most buyable moment of the episode and it already cheapened her character to have her relent because he kidnapped her daughter (really not the kind of thing to go over well with an alpha-mom like her) and taught her to play the piano.

I thought maybe they'd get stuck together because the competing contractor would all of a sudden drop out with the work half-done, and she'd be stuck in an emergency and actually need him. Then the balance of each person's needs would shift to the point where there we might get something interesting.

I'm not in any way, shape or form a screenwriter, and I could have already plotted out that episode better than the professionals did so I'd say that's a horrible start.


On a side note, I think it was moderately awesome that they had a character named "Screwsie"

Episode Review of Community-Sample for the AV Club

Community C



As the first season closes, I can’t help but applaud how far “Community” has come since that awkward pilot episode. The show has not only gotten more comfortable with its own rhythm but we’ve grown towards the show and its characters. Unfortunately, the season ended with a clunker which is made worse by the fact that last week’s episode seemed like a legitimately capable season finale. The main question of the season- “Will they band together as a group in order to pass Spanish?”- was resolved and that was when the curtain should have dropped.

This week's wholly unnecessary plot centered on the return of the Jeff-Britta-Professor Slater love triangle. This triangle later unexpectedly turns into a love rectangle. Or is rectangle the right term when you consider there are three people connected to one person and no romantic complications in between? Maybe a three-pronged fork of love? Anyways, Professor Slater lets Jeff know she wants to get back with him which awakens a sense of competition in Britta for Jeff’s affections. There’s a certain ambiguity over whether Britta really wants Jeff or if it’s more of a case of love tasting better when it’s gone. Or maybe Britta just thinks that Professor Slater is a bitch. If I was convinced it was the latter, I’d be more inclined to justify this episode’s existence.

However, if Britta suddenly came to the realization that she wants Jeff, it turns a character dynamic that was one of the show’s biggest strengths back into the cliché it originated as. The Jeff-Britta relationship grew to the point where it never boiled down to “When will he get her?” or “Will they or won’t they?” It is to the show’s credit that as Jeff’s purpose in life stopped being directed by a desire to sleep with Britta, the audience became sufficiently distracted from those expectations. Britta suddenly coming to terms with feelings for Jeff threatens to turn into a standard rom-com what was once a relationship wonderfully devoid of definition and unbound by sitcom convention. I very much liked that the show didn't treat Jeff and Britta sleeping together as a defining moment in the series.

In other plot lines, we have Annie and her struggle over whether to transfer with Vaughn or stay at Glendale. His reason for transferring (to me, this was the single most hilarious thing in the episode) is because he’s being recruited to join the number one hackey-sack team in the nation. Annie is so full of ambition that she’s always seemed destined for better things but it’s fairly clear that this isn’t one of them, so it’s no surprise she stays. Oh yeah, and she also kisses Jeff. The way I wrote that was the same way I reacted to it: It felt like an afterthought to the story. Of course, we can be sure it won’t be treated as an afterthought next season since the repercussions of Jeff kissing Annie can’t be ignored. Still, it felt like too desperately plotted a moment to register with me.

One of this show’s strengths was that it avoids gimmicky drama in favor of realism. Relationships don’t just turn into things they’re not supposed to just because the drama demands it. I’m hoping that this was a case of bowing to network demand. Maybe, the network wanted a classic “Ross kisses Rachel”-type cliffhanger (correct me if I’m wrong but I’d have a hard time believing that at least one Friends season didn’t end with Ross kissing Rachel) that made sure the audiences were coming back.

Maybe the show’s references to jumping the shark was a tacit acknowledgement that the show knew what it was doing something wrong but couldn’t help itself for whatever reason. At many colleges (at least I know this was the policy at mine), there’s a policy of having to clear out your dorm room after you take your last final rather than stick around during finals week. I wish “Community” had followed the same policy.

Stray Observations:

-There was also a C-plot which I wasn’t able to work into the above recap that deserves mention as well: Troy has to move out of his home and hopes Abed will take him in as a roommate. Abed turns him down but Pierce agrees to take him in. I neither liked nor disliked this story but it does get me looking forward to the possibilities of what will happen with those two.

-Also, there are a lot of smaller little developments relevant to the bigger picture. The D-, E-, and F- and G-plots are that Shirley is reconnecting with her kids, Senor Chang is looking for a shortcut, Jeffery Winger has made friends with a lot of people outside the study group too, and Dean Pelton is dancing with a bear. I’m sorry I don’t know why he was dancing with a polar bear. Was that important?



-John Oliver makes a nice return and steals the little screentime he has. His best line: “I have a counterproposal. How about I point out to you that we’ve never been friends and then laugh at your very well-deserved misfortune”



-On jumping the shark: “And for the record, there was an episode of Happy Days where a guy literally jumped over the shark and it was the best one”


-The closing credits bit was a great bit of humor that felt like the kind of unrestrained improve you see in a Christopher Guest film. I liked Britta’s line: “I don’t believe in yearbooks.”


-“I’m sorry do you have a patent on loving people?”

Thursday Night TV Review Part III: Office/30 Rock

Don't forget to check out my article on how relevant SNL alumni still are these days.


The Office:

While Jim and Pam are on their honeymoon, Michael gets entangled with the mafia (I think?) while the B-plot can best be described as a bunch of people want to bother Jim and Pam on their honeymoon in Puerto Rico.

I honestly was writing too much about Community while The Office was going on to be able to entirely absorb the plot but in the A-plot but here’s what I got: Michael gets the idea to write his own book and starts narrating (this would have been a better plot than what we were presented with); a large Italian man tries to sell Michael something, there’s some ambiguity over whether he’s in the mafia; Andy and Dwight attend a meeting in a restaurant with a large Italian guy; Andy is wearing a mechanic’s uniform and volunteers to repair the car of a woman and her son who mistakenly treat him as such; and the staff launches into a discussion over whether this guy is mafia or not based on his last name. At the end of the episode, Michael “stands up to the mob” although we don’t know if he’s in the mob or not.

The B-plot might have centered around Pam and Jim but it was made all the better by the fact that they were physically absent from the episode. For someone who thinks JAM is overused, it’s nice to get a much-needed break from Jim’s smirk for a week. On the downside, we have an overdose of Kevin who has often been criticized in going from adorably dense to full-on retarded in recent seasons. In a show that’s going for realism, Kevin sticks out like a sore thumb. In any case, Kevin commandeers Jim’s office while he’s on his honeymoon for reasons that definitely seem retarded to me. Things take a twist when Kevin accidentally causes Jim’s credit card to be voided (best scene in the episode). In the meantime, Jim is bothered by Michael because he needs bailing out when the whole mafia thing blows up and Oscar calls up Jim because he feels like the office is going to Hell without Jim’s presence. This all leads up to a fairly rewarding punch line. One major concern was that Jim has only been in charge for one week? Wasn’t he the office slacker a week ago? This characterization is getting a little rushed here.

