John Lithgow back on TV? House surprising me with an ending? The Event actually producing an entertaining episode?!? What’s happening?
Well you can find out below, as we discuss Sunday and Monday night’s television. Wow, what a great segue. I’m awesome.
Spoilers.
How I Met Your Mother – “Legendaddy” (A-)
So we finally meet Barney’s father. It was an interesting episode. Far from perfect, but it certainly stood out to me as a significant moment in this series.
Barney took over most of the comedic duties for this episode. His various reactions during to meeting his father varied in their effectiveness, but as a whole they hit more than they missed. I enjoyed Barney’s digression into a child when he first met his half-brother JJ. The one way sibling rivalry was fun to watch. I also enjoyed Barney’s fake retelling of how awesome his dad was (John Lithgow deserves some credit here as well).
Obviously this episode was about more than its comedic elements though, and that’s where it really shone. The basketball hoop scene was the highlight of the episode for me. It had to be delicately handled, showing Barney’s anguish over never having a father while simultaneously showing hope for their relationship in the future, and I think the writers did an excellent job in that regard. I loved Barney’s line, that if his father was going to be a lame suburban house dad, why couldn’t it be with him. It was some brilliant pathos, executed to perfection by Neil Patrick Harris.
It was nice to see Neil Patrick Harris really get a chance to let his acting chops loose. He’s obviously a phenomenal comedic actor, but being Barney doesn’t give him a whole lot of chances to show off his dramatic side, and clearly he’s got one. On the other side of the scene, John Lithgow was absolute casting genius. He immediately stepped in and filled a role that required a really strong presence. I was so impressed with his performance it made me want to go back and watch some 3rd Rock From the Sun reruns.
With such a heavy main story, the B story had to be light. I really liked the premise of this one, that every person has some sort of gap in knowledge they should have learned but somehow never did. That’s totally true. I’ve seen it happen a million times. My favourite gap in knowledge was Robin not knowing the North Pole was a real place. Her little monologue of fake places she was going to visit – from Narnia to Hogwarts – had me laughing out loud.
I was impressed with the B story’s ability to tie into the main plot as well. The screw driver story, which is what sprang the discussion, is also what provided that little glimmer of hope mentioned above. I’m not entirely convinced that a screw driver was the best idea for what Barney didn’t know how to use, but structurally I have to give them credit.
Now I don’t want to end without talking about Marshall a little here. His influence over this episode was subtle but noteworthy. I liked his line to Barney that got him to visit his father, that while he’ll never speak to his father again, Barney’s was just down the road. I like how they’re handling his father’s death now. They aren’t over using it, just subtle mentions here and there. It’s a great way of acknowledging the storyline without hitting us over the head with the story over and over again.
Anyways, I hope we get to see more from Barney’s dad. It’s a really cool storyline, and it adds a new dimension to Barney’s character that’s really exciting to watch.
Shameless – “Daddyz Girl” (A-)
Wow, a LOT happened in this one. But first things first – I totally called Tony catching Steve and Lip... sort of. Maybe not how it happened but the gist. I’m still counting it as a win.
They actually ended up making Tony a little meaner than I remember which I wasn’t a big fan of. Tony has always clearly wanted to be with Fiona, but he never struck me as the scheming type. At times the verbal jarring between Steve and him was a little over the top, almost feeling like a Disney movie at some points. Still, I like where the story’s headed, especially with Lip and Ian getting arrested. Obviously something big is going to happen in next week’s season finale, and I can’t wait.
Speaking of Lip and Ian, they had a stellar episode as they went about searching for Ian’s real father. The visit with Grams was definitely a highlight. At first I thought to myself, “well if they have a Grandma why was Deb so hurt when she lost Aunt Ginger, and why is she never around?” Well the writers hilariously answered that question when they went to visit Grams... in prison. She was a great character too. I loved the part where she lamented about how one little meth lab explosion can land you behind bars scrubbing toilets.
LIP: It’s probably the two college students that died in the fire Grams.
