Monday Night Madness

I'll just come out and say it, I'm terrible at this blog thing. After a hectic February, the Winter Olympics (and my futile attempts to catch most of the figure skating, thanks NBC :P), and half of primetime TV going on hiatus I'm going to try and reboot this. Starting off with this crazy weekend and leading up to the most busy night of the week...Monday.

Sunday:
Every Saturday, or Sunday, depending, I try to watch Legend of the Seeker. It's delightfully campy in the vein that Xena: Warrior Princess was, and beautifully shot. Of course, it's filmed in New Zealand so that gives it ten zillion bonus points and my automatic vote. Sunday's episode centered around Richard and the gang saving Kahlan from the nefarious Sisters of the Dark and this evil king whom they'd made a deal with. Basically, it was Richard, Cara, and Zedd going undercover as a princess, her brother the prince, and their aunt (the scariest looking man-woman in drag ever O_O). Highlights of the episode included Cara's attempts at rhyming prose, trying and failing to act in a overtly feminine manner, and of course, the requisite fight scenes. Those always rock.

I've only become addicted to Big Love in the past year or so, but I've fallen hard. This show has too many things to focus on, and this season is making my head spin with all of the varying plot lines. It's still good, and even though the eps seem to be hit or miss, this week was a solid one. Some thoughts:

I go back and forth on who my favorite characters are, but I have a solid admiration for Nicky and I love that this season she seems to be discovering herself and building a life separate from the compound and her polygamist upbringing. Her ex, JJ is super creepy, and I'm seriously suspecting that he uses his sister, Wanda for disturbing egg harvesting practices or something. He's getting close to Roman Grant 2.o. Nicky's brother, Alby, has always had that aura of "creeper," and even when he was courting his illicit paramour, Dale, he did it in a decidedly cringe-worthy fashion. Still, it's so heartbreaking to see what he's being put through this season! I thought I'd lose it when he found Dale's body hanging in the apartment they'd rented for their meet ups, and this week, when he got so close to reaching to his sister and finally, shut down after hearing the disapproval from his deceased father (Papa Grant) it was shattering to see him retreat from Nicky, essentially shutting down and closing off all emotion. I'm surprised he didn't catch on to Laura's admission of guilt in outing him and Dale to Bill Hendrickson.

Speaking of which, I wanted so badly to throw something at the TV every time Bill blabbed about his beliefs and polygamy in Sunday's episode. It was so good to hear Marilyn call him a hypocrite to his face, and watch Ana not buy into his bullshit. That scene highlighted how blind Bill is about the hypocrisy of his beliefs. How interesting that Margie's gone and snagged a second husband, even if he's only her hubby on paper. I doubt that's going to last for very long, since Goren seems to have a developing interest in her.

Sarah's up and leaving to Portland with her husband, and although I wish Amanda Seyfried wouldn't leave the show, at least her character is getting away from the mounting snowball of drama that's brewing back at the Hendrickson household.

Good for Barb in sticking to her convictions regarding her fellow housewives and their RX addictions. It might throw a stick in the road for Bill's campaign, but I'm glad she stood up to him, and the naysayers and kept with it. Thank goodness she stopped trying to be the unintentional condescending big boss to the casino workers.

New Teenie: do not want :|

Monday:
Monday nights are making me wish I had a DV-R. At least with satellite we get multiple replays in the same evening, so I can stagger my viewings. Yes, I do watch far too much TV and yes, I do analyze how I'm going to get my fix and yes, I do realize that episodes are on Hulu, however I like my shows on my telly. Anyway, I tried to squeeze in Damages, How I Met Your Mother, Law and Order (original flavor), The Big Bang Theory, and a bit of Life Unexpected. Whew.

Like Big Love, I've only gotten into Damages in the second season or so. I staggered the show then, and was a little fuzzy on the conclusion of the season. This season is great. Where to start? Well, for one thing, I'm devastated that Tom Shayes is getting killed off. By now I'm pretty sure it's got to do with his attempting to retrieve money from the Tobin ponzi scheme for his own family. Whatever thing he was involved with Ellen in seems to have been forgotten. I vacillate between rooting for and hoping Joe Tobin fails spectacularly during any given episode. He's a little like Bill Hendrickson in that, just when you're ready to write them off as completely self absorbed idiots, they do something that surprises you and brings you back to just this side of hoping they pull through okay. For the former it usually kicks in when he actually practices what he preaches with his family, and I guess the same applies for the latter.

I always wonder what Patti has up her sleeve, what she means by making her newest hire meet up with Ellen, and what role the architect dude is going to play in her life. I'm starting to wonder if she did have a part in Tom's death...

I missed most of HIMYM, but the bits I did catch didn't really bring the laughs. What gives?

Law and Order OG has moved to Mondays?! AUGH. That's both a boon and a blessing. The old dinosaur came roaring back to life with back to back episodes and I gotta say, I think Jeremy Sisto and Anthony Anderson's detectives are growing on me. I was so used to the young old dichotomy of Orbach and whatever hot young cop he got paired up with for the longest time that I gave up on the show after he left (okay, I stuck around for a while because Jesse L. Martin was fab as Det. Green). Anyway, it fell into this schlump of ripping stories from the headlines without putting enough of a fictional spin on them that made them seem like serialized hour long news spots. It feels like SVU is starting to hit a snag with their plots, but they've gone the over the top crazy route instead.

I thought the two storylines were going to be related, or connected somehow, but they turned out to be completely different. The first had to do with the murder of an entire family due to some type of metal music influencing a highly disturbed teen. The second had to do with the brutal death of a charter school student at the hands an inner city boy jealous over the impact the kid had on his little brother as a role model, and his friends who had some issues of their own to work out. Both plots were a lot better than I'm making them out to be, but by golly, they really got the feel of old school Law and Order episodes down. This show is practically as old as I am, which is ancient by Hollywood standards, and it's still ticking!

When the Big Bang Theory gets it right, they really get it right. I loved Raj's speaker shirt (how cute is Kunal Nayar? So cute), the whole plot about the boys seeing Stan Lee at their usual haunt, the comic book store, and repurcussions! Yay! for Sheldon's driving Penny to the hospital a few episodes back. I love it when things that have happened in a TV show's universe are referenced in later episodes. Continuity for the win. I'm also glad the judge didn't kowtow to Sheldon's smarminess over his presiding over traffic court instead of some major case. The little script he wrote up for Penny was funny, and Leonard wasn't a huge prat in this one. Sheldon's glee over his restraining orders is weird, and giggle worthy.

That's it! For now anyway.