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Friday, April 20, 2012

Last Week in TV #29

I did watch last night's Community and Parks and Rec, but I'll cover them in next week's post, especially since the former is going to take some time to unpack. In the meantime, here's thoughts on the rest of the stuff I watched this week. 

The Simpsons: Beware My Cheating Bart


It could certainly be my bias showing, but I greatly enjoyed all the Lost spoofs in the Homer B-plot ("Oh my god. Inside the coconut...my pet cat, from when I was little."). I was tempted to ding them once again for failing to mock something at the height of its relevance, but the fact that Homer was only now getting into the show was part of the plot, so it worked (his refusal to watch the pilot with Marge when it originally aired was classic). The main plot was a pretty basic Bart-has-a-crush story, with all the limitations therein caused by the fact that he is still only ten. Perfectly adequate, nothing groundbreaking, though notable for being the first time Bart has seen a girl's boob.

Homer: Lousy Marge. Ruining the delicate relationship between a man and his TV show...

Bart: Oh my god! It’s just like Dad’s!


Bob's Burgers: Food Truckin' 


Though filled with the usual manic energy and affording a unique opportunity to have the entire family together in one place and in one plot, this episode felt like the first step down since the show's return. There were still plenty of laughs (I loved Gene and Louise's sign on the food truck: NOT OUR PARENTS — HELP!), but the plot felt more perfunctory and predictable than usual. We knew exactly how Louise and "Dina's" antics at the food festival would play out, just as we knew, the moment Teddy mentioned the grease trap, that it would be used to slip up pursuers at some point. Again, nothing here was terrible and there were plenty of good bits, but the pieces never quite gelled into a great episode the way the other episodes this season have.   


Game of Thrones: What is Dead May Never Die


King's Landing 
For me, the centerpiece of this episode was Tyrion's brilliant manipulation of the Small Council in order to ferret out who is loyal to Cersei. The sequence in which he laid out a different plan for marrying off his niece to each of the council members was brilliantly directed and tons of fun. This led to a trio of great scenes: Cersei admonishing Tyrion for planning to marry off her daughter (which showed that perhaps Cersei isn't as in control and she thinks or likes others to think), Tyrion sending Master Pycelle, revealed as the Cersei loyalist, packing, and the brilliant discussion on the nature of power between Varys and Tyrion (much of which was lifted for the season two trailers), which more or less could stand as a treatise on the season, if not the show.

Poor Sansa also popped back up, making an appearance at one of the most awkward family dinners ever. Given Cersei's abhorrence at seeing her daughter married off like Cersei'd been, it's interesting that she doesn't have more sympathy for Sansa, forced to play nice with the people who murdered her father. While Cersei's reaction to Tyrion's plan was clearly meant to engender sympathy for the character, her continued treatment of Sansa does a lot to undercut that sympathy, showing Cersei to be some combination of selfish and short-sighted.

Pyke
I mentioned on Nikki Stafford's blog and on Twitter my frustration with Theon siding with his jerkwad family. I was glad when he stood up to his father and pointed out that he was given away and hadn't stayed away by choice; I was hoping that would lead to him telling the Greyjoys to shove it, but instead he was baptized and seems set to betray Robb. While I could understand being reluctant to go back to the Starks were Ned still around, Robb has, as far as we've seen, always treated Theon with respect and friendship, whereas his blood family has done nothing but needle him for circumstances outside his control. Seems like an easy choice to me. My only hope now is that Robb suspected Theon's betrayal, and that Balen and Yara will find an army waiting for them in the North despite Theon burning his letter of warning to Robb.

Renly's Camp
While it was nice to catch up with Renly since his departure from King's Landing at the end of the first season, the big event here was the introduction of two new characters: Brienne of Tarth and Renly's queen, Margaery. We thus far know little of the former aside from her size, fighting prowess and devotion to Renly, while the later proved to be surprisingly pragmatic when it came to her husband's sexuality (heck, in a land where the Lannisters are schtupping their siblings, while not call in your brother as a fluffer?). I've only watched the first season of The Tudors, but I greatly enjoyed Natalie Dormer in it, and was excited to hear that she was cast in GoT. Her first appearance, at least, suggests a character at least as compelling as Anne Boleyn.

