When Do Your Shows Start?

January 2, Sunday
-ABC: Brothers and Sisters at 10, Desperate Housewives at 9

January 3, Monday
-ABC: The Bachelor at 8, Castle at 10
-CBS: Hawaii Five-O at 10, How I Met Your Mother at 8, Mike and Molly at 9:30, Rules of Engagement at 8:30
-ABC Family: Pretty Little Liars at 8

January 4, Tuesday
-NBC: Parenthood at 10, The Biggest Loser Couples at 8
-ABC: V at 9, Detroit 1-8-7 at 10
-CBS: Paula Abdul's Live to Dance at 8
-TNT: Southland at 10

January 5, Wednesday
ABC: Better with You at 8:30, Cougar Town at 9:30, The Middle at 8, Modern Family at 9
DirecTV 101: Friday Night Lights at 9
FOX: Human Target at 8
NBC: Law & Order: Special Victims Unit at 9

January 6, Thursday
CBS: The Big Bang Theory at 8, CSI at 9, The Mentalist at 10,
ABC: Grey's Anatomy at 9, Private Practice at 10, Wipeout at 8

January 7, Friday
CBS: Blue Bloods at 10, CSI:NY at 9, Medium at 8
SyFy: Merlin at 10

January 9, Sunday
NBC: The Cape at 9

January 10, Monday
FOX: Lie to Me at 9

January 11, Tuesday
CBS: The Good Wife at 10, NCIS at 8, NCIS:Los Angeles at 9
FX: Lights Out at 10
MTV: Teen Mom 2 at 10

January 12, Wednesday
NBC: Chase at 9
CBS: Criminal Minds at 9
ABC: Off the Map at 10

January 16, Sunday
HBO: Big Love at 9

January 17, Monday
NBC: Chuck at 8, Harry's Law at 10
SyFy: Being Human at 9
Fox: House at 8
MTV: Skins at 10

January 18, Tuesday
CW: Life Unexpected at 8
USA: White Collar at 10

January 19, Wednesday
FOX: American Idol at 8

January 20, Thursday
NBC: 30 Rock at 10, Community at 8, The Office at 9, Outsourced at 10:30, Parks and Recreation at 9:30, Perfect Couples at 8:30
Fox: Bones at 8
USA: Fairly Legal at 10, Royal Pains at 9

January 21, Friday
Fox: Fringe at 9
Starz: Spartacus: Gods of the Arena at 10

January 24, Monday
CW: 90210 at 8, Gossip Girl at 9

January 25, Tuesday
CW: Hellcats at 9, One Tree Hill at 8

January 27, Thursday
FX: Archer at 10
CW: Nikita at 9, The Vampire Diaries at 8

January 28, Friday
CW: Smallville at 8, Supernatural at 9

February 4, Friday
CBS: The Defenders at 8

February 6, Sunday
Fox: Glee (after the Superbowl. This show will be on Tuesdays starting the following week)

February 7, Monday
Fox: The Chicago Code at 10, Traffic Light at 9:30

February 8, Tuesday
Fox: Raising Hope at 9

February 20, Sunday
CBS: The Amazing Race at 8

February 23, Wednesday
CW: America's Next Top Model at 8

February 28, Monday
NBC: The Event at 9

March 29, Tuesday
ABC: Body of Proof at 10

Did we miss a show you need? Comment and tell us. Unless it's Two and a Half Men or Family Guy, two shows we intentionally ignore. Be sure to check the "Recent Interesting Links" page to see some commentary on the new shows premiering.

Glee's Chord Overstreet is Clearly as Awkward As His Character, Sam

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJgA_yEZT_g&feature=player_embedded

Why Ern Hates Twilight - an old rant, edited/re-worked for this blog

Leeard is out of town and unable to get on the internet today. This leaves Ern full reign to trash one of Leeard's favorite books (Leeard's side note: this is NOT one of my favorite books for any other reason than it's mindless and easy to read. In terms of quality, it's not even on my list) on the blog. (Pause for evil laugh.) You may be thinking, "Twilight has been trashed to death...do we really need another blogger trashing it?" The answer is, of course, yes, because it is Twilight, and it cannot be trashed ENOUGH. Now, Leeard AGREES with Ern on most of these points and is certainly smart enough to notice them herself. (You don’t know this, but Leeard is a bona fide genius. It scares me.) We have argued about Twilight before, and Leeard just says that she is able to enjoy it in spite of these things. But I can’t.

I read the first book and thought it was among the stupidest, most self-indulgent things ever written. Alice was kind of a cool character, but she was hardly in it!!! Toward the end, when I realized that nothing was going to happen except two pretty people making googly eyes at each other, I threw the book across the room. I shipped it off to some unknown purchaser (via Amazon), along with a scathing letter to them for buying it from me. I read it because it was popular. I trust my fellow man and I want to discuss things with people. People keep comparing them to Harry Potter. This isn’t right. Harry Potter was about courage, love, anti-materialism, equality, anti-prejudice, etc. Twilight is just a bunch of gush. Harry Potter appealed to millions of people of all ages and genders, all over the world, of different religions, cultures, intellects, and interests. It was truly special. Let’s face it, Twilight appears to girls, young women, and sad old women in the West. That’s it. After I finished “shitelight,” to see what happens later without wasting hours of my life, I read the summaries of the next three books on Wikipedia. Now, I like vampires most of the time, because I think when you get immortal beings with unlimited power, youth, good looks, and money, an author can show how miserable that is. They can show how what humans think they want is the opposite of what they are made for. I also like books set in high schools, and, sometimes when it’s good, romance. But this…ergh.

Things I didn’t like:

• Edward is borderline abusive. His “best” quality is that he loves Bella obsessively. This shows that many girls don’t care about who a guy is, just how he makes them feel about themselves or how obsessed with them a guy is. His abuse manifests itself in little scenes like when he lies to her, takes the engine from her car so she can’t go visit another man, watches her when she sleeps, says creepy things like, “You are my life now,” and beats her to a pulp the first time they have sex (unintentionally, of course). He apologizes profusely, but she insists it wasn’t that bad and that it was “perfect.” Lots of people are thinking, “No, no! He’s just protective of Bella and concerned for her safety!” Nope. In real life, that’s a red flag.

The Domestic Violence Guide lists characteristics of domestic violence:

1.       constantly criticize you and your abilities as a spouse or partner, parent or employee?

2.       behave in an over-protective manner or become extremely jealous?

3.       threaten to hurt you, your children, pets, family members, friends or himself?

4.       prevent you from seeing family or friends?

5.       get suddenly angry or "lose his temper"?

6.       destroy personal property or throw things around?

7.       deny you access to family assets like bank accounts, credit cards, or the car, or control all finances and force you to account for what you spend?

8.       use intimidation or manipulation to control you or your children? hit, punch, slap, kick, shove, choke or bite you?

9.       prevent you from going where you want to, when you want to, and with whomever you want to?

10.   make you have sex when you don't want to or do things sexually that you don't want to do?

11.   humiliate or embarrass you in front of other people?

Edward qualifies for 7 out of 11

• The author writes most of her guys as controlling like this. The other guy after Bella, a werewolf, forces her to kiss him and talks about suicide if she doesn’t stay with him. Clearly, these guys are both drama queens who need a healthy dose of Xanax.

• Romeo and Juliet style, in the second book when they cannot be together, Bella mopes around, acts depressed, and nearly kills herself by jumping off a bluff (according to Wikipedia). When Edward thinks Bella is dead, he tries to have some super-bad vampires kill him. This is pretty much the plot of that whole book.

• Bella is selfish, psychotic and clearly unable to function without a man.

• He’s 107 and she’s 17. Statutory rape, duh. And why would an adult want to be with a child?

• He’s a 107-year-old virgin. This is probably because the author is a Mormon (which is fine, but doesn't make for realistic non-Mormon character behavior when you project your values on them). 107 and a virgin. How unlikely is that? This is clearly a deep-seated, stupid fantasy for this author. Realistically, as a Godless guy, he would have had sex by now. Mormons can pull that off; vampires usually can’t. Twilight lovers will argue, “He didn’t have sex because he was afraid of killing the human he sexed up.” So in 107 years, he didn’t find another vampire?

• One of the main vampire problems is solved because in this series, vampires can live off animals. This takes the bite completely out of the topic of vampires. It makes it more friendly, but it conveniently robs it of conflict and makes vampirism look attractive. It makes vampirism look attractive a LOT, actually. And usually it isn’t. Usually the lesson is to accept the life you’ve been given. Not in Twilight. In Twilight, the lesson is that living forever is the happy ending and that you should totally leave your family for a guy before you are old enough to drink.
• Half of the first book is just a description of how good-looking the guy is. Take a look at this little gem another blogger pointed out: “He lay perfectly still in the grass, his shirt open over his sculpted, incandescent chest, his scintillating arms bare. His glistening, pale lavender lids were shut, though of course he didn’t sleep. A perfect statue, carved in some unknown stone, smooth like marble, glittering like crystal.” Yes, that’s in the book. That's some of the better writing in that book too.

