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Parks and Recreation is worse this season, but it's still better than most comedies.

By Peabody Awards (Amy Poehler) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

We love Parks and Rec. Seasons 2-4 were as funny as any comedy we've ever seen, and all the characters are hilarious, loveable, and distinctive. But as we head toward the middle of season five, we have to admit that while it's still pretty good and loads better than The Office right now, it's not what it once was. They are having writer's block or something. Maybe having Leslie win the election wasn't a great idea, as much as we teared up and loved the victory.

Pawnee Commons
This was the one where Leslie and Ben met the Eagleton architect, Andy was bored at his new security job, and Tom started work on his new store. We loved when the radio guy had to define Batman for his audience. We also liked the focus on building a park in the lot. That's just the kind of arc this show needs to have at this point in the season. We need to be building toward something like the Harvest Festival or the election. Leslie now has to pitch her park to the council and beat April's pitch. After this episode, that shouldn't be too hard, but we'd love the dog park to win.

We also liked when Ken Tucker, the TV critic from Entertainment Weekly magazine was referenced. He usually writes good, thought-provoking stuff, even if we sometimes disagree with it. We also liked the balloon versions of Ben and Leslie and Eagleton's park design. FACE. We liked the gunshot app April had on her phone. Joey was a cute kid. We liked the end of Bert Macklin and the Segways. There weren't any actual laughs in this one for us though, except for Leslie's revenge on Wreston. Most of the Eagleton stuff was rehashed from previous seasons. The show needs something new for that rivalry.

Ron and Diane
We know the point of having Jerry's wife on the show is that she's hot. That's the joke. That's the only joke. So it makes sense that Christie Brinkley would have more botox than John Kerry before an election. Still, she came off as weird and robotic since she couldn't move her face. But, again, for this plotline, it's just important that her face looks good. Goal achieved, even though we prefer the natural look ourselves. Jerry's party scene should have been a lot funnier.

We're trying to avoid the b-word ourselves, Leslie. It's pretty sexist. Where are the writers taking Chris this season? He drank fatty eggnog. Progress? (Also, a weight loss tip. It's best to just eat the satisfying fatty stuff that tastes good rather than a lowfat version. You'll be more satisfied and eat less later on in the day. You don't want all the chemicals either. Just eat real food and exercise.) April is really weak? We liked the Ron Swanson plot. Diane is perfect for them, and if they break up, we will riot.

Pawnee Commons grade: B-
Ron and Diane grade: B

The Vampire Diaries. Groan.

By vagueonthehow from Tadcaster, York, England (Ian Somerhalder  Uploaded by MaybeMaybeMaybe) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

My Brother's Keeper
We don't love what they are doing with Jeremy because the hunter instinct is taking over him. It's too repetitive. We saw this with Alaric already. The show needs to let Jeremy keep his free will and slowly come to the conclusion that he should kill vampires. Leeard was hating Caroline and Tyler this week, and she continued hating them in the next episode. The big news of this episode was that Damon and Elena have sex right as Caroline and Stefan are figuring out that Elena is sired to Damon. Whoa.

Everything that happened this season makes sense once you know about the sire bond. But is this the best way to have Damon and Elena seal the deal for the first time? Would it be SO TERRIBLE to have perfect, compassionate, sweet little Elena sleep with Damon because she's lusty and she wants Damon? Being sired should not have been the reason they hooked up. The show should have had the balls to take Elena there as a woman making a gutsy choice. Super hot scene though. Thank God Damon didn't know, or it would have been rape-y and ruined his character for us forever.

We'll Always Have Bourbon Street
We loved the dress Elena wore to school and in the beginning of the episode. Female friendships are so great on this show. Still, this episode had way too much teen drama. What with Caroline whining about not liking her friend's boyfriend, the brothers fighting, and the endless talk about Elena's feelings, this episode certainly felt like it belonged on the CW. Caroline was being a jerk, but we can understand that because of what Damon did to her in season one. Why does this show always torture Caroline? It's extremely sad, yeah, but give her a break. We'd care if it were one of the other characters too. This one was a snore saved only by Lexi's presence.

We hate to say it, but this show might have lost what made it one of our favorite shows in the first place. It's not going anywhere. It seems to be biding time, making things up as it goes along, and protecting Elena from doing anything wrong, ever. It's not telling us a story we want to see the ending to. We trust these writers more than most, but only one episode this season has been up to the standard it set for itself in the first two seasons. It needs to let Elena legitimately go for the bad guy without giving her an easy out. If this is the only way this show can keep the love triangle alive, it needs to drop the triangle and just move on.

This show needs a shake-up. At this point, we want it to kill Elena, bring back Katherine, and have her, the Salvatore brothers, Caroline (as long as she starts being less judgmental), Rebekah, Klaus, and Matt leave Mystic Falls for another town, with an angry Jeremy, grieving for his sister, hunting them and trying to kill them. Also, cure Damon and make him a snarky human. Or how about this? Kill Stefan and Damon, have Elena get tougher, and then bring in new vampire love interests. Even Ern has to admit that Stefan is less sexy after the whole ripper thing, and what Damon did to Caroline in season one sort of ruined him too.

Stefan is too boring and "good boyfriend," and Damon has been an ass so long that we can't get onboard with that either, especially if it's not real/sired. Maybe they've both outlived their usefulness. Maybe we ship them with no one. We have many ideas and while many would anger fans, they would be a heck of a lot better than having the show write cop-outs and repeat the last three seasons. We will still watch in the hopes that this show can get its groove back. We believe it can.

My Brother's Keeper grade: C+
We'll Always Have Bourbon Street grade: C

Should we tune into Nashville next year?

By Raven Underwood (Hayden Panettiere @ Grand Slam) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Lovesick Blues
Loved the lyrics to the duet between Juliette and Rayna. It really is a shame neither of them can sing that well. We love both Connie and Hayden as actresses, but it's too bad the show couldn't find some powerhouse vocalists who could also act. It kind of makes sense for Juliette to have a lightweight voice, since she's supposed to be a Taylor-Swift type only with more sex appeal. But Rayna should be able to rip it. It's also too bad that Scarlett is such a weak, wet blanket, mousey bore with a weird speaking voice like she's got a mouthful of nuts in the back of her cheeks that she's saving up for winter, because she can actually sing. We didn't love her Ring of Fire rendition in this episode though. You can't touch that song unless you're gonna really kill it. Scarlett's version was too airy and lacked grit. She could have been shot right after that, and we'd have been like, "Justified."

Where He Leads Me
Gunnar finally kissed Scarlett, but because she is Scarlett, she agonized over it and pushed him away. Juliette goes to church with Tim Tebow, and she looked gorgeous in that church scene. We love her hair up like that. We love emerald green and want that dress. It won't be as good on brunettes, but it will still be pretty. Mrs. Tebow is a jerk. Juliette needs a good mommy, not a snob. We are now solidly on Juliette's side in this show, just because we want her to succeed and stick it to Mrs. Tebow. Teddy comes clean to Rayna in this one. Finally. The trust is broken, and Rayna was meeting Deacon soon after. We like the idea of Rayna and Deacon, but it might not be interesting enough in the execution. It's best to build them up and save them for the end. Finally, finally, finally Rayna and Juliette will be touring together.

Other thoughts-So, we're wondering whether we want to catch the show when it next comes on. We enjoy it while we are watching it, but there's nothing that keeps us coming back except this blog and the need to give promising new shows a chance. We never immediately want the next episode. Also, we don't think this show is going to make it, and we want to spend our time on something that's not going to be cancelled soon. On the other hand, some of the music is so good that we've actually bought two songs, and one of us doesn't even normally like country music. We bought If I Didn't Know Better and Fade Into You.

It gets Nashville, TN pretty well, as far as we know. Yeah, we've been there. It's not a bad show at all. There's nothing we really hate about it, and it could get good. We'd follow Connie Britton nearly anywhere. We loved the pilot. We wonder if Tim Tebow will marry Juliette (even though it was real dumb of her to ask him, not to mention CRAZY; way to cut his balls off). This show was smart to speed up all the storylines right before the break, bringing tension to the show where it wasn't present before. Nashville earned itself a pass for at least one more episode from us. We want to see the immediate developments right after this episode for sure. If we think we like where things are going after that, we'll stay tuned.

Are you guys watching?

Lovesick Blues grade: B
Where He Leads Me grade: B+

Supernatural. This week and last week.

By Canadian Film Centre from Toronto, Canada (CFC in L.A. 35) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Last week, Supernatural treated us to a funny, Loony Tunes-themed episode for all of us who enjoyed Saturday morning cartoons. For the rest of us, there was Castiel trying to be a hunter alongside the brothers. Sadly, that didn't go well, dashing all of our dreams. See, we've said before that we want Sam to die and for Castiel to join Dean full time, hunting. But that might not work so well. Dean didn't seem to keen on taking Castiel's help, and Dean was rolling his eyes at Castiel way too much for our taste. We were like, "Don't ruin it, Winchesters! Just let him be weird!" They wouldn't even let Castiel ride shotgun. How are they missing that he's adorable?