North of the Wall
Last episode's cliffhanger is resolved perfunctorily, the big reveal being that (not so shockingly) Craster's sacrificial sons are well known to the Night's Watch, another lesson in pragmatism for the episode. The scene between Sam and Gilly was sweet, if omnious, though.

Winterfell
So Bran is starting to think that when he dreams of being a wolf he is seeing through the wolf's eyes. Way to catch up with the rest of us.

The King's Road
Arya proved witness to the episode's big action quotient as Joffrey's men returned in force to claim Gendry. While the scene between Yoren and Arya made it painfully clear Yoren would soon meet his end, it was nonetheless a fantastic one that spoke to the intensity of revenge and how it can warp a person, something that, I suspect, will prove to be particularly resonant for Arya. And when it was Yoren's time to go, at least he went out Boromir-style, taking down numerous opponents with an arrow sticking out of his chest (I loved that it took several men holding him down to finally kill him).

Other Thoughts
No Robb, Jamie, Daenerys, Stannis or Joffrey this week.   

While I enjoyed Caetlyn's smirking barbs to Renley (her son is fighting a war, not playing at one), I question how sound it is to mock the man with which you're seeking a desperate alliance. Then again Caetlyn's never been much of a thinker...

The other Sansa scene involved Shae arriving to be her handmaiden (a rather brilliant move on Tyrion's part). I thought it was interesting that the writers undercut the sympathetic dinner scene by having her be a total bitch to Shae, but I suppose it's consistent with the character.

Smart thinking on Arya's part at the end there; I honestly hope that's the end of the "kill Robert's bastards" storyline, as I'd like to see Gendry and Arya's story unfold without that additional threat looming. 

Shae: Every man who has tasted my cooking has told me what a good whore I am.

Yoren: I always hated crossbows. Take too long to load!


How I Met Your Mother: Now We're Even


Though not as structurally nor thematically sound as last week's episode, this one was rather funny, nicely escalating the silliness (as in the increasingly-ludicrous title cards). Of course, finding out the whole thing was just an excuse to explain away Ted in a green dress from last year's "The Mermaid Theory" (something I only vaguely recalled long after the episode ended, which was affirmed for me by the internet) takes some of the fun out of it, and the whole Barney/Ted plot was rather predictable (it was painfully obvious that Barney kept insisting on creating legendary evenings to keep his mind off Quinn being gone stripping). The Marshall/Lily plot was the kind of inoffensive, mildly humorous story those two seem to get handed a lot lately, while the Robin plot did a nice job of integrating her into the episode while keeping her distance from Ted, and presumably setup the next chapter in her story. The scenes of everyone watching with bated breath as she tried to land the helicopter were genuinely touching.

Ted: I don’t feel the need to keep score; that’s like a thousand points right there.

Marshall: Not the rose quartz of the slightly embarrassed, or the tomato red of the mildly abashed; vermillion—the color of carnal shame!


Glee: On My Way


Oh Glee. For the first third or so, this was a perfectly good episode. It brought the simmering Karofsky storyline to a head and addressed head-on the very real issue of teen bullying and suicide in a way that was for the most part true to the characters and deftly handled (by Glee standards). Of course, it was then quickly shoved aside to get to the Regionals business, but at least lip service was paid to how the events of the first third of the episode were informing the second third. Karofsky's story, and the message Glee was trying to present, deserved at least a full episode, but the show still has to do what it has to do.

If the tonal shift had stopped with Regionals, it wouldn't have been so bad. But then we're suddenly dealing with the farce that is Finn and Rachel's wedding as the show slides fully away from our reality and into its own, and by episode's end it goes and spoils what was a pretty well-crafted and performed episode (at least in the first third) by a shoehorning in a PSA as a mid-winter break cliffhanger. Whereas the issue of teen suicide was woven into the fabric of the show and the culmination of a long running storyline (however slighted it might have been by the very nature of the show), the ending slipped far too easily into the realm of soap opera gimmick. In another episode, it may not have been so bad, but here, the shift in tone was far too jarring, making the whole thing fall flat. Karofsky solemnly dressing in his best suit, his dad finding him and howling for help, Kurt sitting down with his tormenter and helping him dream of a better life were raw, intense, wonderfully depicted moments Unfortunately, those moments were an oasis unto themselves, otherwise surrounded in the sea of Glee being Glee

Other Thoughts
The scene in Figgins' office with the teachers was also very good.  