• The main character’s name is “Bella Swan.” Has anyone thought about this? Also, Bella is one of those flat, weak, passive girls. She falls all the time just to give the main guy character an excuse to pick her up and carry her around. This happens a lot. Bella is not interesting because the author intends for Bella to have no real faults. She describes herself as “plain”, but as soon as she arrives at a new school, every guy is after her. So either she is stupid, afflicted with false modesty, or written so as to not have a fault like pride that freakin’ everybody has.
• Edward is the main male love interest. He is jealous, flat, obsessive, intense, and not nearly mysterious enough. In the first movie that came out this last year, he was played as if he had Aspergers Syndrome. (I saw it with a friend to laugh and then I realized that I was just giving MORE time to Twilight. Yeah, sometimes I make bad decisions. The movie is long, boring, unintentionally funny, and plotless. All that happens is the two fall in love and look at each other for a long time. They don’t even fall in love for any good reason either. Then there is some violence tacked on at the end.) They are going for dark and brooding, but it comes off as creepersville to lots of people.

• Bella gets pregnant and decides to keep the baby, even if it might kill her. Because, to Mormons, there is nothing worse than getting an abortion, except for maybe having sex before marriage. Most rational people, even pro-life people, think it’s ok to have an abortion when the mother’s life and health are at-risk. But the author has her own politics to push. There is a whole gross birthing scene where it’s like half vampire and it shatters her spinal cord or something. She survives (darn). Someone told me that Edward ate the placenta. Actually, that’s kind of awesome/hilarious.

• They go to the prom at the end of the first book. Also, Edward can't go into the sunlight....otherwise he GLITTERS. Gasp! It’s so lame.

• It’s poisoning pre-teen girls’ minds, giving them ridiculous notions about men and love, give up everything (including their souls) for a boyfriend, and teaching them to act pathetically for months after a boyfriend leaves them. Also to cut off family and friends and other interests for the boyfriend.
• It gives girls unrealistic, unhealthy expectations. It’s emotional porn with no other substance. Girls want to be desired and treasured, and that is why these books are so popular. But guys are people too. They are going to have bad days, they are going to dislike things about you sometimes, and they are going to have other interests besides you. Furthermore, they are not going to be obsessed with you right away, to that level, or it’s going to be too weird.
• The books are unoriginal. It’s a complete rip-off of other (better) vampire romance books. Young readers are better off sticking with The Hunger Games, Divergent, Harry Potter, or the Mortal Instruments series.

But this is my main reason---
Even though the main focus of Twilight is that it’s a love story, I would argue that the kind of love Twilight contains isn’t love at all. This quote sums it up. Talking about a song he wrote about struggling to hang onto yourself and your goals while living in a marriage, Switchfoot lead singer Jon Foreman said-- “In our barcode media, love is often portrayed as consumption. As consumers in a commercial driven culture we can begin to view other souls as objects, or potential cures for our deepest fears and insecurities. ‘Perhaps if I found the right lover I would no longer feel this deep existential despair.’ But of course no human soul could be the Constant Other, the face that will never go away. Only the infinite can fill that role. But the silence can be deafening. It's a fearful thing to be alone. Do you love me enough to let me go? ‘I can't live without you’- ‘I would die if you ever left me’- These are not the songs of love, these are the songs of consumption.”

For more Twilight bashing, see these funny videos, where a British recording artist reads the books and adds his commentary. We like his accent: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L253VLwH3w

True Grit

True Grit is advertised as a serious Cohen Brothers Western, along the lines of No Country for Old Men, only set earlier. True Grit is also advertised as being an action movie. This is not the case.

Anyone seeing True Grit should be aware that they are seeing a dry, talky comedy, with a little action doled out every thirty minutes or so. It IS funny, if that’s your sense of humor, but sometimes it was hard to hear what the characters were saying. The little girl in the movie spoke quickly, and the others had growly accents and didn’t open their mouths very wide.

We DO recommend this movie, but we recommend that you see it at home, with subtitles, because the dialogue is the movie, and you want to understand it.

Movie grade: B

The Fighter

Checklist (if you check “yes” next to these lines, you should see The Fighter)

-I like Amy Adams, Mark Wahlberg, and/or Christian Bale.

-I like sports movies.

-I like true stories.

-I like boxing movies.

-I like a movie to be entertaining the whole way through.

-I like some comedy in my dramas.

-I want to see Christian Bale elevate an otherwise normal sports movie with a performance we’ve never seen from him before.

-I want to see Christian Bale play an affectionate coke addict.

Basically, if the idea of this movie appeals to you, the movie will appeal to you. We think it’s one to wait and rent on video though. There is no reason to see this on the big screen. Christian Bale’s funny character will come through on DVD just as well as it does in theatres.

Amy Adams is also good, and her character is a real spitfire. She also has some meat on her bones, which is both realistic for the movie and ballsy for the actress. We approve.

Movie Grade: B+

Freedom by Jonathan Franzen - Mostly spoiler-free review

We just finished the much-lauded Oprah pick Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. We thought the book was smug. There was lots of commentary about the world today, but it didn’t feel like the world we live in. There is some real joy, loyalty, and purpose left, believe us. If our lives were like this, we would kill ourselves. The book was populated by mostly judgmental people with many values, but all the values were shallow, unimportant and based off of being better than other people. The characters were fully-formed, but not relatable; Joey was almost relatable, and he made a wise, redemptive decision before the curtains closed. Patty was the most likeable (even though she would hate US with our flip-flops and headphones.)

We liked a lot of the commentary on the culture, even if it was smug and mostly pessimistic. This book was full of insightful social commentary, politics, and character development, but it felt absolutely spiritually dead. It was trying to be really deep and substantial, and it only reached that level every 100 pages or so. There WERE some brilliant moments, but they got lost in the overall tone and story that made us want to switch books.

We weren’t asking for some sort of religious book by any means, but atheists have a spiritual side too, and these characters were just completely dead, spirit-wise. It’s hard to ask a reader to spend more than 500 pages with them. It was weird that this book ended on a hopeful note, because most people who would make it to the end of this glum, hero-less book probably wouldn’t value a positive finale. Two of the women in this book were absolutely disgusting (Connie and Lalitha) because of the way they worshipped their men so much that they ran their lives into the ground and ended up as nothing but pliant strumpets that made us want to hurl.

There was good writing, nice character background and interesting exposition. We’d like to see what Franzen does with a good story. This story was about a bad marriage/dysfunctional family. You’ve heard it before. You’ve seen it before on countless screens. We suppose all the commentary and the picture of our society was supposed to elevate the story to more than another failed marriage story, but it would have been an amazing book with that commentary and more of a story.

We are wondering if we should read The Corrections. This was a technically good book that plenty of people admire. But we think there are two reasons to read a book: 1) the enjoyment 2) to learn something. This book did not bring us either bounty. The first 187 pages were really good, but then it hits a dull stride until close to the end. It pointed out things that we have already seen, that we are tired of seeing.

You know how there are books that you buy, read 200 pages of, and then never finish? We predict that if you buy this book, it is going to turn out like that for you.

Book quality grade: B
Book enjoyment grade: C-

The Walking Dead - Season 1

If you’re alive and watching TV, you’ve heard of The Walking Dead, the supposed best new show of the fall season. First of all, this says very little because only a few of the new shows were worth even giving a chance. We’ve now (belatedly) watched all six episodes of season one. Here’s what you need to know:

1) It’s overrated. It’s not as good as everyone says it is. We’ve heard the comic is superior. It’s hard to live up to that kind of hype in six episodes though.

2) It’s still pretty darn good. Completely worth watching.

3) The characters are decent, but some of the acting isn’t.

4) The guy Keira Knightley kissed in Love Actually plays the main character.

5) It’s absolutely disgusting. The gore is at a level rarely seen, even in most zombie movies. Some people like that.

6) The show did a LOT in six episodes. It established its characters and had some exciting moments.

We will be checking back in next year to see season two, no doubt. We can’t wait to see what The Walking Dead does with a full season. It could turn into another obsession for us; it's definitely got the potential. This further establishes AMC as an essential player in TV right now, with Breaking Bad and Mad Men already major hauls for the network. We’re impressed. If you missed it and can’t find it online, the show encores Tuesday, January 18 and Wednesday, January 19 at 8:00 on AMC. If you can take the gore and have any interest at all, you should catch up before the new season (which should take a while to come out).

Season grade: B+

Movies That Were Messed Up, But You Became a Little Obsessed with Them Anyway

Sometimes you see a movie, and there was something pretty weird or disturbing in it, but you liked it anyway. These movies stay with you, because they get you on a visceral, almost fetish-y level. One of our sisters called a blogger and said, “I just watched this movie called The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo. I really liked it, but it was weird at the same time. Can you think of another movie that will freak me out? I like those.” After contacting the other blogger, we have come up with our list of movies that are not for everyone but that we will never forget.

First, we agree with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - One of us thinks those books are dry, poorly written, and about as boring as a textbook, but no one can deny that the main female character is worth getting to know. The movies bring her dark side, past, and undesirable experiences forth in a way that sticks with you, even though you’re not gonna like it. Plus there’s a rape scene. Yikes.

American History X - That’s at the top of Leeard’s list, in particular. It's about a skinhead who finds redemption.

Quills - This is the first movie that came to mind after the phone call. It takes place in an insane asylum (always a good place to start for this sort of thing), and it is, largely, about sexual desire and expression. It has Kate Winslet, Geoffrey Rush, and Joaquin Phoenix in it, so you know that acting is right on. This one lingered in the brain pan for about a week after we saw it. Hard to watch, and disgusting, but interesting.

The Last King of Scotland - When the Scottish guy goes looking for the young wife after her abortion, close your eyes as he descends some stairs into the basement, or you are going to see the most disturbing image in the history of Ern’s movie viewing. The rest of the movie is no walk in the park either, but this mostly true story is worth looking into.

