The Big C - season three

Season three continued season two’s trend of being way less depressing than the first season. We approve. When the season started, we were like, “What?!! Paul’s not dead? Ugh.” We never really liked him and we always love when Kathy flirts with someone new. Cathy is looking gooood this season. Please, God, let us look like Laura Linney when we are 48. Or Ern’s 48-year-old mom. That’d be good too. Lucky bitches. We liked when Paul shocked his heart for the first time though, and we guess it would have been too much of a bummer if Cathy and Adam spent the season dealing with major grief over to Paul’s death. The third season started out happily. We teared up in the first episode when Cathy got the news that her tumors were shrinking and some were gone.

We’ve always dreamed of finding a bar with cool strangers who just want to hang out (as opposed to the creepers who want to hit on us and the people who just keep to themselves). We loved the black Jesus picture on Andrea's wall. We like that she is still on the show, but we figured she had to stop with the Ababu stuff right away.  We completely forgot about the affairs Paul and Cathy had. This show is entertaining, but it’s not easy to remember what happens on it year-to-year. We’d like to see Paul’s blog to recap.

We love that Adam was acting like a real human in the first episode, but he was soon back to his angry, cold self. We were only on his side when his mom got drunk and confessed all her secrets in front of Adam’s classmates. At first, we enjoyed that Adam’s Bible group was down-to-Earth and not the usual cliché attack on religious teens. We kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and the kids to end up crazy, because most TV Christians do, and of course it happened. The Big C stole the Christian anal sex bit from Awkward. As far as we know, that’s not what Christian girls do when they are saving their hymens. If they were going to be that technical, they’d just stick with oral. But it’s actually possible to not have sex and just turn a guy down. Blue balls don’t kill them.

And the implication that religion beliefs aren’t smart? Ugh, tell that to every intelligent religious person who ever lived. There are a lot. If you require a list, we’ll give it to you, but wow, you shouldn’t require one. What, does TV think that it can make religion seem deeply uncool and then everyone will stop believing in God? Whatever. If it were any other religion, group, or culture, it wouldn’t be attacked like this. You know that we’re not just defending Christianity because that’s closest to our own beliefs. We’ve defended other groups on here. You get unfairly attacked, you get defended on this blog. That’s the way it is.

This is the season where Cathy acted super crazy. We loved it, but we were irritated with her at the same time. Her alter ego, Alexis, was great, down to the tattoo (hating tattoos is "provincial" haha). Cathy also tagged the living room, decided to adopt a kid, posed as a stewardess, pretended to take pilot lessons, and stole stationary from her doctor. Shawn is always a show highlight, and this season is no exception. He gets two jobs, one as a gay phone sex operator and the other as a school janitor. We ship him and Andrea. Does anyone else?

Seeing Susan Sarandon as a guru was a real treat, even if she overstayed her welcome a little with her gross, judgmental, flaky character. Why on Earth would she ever want to have sex with Paul? GROSS. We also liked Victor Garber as the gay phone sex operator Shawn supplanted. Why is he always gay on Showtime? Hahaha. Shawn is the superior operator. It’s all about being shameless.

The adoption storyline came out of left field for us. Yeah, they need another baby. /sarcasm. Because Adam turned out to be such a GEM. It’s a bad idea, and it’s not about a baby. Cathy feels like if she has a baby, she has to be alive to raise it. A tad selfish, but understandable. At least it brought us Meryl Streep’s daughter who we loved on Off the Map. We liked it a lot better than the plotline where Paul rubbed noses with famous people. Paul’s foray into motivational speaking was painful to watch. He’s good when he’s real though. That whole plotline just made this feel like a different, quirkier show, and we liked the show’s tone the way it was.

Another good guest star was Brian D’Arcy James from Broadway and Smash as the gay guy who comes to meet Shawn. We still haven’t gotten to hear him sing on TV though and WHY ELSE would you have him? It’s not like he’s hot. It’s the voice that makes him, not the Devil’s threesome abilities. Throuples are going to be the new thing. That was hilarious.

