Hiatus

So I’m sure by now all my loyal readers (read: my Mom and Dad) are wondering where the new fall reviews are. I’m sorry to say that Stuck On A Channel will be on hiatus for the foreseeable future. I've started a few new writing projects and for now I’m going to spend some time focusing on them. I want to thank everyone for reading. I know someday we will all be together again.

-- Brian

There Are Some Things That You Can’t Fake In The Cake World

It’s the last big review of the season...

Spoilers:

Cougar Town – “My Life/Your World” (B+)

The season started with a proposal, it seems only natural that it would end with a wedding.

But we’ll get to that. The first half of “My Life/Your World” played very much like a normal episode (the cut for syndication was quite obvious I thought) with the writers exploring Grayson’s adjustment to actually living in the same house with Jules. Grayson has always been a bit more private than Jules and the rest of the gang, so I thought his reaction off the top of the episode was quite fitting to his character. His freak out in the bedroom was a little scary, but more hilarious than anything and the therapy session with Lynn afterwards made it even more worth it.

And it all ended up playing into a nice little homage to Groundhog Day, probably my favourite Bill Murray comedy of all time, which is saying something considering how chalked full of life lessons they tend to be (just ask Jules).  Overall the “My Life” portion stayed light and saved most of the big finale moments for the second half of the night.

Which unfortunately is sort of where the episode got a little scattered in my opinion. There were a lot of fun moments in the Napa Valley trip but it was obvious that with the wedding reserved for the beach back in Florida the writers struggled to find a suitable ending for that portion of the episode. In fact, most of the big Napa plotlines ended up falling short of the mark. Jules’ attempt to get Jill/Tampa to the wedding was alright, but Ellie’s seemingly out of nowhere crush on the hotel concierge was a little disconcerting and the big twist at the end of the trip – Trav’s naked confession to Laurie about his true feelings – just sort of got brushed to the side for next season. The trip lacked payoff and in the end it felt anticlimactic because of that.

But I think maybe anticlimactic was how it was supposed to feel. The merit of “Your World” really hinges on whether or not you thought the wedding was worth moving back to Florida. Frankly, I do. The Napa trip may have never quite gotten off the ground, but the wedding was an excellent tribute to the series long love story between Jules and Grayson. Everything from the (literally) moving ceremony to Stan’s turn as ring bearer to Jules and Grayson riding off into the sunset was executed perfectly. And none of it would have been possible if they’d kept the wedding in Napa. That fact for me saved the episode.

It’s been a tumultuous year for Cougar Town, one that saw the series pushed back to midseason and to the brink of cancellation, only to be saved in the 11^th hour by TBS.  Most of the episodes were written in a vacuum with even the producers of the show wondering if they were still going to be on the air come the end of the season. But thankfully, much like the question playfully posed in the opening credits, this was just a season finale and not a series finale. Cougar Town still has plenty of life in it yet, and that, my friends, is something to be happy about.

All The Cool Kids Were Totally Laughing With Us

Spoilers...

House – “Everybody Dies” (B)

And so we’ve reached the end...

It took me a while to digest this one. I spent a good chunk of the week kicking it around in my head, dissecting it from every angle. I even watched it a second time to try and clarify my thoughts. And to be honest, I’m still not totally sure where I stand on the episode. Take this as a preliminary grade, subject to change until it can be properly viewed in the context of the series as a whole. I think time is the only way to truly know where this episode rates in the grand scheme of things.

From a plot standpoint, I’m not at all disappointed with what happened. The writer’s gave us pretty much the type of ending I was hoping for – bittersweet with a glimmer of hope. How we got there though is where I’m most conflicted about “Everybody Dies.”

House’s ideological musings were poignant at some points, confusing at others, and sadly, a little flighty. The string of guest stars was a nice way to look back through the history of the show, but at the same time it seemed to take us in circles, with House flip flopping back and forth between choosing life and choosing death far too often. A more focused approach to those discussions probably would have played much more insightful. As it stands I don’t think it had the emotional resonance it needed.

The burning building probably wasn’t the best choice of settings either. There was no suspense or sense of urgency in House’s decision over whether to save himself. The fire burned on for so long he never really seemed to be in danger and his lack of action was not only irritating but surprisingly out of character. And considering so much of the episode was about examining his character, you don’t like to see that.

