New Fall Shows WrapUp

Since most new shows have finished airing their first three episodes, I thought I would let you know how they are doing in my opinion. I have already dropped some of the shows that I wasn't sure about and I am pretty pleased with my top five choices. I thought I would put them in order of preference and give some quick reasons to back them up.

THE SHOWS I'M LOVING RIGHT NOW

PUSHING DAISIES
What I Like: beautiful cinematography; likeable characters; sweet and charming atmosphere; great voice over voice by Jim Dale, the descriptions that begin with “the fact are these . . . “ it’s not afraid to have Kristin Chenoweth break out into song at any given moment, Digby the dog, the fascinating premise, the music cues just before the commercial breaks, quirky dialogue like “this is how we do”, pie, it’s the most clever, imaginative thing on television right now
What I Could Do Without: the years:days:hours:minutes with every character’s life (unless they plan on doing something significant with it)

DIRTY SEXY MONEY
What I Like: Peter Krause’s mix of self-righteousness and utter shock; Donald Sutherland’s scenes with Krause; Samaire Armstrong’s brilliant portrayal of the emotional Juliet; Seth Gabel’s bad boy image; the way Karen keeps outrageously flirting with Nick; the bitter pettiness of Brian the priest; the mockery of rich people and tabloids, the ring tones, the cat fights; the Dynasty meets Arrested Development vibe
What I Could Do Without: the scenes at home and the investigation of Dutch’s death take away from the fun times; some of the meaningful speeches are a little sub-par

CHUCK
What I Like: Chuck’s sheer innocence; the sexy Yvonne Strzechowski as Sarah; the comic timing of Adam Baldwin; CS Lee as the villainous Harry Tang; just the name Harry Tang; the Lone Gunmen meets Andy Barker PI meets Alias vibe; the fact that they have a character named Captain Awesome; the new opening credits; the use of the Buy More store to stop crime; the sexual tension between Chuck and Sarah; the rest of the Nerd Herd; the overall fun factor
What I Could Do Without: Chuck’s best friend Morgan who just isn’t funny; Casey threatens Chuck a little too much; the sister’s concern is overdone; that they could probably do the same show in thirty minutes and it would be utterly fantastic.

REAPER
What I Like: Ray Wise as the devil who also happens to be very helpful; Sock who steals most of the scenes he’s in (I’d actually want to be friends with this guy unlike Morgan from Chuck); the lameness of The Work Bench store; that it’s filmed in Vancouver; the mystery of how to use each new vessel; the believable friendships; the one-liners; the supernatural aspect
What I Could Do Without: the family is downer; Sam is retarded to not realize that Andi is into him; the plot seems to drag when Sam keeps doubting himself and running away from his duties

BACK TO YOU
What I Like: it’s nice to have a traditional sitcom on the air; every scene Ty Burrell is in; the flustered character of Ryan the news director; the quick exchanges between Grammar and Heaton; Fred Willard’s line delivery; the poppy opening title sequence; the way news is mocked and anchors are ridiculed; it’s timeslot is pretty non-competitive with Pushing Daisies being on Tuesdays at 8 on CTV.
What I Could Do Without: it’s humour hasn’t been at the level of The Office, Arrested Development or even Just Shoot Me (hopefully it will in time); the whole father-daughter stuff makes Heaton resort to her Debra persona; there's not enough scenes with Ty Burrell

THE SHOWS I'M STILL ON THE FENCE ABOUT

BIG SHOTS
What I Like: I like the four main characters; Josh Malina is fun to watch when he’s not in control; Christopher Titus is surprising good at being the whipped husband; Michael Vartan and Dylan McDermott have this natural charisma on the screen; I like the camaraderie between the four guys
What I Could Do Without: the obvious Desperate Housewives vibe; the ironic names of their businesses; the tired plot of the transsexual hooker that is being done a lot better on Dirty Sexy Money

SAMANTHA WHO?
It debuts next week, we’ll see how it goes.

THE SHOWS I GAVE A CHANCE TO BUT HAVE NOW DROPPED

BIONIC WOMAN
What is Lacking: I don’t like the actress playing Jamie Sommers; the special effects are not all that special looking; the music choices are terrible; the conspiracy angle isn’t working for me; the dialogue is pretty bad; the opening title sequence is just plain awful with it’s silhouetted mime trapped in a glass box; I just don’t care about the characters
What I Do Like: Katee Sackhoff is an awesome villain; Lucy Hale does a great job and is believable as Jamie’s bratty younger sister

THE BIG BANG THEORY
What is Lacking: nerdy language isn’t always funny; the laugh-track is way too forgiving; while Kaley Cuoco is cute her character is pretty one-dimensional; most of the characters are one-dimensional; the broken elevator isn’t working for me; the situations are predictable
What I Do Like: The Barenaked Ladies theme song; Jim Parsons (Garden State) and Johnny Galecki (Roseanne) do play well off each other

THE SHOWS I DROPPED ALMOST INSTANTLY

MOONLIGHT
Why I stopped after one episode: there are no classic vampire rules (Mick is able to withstand garlic, holy water, crucifixes and even sunlight); it reminded me of Beauty and the Beast with Ron Perlman; the vampire has no motive to help the helpless; it made me miss Angel all the more
The only reason I watched the whole episode: Jason Dohring (Veronica Mars) and Kevin Weisman (Alias) were in the pilot.

GOSSIP GIRL
Why I stopped after one episode: I couldn’t get past all the text message shortcuts of “BFF” and “L is so into K”; it was a little too girly; they didn’t seem to having the same fun as the kids on The OC; the characters were to boring; the setting reminded me too much of Cruel Intentions
The only reason I watched the whole episode: Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars) was doing the voice over

LIFE
Why I stopped after one episode: Damian Lewis’ Charlie was a little too quirky; the fruit thing turned me off; his outside-the-box methods are not justified; I don’t care about how Charlie got framed; the others cops are pretty boring; the house set looks way too big to be useful
The only reason I watched the whole episode: Adam Arkin as Ted Early

So here's my current television viewing schedule. (Don't worry about my absence of a life, I am marking tests, writing scripts, prepping classes, video editing and such while I watch. I'm great at multi-tasking. I am also taping a lot of shows since many nights will be spent directing plays.) Bear in mind that with digital cable I am able to catch the eastern feeds of numerous shows.

Sunday: 5pm Simpsons 6pm Family Guy/American Dad 8pm Dexter
Monday: 5pm Chuck 6pm Heroes 8pm How I Met Your Mother
_______9pm Two and Half Men (Tape Prison Break)
Tuesday: 6pm House 7pm Law & Order: SVU 8pm Pushing Daisies
__________9pm Reaper 10pm Boston Legal
Wednesday: 5pm Back to You 7pm Dirty Sexy Money
Thursday: 5pm My Name is Earl/30 Rock 6pm The Office/Scrubs
____________7pm Big Shots 8pm Smallville 9pm CSI:

So that's about it with my televison blogs for awhile. I'll be getting back to movie reviews and such in the next few weeks. Stay tuned.