And their visits to each of Frank’s brothers were also pretty good. I love hearing the little back stories about Frank as they paint such a hilarious portrait of the guy. We found out in this one that not only did he used to be devoutly religious, but that he has an identical twin brother too, and he does not like Frank.
Of course it was Ian’s final confrontation with Lip that finally added the emotional edge this story had been lacking. Cameron Monaghan deserves a lot of praise for the scene. I felt legitimately bad for Ian, who clearly felt like he was potentially losing part of his identity now that he knows Frank isn’t his real father. His confession that he likes living with the family and being Frank’s son was a nice reminder of how close the Gallagher family is.
IAN: I’m happy with who we are, even if you’re not.
Frank and the younger Gallaghers had a good week this week as well. First off, watching Debbie and Carl play Xbox was hilarious. I love how into it they were – especially Debbie. But when Frank started teaching the kids the “family business” it was like a plethora of hilarious scenes. I loved Debbie’s resume, I loved watching Frank explain to the kids how he’s doing a public service by keeping the workers comp people employed, and more than anything I loved watching Frank move from job to job, figuring out which one would be the easiest to hurt himself at.
Frank’s storyline ended on a rather serious note however. Karen went all dark and stormy on us this week, still reeling from what her dad said about her the week before. In her final act of revenge she tries to have sex with Frank – on webcam – and, apparently drugged out on painkillers Frank lets it happen. They hinted at a storyline close to this one earlier in the season, and at the time I was glad that Frank didn’t do anything stupid. Now I don’t know what’s going to happen. At the very least it probably spells the end of Frank and Sheila’s relationship.
And finally, lost in the shuffle of a busy episode, we had Fiona making a new friend in Amy Smart. Something, and I can’t quite put my finger on it, is off about that Amy Smart character. Maybe it was the kiss on the lips as she said goodbye, maybe it’s the fact that she’s aggressively trying to win Fiona over, but I feel like something weird is coming from this story. Just another reason to watch next week’s finale I guess.
Castle – “One Life to Lose” (B+)
So this episode should probably be an A- or even an A. Its content was great. But there are only so many times in a season where you can use the Castle-and-Beckett-have-a-moment-and-then-Josh-interrupts-them move to end an episode. So maybe I'm in a cranky mood, and if I felt that my reviews were somehow impacting the fate of the show I wouldn't knock it down for something so trivial. But I am cranky, my review is very minor in the World Wide Web and I've had a long week (already) so Castle loses marks for this one.
That being said, the content of Monday's episode was great and the way it was shot really worked for me. The episode centers around a murder on the set of a soap opera. Naturally the characters being interviewed are all over the top dramatic. To make it more interesting, Martha (Castle's mom for all you casual viewers/readers) had a three week span on the show at some time, during which she was kidnapped twice, caught in a cave and had something to do with Paris. Hit up the comments if you remember the exact quote. It was a really good one.
So the lead writer for the show is killed and they go through the usual laundry list of suspects – the ex husband, the boyfriend, the angry actress/actor, the crazy con artist pretending to be her mother etc. The list goes on. What interests me about shows such as this one that put out 20 some odd cases year after year is how they’re able to use the same basic premise and still keep you interested in the show. They’ll never win points in my book for being a Lost or Fringe type show, but they make use of characters in ways that keep me coming back week after week. I watch 3 shows like this – The Mentalist, Criminal Minds and obviously Castle. Castle is probably my favourite because it’s the newest so the ideas are the freshest, and because it has Nathan Fillion. That guy is awesome. Somewhere (Twitter or some other web source) it was remarked that Castle is really on the air just to show off Fillion's awesomeness. I miss Firefly. Writing about Mal makes me sad.
So where was I going with that? Basically, I knew that it was the secretary early on in the episode. It’s just set up that way. I'm sure most people could see it coming. But what brings me back is not a mystery that throws me for a loop at the end, but rather a good group of characters. I loved Esposito in this episode. His infatuation with the soap opera lead was great. Castle and Beckett are always good together too, but we need this thing to come to a head. It’s time. Or move on. Start something new. Like Community did with Jeff and Brita. There’s more out there. I’m a shipper. I want the Castle-Becket thing to happen. But I won't stand by for the same gimmicks week to week. Do it again Castle, and I'll bump you down a whole letter.
