Monsters of Television

“Police and parents. Of course that’s your plan, Humphrey”

This week’s episode felt like an old mystery novel. Two reluctant enemies team up to solve a crime. An old foe reappears and aids in the search. Unlikely alliances are made and old ones crumble. Questions are answered, reveals are divulged, and the criminal isn’t who you think it was all along. When every conceivable cat was brought forth from the big bag of shit that is the Humphrey/van der Woodsen’s lives, it was Lily who was the enemy. And she would have gotten away with it too if it weren’t for those meddling kids. And that dog, Serena, too.

While I still despise her, I did find myself feeling bad for Serena.  So many of her mistakes are her own, but this one (and a huge one at that) was entirely on Lily. And it’s not just Serena who got screwed over. Poor Chuck is now scrambling to save Bass Industries from being sold. Hos desperation is at maximum levels as he’s turning to Jack for aid. Season 4 is the season of unlikely alliances indeed.

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“The Sacrifice”

Still pretty, but getting way scarier.

Lots of people were doing dumb things to save people they love on this week’s The Vampire Diaries.  Even Damon, who was trying to preach wisdom to Elena about her kamikaze mission, did his own dumb thing.  But when Damon does anything, somehow it seems less dumb, only sexy.  And there was much Damon sexiness to be had.  Perhaps they are trying to make amends for that wretched incident with Rose last week (yep, still hate this character). Maybe they just can’t let go of the tension between Elena and Damon.  Or maybe they know that Damon is why this show sizzles.  Case in point—the first half of this episode was rather lame—and I can only explain it by noting a decided dearth of Damon dash (the alliteration took over—apologies).

Reviewing each episode of a series is a problematic business because it can force a person to make too-firm pronouncements: i.e. episode A was excellent, episode B was crap, and episode C was passable.  When we start debating whether an individual episode was weak, I worry we lose the forest for the trees—after all, I wouldn’t be writing about this show if I didn’t enjoy it with some consistency.  Also, I haven’t yet seen a crap episode of The Vampire Diaries, so when I complain about weaknesses, I’m quibbling.  That said, this episode may be worth exploring a bit deeper to see where the show tends to be weakest in order to highlight why it succeeds as often as it does.

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Well, well, well. It’s an All-Monster Podcast. It’s like Rampage but better because we have four monsters tearing up your town instead of just three. These week, Karen, Matt, Nick and Noel discuss a range of topics across the television landscape including The Walking Dead, the Mad Men finale (yeah, we know it’s old news — but it’s our show), how cable has disappointed us by having the nerve to cancel shows (Rubicon, Caprica), the USA brand (popcorn/beach-reading), how Life Unexpected is gross probably because they need to keep up with the rest of the CW, and Conan’s pedestrian return, among other things. It’s an interesting hour of witness. Listen to the podcast at the bottom of this post or subscribe to the podcast feed.

Running time: 75 minutes

Topics: Place in the Podcast

• The Walking Dead: 0:00:58
• Rubicon: 0:10:23
• Mad Men: 0:16:21
• Cable as a Haven: 0:21:42
• The USA Brand: 0:25:53
• House: 0:29:52
• TV Actors: 0:35:59
• Chuck: 0:37:41
• Nikita (and other spy dramas): 0:44:51
• The CW/Life Unexpected: 0:51:41
• Parenthood defense: 1:04:25
• Conan: 1:06:21

Brief note from Nick: I know that Chuck didn’t air this week because of the Lauer/Bush thing. I meant last week.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

She's undead, naked with Damon, and still a crappy character. No fixin' that.

I feel like the writers for The Vampire Diaries have been reading my mind—so many small complaints that I have had in the past weeks were resolved or at least addressed in this week’s episode. Thanks, TVD!

This was another episode where we have more talking than action, but at least we got some good dish and a number of answers. Even better, Elena took matters into her own hands, so this week it was Stefan having to react instead of lead. I appreciate a feisty Elena, and Katherine seems to bring out the best in her. Let’s have these two gals go on a road trip next!

Still not in love with Rose, somewhat ambivalent about the direction Damon seems to be heading, and absolutely uninterested in Elijah (except for that cool trick with the coins!). But putting the spotlight on Elena was fitting, and the series has now erected some impressive obstacles for our newly empowered heroine to overcome. Obstacles = drama, and that’s a good thing.

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The real stars of the CW's Hellcats

We did a series of reviews of new series at the beginning of the season, so I thought I’d check in on one of those series that has managed to hold my attention up to this point.  My attention, though held, could easily get distracted.  Here’s my intervention for the CW’s Hellcats.

If you had asked me at the beginning of the year whether I thought I’d be more likely to be watching Hellcats or Life Unexpected, I’d have said the latter. Turns out, I would have been completely wrong. While back eps of the latter continue to languish on my DVR (amidst news that it is likely to be canceled soon), each week I find myself enjoying Hellcats more and more (primary difference between the two shows?  Hellcats actually features some likeable, 3-dimensional characters, unlike Life Unexpected). Here are a few reasons why I like this show—along with a few frustrations.