But I imagine the decision to put House in a burning building was born more out of where the story was going than it was about his decision to live or die. The writers needed a way for House to plausibly fake his death and that meant a body that would be difficult to identify. That’s where my view of the episode gets complicated.

On one hand, I didn’t like the way his supposed death was executed, starting from how Foreman and Wilson refused to help him which led them to the burning building (and House into his crisis in the first place), to the seemingly inescapable explosion that capped things off. But I did like the idea of him faking his death. It seemed like a vintage House move and really accentuated that powerful moment earlier in the building where he decided he could finally change. He literally threw his old life away and I like that metaphor... perhaps it would have been more devious if it had looked like it was his plan all along to get out of going to jail, but it was true to the character while also giving the audience that glimmer of hope we needed to properly gain closure.

For whatever reason it felt to me like something straight out of Sherlock Holmes novel, a nice ode to one of the show’s obvious influences. Of course nothing like that ever happened in a Sherlock Holmes novel, so all the literature fans out there please don’t bite my head off (he was presumed dead after one of the books, though I don’t think he was purposefully faking it). But only that type of mischievously intelligent character could ever get away with faking their own death in a satisfying way. That’s part of the reason I think I can forgive some of the weaker moments of that story.

Plus the final act was quite heartening for any long time fan of the series. Chase takes over for House.  Cameron is married with a kid. Taub connects with his children. It’s schmaltzy, but there’s nothing wrong with a good happily ever after. I think the image that will stick with me for a while is Foreman smiling after finding House’s hospital badge and realizing what he’d done.

And it’s also hard to beat House and Wilson riding off into the sunset in the final shot. Maybe not the most original ending, but thematically it summed things up nicely. You get the sense that he’s finally unburdened now and maybe, for once, happy.

So there you have it... why I’m conflicted. “Everybody Dies” is not the best episode the series has ever done, but it ties up the characters and the story in a satisfying enough way that I feel I can leave the show with some happy memories. I guess at the end of the day all I can say is House... it’s been a pleasure.

Modern Family – “Baby on Board” (A-)

Modern Family has been a little uneven this season, but I’m glad the cast and the writers can still put together a great episode when they need to. “Baby on Board” went for a little more than the series traditionally has in its finales, at least in terms of cliffhangers, but what really made the episode great was just how sharp it was comedically. It’s feels like a long time since Modern Family has made me laugh this hard.

Personally, I’ve enjoyed watching Cam and Mitchell a lot more over these last few episodes. Their antics had been wearing a little thin on me this season, but for whatever reason they’ve been getting better material lately... or something. To be honest, I can’t explain it. But their adoption storyline in this one was solid. I thought the Spanish soap opera bit was quite funny while still allowing the writers room to explore the very frustrating and heartbreaking experience they were going through. The scene at the gas station was an especially sweet moment.

Likewise Manny and Jay had a pretty great week matched up with Lilly. Watching the two of them squabble over how to deal with her led to some very funny moments, culminating in a hilarious (and cute) scene between Jay and Lilly at the end of the episode. I laughed out loud when Jay offered her $50 so he wouldn’t have to dance on stage with her.

The Dunphy family were the real all-stars of “Baby on Board” though. It didn’t matter if it was Phil teaching Alex how to dance, Haley conferring onto her parents that a gap year meant working at the Gap, or Phil and Claire running through the horrendous scenarios Haley would encounter living with Dylan, everything the writers tried seemed to work. And they didn’t try to sidestep Haley going to college either. It always bugs me when a show intentionally hinders a character’s development for the sake of keeping up the status quo.

Of course Gloria’s pregnancy announcement was the big surprise of the episode and I thought the writers did a good job of sneaking it in without giving it away. I know I was legitimately surprised when she made the announcement. I’m a little wary of how that storyline will play out next season, but I’ll reserve my judgement until I actually see it.

Modern Family may not be as consistent as it once was, but it can still be very, very funny when it wants to be. There’s a lot of life left in these characters and despite my reservations about the big reveal in this episode, it’s nice to see that the writers aren’t afraid to challenge themselves in new and interesting ways. I’m not sure if Modern Family’s best days are ahead or behind us, but I do think the series is going to be worth watching for the foreseeable future.

I’ll be looking forward to next season.

Line of the night:

PHIL: Guess what, suddenly you’re sixty years old wandering toothless and alone in a post apocalyptic wasteland.
HALEY: Wait a second, how did Dylan get the nuclear codes again?
PHIL: During the robot wars!

