Best of the Week: 1st-7th Nov
A weekly post with the purpose of highlighting the shows I watched during the week and how I ranked them. It’s not intended as a list of all shows on the air, only those that I actually watched during the week. Watching something on Monday that aired on Friday won’t make the cut.
Like everything on this site it’s for my own enjoyment but feel free to comment.
I didn’t get to watch a bunch of shows that I wanted to this week as the uni workload in preparation for my exams took all of my time. Besides eating, sleeping, shitting and working all I did was study. Ah, I hate it so much. I did see Trick r Treat though. It was a cool horror flick. Not that scary but cool. I got a real Tales from the Crypt vibe from it.
1. Parks & Recreation “Ron and Tammy” (2×08) – A nice episode which introduced one of Ron’s previously mentioned ex wives (played by the beautiful Megan Mullaly). I find it a little odd that I hate Will & Grace so much yet enjoy Megan Mullaly in the guest appearances of hers that I’ve seen. I remember her from an episode of Seinfeld as one of George’s girlfriends, from 30 Rock as a child adoption agent screening Liz, and then from this episode of Parks & Rec. On the whole it was a pretty funny episode and it was great that Ron was the focus for once. Not much Aubrey Plaza this week though which is a downer. 7.5/10
2. Bored to Death “The Case of the Stolen Sperm” (1×07) – The show is really starting to hit it’s stride now. More Zach Galifianakis and more Ted Danson (especially being involved in the cases) is a good thing. I particularly liked the storyline this week linking into Ray’s sperm donations to the lesbians which I thought was just a simple joke in the episode it was raised in. It was nice that it formed part of a future story. Oliver Platt and John Hodgeman make great enemies for George and Jonathan. It was also great to see the adorable Sam Bee (The Daily Show) in a tiny little role as one of the recipients of Ray’s sperm. 7.5/10
3. How I Met Your Mother “Bagpipes” (5×06) – I absolutely loved Barney convincing Marshall that it was a good idea to tell Lily he didn’t want to do the dishes and that she should do them. Ted arguing against Barney’s logic was just as great. It was like the devil and an angel battling over him. Aside from that though I thought the episode was somewhat average. I like Barney and Robin together but the stories they’re coming up with for them are so average. Aside from the Robin Sparkles based episodes Robin hasn’t had much good stuff over the course of the show, but Barney has been nothing but comedy gold. It seems like this relationship is dragging him down into mediocrity. I really hope that the 100th episode brings a much needed boost. 6.5/10
4. Fringe “Earthling” (2×06) – Nothing mythology based this week but we did get a fairly decent standalone episode which brought to light some of Broyles’ backstory. This was probably the most that he’s appeared in any episode so far. Not much for Olivia or Peter this week either. The ratings are also continuing to go down too. I don’t think Fox will cancel the show before the end of the season, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they elect not to pick it up for a 3rd season if the ratings don’t show some improvement. That’s a real shame because the show on the whole is very good. 6.5/10
5. Dexter “If I Had a Hammer” (4×06) – When will Dexter be done with that fucking whining bitch Rita. I’ve never hated her as much as I do right now. She’s a prime example of why I hate the idea of marriage. Trying to change someone and make them do all the things that they don’t want to do. Why would anyone want to go through that kind of life. Dexter’s situation is a little different because he’s pretty much forced to live that life in order to blend in and escape detection, but it just pisses me off so much that he’s changed his core self in the adoption of that life. A couple of episodes ago he stated that he couldn’t lose them. There’s no way he would have felt that way about anyone except Deb in previous seasons. The one real bright spot of this episode was the development in the search for info by Deb about her father. I really hope she discovers the connection between him and Dexter’s mother soon. I don’t want that to be the cliffhanger for the season finale. Something tells me it will be though. Oh, and I’m over the Batista/Laguerta relationship too. 6.5/10
6. South Park “The F Word” (13×11) – South Park encouraging kids to call bikies faggots is advice that I wouldn’t suggest be followed. Bikies account for a great deal of drug dealing and as such are probably not to be messed with. That much can be seen by their blatant law breaking in the incident at Sydney airport where a fight broke out between rival gangs in the departure terminal and they beat a guy to death with a metal bollard. That being said, mocking them as they did in this episode was pretty damn funny, and it’s true that all the noise from those bikes does make them fucking assholes. Still not a very impressive episode though. 5.5/10
7. V “Pilot” (1×01) – Having a whining teenage kid complain when his mother says she wants to listen does not build sympathy for him, it just makes him seem like a fucking baby. Call it the Kim Bauer effect if you will. There was some stuff to like about the pilot but nothing spectacular. I’m still mad that Elizabeth Mitchell left Lost to star in this show. It’s been a while since I was truly blown away by a pilot (that being Lost). For the most part every pilot since then has been OK at best. 5/10
