Thursday, July 9th, 2009
07.00 Arrested Development
09.30 It's Your Move
10.00 The Venture Brothers
10.30 Raven
Arrested Development. Episode 15. "Staff Infection" It's Saturday and Michael must work, but he ends up at the beach. George Michael wants to chill out with his dad, but he ends up being the only one at The Bluth Company. The Staff are being forced to work with Michael, but they end up lost in Catalina. Michael's siblings want their pay cheques, but they each end up working for The Bluth Company, in various capacities. And Tobias goes to a 'men's penal colony'.
There's an abundance of quick-fire sight gags in this one one. My favourite is the encounter between Buster and the sheep in the photo booth. Quickly followed by the very similar photo's of Lucille trying to get an ID card for some chain of stores. The sheep, and the idea of sheep/shepherds crops up many times, and you have to be very quick to spot them. There's some delightful stuff of Buster at work on a building site, shown way in the background, and the on-screen text for Annyong's recurring greeting - 'Hello' - is shown much smaller when he's way in the background.
And on and on...
Visually, this episode is a treat.
All the big laughs, for me, come from Michael Cera as George Michael gets the idea that his father is deliberately spending time away from him ('He's at the beach!?').
This is one of those rare Season One episode, so far, that gives Lindsay a lot to do and is all the better for it. She causes chaos, poor girl.
It's Your Move. Episode 3. "Dating Games" Eli wants a date for the Harvest Dance.
One half-hour of hilarious one-liners delivered by a superbly talented young cast: Jason Bateman (of course), Adam Jay Sadowsky, Tricia Cast and Leanna Beth.
The show casts it's net very wide as it delivers laughs. Early on, network executives come in for a pot shot and it just gets better from there. Eli gets some wonderful lines ("I don't like when you call me homely") and Sadowsky is pitch-perfect in deliver. Nobody matches Bateman, though, and he steals every scene. The story he tells about the death of his father is a true comedic highlight. Every pause is perfect and earns loud laughter from the audience. Bateman really knows how to work a live audience and use their laughter and work with it to make his delivery even funnier. Guy is a master. Even at a young age.
Tricia Cast is the real revelation, for me, because it would be easy to dismiss her as playing the dumb, pretty sister. But, in this episode, there's a lot of good character material for Julie and funny stuff, too. And Cast is very, very funny.
Eli takes center stage, story-wise, and the while episode is driven by his need to get a date with Julie and with Matthew's need to be a good friend to Eli. The show gets major praise from me for really writing the Matthew/Eli friendship as a real friendship and making it clear that Matthew likes Eli and even going so far as to tell us why.
The final twist at the very, very end is superb. Very funny, too.
The Venture Brothers. Episode 5. "The Incredible Mr. Brisby" Dr. Venture is taken captive by a cartoon magnate, while the boys are taken hostage by a group fighting the eccentric magnate.
An average episode. Some good gags here, and a few that are so-so. Roy Brisby is a one-joke character and he gets far too much screentime. The Orange County Liberation Front are a much funnier group, but they remind me of something you'd see on The Tick.
Raven. Episode 3. "Reunion" Jonathan thinks the mother of his missing son might still be alive and - like him - searching for their son.
An example of style over content. This is one of the stronger episodes of Raven, but the story makes no great sense. The first half is devoted to Raven's quest to find out who the mysterious woman is. When he finds her, he totally fails to ask any obvious questions about what has been happening in the story up to that point. Consequently when she betrays him, later in the story, it doesn't come as much of a surprise to the viewer. Indeed, the climax makes very little sense. The bad guy from the pilot returns and reveals his part in the events of the episode, but - even at this point - it's not exactly clear why they bothered to convince Jonathan that his dead lover was alive. It makes no sense.
However, the episode's plot fairly zips along, there are several really great fight scenes and Larry Manetti as a guest star. So, logic flaws aside, there is lots here to enjoy.
Highlight? It's Your Move (very, very funny)
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Arrested Development, It's Your Move, The Venture Brothers, Raven