My review of this week’s The Office doesn’t hold much water because of my distraction, but it seemed like this episode took rather unpromising ideas to run with.


B-







30 Rock started and ended off with a cute meta-awareness and in between a definite sense of improvement over a lackluster 3rd season. I agree with the AV Club’s review that the show got caught up in too many “Liz finds love” plots and too heavy of a reliance on guest stars. The Office had a comeback year last season by taking the relatively safe premise (of a regional manager who would always keep his job no matter how eccentric his ideas are) and turning it upside down.

Maybe what was wrong was that 30 Rock was getting too safe. We knew every one of Liz and Jack’s celebrity love interests wouldn’t last because we read in the Hollywood Reporter that Jon Hamm and Selma Hayek had limited episode contracts. Similarly, we know that Kenneth the Page will continue to be dumb but loyal. Jack teased us a couple times into thinking that someday Kenneth was going to amount to more than the sum of his parts and eventually take over Jack’s job. In this episode, Kenneth finally lives up to that billing as a capable foil to Jack Donaughy and that made him interesting for the first time since the poker game in Season 1.

Jack cuts overtime pay for his pages and gives himself a bonus instead. When Kenneth accidentally takes a peek at Jack’s paycheck, he becomes furious and stages a strike with the demand that Jack put down in writing that he lied. It’s a battle of wits between Jack’s hard line business savvy and Kenneth’s naïveté affability. The exact opposite ends of the human spectrum that these two characters inhabit has been capitalized upon a little (the episode where Jack puts Kenneth in an elevator with a literal reenactment of lifeboat ethics comes to mind) but the show has never literally pit the two characters against each other. It felt like this episode seemed like something that the show’s been leading up to forever. Things even get topical with a pseudo-debate between the two about the extremes of capitalism.

In the B-plot, Josh is leaving the cast and Jack orders Pete and Tina to find a replacement that reflects middle American values more. This raises the question of where the hell Josh has been for the past two seasons. He sort of disappeared and I don’t know if it does the show any good to call attention to how thin the show’s cast is anyway (it seems like there are only three characters on the show). This prompts Tracy and Jenna to get in touch with the common man more. The show gets plenty meta but it’s almost as if Tracy and Jenna are used almost entirely as a single meta-joke and it feels a little bit cheap. Still, there’s an inspired bit of lunacy that feels almost improvised as Tracy goes out into the middle of the striking crowd and tries not to act plebian.

There’s also a C-plot in which Liz and Pete have to keep the show’s new hire a secret so they do a really lame job of keeping their scouting trips to the comedy clubs a secret and the staff starts to suspect that they’ve had an affair. It all basically leads to a punchline that’s moderately worthwhile.

On the strength of the A-plot, I’m hoping that 30 Rock is en route to a better season.

A-

Thursday Night TV Review Part II: Parks and Recreation

An article: Borat is satire, Bruno is social harm

Parks and Rcereation:
This was the best episode of Parks and Recreation to date. Fred Armisen guest stars as a the head of the delegation of Pawnee’s Venezuelan sister city and he turns out to be surprisingly rude. He insults Leslie’s efforts to welcome him at every turn and he even appears so culturally abhorrent as to think that he can take any American women he wants as prostitutes. The episode basically takes his Ferecito character on Saturday Night Live and combines it with a little bit of Borat. Needless to say, I wonder how this will play in Venezuela. It’s not very original but it was innovative and it was funny and that alone makes this the best episode of Parks and Recreation to date.

Among the other pluses of this episode were:
1) The absence of the Anne-Mark romance as that has been the most chemistry-laden pairing I have ever seen in the history of television
2) A hilarious B-plot involving a Venezuelan intern being enamored with April who alternates between giving him flirtatious signals and acting bored to death of him. Aubrey Plaza takes the art of deadpan to new levels with her stoic emotional monotone and as far as strong supporting characters go, it’s hard to top her.
3) The show having a few key twists involving the brash Venezuelans apologizing and willing to make it up to Leslie with a major gift before it is revealed that they have ulterior motives. Both the show’s twists surprised me and neither took the easy way out.

The show was great and even approached levels of simultaneous humor and tension that The Office achieves. At the same time, I have to wonder if the show’s characters can produce this much wonderful humor on their own without the benefit of a guest star. Fred Armisen’s character highlighted the inherent humor in Leslie and, on a larger scale, the city of Pawnee’s situation because he serves as such a perfect foil to her inept sense of pride. Leslie is pretty abnormal and that’s where the humor is supposed to come from but
that humor is lost because there’s no contrast: Her ideas and mannerisms are largely accepted by those around her.

Bottom line: A great episode but doesn’t necessarily make me confident that the show will be equally as good next week.

Grade: A

Thursday Night TV Review-Part I: Community

About 3 years ago, I reviewed NBC's Thursday night block in its entirety. Recently inspired by the AV Club's reviews of single TV episodes, I thought I'd do the same thing:

I have no idea if the AV club is hiring, but note to you guys, consider this my application:

Community:




This week, Britta cheats on a Spanish test and Jeff continues his quest to win her favor by defending her before the honor council. Despite Jeff being an a—hole (or maybe because of it), his romantic pairing with Britta is one of the most endearing romances on television simply because of the very reason he stated so succinctly towards the end of the episode: His motivation with her is about more than just sex, because if it was just about sex he wouldn’t be going through all this crap to be friends with her. In an effort to develop the outer edges of their ensemble instead of hiring more guest stars, Community uses the three faculty members on the show (Tony Jeung, Jim Rash, and Jon Oliver) as the honor council and they provide some of the episode’s best moments.

The two b-plots are pretty much throwaways: Annie relies on Pierce to write the school song and he lets her down while Abed tries a little too hard to play a prank on Troy. The last two Abed subplots remind me of those plots on Star Trek where Data tries to answer the question of what it means to be human. That’s how disconnected from the world around him Abed is.

I’m somewhat tough on this show because while it has some characters with potential and moments of humor, its attempts at combining the cynical musings of smart-aleck Joel McHale with genuine heartfelt moments of togetherness fall short. Joel McHale’s rambling diatribe in the pilot about pencils, sharks, and Ben Affleck made me cringe and both attempts to infuse the show with the broken-souls-in-need-of-a-second-chance theme fell equally flat: Annie’s pep talk to Pierce to keep him from giving up on writing a song and Jeff’s ludicrous appeal that while Britta violated the honor code, it’s in the school’s interest to keep her.

