Grid Effect

So finally, we’re going to knock these nightly previews out of the way since we’re knee deep into summer lineups and there’s a shortage of “events”. Of course, it’s reported that there’s going to be wall-to-wall coverage of Michael Jackson tomorrow, so we’ll see how that interferes. We might push Tuesday’s preview back to next week. In the meantime, let’s see what’s being offered on Mondays.

Oh, and in case you didn’t notice, Hung took the week off for the fourth. Makes you wonder why they premiered it at the end of June, but whatever. HBO doesn’t need to worry about issues like this when they’re programming is so good.

Onto the steaming pile of dog shit that is Monday night programming.

NBC

8PM: Law & Order

NBC would you please make a concerted effort to put something original on your airwaves in the off-season. Just throw together some poorly contrived reality series, just make it an amalgamation of three other poorly contrived reality series, and hope it turns into a “hit”. Even I’d advocate that over trotting out the same prime time lineup over and over again. We already have one CBS.

9PM: Law & Order: Criminal Intent

Does this feature the pre-cogs from Minority Report? Because that’s the only way you’re going to convince me I should watch a replay of the same show back-to-back.

10PM: Dateline NBC

Does anyone know why they put the “NBC” at the end of this title? Doesn’t it seem a bit redundant? It’s on NBC, it’s obvious who’s responsible for its existence, no need to rub it in our faces. Though I can understand wanting to celebrate being the foremost leader among the broadcast networks in busting potential sex offenders. It’s good to lead the networks in something, I guess.

ABC

You'd be wise to turn down the rose.

8PM: The Bachelorette

You see NBC? This is how it’s fucking done. Appeal to our cheapest sensibilities at a fraction of the cost it takes to appeal to our sophisticated sensibilities, and watch the commoners flood your network with viewership and increase your advertising revenue. Really, it’s quite fucking simple. Now if you can get Bill O’Reilly to stop talking about you like you’re the devil incarnate and getting drawing everyone’s ire, you’d be all set. This is two hours long, by the way. Anticipate prolonged dramatic pauses before those roses are dolled out.

10PM: Here Comes The Newlyweds

People interact with other people and feign romantic interest to be on television. Call me crazy, but I think this is going to reinvent the genre.

FOX

8PM: House

What would a night of television be without a doctor scoffing at every medical procedure and ethic code known to man? Hugh Laurie does seem like a talented actor, is he going to drop this bullshit sometime soon to pursue an ill-fated movie career?

9PM: Lie To Me

Looks like FOX is pulling an NBC. I suppose the difference would be that FOX can afford to not attract any new viewers.

CBS

8PM: How I Met Your Mother

If you actually give a shit about something as frivolous as Emmy hosts, here’s your chance to meet this years. You better take advantage, CBS is only going replay this show once a week, and since there’s no device or software you can purchase to increase your availability to your favorite television shows, I suggest you tune in.

8:30PM: Rules of Engagement

Also dubbed, “David Spade has managed to stay on a long term series that isn’t a variety show”.

9PM: Two and A Half Men

I like how this show didn’t even try with the title, the intro, the writing or the casting, and they’ve managed to be the number one sitcom on television ever since Friends went off the air. I think this is a good message to send to all the kids out there: To be immensely successful and stay gainfully employed, never strive to exceed anyone’s expectations and it will alllll work out.

9:30PM: Big Bang Theory

This series has managed to gain some critical notoriety and even a couple of friends had the balls to recommend it to men, so maybe I should bother giving it a second try from my review of the pilot.

10PM: CSI: Miami

Follow up your comedy block with a cheap excuse to load an hour with half-naked women. I was watching Dexter last night out of a lack of options, in the episode a woman turns up dead (imagine that) and while over-viewing the crime scene, one of the investigators said she “was a valedictorian, on her way to Harvard Business School”… and of course she was a hot blond. The series is also set in Miami, and felt like it was stolen verbatim from this version of CSI, where even the corpses have to be attractive women so we feel bad about the death. Maybe the Dexter creators were just striving for some gritty realism that they’re always praised for, we all know hot blonds regularly wind up as valedictorians. It’s just like real life, man. Coincidentally, hot blonds also tend to occupy all non-speaking roles in television that relies on cheap thrills. Life’s funny like that sometimes.

Probably it for today, we might try to post our Rescue Me recap a day early but don’t hold us to it. Also, when we finish the third season we might do a post summarizing everything we don’t like about Dexter.

Ahh, Monday nights. The first day back from the weekend and thus the most anticipated television night of the week. What do the broadcast networks offer in the way of entertainment? I think you’ll be pleasantly uninspired. In the infamous words of Michael Scott, “you’re gonna hate it”.

NBC

8PM: Chuck
We reviewed this series back when we were still taking this blog too seriously. It brought some fine qualities to the table but ultimately wasn’t for us. In other words, they go out of their way to load this series with eye candy, but the story format and same cliche jokes about Beta male guys aren’t really anything we haven’t seen before. Still, it’s going to be a shame when yet another scripted series gets cut for budgetary concerns in favor of Arsenio Hall’s return to television.