Look, I'm glad Sebastian stopped twirling his mustache in the face of Karofsky's suicide attempt, but the character had been presented as being just so one dimensionally evil that the sudden change of heart seemed out of character, such as it is. I honestly expected to find out he took the money raised for charity to put towards a death ray or something.

Similarly, we got Normal Person Sue back. I like that version of the character so much. I'll miss her when the show inevitably brings back Super Villain Sue. 

Also, she's pregnant. Who's the father? I couldn't care less.

Part of me really wanted Rory to taste peanut butter and be like, "eh, it's okay."

The scene where the kids went around in a circle and said what they were looking forward to was nice, although some of their desires were odd (shouldn't Kurt's dad already be in Congress?).

Jeff Goldblum continues to crack me the hell up, though it's beyond ridiculous that four adults couldn't step in and stop that wedding.

Never, ever show Will reacting to the kids' performance the way he did in this episode again! 

Things I Shouldn't Worry About: It was nice to see Rachel's dads and Kurt and Finn's parents in the audience, making this presumably the first performance of the glee club either set of parents (or any Glee parents) have ever seen. Also, who the hell were the random background girls with Mercedes, Santana, etc. during the Troubletones song? If they're former members of the Troubletones, why don't they perform with the rest of the group during the joint numbers?

Favorite Song: I recognized very few of the songs in this episode, but while I enjoyed the "Fly/I Believe I can Fly" mashup (as I usually enjoy the mashups), I'll go with "Cough Syrup", a song I've never heard before but which perfectly underscored Karofsky's suicide attempt.


Community: Origins of Vampire Mythology 


There have been episodes of Community that have made me laugh more than this one. Heck, last week's episode was funnier, as good as this one was. But I can't remember the last time I laughed with this show as hard as I did when Abed opened his door to find the Dean standing there and announced, "I need help reacting to something." This show continues to amaze with the versatility of the cast; here, we get prolonged interactions between Troy, Abed, Annie and Britta (and the dean), while Jeff and Shirley got to spend more time together at the carnival. The ability to break the cast up into these little pieces is one of its strengths, as is its ability to sell genuine character moments amidst all the insanity. While all the meaningful glances at the end almost reached the point of parody, the climax of the episode, and the subtle communication between Annie and Britta that Troy had sent the "nice" text, was genuinely touching.

Other Thoughts
I've realized I've become a total shipper with this show. I was pleased to see the return of both the Troy/Britta relationship and the Annie/Jeff one.

The Chang/Pierce storyline was fairly insignificant, but a nice way to position those two characters while everyone else was having touching moments.

I am both glad that Troy and Abed are still friends and that Vice Dean Layborne's desire for Troy to join his school hasn't been forgotten. I'm having my cake and eating it too!

The sequences involving Annie trying to be Blade and the dean, Troy and Abed trying to sound like a carnival was also hilarious.   


Saturday Night Live: Josh Brolin & Gotye


A pretty solid episode. While there were a few sketches that either went on too long or didn't work for me (even if I saw what they were going for), there were no out-and-out clunkers, which is saying something. Josh Brolin acquitted himself well, never really being asked to carry a sketch but sliding in effortlessly for smaller bits.

Cold Open: One of the better cold opens recently, as something about the show bringing together all the whacky Republican candidates always works in its favor. Mitt being the boring straight-laced one is a lot funnier when he has someone like whack-a-doo Michelle Bachman to bounce off.

Monologue: Basically an excuse for Jay Pharaoh's Will Smith impression, but since that's awesome, I really didn't mind. It was also an effective way for Brolin to plug MiB3 beyond the usual "so, I'm in this movie.."

First Look: Game of Thrones: Like the Hunger Games sketch last week, this probably didn't work for you if you've never seen the show, but if you have, it was damned hilarious. The idea that one of the chief consultants on the show is a 13-year-old boy, because of all the boobs, is one of those "funny cuz it could be true" things, and just the sight of Brian Moynihan as George RR Martin (he really dresses that way) cracked me up. “All of that aired on television, right after Rango!”

