Year: 2011

US TV

Review: Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior 1×1

22 February 2011 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior

In the US: Wednesdays, 10/9c, CBS

(Very) long-time readers of the blog will know that I’m not a big fan of Criminal Minds. In fact, I dismissed it pretty much after the first episode, the second season opener didn’t make me recant and the replacement of Mandy Patinkin with Joe Mantegna lured me in for all of two episodes.

My basic problems with it are that it’s very dull, doesn’t really bother with characterisation beyond a couple of the leads, despite being an ensemble show, and although it pretends to be intelligent, largely that’s a thin veneer that covers up an entirely preposterous plot with as much resemblance to real-life as The Magic Roundabout.

Millions of people disagree with me, however. They’re wrong, obviously, but they do. To cater for “these kinds of people”, CBS has developed an identikit version of it called Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior, in which a rapid reaction team called a ‘Red Cell’ heads off in Without A Trace stylee to deal with nastiness as quickly as possible.

However, despite the presence of Forest Whitaker, Janeane Garofolo, the red-headed nerdy one from Criminal Minds and Richard Schiff from The West Wing, Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior is just as tedious and stupid, yet without even the few hints of interest that the original had.

Here’s a trailer for the show that for some unfathomable reason doesn’t feature Amber Heard in a bikini (am I on SEO fire this week, or what?).

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Monday’s “goodbye to Jason Isaacs” news

21 February 2011 Rob Buckley Post a comment

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Today's Joanna Page

Random Acts: Amber Heard melts Twitter, Serene Branson has a complex migraine, Joanna Page designs a Welsh bra

21 February 2011 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Amber Heard on Top Gear

So yesterday was of course the day when thanks to Top Gear, British men en masse discovered there exists a woman called Amber Heard and that not knowing this fact had substantially impoverished their lives. Now our Amber didn’t come ex nihilo and had British men decided to watch Hidden Palms all of five years ago (despite – oh dear – my recommendations), they’d have known all about her. Here are a couple of her finest moments – she/Greta being easily the best thing in it – from the otherwise not that great pilot.

But they didn’t so have lived in terrible ignorance for five years. You could tell this because at 11am yesterday, a Twitter search for Amber Heard would have got you about one Tweet an hour of something like “Amber Heard is the SITRPC on Top Gear? Who’s she? I thought they were getting someone exciting.”

By about 8.35pm, Amber Heard had become the number one Google image search and first a UK then a global Twitter trending topic. And let’s just say The Informers was starting to get an awful lot of illegal downloads. If you thought Top Gear‘s ratings were sagging and it’s been losing its influence this series, turns out you were wrong.

Here’s the interview in case you missed it and want to know why British men went Amber-mad yesterday. Forgive Jeremy Clarkson – he’s Jeremy Clarkson.

Moving on, another of last week’s Random Acts participants, Serene Branson, who we all thought had a stroke live on air, fortunately only turned out to have a complex migraine.

And since this is TMINE, let’s let Joanna Page get in on the randomness this week by designing a Welsh bra. It’s for charity.

Joanna Page's bra

US TV

What have you been watching this week (w/e February 18)?

20 February 2011 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

Amber Heard on Top Gear

It’s “What have you been watching this week?”, your chance to recommend to friends and fellow blog readers the TV that they might be missing or should avoid – and for me to do mini-reviews of everything I’ve watched this week. Since we live in the fabulous world of Internet catch-up services like the iPlayer and Hulu, why not tell your fellow readers what you’ve seen so they can see the good stuff they might have missed?

My regular recommendations for maximum viewing pleasure: Archer, Being Human, Being Human (US), Cougar Town, House, Modern Family, Royal Pains, Shameless (US), Southland, 30 Rock and Top Gear.

This week’s review backlog: Bedlam; Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior; Episodes; Mad Dogs; this week’s Spartacus: Gods of the Arena; and a hell of a lot of episodes of The Killing.

Which leaves, after the jump, mini-reviews of Community, Mr Sunshine, Portlandia, Royal Navy Caribbean Patrol, Smallville and Traffic Light as well as last week’s Spartacus: Gods of the Arena.

Incidentally, in case you haven’t noticed, “What have you been watching this week?” only covers stuff that’s already aired, so an invaluable source of recommendations for things that are coming up in the UK is provided by Scott Matthewman and The Stage‘s TV Today Square Eyes feature. It’s helped me spot a number of things I would have otherwise missed.

Although for some reason, he’s not flagging up tonight’s Top Gear. I’ll be watching, mainly to see how Jeremy Clarkson of all people deals with interviewing a very attractive, openly gay actress who likes to drive muscle cars, that’s all I’m saying…

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