The episode was original, well paced, and unpredictable. It was missing some of the dull glumness that bogs down this show's worst episodes. It was in this episode that we found out that Amelia's husband, Don, never died. We felt a little bad for Sam. We liked Amelia's father because of how perceptive he was, and we were rooting for him to start liking Sam.

This week (last night) was the midseason finale. There was sort of a cliffhanger. Sam left Amelia with her husband, because he was trying to do the right thing, but Amelia showed up at the end. We can't wait for her to find out what Sam's day job really is. We're glad Benny is the real deal and that he and his great granddaughter lived. Sam needs to just listen to Dean all the time. Dean is always right. We didn't remember Martin very well, but we are thrilled that he's dead.

Martin was so annoying it made us like Sam during this hour. Man, what a pain. We can't believe Sam sent him to keep tabs on Benny. What a dumb idea, Sam. Okay, maybe Sam still IS our least favorite character to ever be on this show, now that we think about it. Of course Sam is mad at Dean, even though Dean was 100% right about everything this entire time. We'd love Sam to run off to Mexico with Amelia and leave Dean alone, but we bet they'll make up within two episodes next year.

And so ends the first half of the season with the new showrunner. We're fans. It needed the new blood. Supernatural still isn't as good as it was in its best seasons, 2-4 (and most of 5), but it's a heck of a lot more watchable than the last two years. The "Bs" are an achievement for Supernatural these days. Too bad the LOST people can't get ahold of this show. It's nerdy enough to intrigue them, and now they can write flashbacks for it too! Although it looks like Sam and Dean's flashbacks to what they did last summer are over. Thank God, in Sam's case. Those weren't very good, and they were often poorly acted. See you in 2013, Winchesters.

Hunteri Heroici grade: B
Citizen Fang grade: B-

Lawless and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Lawless
This movie should have been better than it was. It's based on actual people, it had a good cast, for the most part, and it looked awesome, meaning it had good cinematography, costumes, color, and setting. It just wasn't engaging enough to be great. Tom Hardy was a highlight. We swear, that man has a different voice for every character he plays, and we're not just talking about accents (although we've seen him do about four, and he hasn't been in that many movies yet). His surly, tough character was our favorite. Poor Mia Wasikowksa didn't make out so well. We've loved her since In Treatment, when she played a young gymnast getting therapy. She was the best Jane Eyre in movie history, and she can be really pretty. She's a good actress too. Sadly, she didn't get much to do in this movie, and they hardly ever let her put her hair down, so she didn't look that great either. The men we watched the movie with just kept complaining about how she wasn't pretty and was "anorexic." It made us feel bad, since we like her and think she's gorgeous in a different sort of way.

Gary Oldman hardly gets anything to do, but it's the best we've liked him in a while (he was hideous in The Book of Eli). This was beneath Jessica Chastain, especially given her role. Shia LaBeouf did a much better job than we would have predicted, and we're pleased to see him at least trying to get into good movies. He's grown. We were also happy to see Dane DeHaan, who we recognized from Chronicle. He's a great new actor and a little cutie to boot. Guy Pearce has the meatiest role. Parts of the movie are a little slow, and it feels listless. We felt uninvolved when we were watching it. even in the parts where we were entertained. The film lacked both tension and heart, and at least one of those is key in movies like this. In the end, the best thing about this movie was the violence. If you like brutal, slightly creative, and gleeful violence, this is the movie for you. It's not constant, but when it's there, it wakes you up.
Movie grade: B

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
Once again, the cast is the draw here. Tom Wilkinson, Judi Dench, and Maggie Freaking Smith. Yes, please. We ended up liking Bill Nighy's character the best. This movie had a boggy middle, since there was little in the way of firm plot. We didn't know where it was going. The characters' main goals were...wait for it...to enjoy retirement. Hows that for a story? Seven old people set out to enjoy their retirement, BUT WILL THEY SUCCEED when it's in India, and they find the country weird and the hotel a bit run down. We didn't care about one of the major love stories. Dev Patel's character was funny. That guy was so positive that if someone pooped on him, he would say, "Ah, yes, I can eat that and it might have some nutrition."

The movie is sweet, and it has a few good lines and chuckles. We expected more though, especially because of the cast. This movie was wise not to exceed two hours, but we wanted to see more of India and the more interesting aspects of the culture there. We wanted more jokes and fewer cliche plots. The actors save the script. We were a little annoyed at some of the portrayals of women in this movie. All the villains were women (even if their villainy was light), and we watched this movie with a guy who got a chance to throw around the world "bitch" a lot. We're sick of women in movies being negative nags, shrewing around. This film didn't totally work and will end up being forgettable. If it weren't for the cast, it would probably have been a complete waste of time.
Movie grade: B-

Sunday midseason finales: The Good Wife, Once Upon a Time, Revenge, and The Walking Dead

By Arnold Gatilao from Fremont, CA, USA (Jennifer Morrison) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Good Wife- Battle of the Proxies
Nick is gone! Thanks for the Christmas present, CBS. That character was a dud and so was the plotline. We're curious to know how Kalinda got rid of him. We doubt she killed him, but with a storyline that dumb, one never knows. We don't even care what happened to him. In fact, one way for Kalinda to get her mystery back is to have the show just never tell us what she did to protect Alicia. He's gone. No one cares about him. Showing her killing him would be stupid, but anything less than his death would be unsatisfactory (unless the writers have a creative solution of which we can't conceive). Just leave it at that. Kalinda has ways we don't know about. Ways we can't fathom. Stand in awe. Our main complaint about this episode was the lack of Cary. Alicia needs a new love interest at some point too. For a midseason finale, this one was awfully quiet.

What an interesting case to save for the end though. This is one legal show that puts real, intelligent thought into its scenarios. Amanda Peet has Will nailed. Not literally, but it's probably just a matter of time. We can't believe Alicia's kids were so mean to her when she tried to have The Talk with them. Actually, we can. Our parents are cool cucumbers, like Alicia, who we respect, and we even snap at them sometimes. No one wants parents up in their grill, even after high school. Alicia messed up though. Now Grace is probably going to have sex with Bobby. Did Alicia send Grace the message that it's a little expected for Grace to start considering sex? It was cute and hilarious when Zach and Alicia found out that the real sex maniac was Jackie. Peter's campaign is in trouble and Eli is in a tissy. What else is new?
Episode grade: B

Once Upon a Time- Queen of Hearts
As saccharine as it all was, this episode touched us, especially when Emma's heart threw out Cora. Will Emma have more powers in the future? Jennifer Morrison looked prettier than usual in this episode, for whatever reason. Regina didn't get the results she would have wanted from her redemption, but we love seeing her come this far. One of our concerns with this series was that the good and bad guys would be fixed, uncomplicated, and stock characters. But this show isn't afraid to take them from their archetypes and grow them, making room for surprises like Red being the wolf or the "evil queen" being unselfish. We loved the ending too.

Hook is such a little poop. His aggressive "flirting" during his fight with Emma was just disgusting. Who is writing his part? If they are trying to get us to hate him, it's working. As sweet and fulfilling as this episode was, the best part was Hook and Cora sailing toward Storybrooke. As villains, they probably aren't scary enough, but we can't wait to see them face off against Rumpy and Regina. We'll give them a chance to prove that they can cause real trouble. We like that the midseason finale got the whole Charming family back together. A separation storyline isn't as interesting as an all-out war storyline, especially when we are repeatedly assured that they will always find each other.
Episode grade: A-

Revenge- Revelations
This wasn't a bad way to wrap up the first half of the season. It wasn't good, but neither was most of this season so far. The events were a little depressing. Daniel has control of Nolan's company, because Nolan wanted to protect Amanda that much. Wow, that's a great friend. Too great of a friend. David Clarke must have been one hell of a mentor. We hope Ashley wasn't anybody's favorite character (we truly doubt it) because she probably isn't anymore. Her actions in this episode were pathetic, but we can all likely agree that we're glad she and Daniel are broken up. We welcome a triangle between Daniel and Aiden. Jack is just too sweet and clueless to make an intriguing triangle point and be competitive enough to make a fight for Amanda exciting.

It seemed like the Jack/Amanda ship was endgame from the first season, but now that he has a baby with Emily, he seems sort of tainted as a love interest. Plus, he has Declan and gave rise to this season's most boring material, in our opinions: the drama with his dead father's enemies. We had hoped this episode would end that arc for good, but it seems we'll have to contend with it next year. Much more exciting is the idea of the Initiative, the terrorist group that started it all, trying to control Daniel. Daniel isn't as pure as the driven snow as he used to be, but he's not evil, he's smart, and he has good intentions. Heck, the guy is a literal poet. He's going to be horrified when these people start contacting him.
Episode grade: B

The Walking Dead- Made to Suffer
Darryl!!!!! Oh no! We saw the preview for February and he was still running around, so supposedly he lives, but we still don't like to even see or think about the risk of losing our favorite redneck of all time. We have five new characters in the prison, and we're alright with that. With all the people dying, they need to be replaced. We want the show to keep trying out characters and only keep the ones we like (and occasionally kill one of them as well). AMC needs to learn how to write women we like. Maggie is a start. We actually don't hate Andrea, even though a lot of people do since she started sleeping with the Governor, a choice some deem as "gross." Carl is a pretty good little leader, as shown by this episode. At first, we didn't buy him as a bad ass, but he's growing on us.