Fortunately, both those corny moments were redeemed by comedic mishaps: The song Pierce ends up writing was stolen from Bruce Hornsby and Jeff’s speech allows Jon Oliver’s Dean to make a power play on Britta (under her punishment she must undergo counseling with him once a week).

Grade: B+

Also, check out this latest article I wrote at the Examiner (17 Actors overdue for a nomination)

My take on the season's new shows

My take on various TV shows presented through Helium

Cougartown, ABC-The show is clearly oriented towards a female audience in the same way Desperate Housewives or Grey's Anatomy is, but it's surprisingly watchable to both genders. It's more about a woman going through a midlife crisis than it is "Sex and the City" with a teenage son. Courtney Cox does imbue the character with a sort of sincere desperation that puts her on just the right side of endearing.
My verdict: I'll watch it if I catch it on TV

Community, NBC-The idea of a setting of community college is a winner and the cast as pretty amicable. I like the characters of Annie, Abed, the Spanish teacher and Britta already. That being said, some are hailing this as a show that is a genuinely finished product when the show still needs a lot of fine tuning to find its groove. Attempts at sedimentality have been cringe-inducingly akward so far.
My verdict: I watch it weekly but am willing to unceremoniously drop the show if it doesn't iron out its kinks

Glee, FOX-I love this show. I had an attraction to Popular as well ten years ago which was created by the same guy so I had an expectation that we'd be taken into a world of strange extremes: rigidly defined high school stereotypes contrasted with very relatable relationships between people. The show certainly has a unique style and the musical numbers are fun. I don't buy that it's a parody so much as just a tonally different version of High School Musical. The show takes its musical numbers too seriously to be called a parody.
My verdict: Watch it weekly

Castle, ABC-Nathan Fillion just strikes me as a poor man's Jason Bateman. He looks matine-idol-like enough that if you put him on the bridge of a spaceship like in Firefly, then he's pleasant enough, but I'm not that big of a fan of him. In Castle, he's a bit smarmy. There are a number of shows featuring some duo of detectives, thieves (the show with Melissa George and John Stamos), or hostage negotiatiors (that show with Ron Livingston) with sexual chemistry but I give this show credit for not jamming these two people together in circumstances that are hard to buy. It seems that the two are genuinely stuck with each other and only one of them likes it, which is a good formula for keeping the dynamic interesting.
My verdict: Arguably worth watching. Deserves a couple more episodes

Modern Family, ABC-Some are hailing this as the great new comedy of the season and like Community, it's not fully formed enough for anyone to really make that call yet. It's use of the single camera mockumentary format detracts from the show, as far as I'm concerned. Just because the Office uses a mockumentary style and it's a great show doesn't mean that it works for everything. In this case, the humor isn't effective enough for us to laugh without some kind of cue (Malcolm in the Middle, Arrested Development, Srubs, My Name is Earl and 30 Rock, for example have musical cues which cue us in). The combination of a gay couple, a traditional 3-children household, and a patriarch who married a Columbian half his age and takes on her son from another marriage (I'm sure that was a run-on sentence) is still a pretty good set-up and that's what makes the show work well. Some people are saying that Ty Burrell is the breakout character as the dad who tries too hard to be cool, but my favorite Sofia Vergara as the saucy Latina.
My verdict: Not the centerpiece of my TV viewing schedule, but I'll watch it. Deserves time to see where it goes, at least.

Flashfoward, ABC-This sounded like an intriguing show but too many cop cliches kept me from getting too interested in it. After seeing so many cop shows, seeing anyone act remotely like Dennis Franz is enough to get you to tune out. This isn't a cop show, but an example of breaking cliches to make a show interesting would be Dennis Leary's Rescue Me where the firemen are heroic but also pretty vulgar.
My verdict: Didn't even make it to end of episode 1

The Jay Leno Show, NBC-As many others have pointed out, putting Jay Leno on at 10 pm pretty much strips NBC of any integrity that they believe that they can deliver us a good product. It was pretty much a cost-cutting movie and it's like watching monkeys in a cage to see the network execs try to pass this off as a bold creative move that they can be proud of. The only thing to mildly be excited about is that D.L. Hughley and a couple other intriguing personalities are added as correspondents, but NBC is basically throwing in the towel at this point.
My verdict: Depending on who's the guest and if nothing else is on TV, I probably still wouldn't watch it, but maybe if I really have to watch TV

The Good Wife, CBS-I'm trying to figure out as I watch this if lawyer shows are intended only for a certain subset of the population (i.e. people who've been to law school) or if the drama is captivating enough for everyone. There's a lot of dark music to indicate this is supposed to be gripping, but I'm not feeling it. The other angle about the disgraced politician's wife, however, is plenty juicy. The show is basically about Elizabeth Edwards, Silda Spitzer or Jenny Sanford and appropriately starts off with a press conference where the political figure is apologizing while the wife "stands" by his side. As they're walking down the hall on the way out, she slaps him. Now we're talking! A little bit later the daughter asks mommy, "I just read that daddy slept with a prostitute my age. Is this true?" This is the juicy stuff but the show doesn't seem as interested in all that as it does about being a generic lawyer show about a tough woman. I can see how a weekly series that takes the tone of a Douglas Sirk melodrama might really become a drag, but that's the show's most relevant and pressing angle.
Final verdict: Don't see promise

Cleveland Show, FOX-(a bit of a longer review than I originally intended on)
On Family Guy, Cleveland Brown has never served much purpose besides being a token black character as far as I've been concerned. Obviously, Mike Henry disagrees. Henry is the white actor who voices Cleveland and when he talks about his excitement for centering a spinoff around the Cleveland character, it seems apparent how proud he is of his own creation. What exactly Cleveland's unique mannerisms are, beyond being a little timid, that make him worth watching, I'm not sure. He's certainly never been a great source of humor.

Fortunately, there are some unique characters in the background: Cleveland's son, Cleveland Jr. is an incredibly sympathetic figure because he's probably one of the most hopeless characters on television (chubby, little ambition, so eager to please that he's willing to find his niche as a bathroom attendant), his biological son Rollando is someone I could see myself liking more than Stewie (he's a smack-talking kindergartener who might be described as street-smart in the same way Stewie's book-smart), and a rebellious teenage daughter who's more assertive than Lisa Simpson or Meg (might not be up there with American Dad's Hailey). The wife, Donna, is the heart of the show. The show advertises itself as the sappier and more heartwarming spinoff of Family Guy and there's just a little bit of that gooey feeling to be found within the story of Cleveland and Donna being reunited as a married couple.

Cleveland and his three neighbors (two white guys of various socio-economic levels and an animatronic bear) form a social group that's almost a virtual clone of the quartet that drinks at Quahog's Drunken Clam which wasn't a good idea if the show wanted to set itself apart. The bear is nowhere near as funny as Roger the alien, Klauss the fish or Brian, the dog.