The Californians: Not sure if this was spoofing an actual show or just the mannerisms of Californians and soap operas, but it was the first sketch of the night that started out mildly amusing before going on too long (I think two segments would have been better, instead of three). But man, Bill Hader started breaking almost immediately, which was odd (for him), but also funny.

America’s Next Empire State of Mind Parody Artist: Again, nothing standout nor awful here, and another sketch that had maybe one iteration too many. Props to Andy Samberg for his Weird Al though, and nice to see Jay Pharaoh featured so prominently.

Digital Short: Laser Cats! Space Nazi! Steven Spielberg mocking himself ("Hitchcockian!"). What's not to love?

Weekend Update: Mrs. Teebore and I just fast forwarded right past Garth and Kat, as we usually do, so you guys let me know if they were actually funny this time out. Seth's "What Are You Doing?" was funny, but still seemed like a poor man's "'Really?' With Seth and Amy".

Piers Morgan: This sketch, one of the "excuses for celebrity impressions" sketches, worked a lot better for me this time, perhaps because it wasn't leading off the night. I particularly enjoyed Armisen's Ice-T and all the Law and Order jokes, as well as (like usual) Nasim Pedrad's nasally Kim Kardashian.

Slow Motion High School: One of the lesser sketches of the night, but nothing awful. Some of the sight gags were funny, some weren't, it went a bit too long. That is all.

Digital Short 2: It was no "Laser Cats" but funny in its own way (I think Killam makes a nice partner for Samberg), and it thankfully did what it came to do and left without going on too long.

Booker T. Washington Prom: The final sketch of the night was another mildly humorous, overly long affair. I enjoyed Pharaoh's principal and bits of Brolin's wasted and lecherous teacher, but a bit of editing probably would have turned this into a memorably zany end-of-the-night sketch.

Favorite Sketch: Gotta go with the Game of Thrones one, but by no means does that diminish my love of Laser Cats. 

Herman Cain: This country just isn’t ready for an African-American president.

Steven Spielberg: Be honest, what did you think?
Lorne Michaels: I hated it.
Spielberg: OK, now, don’t be honest.
Michaels: That was great!

Ozzie Guillen: We had just played a baseball game against St. Louis, so I figured everyone was wondering, hey Ozzie, what are your opinions on Fidel Castro.  

Episodes Featuring a Game Show: 5/19
Episodes with a Monologue Featuring a Song: 7/19

23 comments:

  1. Well, you'll be happy to know that normal Sue is kind of sticking around. At least so far.

    GoT - i didn't overly think Sansa was being a bitch to Shae. To me she looked like she was on the verge of tears the whole time and was more or less reacting appropriately for a girl her age who just had to have to dinner with her father's murderers and was then confronted with a handmaid that didn't know what to do. I'm really looking forward to the presumed relationship growth between the two of them.

    Poor Theon. Getting baptised and all that jazz was the right decision, but he also should've sent that letter to Robb.

    We've been singing the "Oil Spill" song from Bob's Burgers ever since we watched the episode.

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  2. we liked Bob's Burgers- i especially liked the the Quiet game at the end, and reading all the food truck names. Also when Bob his friend were shouting at each other for no reason other than matching each other's energy. Also- the Oil Spill song is STILL stuck in my head. This is also the first episode that our parents watched (we started taping it for them).

    GoT- i feel bad for Theon being stuck in such a crappy spot, but i agree that CLEARLY he should be siding with the family he knows rather than the family he was born to.
    Bummed that Yoren was killed off, but he did go out very badass.
    i still feel really bad for Sansa (even if she is a bitch) and next episode looks even worse for her. i hope it goes well for her with Shae working for her now

    Glee- damn i don't remember all of that being one episode- crazy! the whole wedding thing is just so ridiculous it was actually frustrating to watch (and warning- it continues to stay shitty). And while i thought the Karofsky stuff was powerful, they could've handled it better by leading to this point throughout the whole season. i mean- i know Karofsky said he was out for 3 weeks, but it certainly felt like all of that happened in one day. I think dragging out the torment throughout the whole season (bit by bit) would've made his suicide attempt feel more real and more sad as we could've seen it coming but been powerless to stop it. Instead i just felt like- welp, here comes the token suicide attempt

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  3. @Sarah: Well, you'll be happy to know that normal Sue is kind of sticking around. At least so far.