The Event – “A Message Back” (B+)
Alright, The Event – that’s a little better. When I talk about The Event, usually I’m talking about its potential more than what it’s actually shown me so far. Well this was a legitimately entertaining episode in its own right. We had plot movement, some interesting mythology, and an ending that actually made me want to watch the next episode.
I loved the start of this episode where the two technicians working at the VLA in New Mexico start receiving a strange signal from space. Watching them trying to find the origin of the signal and the structure of the data was really cool, and it did a great job of setting the tone for the episode. From then on all I really cared about was what the message said.
And that’s because the mythology behind where these people are from is quite interesting. We finally got to find out this week why the NTBs are in search of a new planet. Apparently the star their planet orbits is about to supernova. It’s a real game changer for the NTBs, and it’ll be interesting to see how it plays out. Sophia’s certainly going to feel a little conflicted about working with the President now that her race is pretty much doomed to extinction if they don’t move to Earth. Or maybe she’ll try to work out some sort of immigration deal. I just don’t see the President receiving that kindly at this point.
It’s nice to see the President finally gain the upper hand on these guys. That’s what V never understood – every once in a while you’ve got to let your main characters win one. We finally got to see that the President is in fact quite capable, which is important, because as an audience we need to know we can put faith in the character.
The other promising development in this episode was that they finally found an interesting storyline for Sean. Crashing the fundraiser was actually interesting to watch, even though in the end they didn’t really find out all that much information. More than anything, I think I just liked the pairing of Vicky and Sean. The two of them have chemistry with each other.
I also liked that they showed there can be consequences to doing the right thing. Sean refusing to kill those two party guests was the right thing for his character, but there’s a reason why Vicky wanted to kill them – they’re loose ends. And it came back to bite them. Not majorly, but at least it wasn’t one of those childish the good guy always wins stories.
House – “Fall From Grace” (B)
Wow. I was all ready to write this one off as just a filler episode, a very uninspired rehashing of what we already watched last week. Then, what couldn’t have been more than a 30 second scene changed my entire perspective of the episode.
That ending was creepy. It makes perfect sense if you go back through the entire episode and watch the team’s treatment and the behaviour of the patient. But really – a serial killer who eats his victims. I don’t think anybody could have called that Hannibal Lector would end up being the patient of the week.
Which makes Masters conversations with the patient all the more haunting. He gave her all but a bedside confession and she did her best to comfort him using her newly discovered bedside manner. Then right before he escapes he tells her that it was her who made him keep on going. If that doesn’t mess with you than nothing will.
They had better come back to this storyline. I have no idea how they should do it, but they’d better come back to it. You can’t drop the our-patient-is-a-serial-killer line on me and then never reveal what happens to the guy. Obviously I think they’ll follow up on how it affects Masters, but I’d like to somehow see the return of the patient. I need closure dammit.
The ending kind of overshadowed everything else in this episode, which as I stated earlier was pretty average. The other main storyline involved House going through with a green card marriage. I enjoyed all of scenes with his new foreign bride Dominica (I may have spelled that wrong). Watching her stumble through pronunciations was actually quite fun.
But I think this story was mostly about the lingering feelings between House and Cuddy. As much as House denied it this was clearly a plot to make Cuddy jealous. And really both of them showed they still cared about the other, with Cuddy walking out on the wedding and House refusing a proposition by his newly wed bride. Unfortunately, at the moment I don’t think these two could be further apart.
As much as I was shocked by the ending of “Fall From Grace”, the previous 40 minutes of the episode were fairly mediocre, and a twist ending doesn’t change that. I hope they carry the momentum of the serial killer plot into the next episode. It takes a lot to surprise me with House these days, but for a brief moment in this episode they had me hook, line and sinker.
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