We can’t believe Adam pissed all over the storage locker gifts. That was the best part of season one and it made us cry hard. Adam has TAINTED it. Despite hating him, we were embarrassed for Adam when his mother stole the car. We loved when she stole the car though. So many mixed feelings! We started suspecting baby-daddy Dave was trying to leech money from Cathy in the seventh episode, but we had no idea that Maxine wasn’t actually pregnant. So wrong! Someone should have told them, like Andrea said, “You don’t want to get on the wrong side of Mrs. J.” The Big C ripped off more teen entertainment by having Susan Sarandon get hit by a bus, like Regina George before her. Thank God though. It was time.

We didn’t feel bad for Paul at all when he discovered the bar. We get it. Cathy needs it. Hell, WE need something like that, and we aren’t even dying of cancer. We usually hate when TV shows have their finales set on vacation, because it feels lazy and hardly ever drives the plot. But this wasn’t lazy at all. We liked that Andrea realized her name and new identity were stupid. We loved when Cathy realized that she was unhappy. We hope she ditches Paul and her son completely and finds some peace before she dies. The Angel boat stuff was cute. We were shocked when she swam back to him. What does she think she’s going to do? We guess we’ll see next year.

Season grade: B+

The Big C, Season Two

Those Big C finales really deliver on the emotional front, don’t they? This season was a lot less bleak than last season. No one intentionally committed suicide, Kathy made progress in a clinical trial, it was funnier, and there was more Andrea. The show still had the heart and the tough subject, but it was easier and less depressing to watch. Parker Posey guest starring and Adam turning into a real human late in the game was the icing on the cake.

There were better and more cohesive plots this season too. It didn’t feel like the show was stalled just waiting for Kathy to die. There was less focus on cancer and more focus on characters, family, and comedy. Kathy became a fully-realized character this season too, rather than someone just doing and saying crazy things because she has cancer and can. This is the show we should have had in the first season. This has become our favorite Showtime program on right now, and we hope to see a third season, because that’s a weird way to end it. It has humor as good as Weeds without all the coldness. Sean has also become a good character this season, rather than just another wacko.

Major spoilers are hinted at here: So a huge character unexpectedly died in the finale. The way they did that was perfect/the way they told us that he was dead (and his sweet last words). He’s grated on us for a long time, but the show still managed to make his death sad. That was one of the most shocking TV twists we’ve seen in a while. But it was foreshadowed with the scale that showed that he had the health of a 67-year-old man. Then he started using drugs recreationally to cope. The twist was cool, because we really shouldn’t have been so blindsided. It was much better than Marlene’s death, which just felt unnecessary. Another good death was Lee’s. Marlene and the first season taught Kathy how (and how not) to live; Lee taught Kathy how to die.

Season grade: A

The Big C and Weeds End Their Seasons

Yes, we finished Weeds and The Big C, and we were impressed with both shows. They will both get another season from Showtime next year, and we will be watching them both. Because they aren't watched by many of our readers (and that's a shame), we won't do weekly recaps on them. But just know that we would want to.

The Big C finale made us tear up. The acting on that show is great, we love the guest starts (Liam Neeson and Cynthia Nixon, who looks great by the way), and we like that the show isn’t a one-gimmick thing. We thought it was going to drag Cathy hiding her cancer, acting crazy, and not seeking treatment for longer than this, but this season went through all of that. We are glad her son has a heart, too. This was an easy show to watch, and it was both funny and touching. The finale was good. We loved that the show didn't embrace suicide as the best option for Cathy or Marlene. We thought it was going to go in that direction, and while it respectfully considered it, the choice to fight on was the right one, in these womans' cases.

Season grade: A-

The Weeds finale was stressful! All Weeds seasons end on a cliffhanger, and boy did this season deliver the cliffhanger. Through the tension, there was some humor though (Guillermo’s shoes) and the return of Esteban was scary and welcome. One question for those who have seen it: why didn’t Nancy take the baby and get on the plane, fleeing to France with the rest of the family? What was Esteban going to do about it, at the gate, through security, at the airport? She could have gotten away. Did she really want to take the heat for Shane, just in case France caught him and sent him back? Won’t Esteban just show the police the tape exonerating her for the murder portion anyway? Ugh. More importantly, hasn’t Silas gotten smokin’ hot over the years? This season had its slow points in the middle, but we liked the “family on the run” concept, and there were a lot of laughs.