The setting and the fact that this will be a fairly faithful take on the black sitcom (as faithful as white writers can be) might also be seen as a plus or a minus
Final verdict: Worth watching to see where it goes. Watching 3 Seth MacFarlane shows in one night is a bit overkill, but if I'm not feeling the American Dad or Family Guy episodes, I'll tune into this

More thoughts on My Name is Earl damaging NBC

Again, please click on this link, because articles written for helium is where I get my revenue:
http://www.helium.com/items/1318751-the-hollywood-summer-blockbuster-formula
Click on the name and move around a little bit.

I’m not sure what NBC was thinking when they scrapped My Name is Earl in favor of having a line-up of Community, Parks and Rereation, The Office and 30 Rock.

The Office, 30 Rock, and My Name is Earl are all successes with built-in audiences. The My Name is Earl numbers might have been less strong but the show still had an audience. The president at NBC reportedly had difficult calls to make on Chuck and My Name is Earl and Chuck won him over because fans had a strong write-in campaign. They apparently mailed him Subway sandwiches. That’s the way to run a network?!

My first complaint is why are TV networks so oblivious to everything but Nielsen ratings? Just look up TV guide or Entertainment Weekly and see how often people are writing praises for My Name is Earl as opposed to a show like Yes, Dear or Two and a Half Men. Go to tv.com and imdb.com and see how many people have posted votes or reviews on a series like My Name is Earl. See how active the message boards are. Talk to people. See how many fans of these shows exist on facebook. Look at Q ratings. Look at the volume of My Name is Earl-related twitter messages. Look at traffic on your site. Look at itunes sales and hulu sales. There are so many ready-made substitutes to Nielsen that a network can sell advertisers on. The fact that the network presidents are only looking at Nielsen ratings makes me annoyed at how oblivious to culture they are. It's also worth noting that Nielsen ratings have been thought to be statistically insignificant and are even more faulty in the digital age as people have more options for skipping commercials.

The NBC President’s decision only shows that Chuck has fans were more successful at mobilizing themselves. Chuck fans were a niche group who were strongly devoted to that show, but steady My Name is Earl watchers are more numerous I believe. Judging by the angry responses, I believe they existed as well.

Lastly, My Name is Earl was more important than Chuck because just think how good it would be for NBC to have a solid Thursday night line-up. Remember the days of Must See TV? How many years has NBC actually had 4 good sitcoms in a row and how excited were we as sitcom viewers to stay glued to our TV screens for two whole hours during those years? Remember those disastrous 8:30 shows like Union Station, Single Guy, Jesse, and that animated one King of the Pride? The brief My Name is Earl, Scrubs, Office and 30 Rock was one of the only years in my memory where that two hour block was solid. Scrubs moved networks and Parks and Recreation was worth a shot so the 2 hours were still pretty intact but most people agree that Parks and Recreation has a lot of kinks to rough out for the second season to be watchable.
Community is pretty promising but it could easily not live up to expectations either.

My bet? One of these two shows will bomb and the end result is that you’re only gonna have one and a half hours of comic gold to work with. Then My Name is Earl is going to be sitting there looking like a pretty attractive option. But, oh wait, you cancelled My Name is Earl and the actors have signed contracts for other things. Won’t you be kicking yourself when that happens?

The annoying thing: I’m not running a TV network but I can easily run it better than someone running a TV network because I see the same thing happening every year. In the meantime, I have to live with the decisions made by incompetent TV network execs.

Top 10 TV Shows of 2006

Very soon, my review of Valkyrie will be up here (I very much liked it, 3 1/2 stars).

In the meantime, this is a retread of an article that NBC4 published in 2006. They just redid their website so a lot of my material might be virtually unsearchable at this point. You will notice that all of these shows with the exception of Studio 60, is still on the air:
1. The Office, NBC It’s hard to understate how much the show has outgrown its original premise of an office drone with haphazard career ambitions, the girl who’s taken that he fawns over anyway, the annoying cubicle mate he quarrels with, and the socially inept boss who desperately wants to be Mr. Popular. In the show’s second season and the start of its third, the Pam-Jim chemistry has become a more realistic portrayal of modern day romance than practically any movie in the last decade, Steve Carrell has given Michael Scott endearing traits and even Dwight has been starting to come around. Even better, the show has promoted most of the recurring guest stars to cast members this season, adding a whole new layer of depth. Overgrown valley girl Kelly (Mindy Kaling), politically correct Human Recourses man Toby (Paul Liberstein), and creepy Creed (Creed Bratton) add even more neuroses to an already hilariously chaotic workplace.

2. Grey’s Anatomy, ABC It seems an inescapable fact that there’s always going to be a medical TV show that’s going to be the source of water cooler talk everywhere you go, and as medical dramas go, none have a more well-rounded cast. Accomplished actors Isiah Washington (Hollywood Homicide) and Sandrah Oh (Sideways) along with comedic actress Kate Walsh (Kicking and Screaming, Showbiz Show) play meaty supporting roles, and Chandra Wilson as the resident disciplinarian is excellent. Contrary to popular perception, the show doesn’t ignore the hospital setting in favor of juicy romance stories, but it does effectively make the stories human by focusing less on the medical jargon.



3. America ’s Got Talent While it was clear that the answer to the question “Does America have talent?” would be an obvious yes because it is a big country, you would still be pretty amazed by the quality of the acts that chose to answer this reality show’s call. Some of the acts worth tuning into included the homemade hiphop-acapella group At Last, the tap-dancing-and-fiddling family act Celtic Spring, a rapping Granny, and the bluesy Millers Brothers among so many others. Combined with a vaudeville-meets-reality-TV atmosphere and a panel of judges that includes a Brit that actually makes sense when he talks in Piers Morgan and nitpicky star David Hasselhoff on a career rebound, and this was THE reality show of the year.

4. American Idol On second thought, don’t forget American Idol. This season, the show had one of its most talented from top-to-bottom and uniquely diverse casts. Despite Cowell’s insults to the contrary, Ryan Seacrest’s star power continues to grow and Paula, Simon, and Randy all still are prevalent icons in pop culture today. How much longer until this show runs out of talented singers is a mystery, but this season the show was as strong a facet of pop culture as ever.

5. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, FX The dialogue doesn’t skip a beat and underneath all the bickering, there really is a lot of love between the lifelong friends who own a bar in Philly and share a common narcissistic outlook on life. The addition of Danny De Vitto to the emsemble is pitch-perfect casting.