9PM: Heroes
In this series’ run we’ve watched half of one episode and couldn’t stand it. It was getting rave reviews until the season one finale, now it has the critical and commercial popularity of a FOX reality series in July. I’m not sure what the fall from grace consists of, but either way we feel vindicated. We call this series the anti-Wire, for its large ensemble cast and the fact that it’s blatantly obvious who the “good” and “bad” guys are.

10PM: Medium
In case you haven’t noticed, Monday night is when NBC trots out all their series without an actual weekday in the title that they feel should have a large audience. Medium is a little past its prime in that regard, but I’m fairly certain the woman in this has won an Emmy and still has a paltry audience compared to its younger days. Basically, Medium is NBC’s new ER.

ABC

8PM: The Bachelor
Two hours worth of faux-relationship drama for the benefit of the lovelorn, contemptuous and bitter masses. It’s a dream come true for those that like to see others humiliated on a national stage. Not that I feel bad for anyone invloved. If you’re going to go on national television, proclaim your love for someone you’ve spoken to intermittently over the course of…a month(?) in some vapid quest for fame and fortune, we might pity your aspirations but having any sympathy for anyone in the moment is highly unlikely.

10PM: True Beauty
The natural follow-up to a show like The Bachelor, in which the contestants are judged based on some self-righteous notion of someone’s morality. Naturally, these peoples since of inner-beauty doesn’t permit them from whoring themselves on reality television either, which means they’re probably just older than the people they are judging so harshly. Oh, and by the way, take an hour out of The Bachelor episode that precedes this and replace it with a talk show of some sort, and set aside extremely popular scripted series’, and this will be what prime time lineups will look like in a scant four or five years.

FOX

8PM: House
The good doctor will undoubtedly remove a chainsaw from someone’s head, then use said chainsaw to remove a baby elephant from the lower intestine of an African ivory dealer. Everyone will learn a valuable lesson which House will mock with a dismissive one-liner. That’s what I heard is going to happen, anyways.

9PM: 24
In the episode description it says, “Jack and Renee race against time”. Uhhh, isn’t this the premise of every season/episode of 24? Just replace the name Renee with whoever else is the female lead for any given season, and you have every episode of 24 ever made. Honestly, how in the hell would a show about a man saving the world over the stretch of one day not be considered a “race against time”?

CBS

8PM: The Big Bang Theory
This show has sort of amassed a healthy commercial following, and has even drawn the admiration of a number of critics. We reviewed this series at about the same time we reviewed Chuck and it wasn’t exactly groundbreaking. We’d like to see how they improved it over the weeks, but we won’t. Mainly because it’s on CBS. Unfair and shortsighted? You bet. Honest and forthcoming? Unquestionably.

8:30PM: How I Met Your Mother
The one traditional sitcom (meaning it has a laugh track) that still sees a fair amount of critical praise. I have a number of friends that watch this show, so I can’t completely dismiss it, but it seems like its popularity is founded on the notion that Doogie Howser is in it, and everyone is just flummoxed that he’s still popular.

9PM: Two and A Half Men
What can we say that hasn’t already been said? Luckily for the producers of this show, Charlie Sheen is seen as box office poison as a result of bad PR for the past decade or so, but he’s already a proven and valued commodity on the set of the highest rated comedy on television, and he’s non-expendable. What I’m trying to say is, this series is going to be on until Charlie Sheen either wants to retire or feels he’s lined his pockets with enough coin that he doesn’t have to show up to work everyday.

9:30PM: Worst Week
I have no idea what this is. Actually, I think I made a joke about its title, seeing as how there is know way in hell a comedy’s entire series run is set inside a single week. It’s the sitcom equivalent to Prison Break.

10PM: CSI: Miami
What’s the best way to follow four sitcoms with redundant comedy you probably could have watched twenty years ago? A drama with unintentionally great comedy starring David Caruso spewing definitive one-liners at crime scenes, which are just about always the set of a movie, a photo shoot or anywhere else they can find an excuse to load the cast with attractive women.

Unless you read or leave the house on weekday nights or have cable or something crazy like that, these are your options. Have a great time with them.

Flight of The Conchords review later today.

Man, it’s shit like this that makes one thankful for football season. For the next couple weeks here, I’m going to try and subside my distaste for broadcast network television and review some pilots this fall. Today we’re looking at The Big Bang Theory and Chuck, we’ll try to get to Journeyman later. I am not too happy about any of this, but they should be easy to criticize, and the writing practically takes care of itself. Sorry for remembering so few names, but other than for the sake of this post, the motives were lacking.

First up, The Big Bang Theory, it centers on two guys walking around or sitting around their apartment discussing the scientifically trivial or their new neighbor, whom they’re all tongue-tied around because she’s an attractive blond. You know its going to be somewhat (or extremely) formulaic when they clarify that despite living together, they are, indeed, heterosexual. Homophobia, you crazy mensch, is there any mediocrity that you do not attempt to remedy?

Outside of two of the geeks friends that visit periodically, and an appearance from attractive neighbor’s ex-boyfriend (who steals the two geeks pants when they attempt to retrieve her television), this is your show. In short, I was tired of the gimmick before they rolled the credits.