The battle was okay, but the real action was the fight between Michonne and the Governor. Thank God Michonne put his poor daughter out of her misery. That was a gnarly fight. As disgusting and sociopathic of a person the Governor is, one of us is kind of attracted to him. If he had raped Maggie, that attraction would be completely gone. But he didn't, so there it is. We wondered why the Governor turned on Merle so fast, but then we remembered that Merle lied to him about Michonne being dead, and the Governor probably doesn't want to deal with Merle's whinging about his brother. RIP Oscar. You won't be missed that much. Can't wait until February. We just want an answer as to what the Governor is doing with all those heads. EXPLAIN THE HEADS.
Episode grade: B+

Ern Reads Every Stephen King Book post 3: The Shining

I've read this one before, back when I was younger, and I've seen the popular 1980 movie based on the book as well. I don't remember much about the movie. That was a long time ago. I remember liking it. There are a few classic moments that are not present in the book, like Jack's writings just saying, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" over and over. Also, "Here's Johnny!" only happens in that movie. There are a ton of differences and both the book and movie are good, so it's worthwhile to partake in both. My only complaint about the movie is that the wife, Wendy, is so ugly in the movie that it's distracting. I know that's mean to say, and I'm sorry, but the book paints Wendy as much more attractive.

Stephen King lived portions of this book/got certain scenes from real life. He actually moved to Boulder, Colorado for a year in order to give his third published book a different setting. We guess it would be a problem to write a book set in a place with which you are unfamiliar. King and his family stayed in a hotel one night where they were the only guests, and they stayed in a room that was said to be haunted, Room 217. He was served at a the hotel bar by a man named Grady and dreamed of his three-year-old son running from a firehose. The hotel, The Stanley, had once housed famous people.

This is one of only a few books that have ever really scared me. The "bathtub scene" is what did it the first time around. The second time around, I was more unhinged by the crumbling marriage, the suspicion, and the adult stresses of the job, blame, and parenting. Maybe it's just that I'm older now. The Shining isn't just a ghost story. The novel explores a damaged marriage, hurt and trust in a marriage, alcoholism, and one man dealing with quite the temper. The evil hotel, filled with ghosts, uses all of these already negative things, blowing them up to massive proportions to take a family down.
I don't think this is Stephen King's scariest book anymore, although I used to. The Stand and Pet Sematary probably compete for that title now.

My biggest complaint about this book is that sometimes it got repetitive. King would tell a story from, say, Jack's past, having him remember it. Then he would tell the same story from his wife, Wendy's, point of view, but we wouldn't really get much new information. The history of the hotel was repeated several times, as were several minor, past incidents. We love the way King lets us know the entire life story of most of his characters, but we only need the life story once. Overall, this is a classic for a reason. It has characters you care about, although very few of them. I want to go watch the movie now.

Book Grade (compared to other Stephen King books): B

Re-watching Gilmore Girls: Season five

Season five was the last season of this show that Ern liked. Leeard pretty much loved every minute of this show. The season started right where season four left off, only it showed Dean and Rory lying in bed together, joking. They jumped up when they heard Lorelai in the house, running around and talking. After fighting with her mother and starting to regret her mistake, Rory takes off to Europe with Emily. Rory writes a letter to Dean, breaking things off, but his wife finds it, leading to a confrontation. We loved Lorelai sticking up for her daughter to Lindsay's mom. Real moms are still on their kid's side, even when they disagree with their decisions. They still support them as a person.

Luke and Lorelai start dating. We find out the extremely romantic, kind of pathetic fact that Luke has kept a horoscope Lorelai gave him when they first met eight years ago. He's all in. Well, we're not surprised. Lorelai is touched by this revelation and sleeps with him. Whoa, first date is kind of fast, even if they've known each other for eight years, but okay. We guess fans didn't want to wait much longer. There are a bunch of people who don't like Luke and wanted Lorelai with Christopher, and to them we say, "Huh, what?"

Rory meets rich boy Logan Huntzberger. We liked Logan. We didn't love him. He was good as a character, and we like where the relationship took Rory. It was time for her to have a steady guy again. Logan was unlike both Jess and Dean. He wasn't a pathetic, uneducated puppy dog, and while he was a bad boy, he was a bad boy in an arrogant, entitled way. Jess had a different bad boy vibe. After Dean and Lindsay broke up though, Rory tried to give that relationship another shot, with predictably yucky results. The double date with Luke and Lorelai (with the Bop It) was painful, but funny.

Richard was always right about Dean. As much as class still shouldn't be a thing and love should conquer all, the reality is that most people marry others with similar educations and financial backgrounds. Dean worked in construction; Rory was a blue blood going to Yale. And Dean knew it. The rich girl/poor boy love story is everywhere, but it's not the combination that usually works in real life. Guys have a chip on their shoulders most of the time. They have to be the stars, the successes, and the breadwinners. The wives are the back-up, the support, and part of the overall picture of success. The arm candy. Should it be this way? No. Is it? Not all the time, but most of the time.

It was Dean who couldn't handle being with Rory around her grandparents' house and rich friends. Luke did a little better. Richard and Emily were rude to him at the start of his relationship with their daughter, and things never improved. For all their talk about manners and breeding, they acted like trash. A real respectable person treats everyone the same, regardless of status or income. As Sirius Black said, "You can judge a man by how he treats his inferiors, not his equals."

Or in the words of Brendan Frasier in the underrated Blast from the Past, "Good manners is about making sure everyone around you feels as comfortable as possible." It's not which salad fork to use. It's "the oil of society," helping people to get along as much as possible. So, yeah, we started hating Emily and Richard a little for their behavior. Maybe Dean didn't have that big of a chip on his shoulder. Maybe he just didn't want to hang out with tools. Speaking of tools....Logan's Life and Death Brigade looked fun, but it was more than a little wasteful. We loved Rory calling Logan out for his poor treatment of Marty.

The difference between Logan and Jess was that Logan kind of wanted to be better. Whenever Rory pointed out the error in his immature ways, Logan made efforts to make things up to her, like buying her a coffee cart or apologizing. As arrogant as he was, he could take advice. He was moldable. He could grow. Watching him improve was charming. We also loved his guts and his pranks. His impromptu theater in Rory's class was hilarious. Logan's confidence made him. He did whatever he wanted, unless his father was around. It made him instantly crushable.

Emily and Richards separation continues, and Emily goes on a date. Lorelai has dinner with Christopher, who has broken up with Sherry. Sherry abandoned her daughter because she was tired of being a mother. Ugh, we hate how that show always demonized Sherry, but that was the final straw. It was just cruel to have that character turn out to be so crazy, cold, and heartless. Sure, Sherry was always the worst, but it seemed like lazy writing to us. We were just happy that Lorelai was actually having a personal life rather than forcing us to sit through Inn Drama. So boring.

Rory yells at her dad, who keeps jerking Lorelai around. Lorelai doesn't tell Luke that she's been hanging out with her ex. After Christopher's father dies, Lorelai and Rory make amends with Chris in order to comfort him. Lorelai brings the booze. And she stilllll doesn't tell Luke. Let that be a lesson to us all. That's going to come up to bite her. Emily and Richard get back together in the cutest way, but all that cuteness is ruined when Emily starts plotting with Christopher to break Lorelai and Luke up.

Richard and Emily renew their vows (Rory is Richard's best man, awww). Rory sneaks away to make out with Logan for the first time, and Luke and Chris interrupt her. They both go all He-Man Daughter Protector, making things super awkward. Chris drunkenly throws himself at Lorelai. Luke leaves, angry. We thought that after eight years of pining, it would take more than Lorelai's ex telling Luke that he (Chris) was always meant to be with her.

This break up made Luke look weak, flaky, and uncommitted. We hated it. We did love the final scene when they were all taking pictures and Lorelai leaned in and said to Emily, "You and me, we're done." We've always wanted to say that to someone nasty after watching that scene. She delivered the line like a bad ass. We all learn that you should never make declarations of love a) in front of other people b) while intoxicated. Oh wait, we already knew that. Chris, how old are you?

Lane realizes she won't have sex with Zack, her bandmate and boyfriend, until she is married. Yep, teachings from your upbringing do stick. We loved Lane for this, because it made waiting until marriage because that's how you were taught less creepy and more adorable. Zack didn't even push, earning him points. Meanwhile, Rory keeps her promise to go to Friday Night Dinners, but she's cold to Emily because of what she did to Luke, someone Rory likes. Since Lorelai is also shunning her mother, Emily marches down to the diner to tell Luke that he wins and she will stay out of the relationship. To his credit, Luke immediately goes to Lorelai's house and kisses her. Finally, some balls.