    Honestly, I don't think I could stop suspecting the imminent return of Super Villain Sue until the show ends.

    Getting baptised and all that jazz was the right decision, but he also should've sent that letter to Robb.

    Yeah, that's how I would have played it as well.

    @Anne: Also when Bob his friend were shouting at each other for no reason other than matching each other's energy.

    I loved that. I thought bringing back that character was kind of pointless, but it was worth it for that bit.

    i still feel really bad for Sansa (even if she is a bitch)

    I do too. And "bitch" probably isn't the right word. As Sarah said, she was clearly messed up, and just slipped into "haughty upper class lady mode", which is probably her default mode at this point. I just thought it was interesting that the writers were willing to paint the character in an unsympathetic (albeit understandably so) light at that point.

    And while i thought the Karofsky stuff was powerful, they could've handled it better by leading to this point throughout the whole season.

    Agreed. By Glee's low standards, the Karofsky storyline was damn near an epic in terms of ongoing storylines, but compared to most normal narratives, it definitely could have benefited from more build-up. That it was as affecting as it was is a testament to the performances and direction in this episode.

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  4. meh- Sansa is still a bitch. she was a bitch before Ned died and just because she has been trapped in this horrendous situation doesn't mean that makes up for her bitchy actions before bad stuff happened. and really- she hasn't actually had the opportunity to be a bitch recently- that doesn't mean it's still not in there.
    Now if she gets out of the craphole that is her life and she NO LONGER acts like a bitch, then she can be redeemed

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  5. Game of Thrones: What Dies May Never Die

    the centerpiece of this episode was Tyrion's brilliant manipulation of the Small Council in order to ferret out who is loyal to Cersei.

    Yes it was. I do find that Peter Dinklage's attempted accent is becoming ever more distracting to me, but I still appreciate his delivery of a line, and I try to chalk some of his odd lilt up to Tyrion putting on a bit of an affect with his silver tongue.

    I mentioned on Nikki Stafford's blog and on Twitter my frustration with Theon siding with his jerkwad family.

    And I replied that I'm not sure he's entirely a moron so much as resigned to his circumstances. Not having read the books, I was expecting that letter to go out and the raven to be intercepted by, ultimately, a very unhappy Balon, so if you're at all invested in Theon surviving his best bet may well have been burning that letter and negotiating the literal and metaphorical rough waters ahead. His fealty to family is quite possibly just more circumstantial pragmatism: Theon weighing how the Starks treated him after his father gave him up to them and wanting to be acknowledged as worthy — if not entitled — by his father is likely part of it, but he may simply be giving in to the inevitability of his surroundings; now that he's back home, aligning himself with Robb Stark is just plain risky. If you can't pledge troth to the fam you liege, troth the fam you're with, or something like that.

    Or, like I said, he's being torn apart by Stark-Home Syndrome.

    So Bran is starting to think that when he dreams of being a wolf he is seeing through the wolf's eyes. Way to catch up with the rest of us.

    Ha! Really.

    There was way more violence this week than sex, although if you want to be some clever combination of cynical and scholarly you could characterize it just changing ways men assert their dominance by sticking things into other people.

    Tyrion: "I've decided I don't like riddles."

    Theon: "A ship? She gets thirty and I get one?"
    Yara: "The Sea Bitch. We thought she'd be perfect for you."

    Littlefinger: "Leave me out of your next deception."
    Tyrion: "That's a shame. You were to be the centerpiece of my next deception."

    How I Met Your Mother: Now We're Even

    something I only vaguely recalled long after the episode ended

    Whereas I didn't make the connection at all until reading this. But then I'd totally missed all the numbers in the "countdown" episode until reading about that on the Internet, so...

    I'm always happy to see Ranjit — if only because he goes back to the pilot and I enjoy how he became their go-to driver at the oddest moments.

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  6. Glee: On My Way

    Karofsky solemnly dressing in his best suit, his dad finding him and howling for help, Kurt sitting down with his tormenter and helping him dream of a better life were raw, intense, wonderfully depicted moments

    Agreed. I'm also with you on Sebastian's abrupt about-face — it's like he came down with a sudden case of Sue.

