New show: The Fosters- Season 1, Episode 1

This is show from ABCFamily about a family with two adopted kids and a new foster daughter, as well as a biological son. If that sounds too traditional for you, know that the parents are also two women. And the family is multi-racial. 

We’re pretty stoked. There are already a few conservative, religious groups opposing the show, but talk is cheap and people will always complain. The joke’s on them. The show is getting free publicity from all the attention they are giving it.

Probably the best thing about this show is that it will make teens grow up thinking that fostering children when they are grown up will be a cool thing to do. It’s a great option and one that more conservatives should take, rather than going for their perfect, comfortable lives. 

It’s one thing to say you love God and others; It’s another thing to open your home.

Hopefully the show will have more people considering this, including the haters who are focusing on the wrong thing as usual (other people’s choices instead of how to serve those others).

This is a good show to pair with Switched At Birth, another program about people coming together to form an abnormal family. 

The pilot was nice and entertaining, if predictable. It did a good job of introducing all the characters and the family dynamic. We liked most of the characters so far. 

It’s hard to judge how good the show will be going forward, but we’re interested in seeing what’s next. We hope things don’t get too perfect or too sappy, but we also hope that the characters avoid getting unlikeable like on Life, Unexpected.

Mariana’s dilemma and poor choices are particularly intriguing, and we love what a nice guy Brandon is. We love that Stef is a police officer. The people on the show are down-to-Earth and not preachy, which is a great thing.

There’s also some humor, which could be amped up a little in less dramatic episodes. The pacing was good. We’re into this so far. Good music too.

Episode grade: B+

Teen Wolf Season 3, episode 1

Tattoo- This episode didn't hold our attention the entire time. Also, the opening scene went on for too long. 

It's common for a show to open right in the middle of action, but it's not as interesting as shows seem to think it is. The best opening has tension, but a dialogue-filled tension. 

A perfect example would be the opening of Inglorious Basterds.

We're sad to see Jackson has left, because we liked his character and thought he was hot. We're also wondering where Peter is too. 

We liked the new female character that the new alpha, Deucalion, might have killed. We hope he didn't.

Also, we're going to have so much fun spelling his name all season. (Sarcasm) Deucalion wants to get Derek to kill his whole pack. 

The best thing about the episode was the animal suicides. Very creepy and creative. We loved the bird scene.

We also like the new teacher and the way she started class. We're glad that Scott is focusing on school more, but who studies for the PSATs? Those matter even less than the real SATs. 

It looks like it's going to be a good season. Love Allison's new haircut; hate Scott's tattoo. We agree with Stiles. Get a tattoo that means something to you or is funny, not just a tattoo for the sake of getting a tattoo. 

As long as we have interaction between Stiles and his cop father in every episode, we'll continue to be happy with this show.

That won't stop us from laughing at the super-buff, manly looking freshman this show is trying to pass off as being 14.

Episode grade: B

Game of Thrones season 3, episode 9

The Rains of Castamere- It's been 12 hours, so now we're ready to write about the Red Wedding. Even reading the books couldn't have fully prepared us for the visceral shock and tragedy of that scene. 

Pretty Little Liars show summary: Updated to include all of season 3.

And now, before season four starts, a synopsis of the last three seasons. 

First, a few characters:

Alison DiLaurentis- The dead girl who started it all. Alison DiLaurentis is the Liars' friend who was murdered. She was a fabulous, evil bitch. She often shows up in flashbacks (thank God)

Liar #1:Aria Montgomery- Aria is the Liar wearing too many accessories and crazy outfits at all time. She's mature, outgoing, and artistic (kind of). Her parents are the awesome Ella Montgomery and the lame Byron Montgomery, and she has a younger brother named Mike Montgomery, who is rarely seen. We suspect Aria of being "A."

Arrested Development Season 4, Episode 7 recap/review in chronological order

Colony Collapse- Gob

Finally finally finally the Gob episode. We knew his episode would be the funniest, but what we didn't know is that all the episodes after this one would be good too. We are through the long night of the "meh" and ready for actual Arrested Development to start.

At the end of the season three finale, Gob is dating Ann, George Michael's ex girlfriend. Ann is less than an hour away from turning 18. 

Arrested Development season 4, episode 6 recap/review

Double Crossers- George Sr. Noooooooooo.

As we go through the last lame episode of this season, we shake our heads wondering how the writers, directors, and producers didn't know how hard the beginning would be for people to get through. The cast split up; the jokes still being set up, two George Sr. episodes and two Michael ones! Zzzzz.

But we're almost through the fog and into the episodes that feel like this show, albeit a really dark version of this show. We actually like the darkness. Hello darkness, my old friend. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

Best almost news of the week

Dan Harmon is in talks to come back to Community.