Season grade: B+

No Ordinary Family - No Ordinary Vigilante review/recap

Four episodes into this show, it’s still in our top five of the new season. But it hasn’t returned to the overarching plot point of there being other people with powers on the show since episode two. It’s entertaining, but we wouldn’t be devastated if it were cancelled. We still like the tone and care about the characters, so we hope the show realizes its potential as a must-watch family show soon. It's still really easy to watch, so that's a plus.

Here’s what the family members were up to this week:

Jim - Jim is putting on a hoodie and roaming the park to catch muggers. His pitfall was his refusal to wear a moustache and other things to disguise his very distinctive, round head. Jim spotted a vigilante out in the park, shooting the muggers, and was affronted. The cops were on this vigilante’s side, but Jim didn’t think what the guy was doing was right. Pause while we call the kettle black, because Jim is a dangerous, inept, and careless vigilante as well. While he was whining about how the new vigilante shoots people, we couldn’t help but remember last episode, where Jim threw a bad guy off of a roof onto a cop car. Jim went out to the park again to look for muggers and the vigilante, but he was spotted and mistaken for that vigilante when another mugger was shot. Jim and his lawyer friend tracked down the vigilante and tried to bust him, but no one picked him out of a lineup. Jim talked to the man at the bar, and the man gave Jim a great life lesson about spending time with your kids. Seriously. Then the cops shot the vigilante in the park in a set-up while Jim was at home with his kids. One thing we thought was weird about this storyline was that this whole episode, the show was trying to show that the cops are inept and lazy. So now we NEED vigilantes? What is this, Gotham?

Stephanie - Stephanie has a new lab assistant, and it’s that Asian guy who was competing with her for the research funds. Asian guy revealed that a former scientist who disappeared was working on the same research Stephanie is working on (the stuff about what’s wrong with her family). Stephanie’s assistant, Katie, revealed that the former scientist was dead. Stephanie is coming across as the typical, shrew, working, perfect wife right now. We hope they do more with her character. Her relatively healthy marriage is unbelievable, because of the lack of equity in the marriage. She makes more money AND is way hotter than her husband? No wonder he is feeling insecure. If Jim were the hot one, this marriage would probably work and make more sense. When one partner is way better than the other one, the better person either takes the other for granted, or the one with less going for them starts to feel insecure (think of "The Reacher" and "The Settler" from How I Met Your Mother). We think that spells trouble. But this is TV, where all women are hot, and the show needed some sort of conflict for this marriage, so Jim is poor and useless.

JJ - Desperate for peer and parental acceptance, JJ used his super brain to get really good at football. Apparently, football is all math, physics, and trajectories. The pilot of Friday Night Lights has already shown how intellectual football is, but we appreciate the reminder. JJ’s math professor, who needs to get a life, was still following JJ around and trying to find signs that he is cheating. After seeing JJ excel in football, he called the Powell mom and dad and said that he thought their son was using a drug, like Adderall. JJ refused to tell his parents about his new abilities, so we assume that this “what’s wrong with JJ” storyline will continue into next week. This was the most unbelievable storyline of the episode, for two reasons. 1) JJ is teeny tiny. Even if he could know when and how to throw a football, eventually, he will be tackled and crushed like a bug. Not a good idea, JJ. 2) Don’t they have a JV football team at this school for the coach to suggest he go for until he gets a little bigger? We also have a beef with JJ keeping his powers a secret for this long. This isn’t a dark or entertaining secret, like Laura Linney’s on The Big C. It’s not going to be fun when JJ’s secret is revealed, unless the reveal is spectacular. It’s just going to be awkward, we think, so the show isn’t generating intensity with this particular plot point that is getting way too much screen time.