    Things I Shouldn't Worry About:

    ... Probably the single most important category in your write-ups. As a wise man once said, "Oh Glee." Rachel's dads now show up at her performances, basically, now that actors have been cast and we've seen them. You can't tell me that in-story continuity is not a sentient, meta-aware beast. (Hello, Jeremy Bentham! We shall refer to you by that name unfailingly until it's revealed to the audience who you are.)

    Do they still have late-night horror-movie hosts? It's not like I'm trying to make myself feel any older than I am; I just figure with cable channels and the Web and DVDs and syndicated repeats making up most of local stations' nighttime programming and whatnot, that sort of thing was rendered obsolete from more than one angle.

    Sadly, I knew from the moment that Quinn ran home to get her bridesmaid's dress something was going to happen — you can't unwatch a lifetime of television — but the texting thing made it extra hard to see. It's just so stupid to take your eyes off the road (in real life, I'm talking).

    I don't know either of those Warblers songs but the performances were really underwhelming.

    Sue: "You proved that it's never too late to turn your life around."

    Really? An 18-year-old high-school senior proved that?

    Brittany: "I want Lord Tubbington to kick his Ecstasy addiction."

    Whether it's speaking a random line of dialogue or just shaking what her mama gave her, Brittany remains the #1 reason to keep watching.

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  7. Community: Origins of Vampire Mythology

    I can't remember the last time I laughed with this show as hard as I did when Abed opened his door to find the Dean standing there and announced, "I need help reacting to something."

    Really! Just so much is wrapped up that line — who Abed is that he would say that, how much he's grown that he would ask that as opposed to just not deal (or deal in his Abed way) — and it all hits you at the same time. How are people not watching this show?

    I've realized I've become a total shipper with this show. I was pleased to see the return of both the Troy/Britta relationship and the Annie/Jeff one.

    I'll admit to being a major Annie/Jeff 'shipper — and admit as well that a big part of that is probably Jeff being the primary male identification character (despite my having at least as much in common with Abed as with Jeff, and plenty not in common with either). I didn't recall the Troy/Britta relationship, though, possibly because I jumped into the series late and have seen the earliest episodes but missed a batch later in Season One; what's more, I recall Annie being sweet on Troy from high school and found it weird for her to be fixing up Troy with Britta even though she's clearly been focusing her swooning on Jeff lately.

    Britta: "I need to be on lockdown. You are a pill-head, so think of Blade as Adderall and handcuff me to the radiator like a motherflipping carny-banging werewolf."

    Annie: "Read the banana, Britta."

    Annie: "She's whipped by an imaginary douche."
    Dean: "Hey. Don't knock it 'til you try it."

    Jeff: "None of us has to 'go to' anyone. And the idea that we do is a mental illness that we contracted from breath-mint commercials and Sandra Bullock."

    Saturday Night Live: Josh Brolin & Gotye

    an excuse for Jay Pharaoh's Will Smith impression, but since that's awesome, I really didn't mind.

    Ditto.

    It was also an effective way for Brolin to plug MiB3 beyond the usual "so, I'm in this movie.."

    "... that opens in about six weeks, but it's not like SNL would want me hosting its season finale, even though Lorne Michaels apparently wants to make Barry Sonenfeld or someone at Columbia happy..."

    The idea that one of the chief consultants on the show is a 13-year-old boy

    I'd have liked that more if the character wasn't another over-the-top goofy Samberg thing. Plus, I think that most SF and fantasy authors are still in large part 13-year-old boys, so it was redundant. Just to dissect an SNL piece way too drily: While the revelation of the other consultant being a 13-year-old boy was a great gag, I think that more sustainable would have been for GRRM to show his own hand, and by extension that of just about all genre-fiction nerds, as being an arrested-development adolescent. It's right there in Revenge of the Nerds: "All jocks ever think about is sports; all we ever think about is sex." I would just have had GRRM natter on with some frilly pseudo-historical fantasy grandiloquence before admitting that he'd written so much sex into the books because if it was ever made into an HBO series he wanted to see lots of titties.