There’s A Back Story Here You Don’t Want to Know About

Spoilers...

Community – “Digital Estate Planning” (A), “The First Chang Dynasty” (A-) & “Introduction to Finality” (A-)

First off, I’ve never written three episodes into the same review before, especially not three this good, so we’ll see how this goes. Second, I just heard about Dan Harmon’s firing from the series, and while I by no means know anything about the inner workings of the show, from what I’ve heard he was the heart and soul of Community. So thank you Dan Harmon (he almost surely reads this blog). I know he gets paid a lot of money to do this, but all the crappy showrunners do to, and over the past three seasons he’s made Community into one of the most original and outright hilarious shows on television. If these three episodes are the last he’ll ever work on for the series, he went out with a heck of a bang.

Anyway, let’s start with the first episode “Digital Estate Planning,” definitely my favourite of the night and another strong case for my theory that every time Community drags out the altered title music the episode is going to be awesome. I’ve played my fair share of 8-bit platformers and old school RPGs and as I always do in these high concept episodes I found the level of detail hysterical. It really did take me back to my days playing Zelda and Mario as a kid, from the jumping sounds, to the text bubbles, to the large Super Mario style terrain maps.

And combine that with the hilariously good characterization of the little 8-bit characters and this episode could easily break into my top 5 Community episodes of all time. I loved how 8-bit Jeff had to jump up onto the study room table to give his inspirational speech to the study group (only to have them die seconds later). Or watching Annie and Shirley accidently murder the blacksmith and his wife. Or even the fact that Abed fell in love with the 8-bit blacksmith’s daughter, providing one hilarious conclusion to the episode. It’s just one of those instances, and Community seems to have a lot of them, where the characters and the premise jived together perfectly.

“The First Chang Dynasty” took on the classic heist story, and proved you can never get too many parody episodes in one night. While not as outwardly hilarious as “Digital Estate Planning” it was still a strong showing for the series. I loved watching the study group each take on their different roles in the heist (Abed and Troy’s plumber impression was my favourite) and the way the writers so perfectly captured that pivotal moment in most heist movies where the plan looks to be failing but in truth is actually still part of the plan. I laughed pretty hard at Pierce’s confusion when they actually did get caught and he still thought it was part of it.

I found Troy’s goodbyes at the end of episode to actually be quite sad. If NBC hadn’t decided to stack three episodes together like this that moment would have been a heck of a cliffhanger. I think the brilliance of the scene is how none of the goodbyes actually had any substance to them (in fact they were all hilariously irrelevant), yet still conveyed the raw emotion of the moment. You had to feel for Abed after his stoic “sorry for getting emotional.”

And that leads quite nicely into “Introduction to Finality” which took Abed to a darker place than I’d ever seen him before. I had to laugh at Jeff’s expression at the end of this episode when he heard Abed was planning on sawing off his arm with a bone saw. Abed’s persona is generally pretty lovable, but that’s a pretty serious level of mental illness. Even his claymation visions in last year’s Christmas episode weren’t that bad. He wasn’t going hurt anyone, anyway. Needless to say that look summed up pretty much exactly what I was thinking throughout most of the episode. I’m just glad Evil Abed was defeated.

By far the funniest storyline of the night was Troy’s introduction to the inner workings of the air conditioning repair school. The school’s secret society-like persona was hilarious (the hyped up introduction to the sun room was amazing), especially when contrasted with Troy’s complete indifference to pretty much everything they threw at him. It’s weird for him to be the only normal character in a storyline, but that’s his role at this school and he was damn funny in it.

The episode also marked another major turning point for Jeff. When he started at Greendale he didn’t want anything to do with the school or any of its students, and gradually over the course of the last few seasons he’s come to accept that he needs the place and that he cares about the study group. But he’s always had the end goal of getting his old life back, and this was the first time we’ve seen him outwardly choose his friends over that goal. His final speech at the end of the episode was one of those rare moments where the show sort of transcended its comedy label and was actually quite poignant. To me, that’s a great image to leave the season with.

I guess to sum things up, I’m cheering for this show for next season. I love Community and I want it to succeed no matter what. But it’s hard not to see the stupidity in NBC and Sony’s decision to take the show away from Harmon. I hope the new showrunners can come in and take over where he left off, but I think the sad truth is whatever they do is going to end up being overshadowed by the fact that it’s not Harmon doing it – at least to the diehard fans, who are pretty much Community’s entire audience. Still, I’ll be watching... this and whatever Harmon’s next project ends up being.