The Lives of Others - This one isn’t disturbing, but it’s stirring. Maybe it doesn’t go with the rest of the list, but it’s very good, and it stays with you. It’s not necessarily happy.

Sophie Scholl: The Final Days - This is a true story about a college-aged girl who opposed the Nazis, distributed anti-Nazi literature, and totally got caught. But in an age where everyone is trying to be cool and master “the science of cool,” this is a move that will show you what cool really looks like. While you are bawling your eyes out.

United 93 - Ern doesn't do a lot of crying, but she bawled for about three hours after this movie. It's well-done, but do you really want to watch it? For the record, Leeard refuses to watch this movie, for a multitude of reasons.

The Passion of the Christ - We defend this movie because it's good. It's a good movie, for what it was. What were people expecting? It was a movie about a man who died slowly and left a mark on the world that changed history, whether you believe he was God or not. Definitely a memorable, powerful, yet bloody and disturbing experience.

Nothing is Private/Towelhead - Yeah, this one aimed to shock, and so many people are going to hate it. But we loved the way this girl had one neighbor who didn’t stick her head in the sand. If, as a child, you have one capable adult on your side, that’s a powerful thing. Ballsy movie with a mix of good and terrible people.

The Reader - Well, anything where Kate Winslet is a Nazi who sleeps with a teenage boy and then ages badly is going to be on this list. This is a given. This is like putting Saving Private Ryan or Schindler’s List in this entry. It’s like….duh.

Audition - Japanese horror movie. Watch it. Seriously.

The Last House on the Left - It’s debatable whether this movie is GOOD, but, due to its content, it belongs on this list completely. Leeard liked the recent remake, too.

Se7en - A man kills people for committing the seven deadly sins in a manner that points out their deadly sin, and Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman are the detectives after him. The ending will leave you with your mouth hanging open.

Trainspotting - This one is disturbing and fun at the same time. Yeah, that’s a combo. But it’s a really good anti-drug PSA that doesn’t leave you feeling completely pummeled like….

…..Requiem for a Dream - Another Leeard pick for this list. Leeard and Ern have a mutual friend who names this as her all-time favorite movie. (It IS good.) This friend made one of us watch it for the first time, and we looked back at her once the (ominous) credit music pounded down on our heads, and we were like, “Dude, what’s wrong with you.” We are eternally depressed by this movie. But it was good.

Rachel Getting Married - Moving family drama, but there’s at least one heartbreaking scene.

Little Children - Anything with a child molester in it is creepy. This is one you actually feel compassion for.

The Green Mile - Stephen King and Frank Darabont returned to the old prison setting (after The Shawshank Redemption, a movie almost everyone likes), and this time, they brought a little of the supernatural with them. Plus some gross executions. Fun for the whole family! (It's not, but we love this movie.)

Hard Candy - A young girl creeped on via the internet takes revenge on a sexual predator. It’s Dateline NBC on crack. She’s got her issues too, and this is the strongest role for Ellen Page, who everyone loves now.

Black Swan might be a contender for this list for a lot of people.

Dogtooth- This is an odd one, but it's really interesting.

Fish Tank- Lots of good acting, but you will be depressed by the messed-up dynamics at work here.

So there you are, sister. A list to unsettle, challenge, and creep you out.

Black Swan

Some people don’t trust movie critics. We’ve heard movie critics called too liberal, elitist, too existentialist, snobby, artsy, and boring. But you have to give them one thing: most of them have seen a lot of movies. Sure, sometimes we think they are wrong, but most critics’ tastes have been refined through lots of exposure. We don’t know that we are as good in that area. One of us only has 1,578 movies rated on Netflix. But we love movies, so we’ll give some commentary a try.

Last night we saw Black Swan, a movie lauded by most professional critics everywhere. Well, they are right this time. If the type of movie is your cup of tea, it’s really good, and all our friends thought so too (if that means anything to you). One of us was always unsure about Natalie Portman’s natural abilities as an actress, but she won us both over in this. She needs to win something for Black Swan. She did most of the dancing, according to cast, crew, and director. We don’t see how that role could have been embodied better. Also, we like that Natalie is smart (she went to Harvard) and secure. She picked her friend Mila Kunis to be in the movie with her. Natalie is gorgeous, but Mila’s face is a little less harsh, so Mila turns out prettier. We like that this didn’t bother Natalie enough to exclude her friend.

If you like horror films in general but feel that most of them are poor quality, this is the movie for you. We wouldn’t call it scary, just intense and creepy. One of us had a bad reaction to Shutter Island (even though we both thought it was pretty good). If sort of left you in a foul mood. We were afraid this would be the case with Black Swan, but we walked out happy and laughing. We don’t like the demonic feel of horror movies to leave the theatre with us, we just want to walk out having enjoyed it and remember feeling scared.

And talk about enjoying it. The movie was long, but it didn’t feel long. It was entertaining and dramatic the whole way through. Darren Aronofsky is one of those directors who likes to make a weird movie, a movie you’ve never seen before (like The Fountain), and that’s what he did here. Remember his Requiem for a Dream? This is comparable to that in tone, only more fast-paced, and it doesn't make you want to blow your head off when it's over like RfaD. The music serves to get you inside the main character’s head and force you to feel some of the tension she was feeling. We think that’s a strong point, because the music was consuming enough to make you feel like you were connected with the movie, rather than detached and laughing at the craziness (Splice, anyone?).

Warning to some: This movie is dark, and it features some girl-on-girl oral sex. Mila Kunis had her dad leave for that scene. Also, the camera work is distracting in the beginning and sort of makes you dizzy. Don’t let that worry you though; it calms down as the movie goes on. Overall, Black Swan is a well-made thriller and a good time at the theatre.

Movie Grade: A

Dear Rappers: Show, Don't Tell

As we drift into writing a little about movies, books, and music along with TV, one of us must confess an extreme genre bias against rap music. This blogger doesn’t know a lot about it, but why would you want to find out more with the big bunch of shallow babies making it these days? First of all, most of it these days it autotuned and not at all poetic. It’s one thing to like a little Tupac, Eminem, Mr. J. Medeiros, or Kanye. At least those have some honesty, even if two of them are flocking toward self-flagellation lately to show that they are raw. Good rappers are good poets, period.

We’re probably not the first to notice this, because it’s obvious: Most of the time, rappers just rap about how great they are. This isn’t as disgusting to us as you would think, because false humility is pretty gross. But lately every song has these ingredients: 1) I’m awesome, because I have lots of sex with hot people. 2) I can dance/I have some sort of physical prowess. 3) I have lots of money and a cool car. 4) I’m gangster in some way, because I grew up in a neighborhood of unintelligent, violent people. 5) My rapping is really good and no one had better mess with me.

The most recent offender is Nicki Minaj. These bloggers like Nicki Minaj’s rapping style, because it goes from sweet to harsh in about five seconds, it’s interesting, and it’s catchy. But her cd, Pink Friday, is mostly about how much better she is than her competitors. Who? Lil' Kim, according to the news. But Lil' Kim hasn’t been making music lately. Why is Lil' Kim competition? While feuds might be good for the rap industry, because they get attention, this feud seems pretty insignificant. First of all, what are they going to do? Talk nasty. That’s it. Second of all, Lil' Kim has more “street cred” than Nicki anyway, and that should be no question. She was one of Notorious B.I.G.’s people, her raps are more disgusting (that’s a good thing in this genre), and her rap is actually hip/hop. We like Nicki, but she is more pop with a little rap. Like Ke$ha.

As inconsequential as this “competition” for glory is, since only one of them is making music, Nicki Minaj spends almost her entire album talking trash about her peers and maintaining that she is the best. (Other blogger's note: Lil' Kim started this feud, probably because she's become pretty irrelevant these days. Yes, this blogger likes Nicki Minaj)

The first track is called “I’m the Best,” and the chorus goes: “I hope they comin' for me because the top is lonely. What the **** they gon' say. I'm the best bitch doin' it, doin'. I'm the best, best, best, best. I'm the best.”

Ok, maybe so. We can’t really think of a better female M.C. right now. Point taken. But THEN she talks about it again in her song with Eminem ("Roman’s Revenge" - Seriously though,this song is awesome). Then there is a song about how she pooped on the competition ("Did It On ‘Em"). If you listen to the whole deluxe version album, there are only a few songs that don’t completely focus on Nicki Minaj and literally trying to convince us that she’s a good M.C. by talking about how much better she is than the other saddos making this “music.” You’re no Beethoven, sweetheart. And you’re no gangster, unless we are seriously misinformed about your past in The Matrix or something.

Where Nicki shines is where she puts off the posturing. "Dear Old Nicki" talks about the person she was before the fame, "Super Bass" is a funny little song about a crush, and "Last Chance" is cute and positive. Those are our favorite songs. "Roman’s Revenge" would have been good by itself, but in the context of the entire album, the theme just got old, so it killed that song (other blogger's note: no it didn't. That song is awesome).

Nicki, if you were really that great, you would make raps about life, rather than having to tell us how great you are. Spending your entire album trashing competition just makes us think that your competitors really are threats. The reason you are better as a guest star is that, although you sound good, when you make your own music, you have nothing to say.

Early Obituary - Life Unexpected

Life Unexpected will no longer air on the CW after its January 18th two-part finale at 8 p.m. Hellcats will take its spot, which is disappointing. Even though Life Unexpected had its problems, it was more watchable than Hellcats.