Logan and Rory are having a non-exclusive relationship, and since Rory is a girl, she doesn't care for it.  Rory gets drunk at a weird town function and ends up crying on her guy to a Tarantino-themed party. We have GOT to have one of those. He starts acting jealous. Rory gets drunk at a weird town function and ends up crying on her mother's bathroom floor, asking Lorelai, "Why doesn't he like me?" Amazingly, this did not make us hate her. Rory was now having troubles with "the typical guy," and most of us can sympathize. Especially if she was drunk and weepy.

The weird town function we mentioned, by the way, was Taylor's diorama house. We couldn't breath we were laughing so hard at that. Kirk and weird town stuff was appropriately used in this series. It was never too much and it was almost always amusing. Rory tells Logan that she is a girlfriend kind of girl and doesn't want to continue their open relationship. The ultimatum works, and Logan decides to date only Rory. We loved this. Girls have to stick up for themselves and demand respect. Say what you want, and if you don't get it, don't settle.

Logan takes Rory to meet his horrible family. Honor is cool, but she must have had some trouble in middle school, what with boys almost certainly saying, "Honor? Yeah, I've been ON HER." Logan's family treated Rory like she was Dean, unworthy of Logan and not raised properly to be a Huntzberger wife. Because he has bigger balls than Luke, Logan doesn't let this ruin his relationship. He marches out with Rory and defends her. Rory is crushed and protests, "But I'm a Gilmore." To "make it up to her," Logan's father gives her an internship at his paper. Then he crushes Rory by saying that she doesn't have what it takes to be a reporter.

Lorelai forgives Emily, Sookie has a second baby, and Luke buys Lorelai a house without telling her about it. Rory is so upset about what Logan's dad said, she steals a yacht with Logan. She is arrested. Rory wants to drop out of Yale for a while in order to figure out what she wants to do with her life. She doesn't want to take classes and explore other majors while in college (like the rest of us). She needs direction. Her grades weren't as perfect as they were at Chilton, and now the idea of being a reporter leaves her with a bad taste in her mouth.

This is what happens when you have a perfect, storybook life. As soon as one person doesn't like you or doesn't believe in you, you crumble? Ugh. Everything happened pretty fast. Lorelai disagrees with Rory's decision, so Rory moves in with her grandparents, beginning the longest rift between two characters in the history of this show. Man, was it painful. Richard and Emily first agreed to help Lorelai convince Rory to go back to school, but then they decided they couldn't believe Logan's father would have been that awful, or they couldn't say no to Rory. Or something.

Once again, characters were flopping around like fish. Some of these decisions weren't that believable. Do people really act this way? We went with it. Lorelai runs to Luke for comfort and ends up proposing to him. The season ends. All of this was interesting, but Rory's reaction to a little criticism was completely overblown.

Say Goodbye to Daisy Miller: A-, A Messenger Nothing More: B, Written in the Stars: B+, Tippecanoe and Taylor Too: C-, We Got Us a Pippi Virgin: B, Norman Mailer I'm Pregnant: C, You Jump I Jump Jack: B-, The Party's Over: B+, Emily Says Hello: A, But Not As Cute as Pushkin: B, Women of Questionable Morals: B+, Come Home: A-, Wedding Bell Blues: A+, Say Something: B, Jews and Chinese Food: A, So...Good Talk: A+, Pulp Friction: B+, To Live and Let Diorama: B-, But I'm a Gilmore: A, How Many Kropogs to Cape Cod: B+, Blame Booze and Melville: B+, A House is Not a Home: B+

More Young Adult Fiction: Because It Is My Blood and Origin

We read some YA novels this week. As old as we get, we can't help but read stuff like this. It's fun.

Because It Is My Blood by Gabrielle Zevin
This is the sequel to All These Things I've Done, which we thought was a little silly, but we enjoyed it anyway. These books are part of the Birthright trilogy about the daughter of a mobster. It's like a teenage version of The Godfather, only it's set in the future and it's chocolate, not drugs, that are trafficked. This book improves on things by turning the focus from the teen love story and high school. Instead of that stuff, this book deals largely with the mobster activity, Anya's choices for her future, and chocolate manufacturing.

We loved Anya's new friend in Mexico. This book had some good, believable action in it. It went quickly. We liked the ending, Anya's plans, her new alliances, and the ire it drew from one important character. One of the things keeping this series from being too dry and dour is its sense of humor. The heroine is also easy to like without being cliche or trying too hard. She's smart and tough, and her decisions and emotions make sense. This book is probably trying to provoke thought about why marijuana is illegal and whether it should be. We're fine with that. It's something to think about, especially for the next generation.

If you liked the first one, you'll like this one. We don't admire this trilogy, but we like it, care about it, and enjoy reading it. Most of the stuff we complained about in our review of the last book isn't present here. It feels less like candy and more like a real story as it moves forward. It still has an immature, slightly unrealistic feel that we can't put our fingers on, but that doesn't ruin our enjoyment of a fine female character and her discomfort at being caught between taking care of her family, being a good girl, having a solid future, contributing to her community, loving her boyfriend, and trying to figure out where she fits in her father's crime empire, if she fits there at all.
Book grade: B

Origin by Jessica Khoury
This book is about a scientifically engineered, "perfect" girl named Pia who will live forever, can run 12 miles in 30 minutes, and has really tough skin. She lives in a compound and thirsts for information about the outside world. One night, she gets out. And she meets a boy. A misogynistic jerk of a boy. This book is by-the-numbers and pretty slow. It was predictable, and the ending was too easy and clean. We didn't connect with the main character, who seemed to have no personality, and the love story left us unmoved. The prose/Pia's inner monologue was dull. It wasn't dark enough.

However, this book was written by a 22-year-old woman. That's young. It's rare that someone of that age can write something that really gets to us, deep in the gut. The writing wasn't bad, and there was nothing offensive or terrible about this book. It just wasn't remarkable. In fact, it was promising. We'd like to read what Mrs. Khoury writes in ten years. Older people just have so much more to draw from. Also, this was her first novel. We'll give her credit for trying and getting published, but we don't recommend this book.
Book grade: D+

Re-watching Gilmore Girls: season four

By Jared_Padalecki_2008_Comic-Con_01.jpg: Kristin Dos Santos derivative work: Scarce (Jared_Padalecki_2008_Comic-Con_01.jpg) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

In season four, the show was still at its best, and it made Rory's transition from high school to college without dragging down the show. In fact, we prefer the Yale stuff to the Chilton material. Most shows can't take main characters from high school to college well (Gossip Girl, countless other shows). Gilmore Girls was always about fast dialogue and family relationships, not high school drama. Jess was gone, and this season had Rory single for the most part.

The season started with the girls getting back from Europe, and we didn't get enough stories of how that went. It was better than having a whole Europe vacation special with Rory and Lorelai hopping around and dialoguing though. Yeck. We haaate vacation specials. Rory takes off and immediately misses her mommy. We actually thought that was really cute. We wish one of our parents had hung out with us for the first night at college.

Paris follows Rory to school with her life coach, and she arranges to room with Rory. We were glad Paris was back and annoyed that Rory seemed mostly weirded out. Paris is awesome, Rory. Gosh. We guess that in real life it would be a little stalker-y though. If Paris had called Rory and asked to live with her first, it would have been totally normal. That's what you get for having random roommates, Rory (something we're very glad we did in college; it helps you get close to new, very different people than you would normally be friends with).

Rory continues to be socially uninterested when she doesn't want to ruin the furniture her grandmother sent her in order to have a dorm party. Paris freaks out. Lorelai convinces Rory to open her door to the party. All is well. A cool Lord of the Rings-themed party is ruined by Sookie being annoying and freaking out about being a bad mother. Kids eat kid food, Sookie! Digger Stiles is introduced. He was one of the only interesting things about Richard opening a business. His eventual betrayal made us love Lorelai more, because she chose her family over a sleazy boyfriend.

Dean gets married, but confesses his love for Rory to Luke after getting drunk at his mediocre bachelor party. Luke advises Rory not to go to the wedding, and it's very sweet and fatherly. One of Dean's partying buddies was Schmidt from New Girl, just fyi. He's everywhere. Taylor continues to be annoying and hold up local business, but it's funny to see Lorelai freak out at him. Sometimes. It's MORE funny when Luke freaks out at him. There was a ton of Inn stuff as Lorelai was renovating and opening the Dragonfly with Sookie this year.

We thought it was so, so stupid when Lorelai got rid of the decorator because she had worked with Emily. We get that Lorelai needs space and to be her own person, but that's overkill. It's a decorator. Rory is encouraged by her mother to go out on a date, but she ends up being really boring. That guy was cute too. Her loss. Sookie goes into labor during one of the best Festivals of Living Art we've ever seen on TV. Kurt getting into character to "play" Jesus was extremely amusing, and Lorelai didn't flinch at all. That episode won the show its only Emmy (ROBBED, this show is one of the best shows ever) for makeup. The makeup was fantastic though. The characters really looked like paintings.