My lines of the night (in order):

JEFF: This place is 20 cat turds and a Pixies poster from being your apartment.

SHIRLEY: You had time to build a tiny working water fountain and I’m a pine cone?

TROY: I made a new rule that the air conditioning repair school has to act like a regular school. I can do that because I’m their messiah.

Modern Family – “Tableau Vivant” (B+)

Art projects have gotten considerably more complex since I was in school. I think just to attempt something as grand in scale as a living portrait would have garnered an A+. Alex on the other hand only got a B-, which makes me wonder whether I would fail art if I were a student today. Or I guess if maybe this is one of those fake television schools with an art department capable of producing elaborate set pieces like a living version of the Tableau Vivant.

But that moment did remind how much I like this show when all of its disparate story threads come crashing into each other at the end of an episode. The living portrait scene strained credibility a bit, but it was a nice backdrop for the explosion of tensions that had built up throughout the day. A sort of illusion of required restraint for these characters to trample over as they went about sniping at each other.

 I’m a sucker too for unconventional pairings and “Tableau Vivant” had them in spades. Obviously, most storylines are going to be split down familial lines but there’s a novelty to the ones that aren’t – they feel fresher. Which means it shouldn’t surprise you that my favourite story of this episode was Phil’s struggle to fire Mitchell while avoiding any sort of conflict. The two of them played amusingly well off of each other, and it culminated in a ton of very funny moments in the episode. I loved the revelation that Phil had tried to break up with Claire 20 years earlier without her ever realizing it. It fueled a ton of great bits in the episode. And it was also quite funny to watch poor Mitchell stuck in the elevator while seemingly everyone at Phil’s firm took shots at him.

Claire and Cam were great with each other as well. It wasn’t too hard to see that Cam’s new age parenting techniques were going to be an issue for Claire and I thought the garbage disposal scene in particular was quite funny. Unsurprisingly, the only storyline I wasn’t that keen on was Jay and Gloria. Their argument in this episode felt strikingly similar to last week’s, and I just wasn’t feeling their lovable bickering this time around. I do wonder though whether Jay’s audit might play somewhat into the season finale. Keep an eye out for that...

30 Rock – “What Will Happen to the Gang Next Year?” (B)

Another very appropriate episode title. Considering the show’s going into its final season I am very much wondering what will happen to the gang next year. One thing’s for sure, I’m going to miss Avery. Jack needs another person from his “world” to riff off of and considering how great Elizabeth Banks is in that role it’s going to be tough to lose her. That is of course if we are losing her... I’ve been wrong about these things before.

Ironically enough (for a season finale anyway), this felt very much like a setup episode, and sort of floated along as such for most of its duration. Aside from Jack’s split from Avery – which leaves his character wandering somewhat aimlessly, as he has all season – every other character storyline in this episode seemed to give them some sort of direction for the season to come.

Liz realizing she wasn’t going to bail on Criss was probably my favourite thread. I’m not sure if placing her in a relatively stable relationship this season was a good idea or not, but I am interested in seeing the writers finally commit to this baby storyline. They’ve flirted with it a lot over the years and it feels like one of those things the series has been building towards since its beginning. It might end up being a disaster, but we’ll only know that when we see it.

In the same vein, Kenneth finally dating a girl (if of course that’s the direction his hook up with Hazel will take) is one of those long coveted storylines I think everyone kind of wondered what would look like. The problem is – and it’s applicable to Tracey’s decision to start his own studio too – that other than the big reveal, there wasn’t much else to these storylines. I guess the subtext to my mild enthusiasm about the episode is that while there were plenty of promising developments, at the end of the day they were just promises, and there weren’t a ton of laughs to fill the holes. Despite the fact it was a finale, “What Will Happen to the Gang Next Year?” felt pretty average.

I am looking forward though to seeing how the writers deal with the knowledge that this next season will be the show’s last. Hopefully 30 Rock will get the creative boost most shows experience in their final year. It’s a series that deserves a good send off.

RIP Big Carl

Spoilers...

How I Met Your Mother – “The Magician’s Code” (B)

And so the season ended the way it lived –with a so so episode and a twist ending.