The last episode of LUX had Cate and Baze finding out shocking facts about Lux's past, and the mother-daughter dynamic and theme was very touching. Life Unexpected struggled with being boring when it showcased Ryan and Cate's stupid marriage problems in the first half of the season, rather than Lux's struggle to fit into her new family. But the second half of the season has a decently riveting affair with a teacher and Lux's past front-and-center.

The series finale will wrap up that storyline and have Lux fitting into her family more than ever, plus some surprises, so we recommend that you watch. Britt Robertson, who played Lux, did a good job, and we think she has a future. She has a nice, capable presence, and she could find a good home on any other teen show. The Vampire Diaries needs another female human now that Caroline has been turned....

Life Unexpected was a sweet show that tried to emphasize the importance of love and family. The scripts, plots, and the development of Cate were sometimes lacking, but overall, the show was more good than bad. One of us is sad to see it go. The other one is apathetic. We hope another show comes along and tries this sort of thing, only with the success of say, Gilmore Girls, because TV needs this sort of show. Right now, the show that embodies this spirit is Parenthood, another good one. R.I.P.

Series Grade: B-

The Last Tests

Our last tests of the semester are tomorrow. Wish us luck! Anyway, the blog will be back in full swing after that. Thanks to Hatts for all the help, and happy holidays.

Golden Globe TV Nominations

Best TV Series — Drama
Boardwalk Empire
Dexter
The Good Wife
Mad Men - Leeard's pick
The Walking Dead - Ern's pick
Dexter, while always good, was not at its best this season. One of us doesn't care for Mad Men, and The Good Wife is sort of last year. This leaves Boardwalk Empire and The Walking Dead, and they are both worthy. With Scorsese, Buscemi, and the budget, Boardwalk Empire should have been much better than it was. The Walking Dead is the more notable achievement. LOST was robbed of a nomination. While the last season disappointed some, it was a lot better than at least three of these choices. Leeard isn't caught up on Mad Men, but honestly, it's probably always a good choice.

Best TV Series — Musical or Comedy
30 Rock
The Big Bang Theory
The Big C -Ern's pick
Glee
Modern Family - Leeard's pick
Nurse Jackie
30 Rock is good, but overrated. The Big Bang Theory is cute, but not on par with the other choices. Glee is slacking in season two. Nurse Jackie is not funny enough to be a comedy, even a dark one. Modern Family and The Big C are left, and because Modern Family is just repeating the same things, Ern picks The Big C. Leeard is going to go with Modern Family, because it's a very well-received network comedy, though both are worthy shows.

Best Miniseries or Made-for-TV Movie
Carlos
The Pacific
The Pillars of the Earth - Ern's pick
Temple Grandin
You Don’t Know Jack - Leeard's pick

The Pillars of Earth is the only one Ern watched, and she thought it was good. Leeard saw You Don't Know Jack and while it wasn't amazing, she can't physically make herself root against Al Pacino.

Best Actor - Drama
Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire
Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad
Michael C. Hall, Dexter
Jon Hamm, Mad Men
Hugh Laurie, House M.D.
We would be good with any of these winning, especially the first three.

Best Actress - Drama
Elisabeth Moss, Mad Men
Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife
Piper Perabo, Covert Affairs - Ern's pick
Katey Sagal, Sons of Anarchy
Kyra Sedgwick, The Closer - Leeard's pick

Best Actor - Musical or Comedy
Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock
Steve Carell, The Office
Thomas Jane, Hung
Matthew Morrison, Glee
Jim Parsons, The Big Bang Theory
Either Alec or Jim would be good. Matthew Morrison hasn't had enough material in a while and Steve Carell's Michael Scott is becoming even more uncomfortable to watch, if that's possible.

Best Actress - Musical or Comedy
Toni Collette, United States of Tara
Edie Falco, Nurse Jackie
Tina Fey, 30 Rock
Laura Linney, The Big C
Lea Michele, Glee
You really can't beat Toni Collette at much. The only one we disagree with on this worthy list is Tina Fey. She doesn't have enough charisma for acting, even though she's a funny writer. She just plays herself on that (admittedly funny) show.

Best Supporting Actor in TV Series, Mini-Series, or Made-for-TV Movie
Scott Caan, Hawaii Five-0
Chris Colfer, Glee
Chris Noth, The Good Wife
David Strathairn, Temple Grandin
Eric Stonestreet, Modern Family
Any of these are fine. Chris Colfer might win, but Eric Stonestreet is our pick.

Best Supporting Actress in TV Series, Mini-Series, or Made-for-TV Movie
Hope Davis, The Special Relationship
Jane Lynch, Glee
Kelly Macdonald, Boardwalk Empire
Julia Stiles, Dexter
Sofia Vergara, Modern Family
It's Sofia's turn.

None of these nominations are particularly interesting. Blah.

Commenting on Stephen King's 2010 Favorites

Stephen King put out a list of his top ten TV shows of the past year, with commentary. You can find his list, with pictures and his commentary, on the "recent interesting links" page. We've listened to this man ever since he dogged Stephanie Meyer's "writing." Just kidding. We've listened to him ever since he said, "I'm sick of people saying something is 'Harry Potter for adults.' Harry Potter is Harry Potter for adults." No, wait. We misremembered. We've loved him since our teenaged hands got a copy of The Gunslinger.

He usually has good taste in TV too. He turned us onto Breaking Bad a few years ago, so we will pay attention to his list. The commentary here is ours, duh.

Steve's List
10) Morning Joe - We've never seen it, but it sounds awful. Pat Buchanan is on it? You couldn't pay us to watch something with him, and both of us are Christians (Catholic counts as Christian).

9) Boardwalk Empire - Typical guy pick, Uncle Stevie, but we agree. For the most part.

8) Spongebob Squarepants - Stephen King WOULD like this. Ha. We've laughed at a few episodes before, but it's never been a favorite, even when we were kids.

7) Sons of Anarchy - We have GOT to catch up on that before next season. Way too many people we respect say that it's great.

6) Dexter - Not it's best season this year, but still enjoyable.

5) Damages - One of us has never seen it. The other one watched it like it was her job back in seasons one and two, but it got a bit too ridiculous for her. Should we catch up?

4) The Event - Ugh, disagree. Was he paid to plug this? It's been getting lots of promotion lately (in a lame attempt to save it), especially on E! Take away this life support and let it either survive on its own or die. IF ONLY it were comparable to LOST and 24.

3) Breaking Bad - Agree

2) The Walking Dead - We JUST started catching up on this (we've seen about 1.5 episodes), and so far, we agree. It's better than all the new shows combined.

1) Friday Night Lights - Surprising first pick from Stephen King (over the horror and other weird shows), but we approve. It's nice to see FNL get some love from a celebrity in its final (tear) season.

If you ask us, this list is missing The Vampire Diaries. If he can dredge up some love for Spongebob and Pat Buchanan.... And TVD is WAY more clever than The Event. TVD kept TV good for us this whole lackluster fall season.

Dexter Season 5 Finale

After last season, and with all the madness set up last episode, we expected this season to end with some sort of shocker. Well, it didn't. In fact, it was too happy. We were waiting for the other shoe to drop, and it never did. Deb didn't find out about Dexter, and that curtain thing felt like a cop-out. Everything was too neat. It's not like the people who watch Dexter watch it for a nice love story, a subtle and poignant ending, and a sweet little birthday party. NO! We want dead Ritas, blown up Doakeses, revelations, Dexter hunted, rival serial killers, cliffhangers, mysteries, and some good killings.

However, this interview with the producers makes us feel better about the season: http://insidetv.ew.com/2010/12/13/dexter-season-5-finale-the-big-one-sara-colleton/

We especially like the quote, "Eventually, some season is going to have to deal with Deb finding out about Dexter." Yes, it is. Seriously, every Dexter viewer should read that interview. It doesn't spoil anything that's going to happen next season; it just talks about what happened in this season that is actually important.

After some thought (and reading that interview), we realize that this season was a vital step for the characters, especially Deb, Dexter, and even Harrison. Deb opened her mind to the grey areas in life, and Dexter found healing after Rita's demise. It was appropriate to spend a season on the mourning of Rita. Deb wasn't ready to find out about her brother, and after the finale, she probably is.

But we all wanted the shocker.

Episode grade: B-
Season grade: B-
(All Dexter season grades, for comparison- Season one: B+, Season two: B-, Season three: B, Season four: A)

Bones - The Doctor in the Photo recap/review with help from Hatts

Turkey dinner at Brennan’s house apparently includes a blow-by-blow analysis of the main course’s final moments in the slaughterhouse. Her guests, the whole squint crew (plus Hannah and Booth), were less-than-charmed by this party trick, but we found it adorable. Fortunately, they were saved from choking down their dinner by a call from Cam.

This week’s murder happened in a bad neighborhood about 11 months ago, and the body was found enmeshed in the roots of a growing tree. The female victim was a very sophisticated heart surgeon whose weight and height matched Brennan's. This might not have been enough to creep Bones out had she not found a dolphin ring identical to her own on the victim’s skeletal hand. The rest of this highly anticipated episode followed Brennan's decent into a delusional obsession over the similarities between her and the dead surgeon.

Brennan spent sleepless nights in the lab trying to solve the murder while listening to the victim’s recorded medical journal entries. But when Lauren (the victim) spoke in Brennan’s head, she spoke in Brennan’s own voice. As the episodes progressed, Brennan conducted imaginary conversations with the voice, because she felt that because of the similarities she shared with Lauren, she knew Lauren enough to do “her side.” Brennan was visited by the night guard (played by the same guy who was Keith Mars). This episode was a treat for Veronica Mars fans, because two V-Mars actors graced this Bones episode. The night guard quoted all the free Smithsonian lectures he attended to steer Bones deeper into her self-reflection. One of us thought this was a nicely written, sweet part for the absolutely loveable night guard. The other blogger thought it was weird and out-of-place.