Rory starts writing for the Yale Daily News and reviews a ballet by lambasting the prima ballerina for being too fat and clumsy. We thought that was mean, but it was a little funny. Naw, mostly mean. Rory was lauded for her honesty and strong writing, but we mostly think fat jokes are easy and rarely clever. The Gilmores attend a game at Yale, tailgate, and finally meet the woman who almost stole Richard from Emily in college. Richard meets with Pennilynn every year to catch up, Emily finds that fact out, and the big feud between the Gilmore parents starts. The feud was pointless, sure, but it was kind of cute. It should have been depressing, but it was wholly adorable watching them pine for each other.

Paris starts dating an ancient professor. Gross. We felt as bad for Jamie as Rory did. He was gorgeous, crazy about the nearly undateable Paris, and didn't deserve to be cheated on. There was too much cheating in this season, if you ask us (more on that later).  In the same episode that Lorelai and Luke vandalize the church bells (thank God), Mrs. Kim finds out about Lane's double life in the band and the rock music stash. The band breaks up for a stupid reason, and Lane is forced to move into Rory's Yale dorm for a while. We liked all of these developments a little.

Mrs. Kim's anger at Lane disobeying and sneaking for years was bound to happen one of these days. We missed Adam Brody so much this season. Lane's new and final love interest, Zack, didn't hold a candle to him, and Zack was so dumb that we always wondered why she liked him. Lane eventually makes up with the band and moves in with Zack and Bryan. Because Paris and Rory's other roommates are jerks and won't let Lane stay, even though she's totally helpful and cool. They think it's "weird." Um, you know what's weird? Running all the time, being 16 and in college and having no personality or confidence, and stalking your high school frenemy to college. Not Lane. Whatever.

Next, Jess comes back to get his crummy car and gives Luke an earful. Jess tries to avoid Rory, but later he chases her down and says, "I love you." Rory wisely ignores him and goes about her business, but our hearts are melted because Jess is hot and the bad boy we've always wanted to meet. One of the things we love about this season is the fact that Rory has had a perfect life so far. Her school performances has been nauseatingly top-notch. Boys have always loved her and found her charming. And she never really made bad choices with the opposite sex. Until now.

The start of all this was Rory being advised to drop a class. She took on too much work, got a poor grade, and felt like a failure. It freaking happens. Welcome to the normal world of not getting everything you want in school. Poor baby. Ever since Mr. Medina's class though, Rory had been Hermione Granger-ing her way through everything and making us feel like we should be on the short bus (no offense if you're on the short bus; you can be jealous of a fictional character with us too). It's just realistic and more interesting to watch someone who isn't perfect, right?

Richard's mother, Trix, dies, and we were pretty happy about that. She was mean. Her final act of discord was an old letter begging Richard not to marry Emily, and it was written years ago. Sure, Pennilynn Lotte is beautiful and has a lovely, if different, name, but she's not Emily. Emily's go spunk and would never be meeting a married man who rejected her once a month to catch up once a year. It's desperate. Rory and Paris try to be normal college kids and go on spring break. It doesn't look like they had a good time, little happened, and we were bored.

Meanwhile in that episode, Luke is arrested and Lorelai bails him out. They still aren't together, but hey, at least Nicole is gone. We always hated her. Next, Digger backstabs and the Gilmore grandparents find out their daughter has been dating digger for a long time, behind their backs. Who likes Digger? No one. He even has a creepy dog who is ready for the military. Actually, the dog was cute and did nothing wrong. We take it back. He just had a psycho, controlling owner who couldn't share a bed with a woman after sex.

Jess returns yet again, and Luke listens to self-help tapes that let him know WHAT WE'VE KNOWN ALL ALONG: If you want a girl, you have to go after her. He resolves to pursue Lorelai romantically. Then he gives the tapes to Jess so that Jess can have the same "epiphany" about Rory. *facepalm* It's pathetic that it took Luke this long, but the next couple of episodes made it all worth the wait. Luke's sister marries a decent guy, TJ, and Luke shares a heated dance with Lorelai.

Jess fails to get Rory back. His plan was to ask her to leave Yale and run away with him. Ummm....that's a bad pitch, bro. Just start dating her again. Don't ask her to give up her entire life when you've been less than reliable. Rory has started spending way too much time with her married ex, Dean, going to him for comfort and emotional intimacy. With Dean kind of in the picture, Jess didn't have a chance, especially since Rory has been a little more insecure than usually all season. We were really depressed after that episode though.

The finale was our second-favorite Gilmore Girls finale. It's hard to beat the series finale (oh, the tears). The season four finale was so funny, so eventful. BIG THINGS, WILD THINGS. Lorelai invites her friends and family to an opening night, test run for the completed Dragonfly. Digger shows up and tries to win Lorelai back, but he's rejected. Luke doesn't like seeing Digger prowling around, so he confronts Lorelai and then they kiss on the porch.

It was incredible, and then it got even better when Kirk ran down the stairs, naked, having night terrors, and interrupting them. On first viewing, we were frustrated that Kirk ruined the romantic moment that was melting us, but later we appreciated it as comedic brilliance that kept the show from getting too sappy. The shock of the night was Rory losing her virginity to Dean and Lorelai catching them post-coitus. Lorelai reminds Rory that Dean is married, Rory "hates her for ruining this," and the season ends after the fight.

Lots of people were upset that the show had Rory do this, but we were impressed that adultery was smacked down. Just because it was a fan-favorite couple didn't mean it was alright. There were consequences. Lorelai didn't say, "Do whatever feels good" or "follow your heart." Lorelai stepped up as a mom, confronted her daughter, and never wavered in the opinion that Rory made a terrible, hurtful mistake. Call us judge, but we don't respect a choice that helps someone else break a promise to love someone loyally forever. It adds to the world's brokenness, not its goodness. Thus, Rory's season of insecurity ended, and Jess never threw himself at Rory again. Sadly. Ugh. But let's not forget that Luke and Lorelai finally got together!!!!

Ballrooms and Biscotti: A, The Lorelai's First Day At Yale: B-, The Hobbit, The Sofa and Digger Stiles: B+, Chicken or Beef?: B+, The Fundamental Things Apply: B+, An Affair to Remember: B, The Festival of Living Art: A-, Die Jerk: B-, Ted Koppel's Big Night Out: B-, The Nanny and the Professor: A-, The Clamor and the Clangor: B, A Family Matter: B+, Nag Hammadi is Where They Found the Gnostic Gospels: A-, The Incredible Shrinking Lorelais: A-, Scene in a Mall: B, The Reigning Lorelai: B+, Girls in Bikinis Boys Doin the Twist: B, Tick Tick Tick Boom!: A, Afterboom: B+, Luke Can See Her Face: B+, Last Week Fights This Week Tights: A-, Raincoats and Recipes: A+

South Park Season 16 Part 2

We finally finished watching South Park's 16th season.

Sarcastaball: B-
This is the one where Randy creates a softer version of football and then finds himself unable to stop being sarcastic. This episode is mostly for football fans aware of a controversy over replacement referees. That's not Ern; Leeard, however, fits that bill. The satire worked best for the world's Leeards who would fully understand it, and for them, it should be on-point. Both of us liked the diss of Cee Lo Green for always being on TV and never having enough hit songs. The funniest thing was Butters innocently saving and selling his own semen.

Raising the Bar: B+
This is the one with Honey Boo Boo and James Cameron. We loved the message of this one. We've lowered the bar so much, it would take the events of this episode to raise it. Of course, Cameron's stuff isn't that great either. Avatar was a total rip-off with good visuals and little else going for it. We need to send Chris Nolan down in that submarine. Still, we loved the jokes about James Cameron's ego, as well as his theme song. Honey Boo Boo and her mother were portrayed perfectly and hilariously. Any episode that has Cartman spending most of the time on a scooter and ending up in a 'sketti fight with Alana is a winner to us.

We laughed several times in this episode, and we agree that Americans need to be more discerning, quality-wise, but we don't think Alana's show is the worst thing on TV. Yes, we've seen Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. Not a lot of it, but enough. One thing we liked is how much the family members love each other and get along most of the time. Most reality TV is filled with drama, fights, and backstabbing. This family has its...uh...faults, but they have each other's backs and seem to have fun together.

Insecurity: B
This is the episode where Kyle thinks his mom is sleeping with the UPS man and Cartman installs a security system. And also becomes Bane. We hate to say it, but Glee's Bane imitation trumped Eric Cartman's. What's with a spoof of security systems and people wanting to stay safe anyway? There are other things to spoof, surely. Still, we get the point that response is slow and probably inadequate, and they just profit off of people's fear. That's why one of our security systems consists of 1) lock, 2) glass bottle, 3) barking dog, 4) shotgun, 5) phone for police, and 6) back-up gun (Glock). Seriously. There were funny parts in this, mostly involving Cartman. Also, Ike's drawing showing up everywhere. Mostly though, we just felt bad for the cartoon UPS man.

Going Native: D+
This is the one where Butters goes to Hawaii with Kenny. We didn't think this episode was funny at all. Whatever was going on here, we didn't get it. Do you have to live in Hawaii and be annoying by white people pretending to be natives or something? Meh.

