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reviews of major TV shows - 24, Battlestar Galactica, Big Love, Brotherhood, Californication, Dexter, Heroes, Journeyman, Lost, Mad Men, Weeds - plus: politics
Recent Posts Tagged With 'television'
The Closer Closes on a Fine Note for The Season
You gotta hand it to TNT - I do - they put on most of The Closer this past summer, but had the savvy to save the past three episodes for the television-dreary month of December. TNT probably did this in part to attract attention to its new series - ...
The Roots of Testimony on The Closer
A delightful next to last episode (5.14) of Season 5 of The Closer tonight - the season resumed last week week, after a pause since August - featuring Beau Bridges guest starring as Provenza's old partner, George, now Georgette.Yes, unknown to Proven...
Dexter 4.12: Revenges and Recapitulations
Well, Showtime told us the Season 4 finale of Dexter tonight would be stunning, and it was that, and more.The Trinity killer, who is actually the Quadro killer (because he always kills a fourth, a ten-year old boy, who is kidnapped and presumed just ...
Fringe 2.10: Walter\'s Brain, Harry Potter, and Flowers for Algernon
Fringe 2.10 went Harry Potter's "pensieve" one big, science fictional step better this week, with a story about crucial pieces of Walter's memory being literally sliced out of his brain, and placed for safekeeping in the brains of others.One part of ...
Dexter 4.11: The "Soulless, Anti-Family Schmuck"
"You'll come across as a soulless, anti-family schmuck" - not a shot against Dexter Morgan, or any major character on the show, but what Laguerta says to Captain Matthews, as she stands up for her marriage to Batista in Dexter 4.11, and tells Matthew...
Bones 5.9 meets Avatar and Videogamers
There was almost as much Avatar as Bones in episode 5.9, but that was ok, in fact pretty enjoyable, because we got to see a good story with Sweets, Jack, and Colin on the line in front of the Avatar theater, or, to be more precise, a good story with ...
Heroes Mid Season 2009 Finale
A very good Heroes 4.12, mid-season 2009 finale tonight - with the story to resume in January. I've been watching every episode this Fall, but have only reviewed two of them, because, hey, I'm a fan as well as a reviewer, and sometimes it's fun just...
Dexter 4.10: More than Trinity
A jam-packed edge-of-your-seat can't-catch-your-breath episode 4.10 of Dexter tonight, in which -.Debra nabs Christine as Lundy's killer, with razor-sharp logic and DNA from Christine's toothbrush in Quinn's apartment, which also tells Debra and the ...
Lie to Me in Afghanistan
Shawn Ryan - most famously creator, writer, show-runner of The Shield, easily one of the best shows ever on television, and arguably the best - was brought aboard Lie to Me this season to add some visceral punch to the intellectual power Lie to Me al...
House 6.8 and the Reverse of Flowers for Algernon
"Flowers for Algernon," correctly thought by many to be one of the best novelettes ever written, turned into a novel and movies and soon a movie starring Will Smith, tells the story of mentally disadvantaged Charley, given an operation that turns him...
Dexter 4.9: Trinity\'s Surprising Daughter
This season of Dexter has been exulting in surprises ... Debra and Lundy being gunned down ... the Trinity killer not the man who fired that gun, after all ... and tonight's Episode 4.9 pulled out a last-minute stunner at the top of its league ...The...
Bones 5.8: Booth\'s "Pops"
An endearing episode 5.8 of Bones last night, with a winning performance by Ralph Waite, who continues a sterling career in his senior years. On Bones, he plays Booth's grandfather - "Pops" - who raised Booth and his brother after Pops evicted thei...
Fringe 2.8: The Eternal Bald Observers
Fringe really hit its stride last night, with an episode 2.8 not just about the Eternal Bald Observer, who we've been wanting to know more about, but the Eternal Bald Observers. It was a superb standalone story, with intellectual verve and real hear...
FlashForward 1.9: Shelter From the Storm
Ain't it good to hear Dylan's "Shelter from the Storm," and see him sing it in a vid? This was the theme song and the theme of tonight's FlashForward 1.9, which peeled back a little more of the paradox of the story to reveal ... more fine paradox, a...