It turned out that, in order to survive the emotional toll of the death of young patients, Lauren had become emotionally detached. Whenever she was under great emotional strain, yet felt numb, she would engage in dangerous activities “in order to feel something.” Her death was the result of a car accident in a bad neighborhood where Lauren was buying heroine from a drug dealer, just for the thrill of it. There was an airplane pilot who was in love with Lauren, and being closed-off emotionally because she was fragile, she rejected him. Brennan told the pilot that not giving him a chance was Lauren’s biggest regret. It was around this moment that Brennan realized that she had made the same mistake when she didn’t say yes to Booth last year.

DUH. Oh Brennan, if we didn’t love you so much….

Brennan hurried to the neighborhood where the murder occurred and bent down to check out a road reflector that had possibly tripped Lauren. Lost in the task of blindly following her intuition (a first for Brennan), she didn’t notice a car racing toward her in the pouring rain. Fortunately, Booth appeared to pull her out of harm’s way. He said he was “following her into a bad part of town and saving her life, you know, the usual.” On the ride home, Brennan told Booth that turning him down was something she regrets. A pained Booth quietly insisted that he had moved on, Hannah was not a consolation prize, and that Brennan would get over the pain, because he did. Brennan burst into tears, which isn’t common.

If you like the quippy, “git r done” Booth a la season one, he was back in this episode. This Brennan-centric episode had most of the side characters benched. It looks like Hannah is sticking around, so those of you who have grown fond of her despite her DATING BOOTH WHEN HE SHOULD BE WITH BONES are lucky. This episode had a different tone than most episodes, but it was a long time coming. Brennan reflected at the end that, during the time covered in the episode (three days), the world turned upside down. It was a strange one, that’s for sure.

It left us really sad, because Lauren helped us understand Brennan, and they are both pretty tragic figures. Plus, we really want Booth with Brennan. We can’t believe she reached out and then got her heart broken. UGH. We like a Bones episode that pays attention to the Booth/Brennan imminent love relationship though. This was less of a procedural episode, and more of an intrinsic, character-driven episode for longtime watchers of Bones. We think Brennan's realization and admission will, in the long run, propel the two closer toward a relationship, so we are happy, overall. Even so, that was tragic.

Episode grade: B. We missed the humor and side characters.

The Office - Classy Christmas review

Be still our hearts. That was an actual good episode of The Office last night. Last week’s was about a B, and this week raised it to an A-. Can the show keep this streak of decency up? Here's hoping.

This week, Holly came back, which was great, but she re-broke Michael’s heart. Fortunately, Kelly and the girls planted the idea of an ultimatum to her boyfriend in Holly’s head, so Michael might get her later. We loved Erin not understanding what the big deal about Holly was. Michael’s idea of a classy Christmas party was funny, and Michael had a lot of good lines.

Another great thing about this episode involved a (long) snowball fight between Dwight and Jim…that Dwight absolutely won. We love it when these two go up against each other. Also, Jim absolutely deserved it. He started it by pelting Dwight right in the face with a snowball while Dwight was working. A) Battery, and B) Ouch. We loved how Dwight has a wig to help him impersonate everyone in the office.

Rainn Wilson should direct more episodes. And episode writer Mindy Kaling can just go ahead and write them all as far as we are concerned because, judging from the rest of this season, she's the only funny writer left.

Episode Grade: A-

The Vampire Diaries - By the Light of the Moon review

Stefan got out of the tomb, and Katherine didn’t even get to kiss him. She barely got to taunt him. And, as much as we loathe getting into body talk, does anyone else think that Katherine’s body would have looked less awkward with five-to-ten more pounds on it? She’s so long that her bones can make her look too harsh and angular when they stick out from being a stick. If this is Nina Dobrev's natural weight, then fine. But if (as we suspect) she has to kill herself to have it, she shouldn't work so hard. She'd look better with some LBs. Not worth it. We saw another reviewer compliment her "curves." Sorry, but hip bones are not curves. Hip bones are hips, and most women have them.

During Tyler’s transformation weren’t sure if we wanted Caroline to leave or for her to stay as long as possible. The transformation scene was about as hard-core and satisfying (no, not that way, even though Tyler has a great body) as one could expect from this show. The end of the ordeal, where Tyler cried and Caroline held him, hammered in the fact that these two are going to get closer after this episode. We know the rift is going to be when he finds out that Caroline has been lying to him about being the only vampire in town and about the death of his uncle. Jules is going to tell him. There, show predicted.

Speaking of Jules, we both hate her. But if her bite kills off the annoying English Rose, we will start liking Jules more. We like seeing Damon have to wrestle with his feelings, and Rose dying would bring more of those to the forefront. As far as the two newest love triangles go, we are still shipping Caroline and Matt (mostly). And Jeremy is much hotter (and more well-intentioned) than Luka. And also hotter.

We will have until January to wonder what Elijah is up to, how he can slither through the loopholes of his verbal contract just enough to wreak havoc without breaking his word, and get really excited for the second half of this raucous season.

Episode grade: A-

The Best Christmas Episode of 2010

We’ve decided that Community had the best Christmas episode this season. If you haven’t seen Community yet, we don’t recommend this as your first episode, unless you love stop-motion animation, but everyone else should feel free to watch it. We know some people will object to the show’s conclusion about Christmas, but we don’t. Jesus is about as much the reason for the season as Mithras is, because, yes, he wasn’t born in December.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/199579/community-abeds-uncontrollable-christmas#s-p1-so-i0

The most depressing Christmas episode? Bones. Was that even a Christmas episode? Probably not. But still. Bleak.

We Hate Misleading, Out-of-Context Promos.

One of us usually doesn’t watch promos at the end of the episode. Why? Because they are cheap advertisements trying to get you to watch the next episode. They take footage out of the context of the next episode and make you think something is a) going to happen or b) that something is going to be a big deal. You should never trust someone who is trying to sell you something, and promos are no exception.

Sure, we are glad that promos don’t give away the next episode, but we don’t think they should mislead us. The most recent culprit is The Vampire Diaries promo (see previous post). Even WE were fooled on that one, but it was a cop-out. Even the blogger who said that she hoped it was a dream sequence or prophecy was disappointed. Grey’s Anatomy is another culprit. Remember the promo that showed Owen catching Cristina giving a lap dance? We thought that was going to be a big relationship issue by the look on his face. But, in context, it was next to nothing, and Owen didn’t run any drama about it at all. In fact, the real aftermath is pictured. (Realistically, would any guy react like this if he had any nut sack whatsoever? No wonder we believed that promo.)

Misleading promos make some viewers lose respect for the quality of the show. They come off as desperate. And The Vampire Diaries and Grey’s Anatomy are both having good seasons, so they shouldn’t have to stoop to that level.

Glee - Christmas episode

Nothing happened in this week’s Glee, except Brittany still believes in Santa, Sue was “The Grinch,” Blaine and Kurt sang a romantic song together, and Artie got a creepy contraption that enables him to walk…slowly. There was one really funny part: when Sue gave Will shears for Christmas so he could shave off his sheep hair.

It was too cheesy, cliche, and childlike for us, except for the obligatory holiday romances, because TV often tries to turn Christmas into a less-lame Valentine's Day. We had to hear Wham!'s "Last Christmas," and the boring "Merry Christmas, Darling." Then Will pointed out that Christmas isn't magical when you are an adult, and we got depressed. There might have been some good lines, but how are we supposed to catch them with all the mumblers on the screen?

With the exception of two or three charming moments, the Glee Christmas episode was icky to watch. This episode was one big excuse to sell us a Christmas album, which one of us bought, so the joke's on us.

Episode grade: Somewhere between a C and a D+ (one might say a C-?)

Watch it here, if you wish:
http://www.megavideo.com/?v=9IG3GO6T

Glee will be on hiatus until February 6th. It's going to be a theme episode (ughhh), because it's the Super Bowl opener.

Too many more theme episodes, and at least one of the bloggers will shun this show for good and just download the singles from iTunes, story be darned.

Edit:

Okay, the other blogger had to comment on this now, because she just watched the episode last night. She liked it a LOT more than the writer of this post did. Christmas episodes are always different, and since Glee didn't do one last year, this blogger is a lot more willing to allow this particular theme episode. Also, the duet between Blaine and Kurt is probably her second favorite moment this whole season.

Her grade: B+

A Quick Thought On the Boardwalk Empire Finale

Pretty well-done. We liked the reconciliation between Nucky and the widow, since that's what the whole show is about. And we like the new Jimmy/Eli betrayal of Nucky. We wish there had been some action and a little of the riotous, dark tone of the pilot.

We don't think we will follow the show live next year. This is a good show, but it would be easier to get/stay into on a DVD binge. We will watch it, but we will wait until we can see many episodes at once. So, goodbye BE weekly recaps. You have been a pain in the neck to write anyway. (Some shows are easier than others to write about. Easy shows to write about: Glee, America's Next Top Model, Grey's Anatomy, Dexter, Breaking Bad, and LOST, which we are still writing about, even though it's over. South Park, Bones, and HIMYM are surprisingly difficult. The Vampire Diaries is difficult for one of us to write about, but we both love it too much to stop.)