A Nightmare on Face Time: B
We were so excited to see The Avengers episode of South Park. Then it turned into a parody of The Shining as well. So cool. What a good idea for Halloween. The Blockbuster stuff wasn't timely though. If this episode came out when they were collapsing, it would have been better. Stan as an iPad bordered on poignant.  We laughed several times in this episode, especially at Randy. We liked when he was watching Ted on the screen. And the ending, with the McDonald's order.

A Scause for Applause: B
This was the Jesus episode that parodied the Lance Armstrong controversy and Livestrong bracelets. It was at this point in the season that South Park decided to be more timely. This episode and the presidential election one were spot-on parodies about what was actually, currently going on. We like the commentary about how stupid we are with spreading awareness about our causes without actually doing anything. It's just vanity/making us look stylish. Free Pussy Riot, indeed.

Obama Wins!: A-
This was the best, and last, episode of the season. We laughed at the poop-spewing duck once more, and we also liked the Morgan Freeman jokes. South Park handles politics perfectly, every time, while staying in the middle of the road, unlike most shows. Of course, the controversy wasn't mainly about the presidential election, but Disney getting Star Wars. South Park knows what we really care about. After the "seriousness" of one of the meanest elections ever, this episode was like a balm to all our irritation and worries over the last day. This show exists to make us laugh at what everyone else is freaking out about. It exists to slap down arrogance and point out stupidity. The show does it well.

Cold Days by Jim Butcher

By Jim_Butcher.jpg: Nonsequiturlass derivative work: Kelly (This file was derived from:  Jim_Butcher.jpg) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

We're going to try to review this book without spoiling it. We will mention certain subjects and characters who are and are not present in the book, so if that's too much for you (knowing who and what appears), don't read this if you haven't read the book yet. First, we will give you the grades we would give for the other books in the series, just so you have some basis of comparison and know what sort of installments we like to see in this series. Some people like the books that are heavy on action; some people like the introspective, emotional ones. This is what we like/don't like.

Storm Front: B-
Fool Moon: C
Grave Peril: A-
Summer Knight: B
Death Masks: A
Blood Rites: B+
Dead Beat: A-
Proven Guilty: B
White Night: C+
Small Favor: A
Turn Coat: A
Changes: A
Ghost Story: B+
Side Jobs: B-

Yeah, we liked Ghost Story a lot. We think we're in the minority here. We think this book scared the fans. It was sad, long, and the main character was dead. We think the positive reaction to Cold Days among fans is relief that the series they once loved hasn't changed forever. Still, we think Ghost Story was a more satisfying book. Yeah. the ending was frustrating, but it was also exciting. Plus, the twist at the end of Ghost Story (who killed Harry) knocked us on our asses. That book stayed with us longer and felt less like filler that had to happen in order to further Butcher's overall arc. Ghost Story was a story, and a very human one. Cold Days involved getting all the pieces in a chess match to where they needed to be.

We love books that deal with the White Council, the Denarians/Knights, necromancy/the dead, Marcone, cops, vampires, and family. We don't like when Butcher focuses on faeries. It's only tolerable when, like in Summer Knight and Proven Guilty, the White Council shows up to get in on the action, if only temporarily. We hate faerie so much. First of all, it's one long Jim Butcher boner, because every woman in faerie is unbelievably beautiful (as opposed to every other woman in this series...oh wait. Every woman is attractive in Harry Dresden's world. He must be a magnet), and he goes on and on and on about it. We're straight chicks, so it doesn't do much for us. We can't imagine that guys would rather read about hot girls than look at them. We do like the Faerie Mothers though. They are creepy.

Unfortunately, but predictably due to the last book and this book's title, this one was all about faeries. Faery Queens. Bleck. Dull. Too inhuman and cold. Cold Days indeed. Fix is the sole faerie character who actually invites sympathy, and we were grateful for his presence and actions in this one. In fact, let's keep going with what we liked. First of all, we too are grateful that the main character of the series is alive again. We liked Mab's idea of physical therapy. We liked everything to do with the island. Demonreach's purpose is mega-cool and sure to cause trouble with the White Council, which is what we love. We also liked everything involving Mac. Who is he?!! We liked the Outsider's psychic attacks. We liked Kringle. We liked Bob's Firefly reference that Harry didn't understand. We liked the good plotting.

We liked the scene with the Gatekeeper and the revelations there. It made faerie seem a lot more important, and that's needed if we have to see faeries so dang much. We liked Harry's reflections and observations about the nature of power and temptation. We liked Bob's new "movie projector" capabilities. The exposition between Bob and Harry could get old in previous installments, and now Butcher has a tool to make these conversations hilarious. We like that Harry's allies continue to be un-annoying and helpful. We liked Harry's romantic choices. We're not gonna say who (although you can probably guess) we never ever ever ever want to see together, but there's a couple that can't happen, and it was addressed in this book. Gross. Icky icky never never.

Most of all, we like the way this book picked up threads and pieces from the last books and continued them. It was like LOST, dropping hints and plot points for the future, and then actually picking them up. The continuity is great. We got answers to questions that were raised in the first book. Things we glossed over as unimportant in, say, Proven Guilty, turned out to be fairly pivotal. Butcher is great at world building and creating a puzzle. He's going to great lengths to drop pieces everywhere, much like in the Harry Potter series when Rowling laid down hints and then picked them up again, making everything tie together almost perfectly. Finally, Harry's reunion with Thomas was a highlight.

Now for what we hated. It was a lot. 1) No Maggie, Michael, Marcone, or Ebenezar. Three of these are people who, emotionally, should have been there to see Harry come back and react to it. Marcone is just awesome. We guess Butcher is saving these reunions for later, but ugh. We've already waited a year. 2) No one was surprised enough to see that Harry was alive except for Thomas. Sure, there are reasons why Karrin and Molly reacted almost the same way as if a neighbor had come back from Cabo, but why have those reasons? Why kill and bring back a main character and not take full advantage of the shock, awe, and tears? 3) The status of the Winter Knight and one of the queens by the end of the book. We guess we'll be seeing more fairies! Joy. 4) Too many fight scenes. Those are great to watch and boring to read.

5) The "little folk." Does anyone else find them completely annoying in every way? Yeah, they are helpful and good in small doses, but they were in this book too much. 6) The new characters Lacuna and Sarissa. Sarissa is like Susan 2.0 in that she is just bland and brave. 7) This installment didn't show us anything we haven't seen from this series before, except for the revelations of what's been going on in previous books. This type of story, adventure, and interaction is all old hat.

8) Not as much tension. 9) Not a surprising enough ending or evil plot. 10) Molly was jerked around too much, as usual, and the development in her character since the last book was a little sudden. 11) We got bored during the climax. 12) The Redcap. So grating! He should have died early on. 13) Some sexism. 14) While there was a reason for them, we didn't enjoy Harry's rape-y thoughts. Lots of women have been raped, and it doesn't seem fair to make them read these thoughts in a favorite book series.

15) This Winter Knight mantle scared Harry for a reason. There is a chance it can corrupt him and has already seeped into his brain a little. Now, we've already seen this with Lasciel and know how it will turn out, but we're not loving it right now. Lasciel tempted with power. The mantle tempts with sex and animal instincts (like rape, which is distinct from sex). We're afraid that it will turn out to be an excuse for Butcher to have his main character act like an evil pig and still technically be a good person and hero. We don't want to see Butcher's darkest fantasies, so we hope it's not like that.

(It reminds us of when Anita Blake got an excuse to be really slutty after getting something called the ardeur in another series. That completely ruined that series.) This mantle temptation needs to come and go, quickly. We're tolerating it only because we think it will start drama with the other wizards, and we love wizard drama. 16) Toward the end, we just wanted to finish it already. After waiting for a year for this. 17) Harry is still creating problems for himself. 18) This book was good for the overall, 23-book plot, but not for the characters. And we only get obsessed with things when we love the characters.

Edit based on internet surfing: 19) Lucyzephyr pointed out that in chapter 48, Butcher basically said that Lily being attractive would obviously lead to her being a victim. Not only physically attractive, young people are raped. That statement is messed up. We agree with this tumblr that even though the story gave a reason for these thoughts and fantasies, there were other ways to show dark, primal urges, and there was no reason for Butcher to have eight rape fantasies or for them to be as detailed as they were. Entertainment that references rape affects society. It went past what was necessary. Also, THERE WAS a gang rape scene in Grave Peril. We KNEW we read that right. How is that even a question?

Overall, our expectations for this book were low, since we knew it would involve Winter Court stuff, and we were STILL disappointed. The book was fine. We're just glad it's over so Harry can move onto other subject matter. We hate that we have to wait another year to get the book we would like to have had on Tuesday. We wanted more emotion, but a lot of that has been set up for next time (Maggie, Fix, Molly, Michael), so we're not worried that, eventually, we will get what we want. For now, meh.

Book grade: C
But we still love this series.

Girls Season Two Trailer. We Can't Wait!!!