    “All of that aired on television, right after Rango!”

    That
    was frickin' hilarious.

    Slow Motion High School: One of the lesser sketches of the night, but nothing awful.

    For me this was an admittedly rare example of the concept being so off-the-wall great — key was that the hallway was "oh, by the way" — that I didn't mind it not having a particularly strong impetus or ending.

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  8. Alas, poor Yoren... that guy was awesome. At least he went down fighting.

    As I watched SNL's "Californians" sketch, I found myself hoping people don't think we really talk like that. Plus, those people were clearly Southern Californians. SoCal is practically its own state with its own customs and mannerisms.

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  9. @Matt: I don't know a lot about California, but I do know you all refer your highways with the word "the" in front of them. And if SNL got that right, I'm forced to assume they got everything else right as well.

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  10. Matt: I found myself hoping people don't think we really talk like that.

    Uh... You kinda do. Not you you, maybe, and I'm sorry to pile on, but in SoCal at least, like you imply, yeah, you do. The sketch wasn't way too one-note, though.

    I'm out of commas.

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  11. Me: The sketch wasn't way too one-note, though.

    Was
    ... It was way too one-note. At first I'd written that it wasn't very funny but I decided to be slightly more specific.

    VW: heirdays — Celebrations of those who will inherit what's yours when you're gone.

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  12. @Anne: Now if she gets out of the craphole that is her life and she NO LONGER acts like a bitch, then she can be redeemed

    Yeah, the hope the is, if she can escape from Joffrey and the Lannisters, she'll realize the aristocratic life isn't really all its cracked up to be, and lets some of the haughty bitchiness go.

    @Matt: Alas, poor Yoren... that guy was awesome. At least he went down fighting.

    He certainly went out with a bang. Gotta appreciate that.

    I found myself hoping people don't think we really talk like that.

    As a native Minnesotan, I can tell you we that we both do and do not sound like everyone in Fargo, so I know what you mean.

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  13. @Blam: but he may simply be giving in to the inevitability of his surroundings; now that he's back home, aligning himself with Robb Stark is just plain risky.

    I meant to go back to Nikki's blog and respond to your response there, but here is good enough. :)

    Anyways, if that's the road they're going down with Theon, I can buy it. If he's tossing in his lot with the family because its safer/convienant/lesser of two evils, I can buy that. Theon strikes me as being pretty self-centered and pragmatic, so I can buy him not risking his neck to go back to Robb. I just hope the show establishes that as the reason he's staying with the Greyjoys, as opposed to him thinking he's actually better off there.

    Or, like I said, he's being torn apart by Stark-Home Syndrome.


    That's when Iron Man destroys your house in the course of a super-villain battle, right? ;)

    But then I'd totally missed all the numbers in the "countdown" episode until reading about that on the Internet, so...

    Yeah, I did too.

    I'm also with you on Sebastian's abrupt about-face — it's like he came down with a sudden case of Sue.

    Well said. I'll give them this: at least Glee is consistent in its inconsistency.

    You can't tell me that in-story continuity is not a sentient, meta-aware beast.

    Ha!

    Do they still have late-night horror-movie hosts?

    Probably not, though I loved that character and the fact that everyone else seemed to love him (I meant to mention it in my write-up). Then again, it's possible there are still some late night hosts like that floating around on some of the local broadcast channels (a couple of the local network affiliates around here recently started running these "decimal point" channels (like 15.1, etc.) with specific purposes (one runs old movies, one runs syndicated sitcoms, etc.), and I could see one of those featuring some kind of host character).

    Also, the idea of a late night horror movie host certainly fits with the not-entirely-realistic and not-always-consistent presentation on the show of Lima as an outdated, Podunk town, so it fits within the reality of the show, to a certain extent.

    Really? An 18-year-old high-school senior proved that?

    Ha! Good point.

    Brittany: "I want Lord Tubbington to kick his Ecstasy addiction."

    Fact: I love any reference to Lord Tubbington.