Episode grade: B

How I Met Your Mother - The Mermaid Theory recap review with help from Hatts

Zoey is hanging out with the gang now (collective sigh from everyone who dislikes her), but they are all creeped out by her husband, The Captain. Zoey is the only one who wanted to join Ted on a trip to an architectural exhibit (which proves that she’s attracted to him), and that brought up the subject of whether married people can spend a significant amount of time alone with a single person of the opposite gender. (Ern’s vote is decidedly no, in almost all cases, as is Leeard's.)

Marshall and Robin realized that the two of them never hang out, and they decided to go out to dinner together. Lily decreed that Ted had to become friends with The Captain if he wanted to hang out with Zoey. That left Lily and Barney, and they supposedly got into a fight, the cause of which narrator Ted said he could not remember. Marshall and Robin's dinner went terribly, as they have nothing to talk about together. Marshall revealed that the reason they don't hang out is because of Barney's “Mermaid Theory.” It stated, "Every women, no matter how repulsive, has a mermaid clock - the time it takes for you to realize you want to bang her." According to Barney Stinson's history of the world, when sailors are deprived of feminine company for long enough, even the manatees at sea start to look like attractive mermaids. Marshall was afraid Robin's mermaid clock would start if they hung out to much. This explains powerful men and their unattractive mistresses, we guess.

Ted went out to sea with The Captain but was terrified that The Captain was jealous and was taking him out to sea to kill him. He wasn't; he just wanted to bond with Ted, because he usually can't connect with his wife's younger friends. Ted and Zoe agreed that since neither of them had any romantic feelings for the other it was ok to continue hanging out. At that moment, we heard Zoe's Mermaid Clock start ticking. This neither surprises nor especially pleases us. Heck, Stella was cooler than Zoey. We hope she is not the mother, and we might be rewarded, because older Ted kept calling her “Zoey” in his narration, not “the mother.” And we don’t think Zoey recently lived with roommate Rachel Bilson. Zoey has been married for a while, right?

Lily and Barney had the best story of the episode. In classic HIMYM form, Narrator Ted kept telling the story differently as he tried to remember what really happened. In the end, he realized that the whole fight had actually happened a few years later when Lily was pregnant and Barney told her that pregnancy had changed her from a mermaid into a manatee. Yeah, we would be mad at him too. There were hints dropped in the "wrong" version of the story, and it was a cute way to announce that Lily would be pregnant.

If you’re a loyal follower of HIMYM, you'll want to know that at the end of the corrected/ future Lily-Barney fight scene, Ted marched into the bar in a lovely green dress, and said, “Ha! Now we're even" and Narrator Ted promised that he will explain that story later. We can’t wait for that one, but we will have to, because this is HIMYM, where we have to wait forever for anything to happen.

Ern really liked this episode, and Leeard thought it was average, so it averages out to:

Episode grade: B-

Gossip Girl - The Townie recap/review, with help from Hatts

Gossip Girl's mid-season finale was full of reveals…and lots of exposition, starting with Blair and Dan walking and recapping Juliet’s misdeeds. Seriously, there were so many back stories, explanations and recaps in this episode that it was distracting. The clumsiest one was when Lily and Chuck recapped a meeting with a member of the media while sharing drinks. It felt so forced. And is Chuck 21 yet, Lily? Never mind, because we found out that Lily has much bigger problems than allowing an underage boozer to drink more. Lily is a slimy, cowardly elitist who feels entitled to let others suffer for her own comfort. We’ve always liked Lily, but this will be hard to forgive.

At the beginning of the episode, Blair and Dan were on the hunt for Juliet. Serena was in the Ostroff Center, reliving her past in therapy sessions, and Nate and his mother were dealing with his father's most recent betrayal. It looked like The Captain was only pretending to want to reconcile with his wife to get parole.

In a nice little twist, Dan and Blair turned to Gossip Girl for help locating Juliet. This was Dan's idea, by the way. Gossip Girl was none too happy with Juliet's persecution of her girl, Serena, and the fake photo she was sent. She emailed the unholy alliance an address, and they headed out of the city to track it down, bickering all the way. We ship Chuck and Blair forever, but, as we’ve said before, we wouldn’t mind a brief Blair/Dan hook up that would leave the pair mortified and still enemies...later. Their trip took them to Cornwall, Connecticut, the town where Serena went to boarding school just before to season one. The address was the home of Damian. Remember the drug dealer that used and abused Jenny a while ago? That's Damian. Yeah, we forgot too. Apparently, he sold Juliet, who is a Cornwall 'townie', the drugs she used on Serena. We guess it never hurts to bring an attractive, recurring character back for the finale, no matter how forgettable he is.

While Dan and Blair and Damian visited with Juliet's mother, learning half of the story, Serena's therapy sessions sent us into flashbacks from her boarding school days, and the full story of how Serena wronged Ben and Juliet was revealed. Here's the gist of it - Ben was Serena's teacher (this is something everyone had already figured out). They started hanging out a lot and developed feelings for each other, and here is where we were surprised by Serena’s story. When Serena tried to move their relationship into a full-on romance (oh Serena, you would), Ben declined, because it would have been inappropriate (take note FNL, Pretty Little Liars and Life Unexpected). He was the first and only man to turn her down (besides her own abandoning father, of course). After that encounter, Serena was so embarrassed that she headed back to New York City, but the rumors that there had been an affair and the record of her wild behavior were enough to keep her out of all the best Manhattan prep schools. When Lily went to Cornwall to try to rectify the situation, she overheard gossip about a possible Ben/Serena affair, and she used the information to force the school to stop badmouthing Serena. She forged Serena's signature on an affidavit claiming the affair was real. That was the paper that Juliet and her family saw when Ben was fired, prosecuted, and sent to jail. Lily only meant to bring it up to the school as leverage, but the school got the law involved. The next time Lily could have stopped it was at the time of the forgery, and she chose not to.

Meanwhile Juliet snuck into Serena's room at Ostroff. She was planning something terribly bad (we don't know what), but when she told Serena who she was and why she was trying to destroy her, Serena knew immediately that it must have been her mother who gave the false report and forged her signature. Ahh, the classic “villain monologue.” Although it would have been nice to know Juliet’s plan. Was she going to hurt Serena? “Finish the job?” It makes little sense that Juliet would just go confess everything to Serena. There had to be more to that…because that would just be unbelievably stupid, even for this show.

And so the season drew to a close with a classic Gossip Girl party scene, complete with Serena calling out Lily in front of all the guests. Post-party Rufus revealed to Chuck that Lily was trying sell Bass industries behind his back, and the whole GG cast started a van der Woodsen-Bass-Humphry showdown. Even Rufus was short on forgiveness for her. Lily turning out to be the big bad in the Juliet plot? We were not expecting that....And we don’t know if we like it.

It turned out that Nate's father's house purchase was for a romantic vacation for him and his wife, not a getaway plan. Unfortunately, by the time this was revealed, he and Ms. Archibald both realized that they were not going to get back together. A sad Nate was left watching TV in jail with his father. Feeling guilty for wrongly accusing his father of betrayal, Nate invited his dad to stay at the empire in his suite when he gets out of jail. We wonder how THAT’S going to go. Poor Nate, you need to learn that you just can’t save people. (We would like to take this moment to defend the unappreciated Nate Archibald: sure his stories have never managed to be very gripping, but the fact is, short of Dorota, unless Dorota is Gossip Girl, which we maintain is possible and likely, Nate might be the nicest, and most honorable, of the Gossip Girl crew, unless we are forgetting some unflattering plot from years past? Oh yeah…the married woman affair.)

Chuck headed off to New Zealand, with a very disappointing comment about finding loose women, made right in front of Blair. Can you believe that? He chose to make a callous "man-ho" comment rather than a Lord of the Rings reference, and he is going to NEW ZEALAND. This is why Chuck isn't cool. Blair, however, was more concerned with the fact that Jack Bass is in Australia, and she rightly accused Chuck of looking for his help. Heedless of her warning, Chuck left with a fairly cold farewell to her. Why? Why, Gossip Girl writers, can't you just let B and C be together? There is no Moonlighting syndrome , we love them as an on-screen couple, as long as you give them decent plots! Sadly, “good plots” usually don’t involve Jack trying to take the empire or Blair playing second fiddle to Chuck’s business affairs. Even worse (as far as we are concerned), Dan declined to join Serena on her road trip to rectify Ben's situation. This left him alone in the city with Blair, and we are afraid that the last scene between Dan and Blair was a teaser for the fans who are 'shipping' these two as a couple. It’s too soon, it’s too awkward, and it needs to just be funny, not a real thing, if it happens. Well, at least it's surprising, at this point. Who else thinks that Serena is going to get another shot with Ben after he is released?

This episode barely made sense at times, and it felt clunky. But there was plot development. Hopefully next year we will see a different plot, now that the Juliet scheme has fizzled and died.

Episode grade: B-

Dexter vs. Boardwalk Empire

The Sunday night recapper only had time for one of these shows (her first exam is tonight), and when the rubber meets the road, Dexter isn't road kill.

This is a strong statement, because the Boardwalk Empire episode was the finale. Don't spoil it, we're going to watch it later in the week and bring you some thoughts.

Why Dexter? No, it's not because the guys on Dexter are better looking (not hard, with uggos like Steve Buscemi populating BE), but if you guessed that, you are paying attention. We've just been following Dexter longer, this season is more intense than BE's season (we feel more of an urge to find out what happens on this show), and we care more about the characters. Ok, just Dexter, Lumen, and Deb, but that's two people more than on Boardwalk Empire.