Grey's Anatomy- I Was Made for Lovin' You

Angela George [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The lawsuit plot line is driving us (okay, Ern) crazy. The hospital should not be sued. How is this even a case? We're not lawyers, but it seems weird to us. The attorneys defending the hospital should have a field day. So, that airline was so dangerous that Dr. Hunt should have been aware not to use them? Then why are they even in the air? Why not sue the government officials who let them stay in business if they are SO BAD that some random doctor should have known not to let people fly on them? Oh, but he should have done the research you say? Still. That's a comparatively low amount of fault, wouldn't you say? How much money is "failure to research an already regulated business" worth? Not much. It's not Dr. Hunt's job to make sure airplane's are safe enough for people to use. It's not his duty. Think of your boss (or yourself or any business owner you know): before he or she puts an employee on a plane, does he research the safety record of the airline?

The only way this plotline would work is if the show tells us that it is normal for most chief of surgeries to investigate airline safety. We think any reasonable guy in his position (which is the standard by which he will be measured) would trust that the FAA wouldn't be letting people fly on this airline unless it were safe. That if the airline was in business, it's not negligent to PUT PEOPLE ON IT. It's a heavily regulated industry with few crashes. In order to sue someone for not doing something, it had to be his job to do it. It wasn't. It was the FAA's and the airline's job to check the safety. Those hack plaintiff's attorneys said that the best people to sue would be the hospital's leaders? We can think of so many other parties who would be much better targets. The safety testers, manufacturers, the airline, the government.... Yeah, this is great for drama and Owen angst, but if the show were going to go here, it needed to create a tighter case.

AND THAT'S WHY ONE OF OUR FAVORITE TV COUPLES IS GETTING DIVORCED?

Sidenotes:

• April....you're not nice.
• Arizona, yes finally yes yes yes. Off the floor and back, laughing and being cool again. Woo hoo.
• We hope Meredith doesn't miscarry. She's already miscarried on this show before. We want nice things to happen to her. The pregnancy was a pleasant surprise we should have seen coming.
• Way to be self-destructive, Owen. Go back to therapy.
• Bailey needs to die now.
• The liver patient touched our hearts.
• What happened to ass-grabbing guy?
• Mr. Feeny helped Cristina's heart grow three sizes! And she wants Owen back!
• We love Tina with the chairs, haha.

Re-watching LOST: Season four

Henry Ian Cusick [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Spoilers abound. This season wasn't the best (and it was way too short), but it contains the best episode (The Constant), and the show was reinvigorated by the flashforwards. If you've read anything we've written about the first season of Revenge, you will know that we normally hate flashforwards and consider them to be a lazy gimmick to drum up tension without earning it. Not so on LOST. On LOST, everything happening in the flashforwards was a story in itself, not something that would have to be repeated by the show once time caught up. They were clever. We would have taken anything from this show at this point, though. The season came at the high point of our LOST obsession, so we remembered it as being better than it actually was, on re-watch.

The best thing about this season was that it came just after the writers got their end date. They started charting a nerdy course to the end. We believe strongly in end dates for shows. In our perfect world, shows would get six season and then be forced to end. They can end earlier if they are lame and no one likes them, but after season six, shows should be done. That way, shows don't meander, fail to show us the Mother, have seasons that don't go anywhere, and have characters who can never grow.

This season didn't abandon flashbacks, showing that LOST still had them in its back pocket when they were needed. Now the show could skip back and forth in time as much as it wanted (which would prove useful for season five). The first flashback episode of the season was the second one, Confirmed Dead, which showed us the pasts of all the new characters from Not Penny's Boat. That episode got us excited to get to know them better. Season four also spent a lot of time developing the science-y, time-travel-y element to the show. It took a lot of risks, but they worked. It also had some creepy moments, as well as the one time the smoke monster really worked for us.

We got new characters. Some of them worked and some of them didn't. We loved the C.S. Lewis reference with Charlotte, but that character never realized her full potential. We felt like the writers had ideas of where to take her and then dropped them, turning it into a love story instead. A love story that didn't work. Cool-looking actress though. Then we had Miles, another lame character. He took the show to a repetitive place, and tended to annoy rather than bring sympathy or even laughs.

We preferred Frank Lapidus, the pilot, and Daniel, of course. Daniel just had a lot to DO on the show, even aside from all the crying we had to endure from him. He knew the island's secrets and ended up being a more important character than he was a character we liked. He had a strong role to play. Frank had a few cheesy lines and stupid Hawaiian shirts, but we liked his attitude. He was happy all the time and seemed to roll with the punches easily.

One of the great things about this season was that not everyone on the boat was evil (like we expected; why did we expect that? Apparently, we'd never seen LOST before?!!)  The captain wasn't even evil! The ship baddie was Keamy, a man who scared Leeard a LOT. Keamy brought significant deaths: Carl, Rousseau, and Alex. That was one of the times viewers felt the most strongly for Ben. He wouldn't give his life for his daughter, but he believed he could still get them both out alive. Mid-horrible tactic, she was shot. Then the smoke monster's best moment happened. It must have been the darkness, the wrath, or the emotional resonance, but when the smoke monster took on Keamy and his men, it wasn't silly anymore. Maybe they spend more money on the special effects. Anyway, it worked. The smoke monster was finally scary.

We were disappointed in the Oceanic Six. The six people they chose to get off the island were the most predictable characters to make it. It made us worry about favorites though. We found out (in the Michael episode) that the island can keep people alive even when they are off the island. That was like something out of a Stephen King book. We loved it. We also needed to spend that time with the Michael character after he'd been away for so long and was about to become (briefly) important again. We needed Michael to have screentime to get closure on his arc. We're so glad they killed him. We also liked seeing young Locke grow up and have that gripping interview with Richard. Locke, you should have gone to science camp. Science is cool! This season also featured a flashback to the '50s. Nice. His mom was always cray.

Let's talk great episodes. First, The Economist. Sayid's tragic flashforward hour where he romanced a woman to get to her boss and then was revealed to be (GASP) a hit man for Ben could not have been creepier. In the best way. That woman had the best taste in evening gowns too. Also, Ben and Sayid were hanging out in Ern's favorite city, Berlin. Bad ass. Sayid is the greatest Muslim TV character of all time. No stereotypes there. Abed from Community is a close second. Really, anyone either a) not on 24 or b) who doesn't blow something up is a great Muslim TV character. It's pretty rare, unfortunately.

Another great episode was The Shape of Things to Come, and not just because that's an amazing episode title. Everything about that hour had us holding our breath. Alex dies, and in the last scene, Ben confronts Widmore and threatens Penny's life. After watching The Constant, we were like, "No no NOOOO." In one episode, we felt so horrible for Ben and then went right back to hating him. It was all-in-all a gut-wrenching, brilliant episode.

We already mentioned that we think The Constant is the best episode of this show. It mixed sci-fi with a lot of heart, plus the possibility of key characters losing their minds. It was so different and risky, but then it pulled off the best romantic moment on this show with lines that should have been cloying. Instead, it made Ern cry. Not just once, but every time she's watched it (which is, like, six times). LOST didn't always work in the romance department, but it did here.

Sidenote: We don't think Charlie and Claire were a good couple most of the time. One time, this guy trying to date Ern said that this was his favorite couple on the island, and Ern was thinking, "Oh man, I can't date this dude. He'll bring me fake peanut butter and try to baptize my dog (or something). His taste in romance is, at the very least, suspect." Ern let it go though, mostly because single dudes who even watch good TV don't grow on trees.

Disappointing episodes? Eggtown. This was the one where Kate went on trial for murder and walked away from probation. First of all, that's unlikely. Second of all, we didn't need a whole episode for this. Someone could have just discussed Kate in a conversation. "Oh yeah, she got probation so she could raise her son and because Jack lied for her. He's still in love, you know?" "Oh, okay, cool." Done. We didn't see anything new here. On the island, Sawyer and Kate can't make it work, which is fine because they weren't meant to be together anyway. (Sawyer and Juliet!!)

The sole good moment was the icky scene at the end where we found out Kate was raising Aaron. It raised two questions: 1) What happens to Claire? 2) Is Kate "another," so will her raising Aaron be bad for him and everyone else? Of course, we never got a satisfying answer to the second question, unless "another" only meant "an other" (like, don't let The Others get him). We weren't satisfied with Aaron's arc. He was kind of like Walt. He seemed important, but then he wasn't.

The Other Woman was another dud. It focused on flashbacks from Juliet's affair and her inability to get along with his wife, Harper. The present-day action was wasteful, with Juliet trying to stop Daniel and Charlotte from bringing disaster on the island!!! Oh, but wait, there was no disaster. Everything's fine. Snore. Sure, we found out that Charles Widmore was in charge of Not Penny's Boat, but that wasn't exactly a mindf***. We liked when Ben went all insane like a baby and said, "YOU'RE MINE" to Juliet, but then that was ruined with Jack kissing Juliet in the present. He was defying Ben's possessive, murderous revenge...which never even came. And was never even attempted. We hate when shows set things up and don't follow through. Waste of an hour, for sure. Entertaining though.

