TV Tues - Cat Fancy Magazine and a Blood-stained Clown Suit

And the winnowing continues! Have almost convinced myself to wait for DVDs on CSI and Without a Trace, and last night cemented the removal of one more sitcom from my roster. Which one? Read on, MacDuff!


Out of Practice: Within the first three minutes of the show, one of the characters likened the main character's comic book collecting to "dating kryptonite," saying that leaving a comic book out for women to see was as bad as leaving out Cat Fancy magazine and a blood-stained clown suit. And the geek bashing went downhill from there. As if I didn't have enough reasons to dump this show already. Thank you, Out of Practice, for making my decision much, much easier.

Gilmore Girls: While I'm more than ready for the Rory/Lorelei split to be resolved, I have to say that watching Rory transform from a Gilmore to a Gilmore has been interesting. I like that they didn't try to drag out the fish-out-of-water scenario; Rory is too competent for that to play well for long. Watching her take charge of the community service and D.A.R. felt right for the character. I'm looking forward to this week's episode when Emily and Richard finally find out just what went down between Logan's family and Rory.

How I Met Your Mother: NPH continues to be the best thing about this show. I give them points for not having him use "Suit up!" in this ep. Spread the catchphrases around, and they'll mean much more.

The Office: So far, this season hasn't lived up to the promise of the first six eps, IMO. Still, there are some great moments in each ep. My favorite moment of last week's ep can be summed up in one phrase: Pam-pong.

Veronica Mars: I'm a bit torn: on the one hand, I would love it if Keith became sheriff, if for no other reason than we didn't have to deal with the bumbling moron sheriff there is now. On the other hand, I enjoy Keith as the P.I., not totally bound by the rules. If they do decide to make him sheriff, I'm curious as to how it's going to affect Veronica's methods: will her dad make it easier for her, knowing she means well, or harder, since he has proven he can see through her tricks 9 times out of 10?

Lost: After a really strong season premiere, the show has floundered a bit in its subsequent eps. Still enjoying it, but something has felt a bit off.

Invasion: Okay, seriously, can somebody explain to me why this show has gotten such rave reviews? Anyone? Still not an awful show, but if I see one more ad that refers to it as the "best new drama of the season" I might have a breakdown.

Without a Trace: Good grief, enough with the angst already! I don't mind a little interpersonal drama in my procedurals; as a matter of fact, I prefer it. But to have every single character so miserable is not appealing in the least.

Smallville: After years of dancing around it, Lex is finally turning to the dark side . . . and I can't say I care for it. It's like the showrunners have decided that for Lex to be the full blown bad guy, he can't just be "evil"; no, he has to be Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil. He's so over-the-top now that I can't take him seriously.

Everwood: Ah, the obligatory Andy/Ephraim blowout-for-no-reason. Been a while since we've had one of those, good to see the characters are still willfully stubborn.

Threshold: I think this show struggles the most when it tries to do action sequences, which always feel cheap and amateurish. Which is a shame, because the concept keeps me hooked. I was glad to find out that they didn't really tell the cop the truth about what was going on; when it looked like they had, I was about ready to write the show off.

Numbers: Another "sophomore slump" show. The character dynamics feel off, and the Charley-talks-about-math scenes, instead of feeling natural, are overly staged. And poor Diane Farr, going from such a tightly written show like Rescue Me to a show which basically has her reduced to saying "Wow, math sure is neat, guys! Oh, and here's the bad guy’s profile" each week.

West Wing: The show has definitely bounced back from the slump that followed the loss of Sorkin, largely thanks to the renewed energy brought on by new characters; hard to complain about the new writers screwing the characters up if they're the ones who created them. And, speaking of screwing up the pre-existing characers, I think I can add something else to my list of things that drive me crazy: when characters I like fight with each other for no good reason. The Josh vs. Toby thing has gone on far, far too long. I do, however, love the inclusion of Janene Garofalo as the latest addition to Santos' campaign staff. My only regret is that she wasn't around during the Sorkin years, would have loved to have seen what he would have written for her. At the end of last season, I was torn between Vinick and Santos, but I've found myself rooting for Santos more and more. Part of it is the fact that Santos' staff and support comes from the long-standing cast, but part of it is how Vinick's campaign is going. The tone of "do whatever it takes to shake the other side up" has soured me on the Vinick camp.