Sunday, April 18th, 2010
04.00 24
05.30 24
07.00 The Big Bang Theory
07.30 Party Down
12.15 Police Squad!
24. Season 8, Episode 12. "Day 8: 3:00 a.m.-4:00 a.m."
Simply superb.
The episode opens with Kayla and Tarin running from the good guys and right into the arms of the bad guys (just as he wanted). The episode ends with Kayla and Tarin running from the bad guys and right into the arms of the good guys (just as he wanted).
In the order to make this 180 degree change work, the script has to accomplish remarkable character writing. And it works. And the twists are nothing short of superb.
The only thing more tense, exciting and action packed than the opening ten minutes is the closing ten minutes. Both sequences are some of the best stuff 24 has ever put on screen. We open with a team of cops storming the hotel while Jack is en route and trying to call the shots, we end with Kayla arriving at CTU HQ and causing all sorts of chaos while is still on the road but managing to be the only one talking sense and trying to save lives.
24. Season 8, Episode 13. "4:00 a.m.-5:00 a.m." Chloe goes badass.
This is the episode where Chloe pulls a gun on some NSA idiot and ends up saving the day. And it, of course, is totally awesome. And is some of the best Chloe action we have ever seen in 24. Which is saying a lot. Chloe doesn't get a lot of big scenes, but when she does get them they tend to be awesome beyond belief.
Jack spends this episode trapped (with three others) by snipers. Sadly, two of the others are written as stupid/clueless and they make mistakes, get themselves killed and drag the whole thing out longer than it needs to be. And I'm a guy would generally like a full hour of gunfire on a TV show. Sometimes, not every often, the show will introduce a clueless character to create conflict/tension and it doesn't engage me all that much. Mostly, 24 has a talent for placing two characters with different agendas in opposition and watching them duke it out. In this episode, for instance, we have Dana refusing to back Chloe up. That's more compelling/interesting than when some one-episode-guest-star does it, because we know that Dana has her own agenda. The Chloe storyline (which was awesome) would probably have been better if it had been Chloe pulling a gun on Dana or other regular characters. And the Jack-trapped-by-snipers storyline would have been more tense if they had - for example - started a fire behind Jack which gave all of his team a compelling reason to move too soon, rather than stupidity.
This is also the episode which reveals that Dana is working with the terrorists. I have mixed feelings about this. On one level, I love this idea. Introduce a character and hide her deadly secret behind another less deadly secret. As we, the audience, watch her deal with her less deadly secret we will probably trust her and fail to suspect that she has another other secrets in her closet. And it's pretty much worked. I, for one, didn't think there was another more to the character of Dana. Well done, 24! However... is this a step too far? And isn't it a bit silly? Her strangling this guy right there in the middle of CTU! Sure, at this state, I suppose she doesn't have to maintain her cover for much longer, but c'mon... she strangled him right there in the middle of CTU??!
Party Down. Season 2, Episode 1. "Jackal Onassis Backstage Party"
The perfect balance of melancholy and slapstick. Such an amazing, wonderful show. One minute you are pondering the meaning/meaningless of life, and the next you are watching Ken Marino being tasered. How can you go wrong?
The show works because it is very, very funny. But it also makes us care about the characters: particularly Henry. Adam Scott is superb at making us think there's a hell of depth to the character of Henry. Depth and awareness.
I miss Jane Lynch (curse you, Glee!) but having Megan Mullally eases the pain. I laughed a lot every time she was on screen. Can't complain about that.
Biggest laugh? Roman still loses out to Kyle when it comes to chatting up the girls at the party, even when he's dresses as a celebrity. Awesome. So, so funny.
Police Squad! Episode 2. "Ring of Fear (A Dangerous Assignment)" Boxing
Even more than the first episode this is a story that you would expect to see on a 60s/70s cop show: our hero tries to help a boxer being forced to throw a fight because a loved one has been kidnapped (There's a Gemini Man episode, in particular, that springs to mind.)
Apart from being a dead-on parody of cop show conventions, this is a very funny half-hour of TV. The gags seem more relentless than in in the first episode and many of them are completely absurd, with - at one point - Rudy Solari pulling a succession of odd objects out of his pocket (thin air?) to prove that his henchman has the boxer's lady held hostage.
Best bit? The poker game that ends with the players having an earnest debate as to which hand beats which hand.
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24, Party Down, Police Squad
McMillan And Wife, Police Squad
Saturday, April 3rd, 2010
08.00 McMillan And Wife
10.00 Police Squad
McMillan And Wife. Episode 10. "Blues for Sally M"
After two particularly strong episode in a row, the series takes a downward turn with a very weird and predictable yarn.
When the tale begins we discover that Sally has had a musical piece named after her by a famous composer/pianist. Sally is mystified by this, because she has never met the man. As far as she can recall...
That, by itself, would be kooky way of getting the McMillan's involved in a case-of-the-week but the writers (Alfred Brenner and Oliver Hailey) take it a step further by telling us that Sally reads once a week to the pianist's sworn enemy: a near-blind newspaper critic who hates everything that the musician creates.
Huh?!
I mean, seriously, this is one strange tale. And it gets odder when Sally visits the mysterious critic - to read to him - and he is filmed from a distance, always wearing a wig and false beard.
Between all this oddness, there's the usual mixture of banter, chases and comedy. Sally and Mac have some amusing romantic scenes, Mac's cop sidekick gets a couple of funny scenes and there's a bit of action here and there.
But, as episodes of this series to, this is a weaker than normal outing and ending is easy to predict from about twenty minutes in, which makes the remainder of the movie a bit of a time waster. Shame.
Police Squad. Episode 1. "A Substantial Gift (The Broken Promise)" Bank
The humour in Police Squad works on two levels. Certain gags are funny to anyone, and certain gags are aimed at those of us who have watched a lot of 70s cop shows.
1. When a character called Ralph Twice is shot during a bank robbery it leads to a wonderful dialogue scene having much confusion about "Who shot twice?" and so on. A scene that pretty much anyone paying attention will find hilarious. It's wonderfully written and superbly performed by Leslie Nielsen, Alan North and Kathryn Leigh Scott.
2. When our hero takes to the streets and gets vital case information from a shoeshine boy named Johnny (William Duell) it's a scene that will be found funny by anyone who's familiar with characters like Huggy Bear and the tropes and idioms of television detective fiction.
And some of the gags are timeless, so much so that they are more relevant today. In this episode when Drebin stops off at the lab there's a scene that's as much a parody of every modern CSI episode as it is of anything else. Olsen (Ed Williams) shoots bullets into video tapes and details the results as if the mean something significant. That's how the CSI shows work. The audience is in the dark, and the characters tell us what is significant to them and we believe it. Willing suspension of disbelief. The genius of Police Squad is that it holds a mirror up to that.
As opening episodes go, this is a strong one. The gags are relentless and Leslie Nielsen instantly establishes himself as having star power and an ability to rise above the sea of jokes. Witness his "I did live with a guy once" soliloquy to see his talent at work.
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A Briefing With Michael: One Year Ago