Another one we didn't like was Ji Yeon. First off, it was manipulative in a bad way. Most LOST episodes are manipulative, but this one, with its parallel flashbacks and flashforwards, took the cake. One of us never connected with Jin and Sun as a couple, so that didn't help. We found out Jin was dead. (Only not really. Another fakeout. Ugh.) Sun had a baby. Snore snore snore. If she had died from island complications, that would have been interesting. The episode could have been clever with real emotional resonance, but it wasn't there. We just felt tricked for no reason.

Something Nice Back Home bugged us because it finally got Jack and Kate together only to have them break up for a stupid reason. It wasn't even particularly hot. They lost whatever chemistry they had in the first couple of seasons by this point. We waited this long to see them as a couple, and we got this boring episode out of it. Jack has issues. We get it.

While we liked the finale, it should have been better. It was the weakest of all six LOST finales. It was exciting, watching the island disappear was great, and we liked seeing how everyone got to where they ended up in the flashforwards. Still, moving all those pieces took up most of the episode and stole all the time the show had to make a good story to leave us with. The show knew how to redeem itself though: it gave us a Desmond death scare followed by his reunion with Penny. Yay for happy endings!

The Beginning of the End: A-
Confirmed Dead: B
The Economist: A
Eggtown: D (remember, this is compared to other episodes of LOST, not all other shows.)
The Constant: A+
The Other Woman: F
Ji Yeon: C-
Meet Kevin Johnson: B-
The Shape of Things to Come: A+
Something Nice Back Home: F
Cabin Fever: B+
There's No Place Like Home parts 1 and 2: B-

Movies: The Next Three Days and Cloud Atlas

Caroline Bonarde Ucci [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Next Three Days
One of us is always looking for good (not mindless) action films to watch on Instant Netflix, because that's about the only genre her dad ever wants to watch, and he always wants to watch something. The Next Three Days got lackluster reviews from just about everyone, so we didn't expect it to be any good. Still, it looked better than most of the other action movies on that site, and the trailer was interesting. While Elizabeth Banks and Russell Crowe are probably too good to be associated with this movie, it was a lot better than we thought it was going to be. It was, unfortunately, a little unrealistic at times. Other than that, it was entertaining, and we loved the second half. When the movie stumbles, it keeps going, and it was pretty good at building suspense. It's worth watching, but we're glad we didn't see it in theaters.
Movie grade: B

Cloud Atlas
There's a lot about this movie that we liked: The visuals, the cast (except for Jim Sturgess, who has no charisma. Stop trying to make him happen, Hollywood), the makeup, the way the movie juggled so many story lines without being confusing, the spirituality, the fact that the filmmakers were reaching for the stars, the originality, the concepts, the messages.... Sadly, this had to be one of the most boring movies we've ever seen. Clocking in at over two-and-a-half hours, this film took us right to that line between "care" and "don't care," and then it crossed over into the brain space that was screaming, "Just kill them all. I don't care about these characters!" None of the story lines managed to build enough individual suspense to carry the entire movie. The phrase "hot mess" applies.

You can't just throw a TON into a script and hope something sticks emotionally. Hitchcock's rule was "have three great scenes and no bad ones." This movie had plenty of bad ones and none that will stick in our memories. We heard this movie was based on a very good book. What was needed was depth, insight into the characters' minds and motivations, and, you know, other things that make you invested in the outcomes. Some smart people loved this movie, including people who are close to us, so you may disagree as well. We suggest going after a full night's sleep, with a good amount of snacks, and a comfortable sweater if you want to make it through to the end. Settle in.
Movie grade: D

Two Medical Shows Cancelled

Emily Owens MD and The Mob Doctor have been axed. Totally justified, in our opinions.

(Also, today's show post will be delayed until tomorrow)

Homeland, Revolution, The Good Wife

Homeland- Two Hats
Whoa, this show. We were confused at first, but we're pretty sure we know what went down. Peter Quinn is even more awesome than we previously thought, and he was already campaigning for the title of Our Favorite Character On This Show. His mission is to kill Brody once they have Nazir. That makes a lot of sense, because you don't want Brody in government, and you don't want it all to come out. That's a pretty significant development (even if it was doled out in the most convoluted, stupid way imaginable), and that's not all. Brody met with Nazir, and we didn't see the full scene. There's something there that we don't know, most likely. Maybe Nazir re-turned Brody. Brody has to be holding something back from the way the scene was given to us. Only a few left!
Episode grade: B+

Revolution- Nobody's Fault But Mine
In this episode, things finally happened. This should have been, you know, the fifth episode of this show, but it had to drag things out ridiculously. Nothing surprising happened (and there should have been some twist we couldn't have called), but we finally got some plot advancement. Rachel is free, Monroe has power, and Danny is rescued. The bromance could have been handled better. In superior writers' hands, it could have been emotional and heartbreaking, turning Monroe into a character you could really feel for. These writers are hacks though. We think we will finish this season, but unless things change and we start to care more, this show won't earn a season two pass. If this by-the-numbers episode was their big midseason finale, they've got work to do.
Episode grade: B

The Good Wife- A Defense of Marriage
Alicia and Diane did exactly right. Put your client over politics. You are fighting for their interests, not their cause. Nick and Cary are nearly openly threatening each other. KILL HIM, Cary. We love Stockard Channing, but it's too bad that her character was so nasty. Just what we need, another woman portrayed as a lying gold digger. We see way more of those on TV and in the movies than in real life. We felt bad for Peter finally getting boned by his wife for all the wrong reasons. Get rid of Veronica. She's making our girl Alicia cray. We loved seeing Owen again though. This episode should have been called "The Rules of Evidence." Also, that judge should be sacked since Alicia had to explain really common rules to her like twice. Too bad the gay couple was portrayed as unable to control sexual urges/sleep with only one guy. That's just the kind of stereotype that community needs spread right now. We were entertained, but we didn't like what went down.
Episode grade: B-

Dexter keeps the right character alive, Revenge gives us a little history, The Walking Dead is so freaking good, and Once Upon a Time needs to move it along

Dexter- Helter Skelter
The only lame thing about this episode is that after two weeks of us falsely thinking that LaGuerta knows that it's absolutely Dexter, she still doesn't know and is investigating names. It's realistic to have her doubt that it's Dexter and look through all the boat owners, but since Deb was acting so squirrelly last week and the show has been teasing us with this for a while, we thought maybe last week sealed it. No dice. LaGuerta is working with the old captain to find information on all the listed law enforcement personnel. From the looks of the preview, La Guerta lands on Dexter next week.

We have yet another new baddie. An arsonist. We love the way Dexter handled Deb's love compassion, brushing it off in a socially inept way. We also love that Hannah didn't die. We thought she would and that would ignite the Deb/Dexter romance we've been dreading, but it looks like Dexter is really in love with the living Hannah. It's not like we are into Hannah so much as we just need her around to keep Dexter from pulling a Jaime Lannister. We were sad to lose Isaak though. And surprised. Like we've said before, we love that actor. It was cool to see Dexter try to protect him. We're worried for Quinn. This Nadia thing can't end well. Can it?
Episode grade: B+

Revenge- Lineage
Lots of this show's fans from last year are whinging that it's stupid this year. We maintain that it's no stupider than it was last year. It's like everyone is just now realizing that it's an overacted, ridiculously plotted, slow-moving soap opera. They call it a guilty pleasure for a reason, folks. It wasn't much of a pleasure this week either, except for watching Amanda save Ashley from sex trafficking. We wonder how often Ashley and Amanda met before the show's starting point, if at all, and how much Ashley is aware of. No matter what, it's good to see the show make Ashley useful. The mission was cool, but completely outlandish. The Jack stuff was a complete waste of time, but watching Victoria square off against her evil mother and Conrad ruin his son's poetry career was pretty fantastic. The show needs to stay away from Nolan's corporation drama. No one cares. This moved the plot almost nowhere and was just backstory that no one really wanted, but it was entertaining. Stupid, but entertaining.
Episode grade: B-

The Walking Dead- When the Dead Come Knocking
Glenn has been our favorite character since the show began for a reason. He's so bad ass. We don't hate Maggie for cracking at all, especially since she did it for Glenn, but it was a little annoying that it was a woman who broke. Normally, it wouldn't be annoying, but since AMC fans seem to hate all the women on the channel to an irrational degree, we hate to give them more ammo. Still, Maggie is a far cry from Skyler White, Betty Draper, or Lori Grimes. It's the lack of nagging that will save her from the wolves. It's also fortunate that they kept quiet long enough for Rick and the others to infiltrate. Judith is a gross name. We wanted the next episode so badly, but we have to wait.
Episode grade: B+

Once Upon a Time- Into the Deep
Leeard and many others thought this was an amazing episode. Ern was a little less impressed, but still, it was pretty good. It's getting a little too saccharine that Charming and Snow keep talking about how they always find each other, and the other characters have started saying it too. Captain Hook can rip out hearts? In other news, there are zombies on this show now.
Episode grade: B