Every actor in the pilot is familiar, but I can’t put any names to faces. All the jokes revolve around stereotypical geek or ditzy blond behavior. Hence why she is more oblivious of their awkwardness than seems humanly possible. The petty technical math debates are tedious and boring. The one, Kenny (I think) is entirely too socially inept and unwilling to adjust that it makes him hard to sympathize with, not to mention he’s walking around in his pajamas. The guy is giving a decent performance, but its so one note and relentless that at the eleven minute mark we’ve already decided to not watch this beyond the pilot.

The girl is too dense for words, the personality difference between her and the other two is too vast, meaning if they invited her over for lunch (as they did), she would have been conjuring up an excuse to leave within two minutes tops, not asking to shower at their apartment (as she did). There also isn’t any explanation why the two geeks would be friends with one another. They’re both geeks, but one is so much more socially ambitious than the other that I’d hope they eventually give some back story. Either way, the premise is so washed up and the humor is so repetitive that we probably won’t be around to find out. Is that shortsighted and unfair? Probably, but being shortsighted and unfair tends to save us a lot of time on writing.

At least it was only a half hour, because the only thing I was asking myself during Chuck is, “why the hell is this a full hour long?” It appears that this is an unpopular opinion, but while this show wasn’t nearly as detestable as Big Bang Theory, it certainly wasn’t something we were enamored with. Like, in any way.

For starters, The inconsistencies with Chuck (lead character) are abundant, and annoying. He dropped out of Stanford and lives with his sister, who’s a doctor, apparently. He seems to suffer a little anxiety when at a party where they explain the premise, but unlike the other two characters in Big Bang, he displays a certain degree of social aptitude and normalcy that contradicts his lifestyle, until he goes off on a tangent about his ex-girlfriend. His Brother-in-law or whatever (could be boyfriend to sister) is a complete meat head, essentially an aging frat boy scampering around saying things like “not awesome” or “awesome”. He’s a doctor as well, meaning these doctors are all of the Grey’s Anatomy variety (Has anyone working on these shows ever even met a doctor?).

Chuck’s former college roommate who stole his girlfriend (and apparently the sole reason for Chuck’s apathy five years later) is now a highly trained assassin for some government agency. We are introduced to him leaping off buildings and what have you, it seems like he’s going to be a pivotal part of this series, but dies after sending an email to Chuck, that somehow uploads numerous Government secrets into his brain. Yes, I’m serious.

After watching that action sequence, the setting and tone of the series is dull. Like a cross between Life of Brian and 24, two shows existences that I’m publicly opposed to. This series is created by Josh Schwartz, so maybe replacing Life of Brian with OC would be more apt. Either way, the reaction is not a positive one. All of the technical aspects of this pilot, combined with the theme song (that anxiety inducing “bong-with-the-bong-di bang-da-bang-boogie” track) that is in every “hip” movie and television show nowadays that this series plays ad nauseam, I was ready to switch over to the Monday night game.

Some of the scenes I was put off by: there was a really weird interlude where Chuck films a girl-ballerina dancing in the store because her dad forgot to put digital film in camcorder at her recital. The entire scene seemed like a contrivance put in place for the female agent (who was looking on and Chuck was unaware of her at the time) to see what a great guy Chuck is. There was an odd scene with Chuck dancing with the agent (whom he still believed to be nothing more than a date) where he’s all lightheaded or something, and she is impaling people with sharp objects she pulls off her person without him noticing.

It’s fucking bizarre, and hence the 24 reference. The show requires me to suspend too much disbelief to take seriously. And if its not completely offbeat like the two aforementioned scenes, it’s a textbook cliche (is that redundant?). Like, for example, a scene atop a parking garage with guns drawn between the CIA, the NSA, and Chuck figuring out what’s happening to him as everyone goes full disclosure to avoid any bloodshed. This is spliced with scenes of a military lecturer who’s about to be assassinated and Chuck somehow sees all of these plans through the information that has been downloaded in his brain. He’s like the male equivalent of the robot or whatever from Weird Science. I am guessing by episode seven of this series it all turns out to be some sort of conspiracy orchestrated by the white house.

There are a few lame running gags, including the one about Chuck’s best friend/coworker having a crush on his married to a fellow doctor sister. He was by far my favorite character throughout the hour, the only time I laughed was when Chuck was walking towards his boss to put in his notice for a promotion with some dramatic “showdown” type music playing, and we discover its Chuck’s friend that has turned up a stereo in the store, when he turns the music off. It even made me look past the fact that Chuck was applying for a promotion immediately after discovering he’s now working on call with the CIA.

Chuck is in deep with nary a confidante

With a series like Chuck, the appeal is understandable. In the same vein as Heroes or 24 or Lost, they seem to substitute quality acting and writing, and logic; with lightheartedness and physical attractiveness. This has all the makings of a series that will score a large Nielsen rating, but it’s just not for us, despite our favoritism for NBC over their three primary competitors.

Back with some links tomorrow, maybe a word or two about some other new series’.