Lie to Me 2.7: The Redeeming of Loker
Eli Loker (Brendan Hines), one of the best characters on Lie to Me, in which all of the central characters are outstanding, has been in Lightman's dog house since the middle of the first (last year's) season, when Loker alerted the Security Exchange ...
V 1.3: Multiple Twists and Lizard Visions
The Visitors got visas in 1.3 tonight, and the twists and surprise identities continue to abound.1. Erica stops a human from killing Marcus (Anna's top adviser), but it turns out the would-be assassin is a Visitor. They apparently were testing our (...
Four\'s a Crowd on House 6.7
A highly significant House 6.7 tonight, which clarified a question going back to the first season, brought together the best of all the seasons, and may have resulted in a permanent change - though with House, you never know for sure.The question cla...
House 6.6 Around the Bases
Another fine, primarily personal episode 6.6 of House last night, featuring House and Cuddy, and Chase and Cameron.House and Cuddy clearly love each other - it's more than sexual attraction, even though that is prominent, propelled by Cuddy looking a...
Dexter 4.8: Great Mistakes
Dexter made what might well have been a life-changing mistake at the end of last week's episode - 4.7 - he called an innocent man. Tonight's episode 4.8 begins with Dexter's conscience being troubled by this mistake - I wouldn't say tormented - but ...
Bill O\'Reilly, Saddam Hussein, and Ben Reynolds in Lie to Me 2.6
An outstanding episode 2.6 of Lie to Me last Monday evening. Among my favorite parts -. Reynolds (Mekhi Phifer) has an expression of stubborn defiance about something he may have done wrong - cut to shots of Bill O'Reilly and Saddam Hussein. Pricel...
The Kid Who Changed Minds in Fringe 2.7
A powerful and effective episode 2.7 tonight of Fringe, which continues to pull itself away from the horror insano-gore of last year, towards a more rational, edge-of-your-seat kind of science fiction. In other words, this evolution of Fringe is for...
Psychological Bones 5.7
Physical bones played little role in tonight's fine Bones 5.6 - not just because the bones in the case were those of a little person (should not be called a midget, as Bones advises, but a condoplasiac dwarf) - but because the heart of the case was p...
V 1.2: The Effects and The Characters
A fine second outing for the return of V on ABC-TV on Tuesday, in which I especially liked -1. The special effects: A story about high-tech aliens on Earth has to have convincing gadgetry, weapons, and vehicles in motion, and V didn't disappoint. I...
Mad Men Season 3 Finale: The Best of Times and ...
Well, it was the end of the world in last week's Mad Men 3.12, in every way for most of our major players, especially for Don. Tonight's surprising, satisfying altogether brilliant Season 3 finale reversed that. It was the best of times, for everyo...
Bones 5.6: A Chicken in Every Viewer\'s Pot
Well, I've often said that truly good combinations of mystery and comedy are as scarce as hen's teeth, and none do it better than Bones, as tonight's episode 5.6 about a murder in a chicken coop so tastily shows.The chicken part led to fine puns, whi...
FlashForward 1.7: The Future Can Be ...
The sweeping winds of November brought as an episode of FlashForward - 1.7 - that may be better then even the pilot.It starts with a scene which in part is actually close to the end of the episode - that is, the end of the piece of the present we are...
Soviet Dust: A Different Stripe of Fringe in 2.6
Never underestimate Soviet science. In reality, they got out into space before we did in the 1950s. In the intersections of science and science fiction, the Soviets experimented with mental telepathy and all kinds of things. Who knows what they ma...
V Returns to TV
Kenneth Johnson's original 1983 mini-series V - along with its 1984 sequel V: The Final Battle - was oddly one of my favorite television shows. Actually, it still is. But I say "oddly," because although the story was trite - aliens landing on Earth...
Dexter on the Couch in 4.6
Poor Dexter was on the couch in 4.6 - the shrink's couch, brought there for couples counseling by Rita, concerned about their lack of communication. She of course doesn't know the tenth of it, and when things work out just fine at the end of the epi...
Mad Men 3.12: The End of the World
Skeeter Davis's The End of the World played under the closing credits of Mad Men 3.12 tonight, and it came pretty close to that in many, but not all, ways...We knew it would be coming. But the logical time was the Season 3 finale - which will be on ...