I’m going to focus as much as I can on discussing that ending because, frankly, that’s what I care about, but I will say, the writers really need to stop foreshadowing crazy future moments if they don’t have anything planned for them.  The “No Motorcycles on the Casino Floor” was a decent bit if only because of Barney’s bravado in the interrogation room, but Dr. Sonya’s blowout just seemed perfunctory and out of place. The novelty of these jokes, at least so far, aren’t worth the disruption they cause to the future episode they inevitably have to be inserted into.

 In general, the “The Magician’s Code” was fairly average from a comedy standpoint. I liked Marshall’s intense struggle to get up two stairs, but the rest of the drunk act wore thin pretty quickly. Ted’s “that person’s a parent” bit was pretty good too, even if he could only come up with two examples. I would have preferred more of those over the flashback stories Lilly kept demanding.

Regardless, baby episodes are always a bit of a letdown and it looked like the writers were just doing the best they could with a storyline that lends itself to clichés. Using Wait-for-it as a middle name was a nice way to add the How I Met Your Mother touch, but the obligatory delivery room bits combined with the fairly anticlimactic reconciliation of Ted and Robin bogged down the first half of the episode.

The writers are smart though – they know that people still care about the happily ever after of these characters and they use it to prop up these episodes that need the help. But since I’ve been speculating about who Barney’s bride will be for as long as I can remember it’s hard to be disappointed about finally getting an answer. While I’ve always maintained that Barney will end up with Robin in the end, now at least we know it won’t be a last minute catch-him-at-the-altar type situation. She did look worried when she saw Ted though, so I’m guessing there’ll be some potential cold feet involved. Of course I doubt the writers have planned that far ahead.

I think the bigger twist was Ted deciding to run away with Victoria. Everything up to that point in the storyline was fairly predictable, but I honestly didn’t see that coming. Shame on me I guess, since it is a finale. It’s another perfect example though of the writers leveraging the goodwill they earned in the show’s early seasons. I said it at the start of the season and I’ll say it again – I like Victoria, I like Ashley Williams, and I like that the writers have recognized her as the one that got away from Ted. What I worry about is that they don’t use her well and it end ups tainting those wonderful first season memories.

On one hand there’s a story worth telling in revisiting an idealized relationship that ended before it should have. In real life that’s a pretty common occurrence and it can hold people back. But at the same time, we know this relationship is doomed from the start, and if the writing staff isn’t delicate it could end up backfiring. It’s at the core of almost all the problems people have with How I Met Your Mother these days – every girl Ted dates that’s not the mother is a stall.

House – “Holding On” (B+)

This was a dark one. Granted it needed to be. “Holding On” dealt with some pretty heavy themes, and even though it was excruciating to watch at some points it was better that it stayed true to them than pull back in fear of turning off part of the audience.

There were a few times where this episode got a little off tone (I’m not sure we needed House using actors to psyche out Wilson one last time) but there were at least a few powerful moments to add to House’s prolonged farewell tour. I thought the scene where House revealed to Taub why he was so angry with Wilson was particularly strong. Before that moment I’d just chalked his behaviour up to House dealing with his emotions poorly like he always does, but after you could understand his anguish. He’s been living in pain all these years, if anyone’s allowed an opinion on that matter it’s him.  Needless to say, I thought it was one of the more intimate glimpses into his character we’ve seen over these past few episodes.

The other moment I liked was the scene where House told Wilson that Wilson was smarter than him. It was one of those easily forgettable moments, but it stuck out to me because I don’t think I’ve ever heard House say that to anybody. For House intellect has always been king. I think at least part of the reason that these two have remained friends all these years is that in some way Wilson challenges him in a manner no one else does. Of course I could spend hours uncovering all the different layers of that statement, so I’ll just leave it at it was a nice sentiment.

As for Thirteen’s appearance in the episode, it was for the most part well done. I’m glad they could get Olivia Wilde back in for at least one more episode. Granted her appearance felt a little “inserted”, but I liked the content of her few scenes as she fit in quite well with a lot of the themes in the episode.

Personally, I don’t think House as a series can finish on a completely upbeat ending, and considering he’s headed back to jail it looks like I’m right. But I do hope the writers leave House with at least some measure of peace. He’s not the easiest guy in the world to cheer for, but he’s been through a lot and he deserves that much.

Cougar Town – “Square One” & “It’ll All Work Out” (A-)

I’m so happy that Cougar Town got picked up by TBS. It’s been a rough couple of weeks speculating about what was going to get renewed and what was going to get cancelled and for a while there it wasn’t looking great for this series. Luckily TBS stepped in and saved the day, which is the second time they’ve done that for me. (They were also the network that picked up Conan. On a related note, watch Conan).