As for Dexter, it was a great episode, but the cliffhanger ending left us spitting and unsatisfied. Dexter season finale next week.

Episode Grade: A

Dexter has been renewed for a sixth season.

Facebook Cartoons Craze

It seems that many people are changing their Facebook profile pictures to cartoons they love, whether they are from movies (like Disney movies) or from TV.

Ern picked Hey Arnold (pictured), because Ern can still watch and enjoy that, to this day. Leeard refuses to play any Facebook games that are not Bejeweled Blitz (Ern and Leeard have a fierce-ish Bejeweled competition going, usually). Ern's sister picked Ahh! Real Monsters. We've seen some Disney princesses, Doug, Dragonball Z, and Rugrats.

We have not confirmed why people are doing this. It's either to promote awareness regarding child abuse or to celebrate your favorite childhood shows.

We wonder how long we are supposed to keep the pictures up. We wonder a lot of things about this new trend. We like the celebrities thing better, but this is cute too.

If you are reading and changed your picture, let us know what you picked.

Grey's Anatomy - Adrift and at Peace review

Yay! It looks like the end for Pathetic Cristina. She went fishing with Derek, learned to stop thinking and be Zen, and she caught a fish. Holding the fish (life!) in her hands for the obligatory Big Catch Picture, she realized that she had healed and wanted to be a doctor again. At least that’s what we go from her expression and Meredith’s voiceover as she hung the picture on the refrigerator.

This episode had unlikely people working together and hanging out. We had Cristina and Derek fishing. We had Mark and Callie hilariously bickering about their casual sex. We had Callie and Alex working together and making jokes. We had Meredith and Owen in the operating room together, fighting. And then after the operation, they were fighting. We can see both of their points a little bit. Meredith thought that Owen was an enabler. He married Cristina, so now Cristina could just live off of him and mope around the house rather than face up to her problems. Owen told Meredith that she shouldn’t hold Cristina to her standards. This is true. Meredith and Derek are so perfect right now that she shouldn’t be judging our new Resident Dark and Twisty Couple. But the rest of their arguments made no sense and seemed to just be an opportunity for the writers to have someone point out that Meredith is fearless. Meredith is “reckless” and Owen doesn’t want her around Cristina? Where did that come from?

Owen and Meredith have never gotten along, and we have no idea why. Think about it: When have they ever liked each other? Is Meredith not over the choking thing? Why on earth would she blame him for Cristina’s problems? Maybe Owen doesn’t like Meredith because she never gives him a break and hollers at him about personal problems in his O.R. while he’s trying to think and maintain his authority at the same time. We actually like that they dislike each other. Some of these doctors get along too well. In real life, personalities clash, and sometimes your best friend marries someone you don’t approve of. We just want the writers to give them real reasons to fight besides their gargantuan amounts of stubbornness. How about the fact that Owen dyed his hair blonde, ruining his entire head? Why hasn’t anyone yelled at him about that? When Lexie and the chief changed their head colors, they got crap for it.

What was with Teddy? She is so desperate that she asked some patient (Scott Foley) to marry her because he needs health insurance to live? Wow. Pathetic Cristina dies and Pathetic Teddy is born. Admittedly, this could have been a solid idea. Teddy marries a cute patient to save his life. Arranged marriages work all the time. It could have been cute. But we think the scene was poorly written, and Teddy came off as crazy. That was so awkward. We guess the guy is going to say yes though.

Why does Bailey always get asked out by young, hot, tall men? She always gets a guy who looks like he stepped out of the pages of a men’s magazine. It’s unrealistic, and not just because she looks like a little brown mushroom. It’s unrealistic because hot, nice, smart guys are pretty rare for just about anyone.

We can’t believe Callie shut the door in Arizona’s face! Nooooo. Arizona is going to have to work hard to win Callie back, because Callie’s heart is cold and closed right now. We can’t believe she didn’t take Arizona back after Arizona left her fancy Africa job for Callie.

This was the last episode until January, and that’s like four weeks later. The preview of next week excited us. We can’t believe we have to wait this long. At least we got a Mark and Lexie kiss to tide us over. Lexie looked really cute in this episode.

We wonder if Bailey will be over the fistula thing by next year.

Funny episode, for the most part. And we’re glad Alex returned to peds.

Episode grade: B+

The Vampire Diaries - The Sacrifice recap/review

This episode wasn’t as jaw-dropping as episodes of this show usually are. Sure, we had our weekly dish of hot guys, a few twists, some heat between Damon and Elena, and a bit of drama, but we weren’t awed. Also, one of us thinks that Ian’s acting was odd this episode. He overplayed Damon’s mischievous intensity. After three weeks of missing this show, we were expecting more for our patience.

Elena woke up in the middle of the night, because she heard Luka's father snooping around her house. When she got up to investigate, all she found was Alaric walking around in his boxers with a bowl of chubby hubby (have you ever noticed that ice cream on TV is ALWAYS Ben and Jerry's?) Lucky Elena. We would like to wake up to half-naked Alaric any day. Looks like he and Jenna are getting on well. Meanwhile, Team Salvatore was visiting Katherine in the tomb. They were after the moonstone, which Katherine unsuccessfully tried to barter for her freedom. We guess she's decided that starving in a tomb is not a fate better than running from Klaus.

The boys showed up at Elena's to tell her their plan. They were going to have Bonnie open the tomb so they could go in and get the stone. Elena was still spooked by what Katherine had told her in the last episode: that Klaus would take any resistance out on her friends and family. Elena went the Salvatore house looking for Rose, and found Rose in her lingerie, still keeping Damon company. Elena got Rose to take her to Slater’s apartment, so that she could get information from Slater. They found Slater, the “vampire almanac,” dead, staked through the heart. They also found his idiotic girlfriend, and she helped them get into his computer system. Elena found out who Slater’s contact to Klaus was, and she immediately sent him a message announcing her intention to surrender and sacrifice herself. Rose was horrified, and we weren’t sure why. It would solve all of her problems. In any case, she called Damon.

Jeremy, wanting to save Bonnie from the dangerous over-exertion of opening the tomb, stole some of the magic Katherine-paralyzing ashes Bonnie had made for Stefan and Damon’s use. He headed into the cave with his supernatural ring, disabled Katherine, got the stone. The time he took to find the stone gave Katherine the opportunity to wake up and bite him. We can forgive him for this stupid lollygagging, because he had the sense to toss the moonstone out of the tomb whilst being chewed on by the villainess. Stefan, Damon, and Bonnie headed over to the tomb, but Damon was called away by Rose, and he disappeared. Stefan and Bonnie found Jeremy held in the tomb by Katherine, being toyed with. She could kill him over-and-over because of his ring. Horrified, Bonnie tried to open the tomb. Bonnie channeled energy from Luka, a trick he taught her earlier in order to bond with her. We guess he didn’t anticipate that she was a power thief. Even with the extra juice, Bonnie failed, got a nosebleed, and passed out. Useless. Katherine opened the loud hole in her head for another bite of Jeremy, and Stefan rushed in, threw Jeremy out, and trapped himself in the tomb with a very happy Katherine.

Damon showed up at Slater's apartment, and he was not onboard with Elena’s plan. Klaus's goons appeared to take Elena, and Rose bolted. Elijah, who had tracked Elena down with help from Luka’s warlock father, also arrived. In a surprise twist (man, there are tons of those on this show), Elijah killed Klaus’ men by ripping out their hearts. Apparently, he wants Elena safe and (seemingly) isn’t working for Klaus.

Caroline and Tyler bonded when she helped him to prepare for his first full moon. They found Mason’s diary in the Lockwood cellar in which he chronicled all of his experiences with lycanthropy. Mason also left a video he made of his first transformation. Caroline and Tyler watched it together, and they found out that Tyler’s new curse will be horrifying, painful, and hours long. Tyler, understandably, flipped out. Caroline comforted him but was interrupted by Matt at the door. Matt told Caroline that he misses her, she smiled, and then Tyler stepped into the doorway. Matt looked sad. End scene. Uh oh. Obviously Matt is going to think that Caroline moved on with Tyler. It’s not like they can tell Matt the truth. But Tyler didn’t start reassuring Matt that there was nothing going on. There could be another decent love triangle forming here, in addition to the main one and the Bonnie/Luka/Jeremy one.

When Damon and Elena got home, Jeremy was there to tell them what happened to Stefan. If you didn't watch this episode, but you are following the show you might want to at least take a second to check out the last scene in addition to reading this recap, because it is going to be pivotal for our triangle. Elena rushed to the tomb, cried out for Stefan, but he wouldn’t come to the entrance to speak with her. Damon held the flailing Elena away from the entrance. When she realized that she was never going to get to Stefan with Damon in the tomb, she stormed out.

Stefan came out to speak with Damon.
Damon- "Of all the idiot plans Stefan...I'll find a way to get you out."
Stefan- "Keep Elena away from here. Promise me. No matter what happens, promise me you'll protect her."
Exit Damon
Katherine "That right there was the biggest mistake you've ever made."
We sure hope so.

There was lots of good Elena/Damon interaction, and we loved the ending, so we’ll give this one a B+.

Bones - The Twisted Bones in the Melted Truck recap/review

This episode opened with the spontaneous combustion of a truck as the sun rose over a field where it was parked. When he got the call, Booth was getting out of bed with Hannah, and they were talking about when she should meet Parker. Hannah was worried because she thinks she’s bad with children. We don’t trust people who are usually bad with kids. It’s a sign. Dump her already, Booth. Booth reassured her, but later on he revealed to Sweets that Parker 'hates' Hannah, in spite of not having met her. We feel the same way, Parker. Sweets tells him not to worry. By the way, if you’re a Sweets fan, this is a fun episode for him. Leeard is, Ern isn’t.