6. 30 Rock/Studio 60, NBC Each show, about the fascinating topic of backstage comedy, has something the other half doesn’t, so put together they make one excellent TV show. Aaron Sorkin’s Studio 60 tackles serious issues with insight, and it offers very fleshed out characters except for the fact that none of them have a sense of humor. Unfortunately, that is kind of vital to a show about comedy. On the other hand, 30 Rock doesn’t have as much depth, but its characters convincingly belong on a comedy show. It also boasts two of today’s most appealing comic actors in Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey. If only one can learn from the other, NBC would have a hit.






7. Ugly Betty, ABC James Poniewozik of Time Magazine had a good point in his November 20th article that Ugly Betty really is the new face of the American dream. “Smart and sweet-hearted, she embodies the Puritan-Shaker-Quaker principle of valuing inner good over outer appearance. She's as Norman Rockwell as a chestnut-stuffed turkey,” he writes. For those not wanting to look that deep under the surface, the show is a fairly entertaining dramedy about a fish-out-of-water that exudes a lot of charm.

8. Heroes, NBC At a point when the entire superhero genre in films and TV is pretty much made of recycled comics material, part of the appeal of Heroes is that it’s fresh, completely original, and entirely unpredictable. Played out as a serial like Lost was last year, the show grounds the world of superheroes firmly in everyday reality, revolving around a group of people scattered across the globe who are slowly discovering and coming to terms with their supernatural powers. The episode plays out through multiple storylines being weaved together and more often than not each individual one is interesting enough to be able to sustain itself. The show is also becoming known for the character Hiro Nakamura (Masi Oka), the Japanese computer programmer who possesses childlike giddiness over his ability to teleport.

9. 30 Days, FX Morgan Spurlock’s shtick of investigative-reporting-by-experiencing is transferred from the movies (Supersize Me) to the TV screen with decidingly interesting results. Morgan Spurlock spends 30 days in a Richmond prison, and various other people spend a month outside their comfort zone. An abortion clinic director moves into a pastor’s motherhood clinic, a conservative moves into San Fransisco’s gay community, and an anti-immigration advocate moves into a bordertown with a family of illegal immigrants. This is one of the few reality shows to escape the sensationalistic clichés of the format: people don’t lose or win, they just get enlightened and by watching them, we do as well.

10. Best Week Ever, VH1 Possibly the only good thing VH1 has ever done, the show works as an offbeat alternative to the now more mainstream Daily Show where clips of news events, celebrity shenanigans and the highlights of the week are shown and a collection of comedians take turns sounding off on them and as of late, they’ve gotten surprisingly good within their format. The quality is far better than commercialized nostalgia-fests of VH1’s Best Week Ever.

Saying goodbye to Season 4's most dynamic character

With the arrest of Ryan in this past week's season finale on The Office, the show might have jumped the shark on the only character arc worth following in season 4.

I found Ryan to be boring in Seasons 1-3, but he became immensely interesting this past year. I find him incredibly relatable to real life for a lot of us young 20-somethings, who see some of our less intelligent peers excel through the ranks very quickly and let it get to our head.

Beyond that, Ryan was the only truly dynamic character in Season 4. Dwight has softened up over the last 2 seasons and has gone from stiffie to sympathetic figure but a lot of that was last season and some of the better characters had their coming out parties in prior seasons where they developed personality and became interesting characters: Oscar in season 3 (where he literally came out), Meredith in Season 2 revealing her alcoholness, Angela in season 2 and 3 revelaing her insanity, Dwight in season 3, creed in season 3 with his creepiness, Kelly in season 3 (the customer service episode especially).

The problem here is that the show aims for realism so the writing staff has to make sure the characters aren't overly dynamic, undergoing humongous character arcs. The only option in turn is to bring out interesting facets of characters, and the writers have done the best job with Ryan. I know we don't like Ryan as a person, but I loved where the character Ryan went this season as a study of absolute power corrupting absolutely.

JAM gone sour on The Office

I think that the Jim-Pam relationship has changed considerably since the end of Season 2 and it's not because they're together, but i think that that's taken down the show a little.



At first, Jim and Pam were these two people who in the midst of everyone were just right for each other.



Now, it's like Jim and Pam are the two most popular and in-demand young people in the Office. Jim isn't this guy who's akward around women and is interested in that one girl because he makes her feel complete. Since his successes with Katie and Karen, Jim's like this guy who can get anyone he wants.



He's no longer the everyman I root for. If Jim got rejected a little more, or proved to have some social kryptonite. I just see Jim as the alpha-male, now. For one, he used to pick on Dwight because Dwight annoyed him but his treatment of Andy is uaully unprovoked. But Jim had an, "I gotta show Andy who's boss," about him when he started messing with Andy by stealing his cell phone. Jim does what he does with Dwight because he works in close proximity to him.



And Pam is like the alpha-female of the office. Now, it's been revealed Ryan seems to have had a crush. Creed has seemed to have a sexual fetish for her. Toby likes her. She's like the most desirable property in the office.



Also Jim is like a big guy in size and he has cool hair. Those guys are usually the ones I see getting girls in bars. Girls generally are physically attracted to bigger guys. Martin Freeman, on the other hand, was small in stature.



Jim used to be the hopeless romantic, but I think he's like the alpha male steaking out the biggest property in the Office. And when you see it that way, then Jim's misguided relationships with Karen and Katie to get to Pam seem a little less noble and kind of wrong.

It's sad watching shows that have no chance

I watched Big Bang theory, I thought it was kind of clever, but I realize it has no chance. Half the comedy shows that come out have no chance of making it to season 2. Usually if they have a laugh track, they've pretty much got no chance. It's ripe for being considered old-school by critics and viewers alike which means it will have to work really hard to counter those perceptions.

A show will usually only survive if:

• It's a comedy, that has some funky music, then it will be considered hip
• It's a comedy featuring black people on the CW
• It's a comedy featuring a B-level comedian on CBS or ABC It was a reincarnation of Star Trek on UPN
• It's a drama show about cops, medics, or lawyers. Even if there are twelve on.
• Dramas that attempt to portray the lives of people not in life and death situations like school teachers (Boston Public) or airport workers (LAX)
• It's a reality show of any sort, no matter how shameful it is
• It's a comedy starring a woman because of affirmative action (see New Adventures of Old Christine)

Fall TV Review

So far I've seen:
K-Ville: As a strong advocate for raising awareness for Katrina, this show does a service to that cause, but the cop characters are seriously cliched, and the references to Katrina are really forced upon the script. It might also be possible that Anthony Anderson is overrated.

Back to You: Maybe Kelsey Grammar is destined to be Frasier Crane forever, because I have to admit it's hard to see him as anything else. I love shows that take place at TV stations and am even a sucker for mediocre copy-offs of that form like the 2-season long Good Morning, Miami, but this falls a little flat. I think too much screentime goes to Kelsey Grammar when there are a lot more interesting characters like Fred Willard that I'd like to see more of. It has the potential to get better.

