MagneticMediaFed

S–t sandwich.

I guess at this point I’m basically watching Weeds as something of a goof. I mean, over the past six or so weeks the show has gone from whimsical to odd to reaching to just plain awful. Now, it is no longer worth tuning in for the characters, but instead just to see where this runaway train ends up. It also isn’t worth devoting any more than two paragraphs toward.

This week, for starters, I have to admit I was a little saddened that they didn’t take the twist I was expecting them to take from the moment Nancy left the doctor’s office. Given the series’ recent track-record of having characters do things for no particular reason I was certain she was going to have an affair with Peter’s ex-wife. Why did I think this would happen? Because at this stage in the game, why the f–k not? When this moment didn’t develop I was a little sore, but quickly found comfort in the geyser of s–t that closed out the episode. How fitting, right? Talk about your metaphors.

For the love of god, get us off of this trainwreck of show.

Man, those Weeds producers love kicking up the indie-rock soundtrack to pretend the story they’re telling is of any consequence whatsoever. Sure it might have worked a season or so back, but that was before all of the characters were reduced to pawns in a series of non-sequitors and cheap thrills. Even the episodes dramatic core (Celia’s physical and emotional reveal of herself to us to and to Sullivan) was ultimately nothing more than shock as Sullivan had already presented himself as such a miserable human being there was no genuine resonance. Wasn’t this the guy who was trying to nail Nancy about ten minutes prior?

As for the Andy storyline… OK? But… why? What’s the point? What does any of this have to do with anything? The only reason to keep watching is for the two kids, Shane and Isabelle, and the occasional funny line by Kevin Nealon. At this point those characters are in their own series that just happens to be airing in the middle of Weeds. Am I the only person who feels this way? Talk about a fall from grace.

Hey, it’s Conrad!

This show is dangerously close to falling off my radar. What was once thought of as simply a string of uneven episodes is now edging close to being more of an epidemic problem for the series as a whole. The decisions they made during the latter half of the second season suggested the writers were interested in sacrificing ease for drama and reality for comedy. This I appreciated. There are too many shows to count that do the opposite. Now, I can’t get through an episode without the characters making the single most obvious decision for every problem that arises — unless of course it’s Nancy inexplicably nailing Matthew Modine’s real-estate kingpin for reasons that are as mysterious as they are unsettling. More after the break…

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“Uncle Jesse! Uncle Jesse!”

You knew it was going to be a crazy week when The Rippers tried to have band practice in the basement while Michelle was home sick from preschool. When she wandered downstairs during a particularly raucous version of The Beach Boys “Cocomo” and said, “Uncle Jesse, you’re making noise!” I almost thought I was going to squirt milk out my nose — because I was watching the episode drinking a tall glass of 2% milk and munching on some graham crackers. Of course, once Stephanie got home from girl scouts things didn’t improve much for The Ripper’s chances on being ready before their big gig. More after the jump…

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I’m sorry, Andy Millman was wrong. Wigs can be funny.

Weeds has gone from being at the top of my “excited to watch” list to somewhere between Oprah and reruns of George Lopez. It’s not that it’s a bad show, it’s just wildly inconsistent… and maybe a little racist (maybe more than a little). If not for the million-faces-of-Mary-Louise Parker it would be a far more difficult sell (and probably placed on the list between one of those creepy penis-enlargement infomercials and that really weird call-in game show where the host talks at the screen for two hours without stopping in the middle of the night). A bit more after the break…

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I really loved in the opening scene (between Nancy and the DEA agent looking for the presumed dead, Peter) that Nancy never really looked the guy in the eyes. She looked everywhere, just not at him. Mary Louise Parker is great at this sort of thing, and is really the main reason I stick with this wildly uneven series. But is that enough? More after the jump…

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Hey, it’s Carrie Fisher!

After last week where I spoke highly of Showtime’s decision to run a lower-third on the screen during the first few seconds of the episode filling us in on who was singing the theme song, they didn’t do it this week! What’s that all about? It wasn’t even being sung in English. Throw me a bone, here Sho.

OK, now that that’s out of the way. What was up with the dancing scene? It seemed right out of Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, only without the platform shoes, and y’know, this time with the threat of rape. Kind of a stupid scene, no? Really, it was a scene that highlighted the problems with the series. More often than not, it seems that the solution to all problems is for Nancy to do something vaguely sexy in front of seemingly dangerous people. It’s fun, sure, but it isn’t particularly funny. The series needs Zooey Daschenel back (hell, any series could use Zooey Daschenel back). Perhaps her presence at the end of last season and the beginning of this one raised the comedy stakes to a level the series creator’s weren’t prepared to maintain.

I just want to laugh. Is that too much to ask?

The brightest spot in the episode was Andy finally having to show up for army. It provided more “potential” for comedy than anything, but at this stage of the game, potential goes a long way. Nothing else in the episode was all that memorable. Hopefully this changes in the coming weeks once Matthew Modine and Mary-Kate Olsen show up. Right now though… not so much.
Again, I just want to laugh. I’ll leave the drama to the professionals.