 And these last two episodes are perfect examples of why this series is worth keeping around. Actually ironically enough “It’ll All Work Out” had a nice meta commentary on the show’s long absence in the fall and the potential of its cancellation. It was a nice wink to the fans and a funny little setup for why the series was doing a Thanksgiving episode in the middle of May. Plus I have to agree with some of the points made by Jules, Laurie, and Ellie – I mean what is so great about those new people.

If I had to pick my favourite between the two episodes though it would have to be “Square One” by a small margin. I’ve loved watching Grayson and Jules take to going to therapy this season. Their therapist (played by Nicole Sullivan) made me laugh out on more than one occasion in this episode, which was by far her best appearance on the series. And while I literally said this exact same thing the last time she showed up, Nicole Sullivan is incredible at playing the straight man while still remaining funny herself. Watching her reactions to Jules and Grayson saying she was “off her game” was probably my favourite part of the episode.

Of course I’m always a fan of great Bobby/Andy moments and “Square One” had a plethora of those too thanks to the white shirt competition between Bobby and Jules, another quirky Cougar Town invention. I love how committed those two are to each other (Bobby and Andy that is), with Andy actually taking off work to follow Bobby around and protect him from stains. I mean the man took a meatball for him. They truly are worthy successors to Scrubs’ J.D. and Turk.

“It’ll All Work Out” was a very watchable episode as well though. The touching tribute to Big Carl in the tag was alone almost worth the half hour, but I had at least a few favourite moments in this one. Laurie’s explanation of her outfit, including everybody wondering whether it was supposed to be a costume or not. Stan, the toddler, somehow finding his own way downtown to tag things. Bobby’s touching words to beer. The box head of varying emotion.  Laurie’s vows about sex with Matt Damon watching. Wow, I probably should have just written this out in list form.

In general it was just a good week for the entire cast. To me, Courtney Cox has had incredible delivery lately. She’s always been funny, but somehow she seems even more comfortable than ever as Jules. And of course Brian Van Holt, Ian Gomez, Busy Philipps, Dan Byrd, Josh Hopkins, Christa Miller – everyone was on their game in these episodes.  Great comedies are born out of great ensembles and TBS was smart to scoop this one up.

Oh yeah, and Cougarton Abbey – hilarious. It’s nice to see them paying tribute to the British original.

Good News Guys, I Spent All My Money!

I’m saying it now – if Parks and Rec doesn’t end up with the Emmy for Best Comedy Series this year then the whole awards show will have been a massive waste of time.

Spoilers:

Community – “Curriculum Unavailable” (A-)

Well I don’t know about you, but it sounds like we’re probably not going to get another paintball episode. It’s probably for the best anyway, it’s just ironic that that message came to us in the successor to another popular episode, “Paradigms of Human Memory,” though I guess the latter still had some life left in it.

“Paradigms of Human Memory” in its own way was a remarkably original idea. To put together a clip show where all of the clips are brand new material in and of itself is funny, but to do it and also construct a veiled parody of your own show at the same time is something else entirely. “Curriculum Unavailable” didn’t have the full out surprise of that episode, yet it functioned in the same joke machine sort of way, spewing out cutaways at break neck pace with the notion that whatever lands, lands. If you don’t like something just wait a second and we’ll get you some other way.

In fact, I enjoyed the episode more the second time I saw it almost solely for that reason – the jokes come at you fast and it was hard to catch some of the more subtle nuances because of that. But I think that’s the sign of a good comedy, that the more you watch the more you pick up. How many of you are still finding new things to laugh at in all those classic Simpson’s episodes?

The first joke packet (a term I just now coined) that really stood out to me was the jaunt through all of Greendale’s... well let’s call them eccentricities. To me that was probably the most consistent group of clips, giving us the Dean literally playing human chess, Shirley picking up a hollowed out library book in the shape of a gun, and a plethora of hilarious classes. They were the type of Greendale sucks jokes we get pretty much every week on the series, but I don’t think most of them would have worked outside of this particular format.