That would be amazing. We would both start watching it again (only one of us is watching it now). The show was so much better when he ran it, jerk or not.

The Fall- Season 1

A BBC show, The Fall, has come to America on Netflix. There is one season and it consists of five episodes. It stars Gillian Anderson, Archie Panjabi, and Jamie Dornan. This show was renewed for a second season on May 27, 2013. It will start production at the beginning of next year. As fans of a few BBC shows, we're used to long waits.

The Fall is about Detective Stella Gibson, a woman who specializes in the psychology of killers. She is brought in to hunt a man named Paul Spector who is pretending to be a loving family man while killing women in Belfast. 

First, the bad news:

• The ending of the season is so unsatisfying! The last episode is very good, but we can't believe we have to wait probably more than a year to see it. That's an awfully long wait for a story like this. 
• The show has kind of a slow start. Two hour-long episodes in, we almost quit watching and didn't love it.
• The pacing can be off. We think the amount of actual plot they had could have been stuffed into three or four episodes, or even a movie with a frustrating "to be continued" at the end.
• There's a B-plot featuring corruption that we didn't give two hoots about.

The good news:

• It's well-written and beautifully shot most of the time.
• Gillian Anderson. Not only is she great in this, but she's absolutely stunning.
• Sheriff Graham from Once Upon a Time is getting work. Sure, it's as a serial killer, so we can't swoon over his hotness properly, but we'll take what we can get. 
• The feminism. Holy crap is it good on this show. Stella calls out misogynists when it's appropriate and bites her tongue when she knows it won't be properly received. She's pretty bad ass too.
• It's set in Ireland, so everyone has an adorable accent. There are little kids in it too, and they have adorable accents. It's like double the adorable.
• There's a scene in the finale that's (sort of) between Stella and the killer, and it's electric. You won't be able to take your eyes off of it.

Our recommendation is that you catch up on other shows for now, but get into this right before the start of the second season. You don't want to be stuck waiting like we are. It's not worth jumping into just five episodes only to have to wait for freaking ever for the story to be picked up. But check it out when season two is up.

Show grade: B

Arrested Development Season 4, episode 5 recap/review in chronological order

A New Start- Tobias's first episode. 

Ah! Just what the show needed right? A Tobias episode? Well, it's definitely an improvement over focusing on Michael, Lindsay, and George Sr., but it didn't meet our high expectations for a Tobias episode. 

At the end of the season three finale, Lindsay is breaking up with Tobias and tells him that he is gay. Tobias is surprised to hear that people think this, and Lindsay assures him that this is a running joke in the family because of the misleading way in which Tobias speaks. The constant gay Freudian slips.

We love that this show doesn't make fun of Tobias for being gay, but rather for being in denial that he's gay.

Hannibal has been renewed for a second season

Yay! That's deserved. We have to get caught up.

Arrested Development Season 4, Episode 4 recap/review

The B. Team- Focal character: Michael Bluth

At this point in the season, this episode needed to be a slam-dunk. Enough was enough. We'd had two "meh" episodes in a row, preceded by a "pretty good" one. Sadly, this one was "meh" and really dragged the show down, making some lose hope for this comeback.

If they had put the Gob episode here instead of a Michael one, it would have saved the first half of the season. We didn't like what this episode did with the movie industry and Ron Howard plot lines. We thought those plot lines were going to keep being boring and drag down the entire season. Thank God they turned out better than they started off.

Arrested Development Season 4, episode 3 recap/review in chronological order

Indian Takers- Focal character: Lindsay Bluth-Funke.

Unfortunately, we have to talk about Portia De Rossi's looks in this episode, mostly because the internet was abuzz with comments such as "she looks so different!" and "she hasn't aged well." First of all, you guys are blind and she is beautiful. 

Second of all, she DOES look different, but it's mostly because she's wearing a wig in this first episode. When she chops her hair in the show and wears her real hair, she looks more like herself again. Third, she has lost a ton of weight, which doesn't look good on middle-aged women, because it makes their faces thinner and more haggard. 

We hope the dramatic weight loss isn't due to returning unhealthy habits related to her eating disorder. There's a debate over whether Portia had a nose job. We hope she didn't and that it's just clever makeup capitalizing on an old joke. 

Arrested Development season 4, episode 2 recap/review in chronological order

Borderline Personalities- This episode focuses on George Sr. Meh.

We get to see a young Barry Zuckerkorn practicing law with his father, who is ashamed that Barry is even speaking. Young versions of George Sr. and Lucille hear Barry suggest that if something goes wrong, they could always take a getaway boat out of trouble. Hilariously, Barry didn't go to law school in this country. Nor, we find out later, did he actually pass the bar exam. He paid a lookalike to take it for him. Finally, the plot hole of how that man ever became a lawyer is filled.