Kid Nation: It's not that bad or inhumane at all. I found it kind of cute. And I kind of like reality shows where there's no elimination.

Chuck: First off, I've already seen this show when it was called "Jake 2.0." That show, about a computer programmer at the NSA who gets involved in one of those toxin/nanoprobe accidents that has been used as a convinient superhero-creating plot device since the origin of comic book heroes. In this case it turns geeky Jake into a human computer. The show ran approximately five years ago for a single season but it's rerun quite frequently enough on the sci-fi channel that a casual viewer like me can get familiarized with the series and subsequently feel weary of Chuck for it's lack of originality.

Granted, there are a few differences: Chuck isn't superhuman, he just knows secrets, but when they use the word "human computer" to refer to Chuck, I just think this is trying too hard to be Jake 2.0. But all in all, it's an entertaining show so far. I like the cast of characters: The cool brother-in-law, the caring-but-overbearing sister, the geeky sidekick are all great additions and Zach Levi is an affable lead. It's funny, because I've seen the show Less than Perfect, but can't remember him in it for the life of me. The efforts to keep the sexual tension in place between Chuck and the female CIA agent seems a bit forced, however. The way she turns from mouthwateringly flirtatious mode to this-is-business mode indicates she couldn't care less about him, so I'd perfer the show stay consistent with that tone and make it so that Chuck is just trying to see something in her where nothing really exists.

On another note, I didn't really believe a lot of the show. Although, it's supposed to be light-hearted fun, even the most pessimistic view of our current administration doesn't hold that CIA and NSA regularly go around killing American citizens over bueracratic turf wars without the directors of one or both agencies getting fired in a public scandal (which, by the way, is a good thing I think).

Journeyman-It sounded cool but it didn't really hold my attention, unfortunately.

Bing Bang Theory-I really find it entertaining and even though it packs massive cliches into each of its characters, the whole nerd-hottie dynamic is something quite original to see for a TV show. Besides, nerdiness can make for great humor as evidenced by the character of Sheldon: the protagonist's snarky roommate who for all his great intelligence doesn't know when to keep his mouth shot. Sadly, I don't think it has too good of a chance of surviving because laugh-track sitcoms are an uphill battle.

Pushing Daisies-Pleasantly quirky. I would have said that there's no more room for another murder mystery on TV, but then again reviving the dead and putting them back to sleep has never been done before. Kristin Chenowith is a pleasant addition to any cast, Chi McBride plays his usual Mr. Grumpy character, the main character doesn't particularly look star like but he holds up ok, and Anna Friel is easy to fall in love with as the girl-next-door type. And on the subject of naming Anna Friel's character Chuck: why is it suddenly hip and sexy to give your female characters guy's names?

Big Shots-Not worth even watching the pilot to see if you like it or not.

The Hiro in Heroes

The NBC show Heroes was the #1 new drama this season and it was one of the few dramas that I did watch this season. I found it to be pretty good but it was also difficult to follow and it required a large commitment from the viewer. I'm not a humongous comic book geek so I might not have been drawn in as some other people but I liked it as I like X-Men: All the people with different powers.

It's a TV show that threads together multiple storylines and it juggles them pretty skillfully but some of the stories are more interesting than others. I think the most interesting of the storylines is that of the Japanese desk jockey Hiro Nakamura and his sidekick Ando. I wanted to analyze the relationship a little more here:

I think we love Hiro because he's a post-modern product of the superhero genre. He's this guy who's incredibly alien to our culture (it's kind of blatantly demonstrated through the fact that he doesn't speak Japanese) and understands it through his childhood affections of comic books. This is clearly reiterated through the line of Ando "you will follow in the footsteps of Star Trek and Superman" or whatever he said. That explains his geeky recitations of what a "hero" shouild be like. Also, there's a geographical symbolism. Wanting to come over to America and save New York is a kind of a twisted parrallel to immigrants wanting to come to America and take New York (the city long associated with the American immigrant experience) by storm in the 19th and early 20th century. Japan has higher living standards than America, but that's really irrelevant, anyway. It's kind of like Mystery Men or Galaxy Quest spoofing superheroes and Star Trek in a very post-modern way, by relying on characters who are intimately familiar and base their reality on those texts.

Ando is the muse through which the audience connects. He's this ordinary white collar worker like many of us who has this nutty friend who's a superhero. Like the audience he has a passing knowledge but a healthy superstition of superheroes until he sees Hiro's powers firsthand. Ando is drawn more and more into Hiro's quest and Hiro's enthusiasm spreads to Ando so he will follow him along on his journey, just as Hiro's enthusiasm is supposed to spread to the audience so we will follow him.

My Name is Earl picks it up in second season

I think as My Name is Earl hit the homestretch of its second season, it lifted itself from being a decent quirky hit that compliments shows like 30 Rock, Scrubs, and The Office to being a great show itself (note: I wouldn't count 2 of the three shows above as great shows yet although 30 Rock has shown flashes).

"My Name is Earl" works as a quirky no-laugh track show that used to get by on the star power of Jason Lee and the comic gifts of Jamie Pressley. It's storylines have a little humor and that humor is usually balanced by the feel-good aspects of the show. In other words, it's like "Touched by an Angel," only funnier. As of late, however, I think the show has not only been funnier than Touched by an Angel, but it's become funny period and as for the "Touched by an Angel" factor, I think the show has been moving into deeper territory to the point where we're actually caring about the characters' evolution from one episode to the next. It's starting to become dynamic and characters are starting to grow past the requirements of what would make the laughs meaningful within a half-hour episode. Earl is trying to grow up by getting an education and a job and he's taking his brother with him. Jamie is trying to become a mom and like The Office last season, the season finale ended with such a bang of a cliffhanger, it cemented the show as Must-See next year.

"Twenty Good Years" as NBC's annual fall guy

"Twenty Good Years," the NBC comedy that commericials on NBC advertised as the great new sitcom to come along pairing comedic legends Jeffery Tambour and John Lithgow, brought to you from the creators of Friends and the screenwriters of Will and Grace (or something like that) is not being renewed by NBC. Why am I not surprised? I was fairly sure Twenty Good Years would not make it through a first season when I saw the promotion for the fall season with its line-up of the two new comedies: the above-mentioned sitcom and 30 Rock.

Why? Because NBC does this practically every year. They always bring in some sitcom without a laugh track (i.e. 30 Rock, Scrubs, The Office, My Name is Earl) and one with a laugh track, and the one with the laugh track is pulled by the network and proclaimed as an embarrassment everyone at NBC Headquarters would like to forget about, before anyone's ever seen it. Before the show comes out, every person associated with the network talks about how great the show will be and how it's truly quality programming. People like Scrubs creator Bill Lawrence work into blog chats who lucky his show is to be alongside Twenty Good Years. Than once the ratings are low enough and they back the winner (this year it was 30 Rock), they discard the bad show out the window.

