Agree about SGU being a mess - but completely disagree about the twist at the end being a good one. Every time they "pop back" to Earth my attention starts to wander. At first it made a nice change of pace, but with each episode it becomes more and more annoying. I signed up for a sci-fi drama, not a soap opera. With any luck they'll accidentally lose the communication stones so that the show can focus more on the shipboard antics - which *really* need to develop.

The Thick of It continues to be excellent.

Due to the CMA Awards show, there were no episodes of 'The Middle' or 'Modern Family' this week, so it's given me another day in the week to catch up on my DVR queue.

Because of the Nor'easter weather that started on Thursday, I was able to polish off a disk from my Netflix queue - another three episodes of the Victorian era detective drama set in Toronto, 'The Murdoch Mysteries'. I'm warming up to Yannick Bisson as William Murdoch, but I still have a preference for Peter Outerbridge, who played the role in three tv movies. No famous historical figures this time out (the previous disk had Nicola Tesla in one episode and Conan Doyle in another), but interesting takes on the views about homosexuality, idiot savants for the time, plus a fun look at Shakespearean theatre types.

I also watched a DVD loaner from a co-worker - "Duel At Diablo". (The guy knew I'm a big James Garner fan.) This also had Sidney Poitier, Bill Travers, Bibi Andersson, and Dennis Weaver. Directed by Ralph Nelson who did everything for that behind the scenes look at the making of "Requiem For A Heavyweight" I mentioned last week. Not bad, but tough Garner isn't what I'm usually interested in....

I caught an episode of 'Wallander' (the Branagh version - I doubt we'll ever see the Swedish version over here) which I must have missed on its first go-round. "Firewall" dealt with global terrorism via computers and I'll admit I felt a thrill of fear during it for characters' safety, which I don't often get from other series.

I don't know if you've ever been exposed to the world of 'It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia' over there, but they took a page from 'How I Met Your Mother' - they mentioned a website they started up and sure enough, it exists: dicktowel.com (but it's not safe for work!)

I've got all the crossover episodes in the 'CSI' trilogy, but I won't start watching them until 1] it gets closer to when I have to make a determination on the Toobits Awards, and 2] I find the time!

Lately I've tried to avoid mentioning all the usual network series I watch, but I thought I'd give 'Castle' a boost here because I really enjoy the characters. But I was having a hard time trying to remember the actual plot - finally came to me as I was typing this. Again, it didn't really matter, because spending an hour with Castle and Beckett makes for a fun way to unwind after I get home from work in the morning.

Another show to mention from the usual suspects - 'How I Met Your Mother'. There was a plot development this week that I think came far too early; in my opinion, there was still some comedy gold to be mined from the situation. But unlike other shows, I'm sure the producers of HIMYM know what they're doing....

One last mention from the standard rotation - the season finale of 'Mad Men'. I wrote about this already elsewhere (I jumped the gun and mentioned it in the Daily News rather than waiting for Rob's review.), but I'm still pumped up from its 60s caper film feel. The two other shows I compare it to for how I felt while watching it - the first season finale of 'Slings & Arrows' (when the young actor hit all his points in "Hamlet"), and the "Let Bartlet Be Bartlet" episode of 'The West Wing' (for that "I serve at the pleasure of the President" scene).

For once I watched my Thursday night line-up of shows as they actually aired, well, except for 'FlashForward', which I watched Friday morning. I watched 'Bones' instead because of a week-long promotion that FOX was running across the board with all of their shows. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of 'The Simpsons', they were holding a scavenger hunt for Simpsons related trivia to be found in each show.

So for instance, on 'Bones', Dan Castelleneta played a small role as a local cop and there was a midget wrestler named Bumblebee Man. On 'Fringe', somebody was using a Homer Pez dispenser and the action ended up in Springfield, Maryland. (Which for this show meant that we got to see the name of the location in huge block letters floating in the sky.)

I didn't get to see any other FOX shows earlier in the week (the only other two I watch are 'Lie To Me', which didn't air, and 'Dollhouse'; gave up on 'House' years ago), so I'm not sure what else came into play.

I think I already mentioned this in last week's "WHYBWTW" but the latest Merlin with the Witchfinder was excellent.

Dexter for me was much better than "okay" because something happened that I had been longing for since the very first episode. Plus it has been more tightly written in terms of character lately (they fell back on cliches quite a bit in season 3 I think).

Mad Men was awesome. I agree with Toby that the feel to the caper/heist was invigorating but I also felt deeply saddened at the same time by the rest of the episode. It was perfectly bittersweet.

FlashForward (channel 5 pace, not American pace) was great too. It is finally playing with the theme in the way I wanted. It seems very odd that they didn't make their first three/four episodes as strong as they have been lately. To my mind, they must have lost a lot of viewers. I bet the network argument is that audiences are driven away by too much philosophising or something. *shrugs*

Supernatural this week ("Real Ghostbusters") was brilliant except, as Rob said, suffered hugely for being hot on the heels of a more brilliant episode. Two comedy episodes should not have been back to back like this.

Hmm... HIGNFY as well of course. Oh- and Miranda! My parents and brother saw this being filmed and recommended it to me. It was so painful. I pushed myself through the whole episode but felt offended by its stupidity several times enough to almost press stop. The talking to the camera and breaking character stuff could possibly just maybe work but not the way they are doing it which is just too cheesy. And "Miranda being mistaken for a man/transvestite" was reminiscent of 70s sitcom comedies and their disregard for offending minorities.

Anyway. I think I will watch the Misfits now.

MediumRob wrote:

@matt: See, I do want to watch something a bit soapy, although I'd err towards drama on this, since it did at least feel like a proper grown-up bit of drama, rather than the somewhat adolescent relationships on Stargate/SG-A. But yes, they do need to spend a bit more time on onboard interactions.

@martin: Welcome! Yes, I probably will end up ferreting out some old eps of Curb, just to see what all the fuss is about. You're already watching Community, I think, which is the best of the current new shows, but I can't think of any other standout dramas at the moment. Looks like it's DVDs time.

@toby: Wallander did actually get better as the season went on, and Firewall was pretty good IIRC. And we do get It's Always Sunny… on FX, the home of good imports that nobody watches on Sky.

@bob: Steered clear of Miranda on purpose. Just had a sixth sense it was going to be arse.

@rev: Debate 109 certainly pushed Community in a direction I wasn't expecting, and really played with some unusual ideas for the show as well. It's wonderful!

MediumRob replied to Rev/Views's comment:

"Tell me about it! How great was the end sketch? I'm sure the two people acting as "Abed" and "Troy" were Sandeep Parikh (Zaboo - The Guild) and Manley Henry (Snoop Dogg Attending - Scrubs). But the IMDB is no help there..."

I think you're right re: Snoop Dogg. Community plays around with the whole fourth wall thing, without ever breaking it, which is pretty clever. Especially loved the ep where Abed decides to stay low because he was over-used as a character the previous week.

Agree on Collision JH, though I'll try and muster strenth to do a lengthier review. But yes, Dougie was lovely. Of course.