Arrested Development Season 4, Episode 1 recap/review in chronological order

Flight of the Phoenix- Season four focuses on mainly one character per episodes. While a few other main characters are in this episode, it mostly focuses on Michael. 

It's 1984, where a young Lucille and George Sr. are played by a pitch perfect Kristen Wiig and a passable Seth Rogan. In a brief Grinch parody, Lucille decides to hold a holiday the day before Cinco De Mayo so that holiday supplies would be depleted and her Hispanic help would be around to clean her house. This plan backfired over the course of more than 30 years, because the Hispanic community profited financially off of it and even had a boat parade. Also, Lucille, cinco de cuatro would be April 5, haha. Nice little joke there.

Arrested Development Season Four is Great, It Just Takes Six Episodes to Get There

We’ve been watching Arrested Development season four all day. We started at around 1:30, took a dinner break at 5:30, and then powered through until the end. We aren’t the first to finish it, by far. There are people who started at midnight and went until dawn. Now thats hardcore. 

Watching Arrested Development

We're on episode 10 out of 15 right now, and we just wanted to let you know, we've made a huge mistake. Don't binge it. Watch one a day. We can tell it would be much better with a little time to process/more breaks.

Teen Wolf Summary / Synopsis / Recap of Season 1 and Season 2

Can't watch or re-watch 24 episodes before June 3rd? No problem. You can review and catch-up here. This might be hella long, but it's shorter than watching two seasons of Teen Wolf. You should probably at least watch the pilot, just so you know what some of these people look like.

Teen Wolf- Season 1-2 Review

Should you watch this show? If you like the teen fantasy genre, definitely. If you can make it through a slower first 12 episodes, yep. 

As for us, we caught up on this show just in time for season three, and man are we glad we did. The first season was merely watchable. It was a little predictable, and we didn’t love many of the characters, but it wasn’t a chore to watch. It was cute. There were a lot of filler episodes in the first season too.

The storyline didn’t start speeding along until the second year. The second season was great and a definite improvement on season one. There was more tension, we started to like more of the characters, and it went to more creative places. It went from “cute” to “reeeal fun.”

One thing we didn’t like about this show was the principal romance. We kind of wanted Allison with Jackson or Stiles or anyone else. Well, not Matt. The problem was that they got together too quickly. As a result, their relationship was based completely on sexual desire rather than anything we could emotionally get attached to. The primary romance on this show fails to get viewers swooning like it really could have.

Adding some buildup or a reason other than “we’re hot” for them to like each other would have been good. Sure, they have a solid history and a ton of trust in each other by the time the second season rolls around. That means this won’t be as much of a problem in the future. History brings people closer together. Still, the show missed an opportunity to really tap into the romance potential. The first season spent a lot of time on a vanilla romance that wasn’t all that romantic. 

Another thing we didn’t like was that Allison was a gymnast and this might factor into her growing into a more violent character. We like that the show seems to have dropped that and made her primarily more of an archer. Gymnastics does not equate to combat. Just looking cool and a natural athleticism. One of our sisters is a black belt gymnast and she would never flip in an actual fight. That’s how you die. 

As for the things we liked? Lydia turning out to be a genius who can make a molotov cocktail. Her character had a lot more depth than we’d expected, although her shallow persona is hilarious.

Speaking of hilarious: the lacrosse team coach. He’s an enjoyable side character. We also like Crystal Reed’s acting, especially when she’s reacting to personal tragedy. She’s so pretty too. Can you believe she’s 28 in real life? The girl playing Lydia is 26. Yeah guys, no one looks like that in high school. Most people’s looks improve after those years. 

Hands down, the best character on this series is Stiles. He’s like the Seth Cohen of Teen Wolf. Heck, if you close your eyes, he even sounds like Seth Cohen. Stiles is the comic relief, but he also brings a lot of heart to Teen Wolf. Our favorite relationship is the one between him and his father, especially in season two. 

A good thing about this show is that it knows to plan its stories in season-long arcs. That way, it never drags, it focuses on a short story, and it has a climax and resolution and the end of each season. If it’s ever cancelled, we won’t be left frustrated. After the powerhouse second season, we’re more than ready to watch the third.

Season 1 grade: B-

Season 2 grade: A-

Agenda

Only three episodes away from being done with Teen Wolf. Can’t wait for Arrested Development this Sunday! One of us is having a bunch of people over for an all-day marathon. It’s gonna be the tits.

Catching up on Teen Wolf

We ship Allison/Jackson.