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  14. Just so much is wrapped up that line

    Nice break down of that line. For all the talk of Community doing all these over-the-top of meta gags, so much of the humor is derived from the characters themselves, and that's exactly why that line is so funny.

    and admit as well that a big part of that is probably Jeff being the primary male identification character

    And also, I'm not ashamed to admit, because Alison Brie is gorgeous, and I just want Annie to be happy...

    what's more, I recall Annie being sweet on Troy from high school and found it weird for her to be fixing up Troy with Britta even though she's clearly been focusing her swooning on Jeff lately.

    The Annie/Troy crush was pretty much swept aside as soon as the Annie/Jeff thing started (at the very end of season 1). So far, there isn't much of a Troy/Britta relationship per se, just hints at mutual attraction between the characters. The first episode to really hint at it was late in the first season (I think), when they take a dance class together and Britta discovers Troy is a really good dancer (there were also some hints towards it in one of the realities in "Advanced Chaos Theory").

    Really, I think it's born of the fact that the two actors have good chemistry together, and it wasn't really until this episode (and the next) that the show made the idea of their being a couple overt/something the other characters/the show would comment on/react to.

    (I'm going slash crazy!)

    I would just have had GRRM natter on with some frilly pseudo-historical fantasy grandiloquence before admitting that he'd written so much sex into the books because if it was ever made into an HBO series he wanted to see lots of titties.

    That would have been hilarious. I'll admit, there wasn't anything inherently funny about Samberg's character, I just appreciated the idea that the show was being informed by the sensibilities of a 13-year-old boy (which, as you say, could come from plenty of adults working in the genre). And Brian Moynihan's GRRM was pretty great, so I would have liked more of him.

    key was that the hallway was "oh, by the way"

    The offhand nature of the hallway was indeed the best part of the sketch.

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  15. Teebore: If he's tossing in his lot with the family because its safer/convienant/lesser of two evils, I can buy that.

    I realized after posting what I did that I guess how you feel on this depends somewhat on whether you're rooting for Theon overall or just rooting for him to succeed at the side of Robb Stark. And I'm actually in the latter camp, as I suspect you are, so I should've made clearer that while I was happy that he didn't send the raven — fearing that the move would go south — it was specifically so that he could bide his time and win over his sister (not... like that) or otherwise find a way to throw the lot of the Iron Islands behind Robb and/or just defect from The Sea Bitch — won't stop being funny, ever — at the right time. Theon in and of himself doesn't matter all that much to me except in the way the show tends to align our sympathies with de facto POV characters.

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  16. Teebore: That's when Iron Man destroys your house in the course of a super-villain battle, right? ;)

    Even when I did that "Iron Theon" pic, I totally failed to make any Ned-Tony Stark connection, and now I really wish there'd been a way to work a Stark Industries joke into that.

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  17. @Blam: Theon in and of himself doesn't matter all that much to me except in the way the show tends to align our sympathies with de facto POV characters.

    Yeah, I'm with you in that I'm rooting for Theon to succeed at Robb's side. I read Theon's actions in this episode to mean "to hell with Robb, I'm a Greyjoy now!", which is why they bothered me. But I see now that Theon may have simply been acting pragmatically, and it's entirely possible that he still intends to at least try to sway his family to Robb's side from the inside.

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  18. "By the power of Greyjoy, I... need a shower."

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  19. @Blam: "By the power of Greyjoy, I... need a shower."

    Congrats. I think you just won the internet.

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  20. @Teebore: Congrats. I think you just won the internet.

    I wasn't even sure that I'd typed that "out loud" until it showed up in my inbox. Not that I don't appreciate the reply, but it's kind-of a non sequitur really... It just seemed like the right thing to say at the time.

    All that said, How awesome would a Game of Thrones / Masters of the Universe crossover and/or mash-up be? I mean, Westeros and Eternia are— Oh, crap. I think that I just came up with a completely inappropriate He-Man / She-Ra picture...

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  21. @Blam: Oh, crap. I think that I just came up with a completely inappropriate He-Man / She-Ra picture...

    Ha! In you defense, I'm not convinced the writers of those two characters' respective series didn't put some of that into the subtext. ;)

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  22. @Teebore: I'm not convinced the writers of those two characters' respective series didn't put some of that into the subtext. ;)

    I don't think I ever actually saw She-Ra, so I wouldn't know. And I did this anyway.

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  23. @Blam: As I just mentioned on your blog, that picture is effin' brillant. :)

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