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Come on--he's too pretty to be scary.

The Vampire Diaries took a bit of a break this week from its record-setting pacing. Instead, it allowed the characters to reflect on the many changes that have occurred in the past few weeks. At school, Tyler and Awesome Vampire Caroline are forced to stare at reminders that two girls died last week. Jeremy learns that there are limits to what Bonnie can do—and his subtle flirtation with her continues to develop intensity. Elena gets world’s chattiest vampire kidnappers to tell their their entire life history—a rather unrealistic series of conversations that provided the exposition needed to introduce new bad guys now that Katherine is out of the picture (for a brief moment).  Basically, a bunch of taking stock, reflecting, and conversing.  Little action.  Not necessarily a critique–more of an observation.

Meanwhile, in the episodes best subplot, Damon and Stefan take a little road trip to rescue Elena. I would have been perfectly content if this entire episode had focused on Damon and Stefan in that car. Amidst jokes about the requisite bonding that accompanies all road trips, our boys delve into the dangerous territory of Damon’s feelings for Elena and their own history of betrayal.

I’ve got some concerns about the direction the series seems to be taking, and I’ll discuss them below, but I loved the heck out of Stefan and Damon this week. Neither man has aged in 150 years, but they mature nevertheless. Their mutual recognition of their bond allowed them to move past so much nonsense—good acting and strong writing that deserve to be commended.

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The real love story at the heart of TVD

Pop quiz: If The Vampire Diaries mated with Rubicon, what would they produce? World’s fastest paced show with world’s slowest paced? Would create pretty much every other show on TV. Man does this show know how to advance a plot. And taking a page from Rubicon, it seems to be developing its characters more, too. Bonus!

This week’s episode featured collateral damage—dead people, bleeding wounds, and heartbreak—all over the place. It also featured some pretty nice character development for the show’s least interesting characters. Perhaps my theory that TVD needs to kill all its bad characters to improve them missed another option—distract the bad characters (and us) from their annoyingness by making them sexy. Still pretty sure there’s no hope for Matt. But you never know with this show.

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Hard to find a male mentor around here, huh?

Quick Take: Whoa!  The Vampire Diaries has yet again proven it has some guts.  “Plan B” featured reversals of fortune, shocking twists, and a good deal of heartbreak.

In his review of TVD for The A.V. Club at the beginning of the season, Todd VanDerWerff compared TVD to Smallville, stating both are the kind of program he could watch at the beginning and end of the season only, yet still manage to keep up. I have never watched Smallville, so I can’t speak to that issue, but for TVD, I have to disagree. Sure, the “previously on” features may provide a cliff’s notes guide to the main plot points, but experiencing them in this form would remove all their shock, their impact, and their resonance. I know what some of you may be thinking…resonance?  Don’t worry–I know TVD ain’t all that deep, but it does excel at surprises—as this episode demonstrates.  TVD may not be world’s deepest show, but it is seriously competing for world’s most entertaining.

Characters were getting taken down all over the place here. Katherine is proving herself most dangerous in how she gets others to do her will—guess that shouldn’t be surprising considering her history with manipulating the Salvatore brothers. But seriously, I think she was in two scenes during this episode, yet she still managed to inflict quite a bit of damage through direct or indirect interference. By the end of the episode, Elena was crying, Stefan was crying, Jeremy was looking all determined, Caroline was crying, Mason was…well, if you want to know what all the fuss is about, come on in.

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Love the scarf, Damon.

So I was out of town last week, which means this week is a SUPER SPECIAL TWO-FER!!!! That’s right, two eps of The Vampire Diaries [TVD], two reviews. Super exciting, I know.

This episode was sort of okay.  Needed more vampire Caroline (instead of “trying to be a good friend but secretly working for Katherine” Caroline).  Needed more Damon (amazing how the dude brightens a scene, despite being so dark).  Needed way less of the flashbacks of mooning teenagers in Civil War garb. But there were some good moments, to be discussed after the jump…

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Awesome Vampire Caroline

SPOILERS EVERYWHERE!  AVERT YOUR EYES!  DON’T EVEN LOOK AT THE PHOTO!

Last week I wrote that Caroline the vampire was pretty much the best thing ever. This week, however, as we are descending deeper into the rules about vampire transitioning, I am beginning to ask questions. This is a bad thing when dealing with a genre program. Suspension of disbelief works just fine until the program itself starts messing with the rules. Then, trouble starts.

Not that this episode did not offer a series of delights.  Damon, as always, was charming.  Learning that the Lockwood family might be werewolves, Damon called Mason and Tyler “Lon Chaney Sr. and Jr.” and himself “Bela Lugosi,” noting that based on his movie knowledge, “Lugosi, which is me, is totally screwed.”

My nagging questions follow after the jump.

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