The other bit I quite liked was looking back through the history of the series under the guise that our study group was in a mental institution the whole time. The entire concept was ridiculous, but I think the writers did a good enough job of acknowledging just how stupid it was that it was still enjoyable. There were two moments that really got me, the first being the look back at “Paradigms of Human Memory” (Do you remember this? YES! Do you remember this? Yes!) which is about as meta as it gets, and the second being a super articulate Garrett wondering what would happen if they took one of their pens. That’s another level of writing onto itself.

Of course, the problem with reviewing an episode like this one is that there are just so many hilarious moments that don’t fit into any category. So here’s my list:

-          Annie doing Troy and Abed in the Morning without them.

-          Troy’s ATV (“Good news guys, I spent all my money.”)

-          The Dean chasing away a girl because she was wearing the same outfit as Annie.

-          Britta’s peyote hair.

-          Abed narrating Pierce’s life ala Stranger Than Fiction.

-          Chang using Garrett and a kiddie pool to solve future crimes Minority Report style.

To the quotes!

TROY: You have to understand about Abed he’s usually adorable weird, like Mork from Ork, but since we got expelled he’s been creepy weird, like present day Robin Williams.

TROY: Please Mr. Doctor Psychiatrist Sir, please don’t send my best friend to crazy people jail.

And my obvious choice for line of the night:

DOCTOR: Should we increase their lithium?
GARRETT: Not yet, I want to see what happens if we confiscate one of their pens.

30 Rock – “The Return of Avery Jessup” (B)

The title kind of says it all for this one, and I mean that in both a good and bad way. The good – Avery did return in this episode (it wasn’t a misprint) and that return was pretty awesome. The bad – that was pretty much all this episode had going for it, as the B stories didn’t even come close to matching the quality of her homecoming.

I’ll start with the good of course because I’m a positive person and I want to lull you into a false sense of security. I didn’t realize how much I missed Elizabeth Banks’ presence until I watched her in this episode. Avery is funny in her own right, but she also seems to bring out the best in Jack whenever she’s around, which makes her a dual threat. The competition between the two of them was an element, particularly for Jack’s character, that the show has been sorely missing lately. We only saw Jack’s perspective for most of this episode, but even the perceived rivalry in the eyes of his character was enough of a spark to jump start the storyline.

On Avery’s end though, I quite liked the cutaways to her news broadcasts while she was a prisoner. The writers on this show sure do love a good North Korea joke, and they had a year’s worth of material to work with in this episode. I just wish Michael Mosley (who played Scott Scotsman) had been given a little more to do. I’ve been a fan of his ever since he was brought in for the med school version of Scrubs and unfortunately he was relegated to the role of a decoy here.

But as I said before, the rest of this episode just couldn’t compete with Jack and Avery’s storyline. Jenna’s wedding sponsorship story felt fairly generic for her character, and outside of watching Tracey shout “AGAIN” over and over it didn’t have much to keep me interested. Liz’s thread was similarly disappointing – the writers didn’t really go anywhere past the initial premise and the whole storyline stunk a bit of filler.

To the quotes!

JACK: I didn’t wear your nightgowns. If they seem stretched out it’s because you’re remembering wrong.

JACK: Avery I should tell you something. I wasn’t completely honest when I was being completely honest earlier.

JACK: Nice to see you relaxing and enjoying yourself and totally unprepared for a forgiveness attack.

And line of the night:

JACK: Did Liddy go down?
AVERY: Eventually. Understandably she’s a little wary of me. I heard her ask her bear who the dye job is.

The Office – “Free Family Portrait Studio” (C)

This was a disaster of a season finale. I was actually excited to see Andy’s big coup, but somehow this episode managed to strip the fun out of it entirely. I wasn’t at all a fan of Andy’s pathetic janitor bit. It’s one thing to put Andy’s accomplishment in perspective by covering it with a shroud of incompetency in some other area – it’s a comedy show after all and incompetency is The Office’s bread and butter – but you’ve got to make it funny and his ridiculous plan to reveal he got his job back just felt laboured from the beginning.

I also had a hard time with the way they wrote Robert off the show. Part of that has to do with expectations – in the last episode it looked like he and Andy were headed for a showdown and I was hoping he would get some sort of comeuppance. But even without the grudge match I think the writers have exposed him over the last couple of episodes as a fraud, and I would have liked to have seen that out in the open rather than having him con his way into another cushy gig.

In fact there wasn’t much I liked about David Wallace’s final visit to the office. It was just a little too neat and tidy for my liking. Aside from the general mishandling of Robert’s exit, it wasn’t until last week that the company even looked to be having any problems at all. Now Jo’s liquidating the company? It’s a convenient way to get rid of that pesky Sabre storyline I guess, but it just felt a little too much like “okay, this is what’s happening now” and that isn’t great storytelling.