At the crime scene, Bones and Booth found a skeleton 'melted' to the dashboard of the car. Since melting is not something that bones can usually do, all the squints were intrigued. Back at the lab, Daisy worried about a psych evaluation that she had to pass in order the get higher clearance. This makes sense, because Daisy is a looney tune. She seduced Sweets into helping her in some very cutesie scenes. The couple is apparently very much together again. Daisy also assisted Hodgins in one of his infamous experiments. This one, unfortunately, resulted in a minor gunshot wound for him....Still, we love Hodgins’ experiments.

It turned out that the truck had magnesium scraps in it, which the heat from the sunrise caused to burst into flame. This burned the skeleton at a heat high enough to cause the bones to appear melted. Booth and Brennan visited the victim’s wife at a high school where she worked. While Booth interrogated her, Brennan went into the class room to question a suspicious looking student. The student was sleeping with his teacher, the victim’s wife. To make a long and very typical Bones story short, the kid’s ex-girlfriend, who Brennan meets in detention, was the killer. We suppose the fun of the Bones formula is guessing which minor character did it, but its wasn't too hard this week. But what is with the teacher/student relationships in our shows this fall?

Parker and Hannah's meeting went swimmingly once Hannah told Booth to get lost and leave her alone with Parker. When Booth reported this back to Brennan, her congratulations where mixed with some not-too-subtle jealousy. We spent the entire Parker-Hannah scene wanting Parker to tell her that he wanted his dad to be with Brennan. That would have been fantastic for the fans, and it would have thrown a wrench into this boring relationship. It would have been so cute if Parker could see what we see watching these people every week. Alas, the episode ended with Booth, Parker, Brennan, and Hannah at dinner together. Parker declared his affection for both Hannah and Brennan. Brennan invited them all to her house with a smile that quickly melted into a frown as she watched Booth holding Hannah’s hand. Well, we like where THAT is going.

Now that the Bones writers have put off teasing us with sexual tension, they've taken up teasing us with Brennen tension. When will she realize that she's in love with him? Has she already? Is she just too afraid of abandonment after her past? Does she think it’s too late since she stomped on Booth’s heart last season? We guess we will have to take what we can get, as usual with this show. We have high hopes for next week’s episode, which is rumored to be a psychologically probing Brennan-centric episode. Whatever realizations Brennan comes to about herself, they need to push her more closely toward Booth, stat.

It really has been too long. It's past the point of annoying.

Episode grade: B

Ann Ward is America's Next Top Model

We are angry at this season of America’s Next Top Model for being predictable throughout the entire season. We almost always knew who was going home. And last night, we knew who was going to win as well. The show makes it easy by what it shows in the girls’ interview clips.

Chelsey’s clips: Showed her talking herself up, talking about her own confidence, and talking about how much she wanted to win and how she should win. At one point, her voiceover said that she couldn’t imagine NOT winning.

Ann’s clips: Showed her confident, not crying (for once), and speaking with humility and a few “aw shucks, it was nice just to get this far" comments.

We could just see, via these clips, that the show was trying to make us root for Ann so that we would be happy when she did win. They have done the same thing in years past. Never, ever say something nice about yourself or talk about why you should win on this show, because they will take that sound bit out of the context of what was probably a reasonable speech (unless you’re Jade or Melrose), and air it if you are going to lose. Why? Because Americans hate arrogance in others (oh, the irony), and can’t stand to see someone praise themselves. Most people prefer false humility (this blogger finds that to be disgusting).

This whole thing made the winner predictable. No way would they show unflattering clips of the winner. No way. So we knew it was going to be Ann.

But the show actually got us onboard with its decision. We lamented that unconfident, pathetic Ann was going to win when Chelsey had more experience and wanted it more. But the judges made a great point: Ann is unique and has the potential to be a star, whereas the perfectly reliable Chelsey would end up another face in the crowd. That doesn’t scream “Top Model,” it just screams “Bookable Model.” We thought Ann would win so that Tyra could celebrate the different people, the underdogs, and patronize Ann to give her self-esteem. But the judges gave a reason why Ann was the best bet to being successful and famous. We felt really bad for Chelsey though.

Oh well. Ann was a worthy winner, photos-wise. We just wish the season had been more memorable and surprising. The only shockers of this season were the prizes and how much an awkward, funny-looking girl who reminded us of a female Lurch can be improved by makeup.

Season grade: B-

Also, can someone tell us why this is our most popular post of all time??? Weird.

Glee - Special Education review

Now that’s more like season one, Glee! The only thing missing was more humor, more lightness, and more (or really any) Sue Sylvester. Other than that, it was a sweet episode with drama, no WTF? moments (like the Beiste kiss), and devoid of a glaring theme. Next week, we go to a Christmas theme, so enjoy the goodness this week while it lasts.

The show must be reading what critics and commenters have written about Glee: That it focuses too much on its main players and doesn’t showcase the whole cast. For the record, it was never this blogger writing that. The show caved to these people by not having Rachel’s awesome voice solo at Sectionals. Giant fail. It should be Sam/Rachel with the opening solos, because we think they have the best guy/girl voices right now, but we guess it’s tradition to have a couple walk down the stage aisles for that cheesy opening. Quinn, Sam, and Santana had the major solos (although we heard you hit a power note at the end, Mercedes, you sly minx), and they all have nice voices. So it was … nice. Actually, Quinn’s vocals were too breathy and the song ("(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life") was forgettable. Santana’s cover of "Valerie" was better. We loved her headgear. Will’s best decision was to have Brittany and Mike out front busting moves.

In real life, Will would be an amazing teacher for doing this. School is about learning, finding yourself, and building confidence. Getting the kids to work as a team (even if he had to yell at them a lot and snap at Rachel) and share the spotlight is good. In REALITY, arts teachers have about two-to-three favorites they overuse, and they creepily hang out and joke with them. It's like a lame clique. Anyone in the high school arts knows what we are saying.

Everyone freaks out when Rachel is aggressive and goes after what she wants. Little known fact (for a reason, because it’s lame): Ern was in the show choir in high school. Don’t laugh. You had to AUDITION to get to wear those lame sequins and falls, and it counted as school credit. But if you wanted a solo, you had to fight for it. If you want to be successful, you have to push yourself out there. Granted, you also want to be classy, nice, and not tick off the wrong people, but that’s called maturity, and Rachel is 16.

Speaking of Rachel, we loved seeing this character get screen time after such a long absence from the story spotlight, even if it was only about her relationship with Finn. Ok, ok, it was about her trying to be nicer as well. And we have been rooting for the return of Puckleberry. But why did it have to be over even faster than it was last time? We felt so warm and happy inside when Rachel and Finn made up, and we shrieked when Rachel told him that she’d almost had her Berry Pucked. This couple was dragging down the storyline though. Even though they are cute, and we like them, we like this development. And we knew that “I’ll never break up with you” stuff was going to bite them in the butts. We wish Rachel hadn't betrayed Finn so harshly and selfishly, especially when everyone knows how sensitive Finn would be about this particular development. She needs a big storyline where she develops some compassion and love of others, because the only time we like her is when we feel sorry for her ... or when she sings. She needs some good traits. Why, after all this time, are they completely ruining, and sometimes dropping, this character? Her loyalty to Finn was one of her few redeeming qualities. Now what are they? Her haircut and being nice to Kurt?

We hope the Rachel and Kurt friendship sticks and develops. He seems to soften her, and maybe she can toughen him up. And they both need non-romantic friends right now. They were so sweet together that it made us sure that Lea Michele and Chris Colfer get along in real life. Kurt’s realization that The Warblers aren’t all that was interesting, yet annoying. The Warblers are all about fitting in (unless you are Blaine, the star) and not being bullied. New Directions is about standing out and sometimes being bullied for it. We liked Lea’s version of "Don’t Cry for Me Argentina" the best (the solo versions can be downloaded on iTunes), and we wondered why this show keeps giving Kurt women’s songs. His voice isn’t THAT high. He can do low too, and there are some great high guy songs out there.

Two songs we haven’t mentioned yet: "Hey Soul Sister" and "Dog Days Are Over". "Hey Soul Sister", sung by The Warblers, wasn’t nearly as impressive as "Teenage Dream", but it was better than the original Train song, which stays in such a high place all the time that it’s annoying. We wish they had done something else, because who isn’t sick of that song? "Dog Days Are Over" was better. We wish Tina’s voices was less bland and more distinctive. We never know when it is her singing. We like the original version of the song better, but this was cute. One of us wishes they had sung this song at Sectionals.

Brittany and Artie were adorable this episode, but in the back of our minds, we wonder how he could date someone that dumb. What, his handicap cancels hers out? Still, Tina needs to step off. Go enjoy your Asian kisses, Tina (LOL). And sorry Wemma fans, Emma is married, and Will is still wretched. Team Carl all the way. And Emma, what’s with the horrible Florence-Henderson-needs-a-haircut haircut?

We love the newest Glee club member, Laura, who had the laugh-out-loud quote of the night: “I’m not nervous. You know why? Because show choir is stupid.” And we loved that she rocked Puck’s world in kisses. Her laid-back, dry humor is just what this show needs at this point.

Poor Hipsters. They tried.

Episode Grade: A