“I ran into a door”

I really appreciate Showtime running a lower-third during the opening song telling us that this week’s version of “Little Boxed” was being performed by Angelique Kidjo. Usually I’m totally opposed to screen clutter (especially on premium cable) but in this case it’s much more of a service since most fans of the show probably wonder who’s doing the theme each week, but probably not interested enough to dig through the closing credits thirty minutes later. Full recap after the break…

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The finale of Weeds second season was so crazy in its desire to have every single character in what appeared to be an inescapable life and death cliffhanger, I found going into tonight’s season premiere I was far more interested in how the writers would get themselves out of this painted-then-nailed into a corner predicament than what the future held for our beloved characters. After all, aside from Peter the DEA agent, no one has really been that badly hurt — well, Andy did get his toes bitten off, but it seemed to be in good fun. To my great relief, 30 minutes into this new season we aren’t even remotely close to solving the problems that plagued our characters in the last. Nor should we. The full details after the break…

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I looked at my DVR to see what was going to be on tonight and almost startled myself into a coma. Tonight is the most jam-packed night of programming since the standard television season ended in May. It is a clear sign of things to come as the fall gets underway and sleeping patterns greatly diminish. In any case, here’s a list what I’m hoping to watch:

• My Boys (TBS, 10pm)
• No Reservations (Travel, 10pm)
• Weeds (Showtime, 10pm)
• Californication (Showtime, 10:30pm)
• The Hills (MTV, 10pm)

What’s that? Scheduling conflicts? I don’t understand. I’m just thankful I bailed on Big Love two months ago or things might have been really hairy.

Four of five of those shows will likely work themselves into the regular weekly rotation (Californication is a toss-up as early word is it sucks). The real question mark is on MTV’s The Hills, a series I watched during its first season and was more or less repulsed by. That being said, when a friend’s Gmail away message today reads “Spencer Sucks” I have to wonder if perhaps I was grading the show a bit too harshly and not savoring its “cattier” qualities — so I’m going to give it another shot.

Last night’s finale to season two of the Showtime pot-series Weeds might have had one of the best cliffhangers in recent memory (apologies if I said this about a show four months ago). In fact, things would have only been more interesting had a character actually been dangling from a cliff. Basically, every character in the show was put in a seemingly unescapable position except for Peter, the DEA-agent/boyfriend/husband to Mary-Louis Parker’s Nancy who was bumped off in what can only be classified as a ‘casual television murder.’

The only drawback to last night’s finale was the unfortunate realization that the show will be back next year and they’ll have to find way to resolve all of this (which will be mostly impossible without bending their already heavily bent reality beyond recognition). I was curious, before last night, if the show would even be back for a third season. Showtime likes to dump its hits before they get too expensive (read: Huff, Dead Like Me), but the post-episode teaser said a new season is indeed on the horizon. Call me crazy, but it would actually be kind of cool just END a show on a note like that– especially when there is no way you can write yourself out of it and live up to expectations.

Since about episode five or six of this season, Showtime’s Weeds has fallen off a bit from the season’s strong start. That is until this week when Zooey Deshanel showed up as Andy’s exgirlfriend. It was a hilarious role and perfectly cast. Perhaps the best guest roll in television since Forest Whitaker completely took over The Shield. As an actress, Deshanel has always been best with flighty characters, and here playing someone who had spent the past 48 hours eating nothing but salmon and Red Bull, she was pitch perfect. It also didn’t hurt that she was incredibly funny, which is important on this show since sometimes it becomes a little overly concerned with its inconsequential plotting. Knowing that this is Showtime and that series rarely make it to a third season because they can’t afford to pay them, I’m assuming that Weeds will wrap itself up in the coming weeks. This is a shame, when such a great character is introduced so late in the game, but I guess that’s how things work out.

Veronica Mars seems tighter this season. (WHAT?!) Wow, that sounded horrible. What I meant was that the writing seems tighter. The story, whether it be the main mystery or the individual mysteries seem to constantly expanding. Everything is relevant to something else, and those few things that don’t seem to fit are probably just the formation of important things to come. Also, does anyone else secretly (or not so secretly) want Veronica and Logan to split? While I did find the end of last night’s episode to be mostly romantic, Logan is best when he’s bitter, and frankly he just doesn’t seem all that bitter when Veronica is on her good side. This is a shame as Logan’s quips rank among the highlights of previous seasons.

Also, you can add the line, “Larry, you’re entering a world of pain” to the long list of Big Lebowski homages. And let’s not forget the seemingly late arrival of Weevil to the Hearst campus. It was actually probably a good idea to wait a couple episodes so that his joining the school’s custodial staff didn’t seem quite so forced. Now we have all the major players perfectly aligned for some sort of horrible future conflict. But first, perhaps we should figure out who’s the rapist?

Heroes — The last minute and a half of Heroes was so awesome it was infuriating. Infuriating, because it made me wait through 45-minutes of ho-hum setup and seemingly unanswerable questions. Infuriating, because it also will make me wait through 45 more minutes of ho-hum seemingly never-ending setup and, of course, more questions.

AND WOW, was it violent! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a woman nailed to the side of a stairwell with ice picks before. THANKS NBC!!

See, what all of these new super-secret-serials have failed to learn from Lost is that people want to see a story mixed in with their supernatural intrigue. Sure, any give Lost ep will boggle the mind and dazzle the senses, but it will also tell a story about a character, and when the hour is over you feel like you’ve learned something about why someone behaves the way they do, even if you’re left asking a million more questions regarding the madness that is the Lost universe.

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip — A note for Aaron Sorkin: quit preaching to me! If I wanted political opinions I’d watch cable news. Or better yet, I’d watch The Wire. See, The Wire is one of the few shows that can say everything about everything without actually saying anything. Studio 60… has started to irk me simply for its lack of subtlty. Sorkin, I suppose, is an acquired taste. Maybe I have yet to acquire that taste. I’m curious if I will before I quit watching. However (as usual), Matthew Perry is still good enough to carry me over to the next week.

Weeds –  Have you noticed that once a season hits episode six or seven, it suddenly becomes void of discussion material? I did enjoy the scene with Andy and Silas laying the pool talking about how their lives suck. That was funny (if obvious).