Tuesday, September 27, 2011

I seen her just the other day. Jockin' Mike D. to my dismay.

Quick Hitters and Random Thoughts

--Breaking Bad is on a roll that very few shows have ever or could ever possibly match. We knew it was going to hit the fan when Walt eventually found out about Skyler giving money to Thom Brennaman-look alike Ted Beneke. This revelation finally happens after Gus tells Walt that he’s no longer needed, GTFO and oh and I’m killing your brother-in-law. Walt is a broken, panicked man when Skyler tells him about the money so all he can do is laugh hysterically. Fantastic scene and as usual it was shot beautifully as we see his hysteria and sadness through the opening in the crawl space as the camera moves higher and higher. Though nothing cooler than the shot of Gus and crew telling Walt what’s up in the desert as the sun goes behind a cloud only to reappear shortly thereafter. Awesome. Everyone is in danger and I don’t know what’s going to happen next. But I do think they’ve built up Gus to be such a BMF that I can see him getting killed off at some point over the final two episodes this season especially if he doesn’t have his direwolf Mike by his side. Never, ever go anywhere without your direwolf.
Most underrated sympathetic character on the show? Walt’s car. That Aztec has been through some sh**.
Videogum with some Breaking Bad audition tapes. I'd like to see Gustavo's.


--“I used to kiss his little winky.” Uhhh, welcome back Boardwalk Empire? Holy crap does Nucky have his work cut out for him with threats on all sides. The Commodore is bent on taking back what he thinks is rightfully his, but at least Jimmy seems somewhat conflicted about plotting against the man who raised him. Should be interesting to see if Jimmy stays on Team Commodore. As for Eli who the hell knows. I loved Nucky’s speech that started at a black church and ended at a Klan funeral. Very Nucky of him.
I knew Chalky was supposed to get more play this season, but I was hoping it wouldn’t come courtesy of a Gatling gun in the opening scene. Wow. I think this was the first episode where I was looking at Chalky, but wasn’t thinking about Omar.
Richard Harrow owns every second he’s on the screen. His envy of Jimmy’s home life and later cutting out the pictures of family scenes was about as sad as you can get.
Probably the biggest laugh I had all weekend was the bouncy bed swerve with Van Alden. Good stuff from a guy who orders glasses of cold buttermilk with dinner.
I missed watching this little slice of crazy from the Boardwalk in the early 1920’s even if we didn’t get any Arnold Rothstein or Lucky Luciano this week.

--The end of an era passed last Friday as All My Children signed off on ABC after more than 40 years on the air. I was raised on it and Ryan’s Hope which is to say I was raised to believe hospitals are the place to be, jet skis are dangerous, kids can age dramatically overnight, pregnancies happen EVERY time you have sex, everyone is rich, there are no fat people, everyone has a crazy twin and a stalker and often they’re the same person and death is only temporary. Thanks mom for laying out the facts of life for me in such an entertaining way. I could write and write about Greg and Jenny, Tad and Dixie, Jesse and Angie, the Chandlers, Palmer, the Martins, Hayward, Greenlee, the Kane women, etc. But I won’t. Not after watching a finale that made me want to throw up a middle finger to all who were responsible for the last 15 minutes of this legendary soap. 40 years and you give us an ambiguous ending with a gunshot and cut to black?!?! What kind of thank you is that to your viewers?! Are you stupid enough to believe more than 10% of your television audience is going to continue to watch this series online?! Ain’t f’n happening and especially now. There were a million ways to end this gracefully without a villainous act from the worst actor on the show. Give us a 15-minute montage at the end, a speech from Erica, a Tad and Dixie quickie wedding, show Babe-Cara-Greenlee as the new Charlie’s Angels, make it all Stewart’s dream. Anything, just don’t give us a soapy interpretation of the Sopranos final scene. Pathetic All My Children. Utterly and completely pathetic. Ray Gardner thinks you should be ashamed of yourself. Now if you’ll excuse me I have to go decipher this awesome timeline of all the relationships Pine Valley ever saw to make me forget that crap.

--I wasn’t expecting much from Terra Nova so maybe that’s why I liked it. That or I’m just a sucker for anything having to do with dinosaurs. Yeah, probably the latter since I’m rooting for them so far.

--A nice “Where Are They Now?” for The Wire crew. I was already looking forward to Suburgatory for Cheryl Hines reasons, but Randy is in it too!!!


--Did not think that come Week 4 I’d be more worried about the Raiders than the Steelers. As for the Saints, I’m not going to freak out.

--It’s not just that the Bills are 3-0 it’s that they overcame 18-point deficits in those last two wins. No one would’ve bet on Buffalo down 21-0 to New England with two minutes to go before the half.

--On the flip side the Vikings are 0-3 with all three losses coming in games in which they had double-digit halftime leads. Ouch.

--I should have known better than to get my hopes up for Weeds, but they seemed to be going in a different direction. Nope. Same old crap. Silas goes back under his mother’s thumb. Mother gets everything she wants. Shane, well why bother. Andy might as well have taken the season off. There were spots that gave me hope for this show for the first time in years, but the finale was a complete disconnect from the season up to that point.

Who cares?

--Brazil is scary enough on land without having to be scared of what’s in the water. About 100 people at the beach the other day were bitten by piranhas. Apparently they have a “piranha overpopulation situation.” Any population of piranhas is an overpopulation as far as I’m concerned. Officials have released brave, expendable tilapia to try and sate the piranhas blood thirst. Godspeed tilapia. Godspeed.

--Jay Cutler and Kristin Cavallari are trying to work things out. Whew.

--Sticking with love stories it’s nice to see couples do a little bit of extra work in order to give themselves their dream wedding. Like Joseph and April in Pennsylvania. Four days before the wedding they were hard at work taking copper from 18 utility poles. Yeah, they were busted.

--How many times do I have to explain that KKK members DON'T have sprinkles on their hoods, but ice cream cones do?


--Maura Tierney to The Office. I like.

--Remember when Chris Johnson was, you know, good? I’m sure it’s just a matter of time or maybe just the first time he plays the Texans, but 98 yards on 46 attempts is mind boggling.

--“Franchise potential”? Look, I loved the Dead Island video game trailer just as much as the next zombie mark, but building a movie around it and calling it franchise potential seems a little much.

Questions, comments or if you’re counting the minutes...

6 comments:

  1. Do you think we'll get more information about Gus' past before the season is over? Hank keeps referring to the laundry and warehouse as being owned by a German multinational corporation. Gus is from Chile. I'm thinking Gus' mysterious family has some sort of Nazi war criminal ties.

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  2. I think we probably will get some more of Gus's past. Hank repeating the German corporation stuff to Hank was curious or maybe more so them choosing to show us that information again was curious. Nazi war crimes would be an interesting development. I can't wait for the final 2 this season and yet I don't want it to be over.

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  3. I feel confident that had Hank been on the case the Rosie Larson murder would have been solved by episode 2.

    The second to last Weeds was so good and then that turd of a season finale. You know the sister is going to get killed so Nancy can ruin Stevie's life too.

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  4. Hank would be the only guest star to get me to watch Killing again.

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  5. I just watched SVU to see how they got rid of Chris Meloni. That ending beat AMC by a long shot. And that was one damn character. I even erased The Bianca episode.

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  6. Erasing the Bianca episode is serious business.

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