It's so disorienting: one minute Conan O'Brien is lavishing Matt LeBlanc about his new "hit" sitcom Joey during an interview and within a few months Conan is using the show as joke material for his opening monologue. The problem is that the network usually doesn't give the shows a chance to gel to the audience. Over on CBS, they practically never cancel anything. Mediocre shows like Yes, Dear and Still Standing stay on for years and a relatively decent show like Two and a Half Men and New Adventures of Old Christine are considered humongous hits when they are in fact nothing THAT special. The truth is that I prefer CBS's method. There are two things I want when I look for a sitcom: familiar/interesting characters and laughs. If a show is on long enough the characters start to get familiar which can easily replace interesting after a while and there are usually at least a few laughs per episode. So what happens is that when it's one in the afternoon and there's virtually nothing on TV but Yes, Dear and I feel like watching TV at one, then I'll turn on Yes, Dear. I don't particularly like it, but I can live with it and the more I watch it, the more I get accustomed to it and eventually enjoy it. So what I'm essentially saying is: keep something on the air long enough and the audience (at least from the experiences of this audience of one) will grow to it.

That rarely ever happens with NBC. They prop it up to such high expectations and expect it to perform to the level of their classic sitcoms like Friends and Seinfeld. NBC is all about quality and they have high standards but the truth is that some of these cancelled sitcoms like Happy Family, Good Morning Miami, Whoopi and Twenty Good Years are easily better than what CBS and ABC offer on the average. It also alienates viewers when programs are cancelled too quickly. Nothing is more frustrating to me as a viewer then when a show I'm liking gets cancelled.

Usually, these shows feature established stars like Jeffery Tambour and John Lithgow in 20 Good Years, John Laroquette and Christine Barinski in Happy Family, Whoopi Goldberg in Whoopi, Michael Richards and Tim Meadows in The Michael Richards Show, John Goodman in Father of the Pride, Nathan Lane in Encore! Encore!, Christina Applegate in Jessee, etc. The good news is that these short-lived failed sitcoms are treated as something equivalent to a stint in rehab and referenced to as an example of self-deprecating wit when the stars need to poke fun at themselves (aka "remember when I did Encore! Encore! hahaha).

Social Competency/EQ Rankings for The Office characters

Rate all the members of the office from best to worst in terms of social skills/emotional intelligence (emotional intelligence isn't about who's in touch with their feelings but ability to discern emotions and navigate social situations). The scenario would be let's pretend Dunder-Mufflin had their employees tested with an EQ test, how would they all score. I think what you'll notice is that they're all dysfunctional in some way, except for Jim (the hero), hence that's why it's a comedy. After some thought, I'm going to exclude Jan because she's management. All the actors were probably entrusted with creating a social flaw for their characters:
Class A: Normal
1. Jim (that's why he's the hero, obviously)-What I like about him that other "cool people in the office" like Kelly, Darryl, Roy or Pam wouldn't do is befriend Michael or at least try not to make him look like a complete idiot. He helps him save face, and that's part of why I love him, because he's looking out for everyone.
2. Tobey-I think he's crush on Pam is absolutely nothing unnatural and he handles it like a gentleman. It's precisely why he's a thorn in Tobey's side
3. Ryan-I don't really like him though (it might be a BJ Novak thing), but he doesn't have any beef with anyone or any real social problems, except he can't stand up for himself
4. Oscar-His comic flaw is being gay, but otherwise he's a cool guy who has healthy social interactions
5. Pam-A little shy, and clung to Roy a little long.
6. Karen-A little needy, but a very cool chick. I'd love to have her around the office (i'm not physically attracted to her, but I think she's very outgoing and fun). I think that's what makes Pam vs Karen so much more intriguing than Pam vs Katie was that Katie was so much wose off. Karen vs Pam is a closer call.
7. Darryl-How long did he bother to put up with Michael's tauntings of him
8. Stanley-A little stiff, but I think a good barometer over whether Michael's acting out of line

Class B: A little questionable
9. Phyllis-I guess she's like the overweight girl with low self-esteem. Just a victim of the effects of how much society makes fun of the fat girl when they're little that they take that self-esteem with them into adulthood
10. Roy-Well, he was a really really bad boyfriend/fiancee and I think his interactions with Jim were a little questionable. I don't think he's grown out of his "class bully" stage. I'd call him borderline, although he's improving in his understanding that girls like romance and he's improving in understanding what's important to him. If i were his therapist, i'd say he's making great progress. Also, in Roy's defense, we know about his bad quality's through Pam's stories and I think guys usually have more stories in the closet that wouldn't have gotten let out to the general public through her stories.
11. Hannah-Her lack of social skills is evidenced in the fact that she chose the wrong party last night. Major deduction.
12. Meredith-She needs to deal with her drinking problem to move up into Class A
13. Kelly-Kelly has one flaw too that she needs to deal with to enter A class. She needs to deal with her problem of still being in high school
14. Kevin-He's slightly creepy like Creed but he has a decent-looking fiancee so he must be able to carry on at least one relationship with a girl. I think he's kind of like an overgrown teenager. He talks about "banging girls" like he's with his high school buds, he loves chocolate, and he still thinks his "band" can make it big. Also, he's not so bad with interacting coworkers that Angela can't stand him. They were also sympathetic of him when he had skin cancer
15. Andy-I actually think he's not that bad as to be a complete wreck. Just a little bit self-involved like Garreth

Class C: Unfit for society
16. Todd Packer-I think he's slightly better than Michael in the sense that he doesn't try to hide his sleazy habits: bad taste in jokes, insensitivity to women and everyone else
17. Michael-He's been talked about so much, i don't want to go down the long list of his traits cause he's obviously the center of his show. I think he's actually a little more of a gentleman than people give him credit for and i think he does eventually correct his big errors. He does this so more lately. When he said "I've got a big surprise" and went blank in season 2 after ice cream sandwiches didn't win over the staff, that was bad. I think he does less of that. He made major progress at winning over his staff by episode's end of the skin cancer episode when he invited them to go ice skating.
18. Creed-I think Creed can pass for normal but at the same time, he's like a mental case. His past is so shady. Maybe he actually was in a mental hospital. It's a beautiful character. My god, he's like a predator to Pam and Anna. I think for example Michael like everyone else in the office thinks that Pam is cute, but at least he doesn't go stare at her breats and insist on remaining there when asked to stop.
19. Angela-I think last week confirmed that she is indeed the most evil, malicious, and stubborn person in the office. Angela Kinsey really should be hailed.
20. Dwight-He's made strides. He's not completely evil and dislikeable which makes for a better and more well-rounded character. Before the end of this season, i might have ranked and rated him a little higher for winning Pam's friendship to some degree and for scoring himself a girlfriend but major negative points when it's revealed how insane his girlfriend really is.