Daphne - Daphne heard a man at a liquor store think about how he was dipping into the cash register. Next, Daphne used her powers to read a popular girl’s mind and find out where a cool, no-sophomores part was going on. When she went to the party, however, the cool girl said, “We have a strict no losers policy,” and tried to throw her out. Desperate for peer acceptance, Daphne told the cool girl that she could get them alcohol. Fortunately, the stealing cashier worked both early afternoons and late nights. Yeah right. Daphne tried to blackmail the store cashier into selling her lots of booze, but the man knew she couldn’t prove his crime, so he called the police, and Daphne was busted. In the end, we saw JJ actually do something unselfish, for once, when he assured his parents that Daphne didn’t drink at the “cool” party. He was there, since he made the football team and is now cool, so he could attest to that fact. JJ did not get in trouble, and his father even made a great speech about how everyone needed to work hard and be good, like JJ. Typical parental response to the youngest child acting up. Ugh.

Episode grade: C+

Watch it here:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/186428/no-ordinary-family-no-ordinary-vigilante#s-p1-so-i0

Ern's Five Favorite New Shows

Leeard needs a little more time to decide (three episodes instead of one or two), but Ern is pretty sure that these are the five shows worthy of viewing, if the genre is your taste, of course. Neither Leeard nor Ern really have genre biases. We like guy shows, girl shows, sci-fi, history, fantasy, teen stuff, soapy stuff, mysteries, violence, medical shows, legal shows, satire, comedies, and more. Here is Ern's list pulled from all the new shows that are still on air. Lone Star would have made the list, but the network drones took it off after two episodes.

1. Boardwalk Empire - This should come as no surprise, due to the quality, acting, history, characters, and story. It makes us feel like we've been watching this show for years. It plopped us right into Chicago mobster history with style, a little family drama, humor, and brutality. It's unpretentious for an HBO show and easy to watch, but it's not stupid.

2. Blue Bloods - Ern doesn't usually flock to cop shows, but this one pulled her in immediately. There is family drama, a secret organization of cops who act more like vigilantes, a "dirty" cop who you kind of root for, an overarching murder mystery, and, so far, interesting cases. There's really nothing else on Friday nights, so there's really no reason to skip this cop drama. Plus, it has Len Cariou in it. He's the really old guy with white hair. Broadway nerds will remember that Len Cariou was the original Sweeney Todd with Angela Lansbury. His voice is so great that when we watch the Johnny Depp Sweeney Todd, we watch it with Len Cariou on our ipods and mute the TV during the songs. Just hear for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Kt5PsyEMWk&feature=related He's the guy who talks first and sings second (the one who doesn't sound like a creepy old man) We love that this talented old-timer is still kickin and making shows.

3) No Ordinary Family- This show was surprisingly fun, and it's good for the whole family to watch. The pacing made it easy to stick with, but it wasn't infantilizing. We hope this one can find an audience and stick around.

4) The Event- So far, this show is one of the best because we don't want to stop watching it. It's exciting, we think it's going to start focusing more on character development, and we like a high-concept show. It could get bad, like Flashforward did. But for now, it's one of the most promising new shows.

5) The Defenders- This is sort of the best by default because Ern wasn't impressed by most of the new shows. But it's a perfectly solid and fun legal drama for people who like to see laughs and twists in the courtroom.

Honorable mention: The Big C. This show is more of a comedy than Ern's other favorites, and it didn't make the top five, because it really started in the late summer. It's hard to call it "a new fun show," but it's too good not to mention it. It's light and breezy, yet respectful and true to the pain a cancer diagnosis can bring. We love the crazy main character, her precocious student (played by Precious' Gabourey Sidibe), and the main character's voluntarily homeless brother.

One to give more time to: We think that if it gets off of its "sex sells" gimmick and starts giving us smarter stories, Nikita could someday be a good show. For now, it's not as exciting or cohesive as it needs to be, but it's one Ern is keeping an eye on.

Ern's bottom five: My Generation, Chase, Detroit 1-8-7, Undercovers, Hellcats (just rent Bring It On, people; it's way better)