The Late night talk show wars

I was watching David Letterman last night for about 15 minutes because Rachel Ray was on, and I wanted to see what she was all about, and I just can’t stand him. It just baffles me that 10 years ago our country was engaged in a debate over who should be the next Tonight Show host and our only two options were Jay Leno and David Letterman, because neither of those 2 are particularly good.

Jay Leno is a pretty good stand-up comic and seems like a genuinely nice guy but when you get down to it, he’s a poor conversationalist. In other words, he’s a boring guy to talk to and an even more boring guy to watch having a conversation. He asks the guests really obvious and boring questions like “how’s your marriage going?”, “how are your kids doing?”, “what do you like to do with your kids?”, “how do you like to spend Christmas/Thanksgiving/The 4th of July/[whatever holiday is coming up]?” He also asked a lot of people when the Olympics were on if they watched the Olympics and what events they liked and stuff (It’s kind of a promotional thing because NBC broadcasts the Olymnpics), which is funny because most of the guests talked excitedly about the Olympics with him, while I’ve heard a lot of celebrities (like Bryant Gumbel and Charles Barkley) speak out about how boring the Winter Olympics are. For the record, I personally like the Winter Olympics, but I’m getting off track.

I don’t really feel a need to attack Leno because, despite the fact that he apparently gets better ratings than Letterman, I’ve never met a single fan of Jay Leno. Theoretically, some people must be watching somewhere, but it doesn’t seem like criticizing Leno is doing anything more than preaching to the choir. Letterman, on the other hand, has a cult following of people who love him. Just turn on his show and you’ll see that the audience wildly applauds at anything he says that’s even a remote attempt at humor. They applaud twice as much as they actually laugh, which says a lot because laughing is a physiological reaction to something funny whereas clapping is something a brainwashed audience does. He also gets claps for things that aren’t funny, but are things he says that the audience agrees with. He might say “New York is a great city” or something and the audience goes off on. (I have that same problem with the Daily Show. Not so much John Stewart but the way audiences tend to hang on every word of his and clap and laugh too much). The problem is the difference between the actual number of funny things he does vs. the number of times they applaud or laugh. My theory is that he used to be funny, and that things like “Will it Float?” or “Is This Something” were at the time revolutionary. They’re both kind of funny once, but he hasn’t changed his act in years. Conan O’Brien does the same kind of acts like “Celebrity Signatures” or “New State quarters” but each new act gives us a new set of state quarters or signatures. That sums up Letterman as a whole: You know how sometimes a funny comedian tells a few jokes to warm up the crowd so that they’ll laugh at anything for later comedians? Letterman warmed up the crowd ten years ago and those people come back to watch him and laugh at what he does now, but for those of us who just turn on his show now and watch, there’s not much to watch. He’s also a poor conversationalist like Leno (slightly better, though) and he is often rude with and disinterested in his guests.

Conan O’Brien, on the other hand, does have the qualities that a talk show host should have and I think that most people my age know it, even if the demographics don’t reflect it. He is genuinely interested in his guests, self-aware, and he works for his laughs every night.

Someone get Aaron Sorkin a script doctor

I don't know much about screen writing and can't really do it myself but it seems like an obvious rule that if you want to have a prolific career you are aloud to write characters that are like you, but to give contrast, you need to be add at least a few characters that aren't like you.

I recently watched one of Woody Allen's movies and just got a little tired of it because he's just made too many movies for someone with his lack of range. He is very innovative, no question, and he mixes things up (Sweet and Lowdown didn't seem much like a Woody Allen film, for example), so it's kind of up in the air, but most of Woody Allen's characters, however, are the same. They're usually engaged in some creative industry, Jewish, from New York, self-possessed, self-aware, incapable of taking relationships and not making them more complicated than they are, etc.Aaron Sorkin suffers from that same problem immensely. I really didn't like Sports Night because it just seemed really phony and the clichés started growing and growing until, after enough viewing, every bit of dialogue could be predicted a mile away.

I didn't bother with West Wing but because I have an interest in Saturday Night Live and the comic industry (I've read two books on the behind-the-scenes workings of Saturday Night Live), I've tuned into this one, and there's no doubt it has some great stuff in it. The characters are really great and it really has a keen eye for its topic. From the first to the second episode, however, my annoyance with the dialogue grew and I'm worried that like Sports Night that is going to increase with each episode, to the point where I'm not willing to take the good with the bad and I'll just be forced to ditch the show. Like Sports Night, the characters:
-All have ADD, they can't discuss less than 3 topics at once
-They all complete each other's sentences like married couples (Robert Altman did this a lot in films like MASH and was considered a revolutionary for it, but Sorkin pushes it to annoying extremes)
-They are all highly intelligent but at the same time they all have really bad tact every once in a while and bring up the wrong thing to say at the wrong time
-They usually have some conflict with someone else, and often are entangled in some work-related relationship which they can't discuss in a conversation without discussing 2 or 3 things at a time with them.

Just for the heck of it, could Aaron Sorkin have thrown in a big, slow guy who will just say "huh" in response to what the other characters are saying?

Worst of all, the characters have the same sense of humor, a kind of witty and unapolagetically smart irony. This is really bad for a dramatic portrayal of a comedy show. While you don't need to necessarily be funny for an hour drama show, you need to realistically portray funny people. Watch the show and ask yourself are Nathan Corddroy, Sarah Paulsen, D.L. Hughley, and Matthew Perry's characters actually funny? Even when they're performing in the show-within-a-show scenario, are they even remotely making you laugh? Sarah Paulsen's character, a born-again Christian, who's just-ended relationship with Matthew Perry is very much at the center of the drama. She's self-deprecating about her religion and slightly whimsical but beyond that, she's not remotely convincing as a funny person, and has yet to say or do anything funny except to provide a light-hearted moment to ease the mood in the way that dramas like Aaron Sorkin's The West Wing might do.

Perhaps, the point of the pilot was to show that they, in fact, weren't funny, but the drama is that hopefully the two new writers will make the show funny. Still, that sets the bar pretty high for Sorkin and company to make us laugh and I'm not sure if he can reach it. I can't imagine it being that hard considering D.L. Hughley is an acclaimed stand-up comedian and Matthew Perry was already successful at being funny on a TV sitcom. This show has great potential but Aaron Sorkin needs to get someone else involved in the writing process who can provide a slightly different voice to his scripts, preferably a funny one, so when we watch it at home, we'll
have the feeling that we're watching more than one character.