The side stories in this episode were a little better, but more from a story perspective than a comedy perspective. The episode in general was pretty devoid of laughs. Dwight and Angela’s thread looks like it could be promising, but taking into account that Dwight is set to receive his own spinoff next season I don’t know how far it can really end up going. I was happy to see Darryl finally gain the courage to tell Val how he feels though, even if the storyline was largely pushed to the background.

Line of the night:

DARRYL: What flavour’s that?
HIDE: Coconut P***s.
DARRYL: The coconut is pretty subtle...

Parks and Recreation – “Win, Lose, or Draw” (A)

I’m on such a high for this series right now. I know these types of recaps are wrought with hyperbole and sweeping generalizations, but I’m being sincere when I say that over the past two years this series has produced two of my favourite seasons of television ever. And “Win, Lose, or Draw” really cemented that for me. Not only was it an excellent conclusion to the season that was, but it showed once again that the writers of this series are not content with the status quo (well except for with Ron, who kind of likes the status quo). They’re willing to let these characters grow and expand, and because of that they’ve turned this series into one of, if not the, funniest show(s) on television.

When Amy Poehler does her Emmy submission she should put this episode and “The Debate” into the package. She was fantastic, and not just from a comedy point of view either. I could cite all kinds of examples of her brilliance in this episode – the heartbreaking scene where Leslie cast her ballot, the raw emotion on Leslie’s face (and let’s be honest, in our hearts) when she found out she’d won – but it’s much simpler to just say she was a force from the get go in this one. Frankly, I can only think of a handful of episodes where she’s been better.

Structurally “Win, Lose, or Draw” wasn’t a perfect episode. The demands on Leslie’s time periodically made things a little clunky, the best example being Ben looking for her only a scene after the two of them had been alone with each other. But overall, it didn’t detract too much from the episode. In fact, it was the cost of making sure no one was left out. Leslie got one on one time with pretty much every important person in her life – Ann, Ben, and of course Ron – and each scene was sweet and smart and touching in its own way.

It was a smart move by the writing staff to put the emphasis on the relationships that have gotten Leslie to this point rather than her own personal glory. Her final impromptu speech at the end did a phenomenal job of summing up what was essentially the thesis of this episode – that no one achieves anything alone. And for an ensemble series such as this one, that’s a powerful message. It was one of those moments where the show transcended the narrow definition of a sitcom and became more than just the sum of its parts.

And while this episode was first and foremost about Leslie, I was still quite impressed with the small B-story they gave Andy and April. For Andy, it did a nice job of subtly setting up a possible direction for his character next season. For April, it showed that she actually cares about her job, which has been part of her slow evolution over the course of this season and hopefully the next one as well. Not bad for an almost purely comedic storyline with essentially three scenes.

That sort of led into the tag of this episode, which contained the standard pitches for possible storylines next season. In truth, some of them will be around come September and some of them probably won’t, but regardless I have a ton of faith in the instincts of this writing staff. Parks and Recreation is clearly in its prime right now, and while it’s still unclear how long it can remain in that position, if it can capture anything close to the magic it’s given us over the past two or three seasons, it’ll be something worth watching.

Line of the night:

ANDY: Okay, okay, calm down. First of all you did the right thing by hiding under this table. Secondly, your man is here. I’m gonna take care of this for us. I’ve been playing Xbox for years. I’m really good at fixing it when it freezes.

Taters Are For Laters

I’m working on NBC’s Thursday night line up. In the meantime please enjoy this Cougar Town/New Girl/Modern Family recap.

Spoilers...

Cougar Town – “Down South” (B)

Is it just me or did this episode strain its credibility by having the Cul-De-Sac crew run out of wine in the middle of a hurricane. From what I know about Jules and the gang, there’s absolutely no way they would ever let that happen. It’s ironic, because my beef with “Down South” is a direct result of the fantastic character work that came before it, but oddly enough I actually found that it played a factor in my enjoyment of the episode. Totally fine with Tom spending an entire hurricane outside of Jules’ window, but this group of friends running out of wine – grab a pitchfork, we’re storming the Cougar Town offices.

That was a pretty specific example (though I stand by it) but there did seem to be something off about this week’s episode. I think I would have actually preferred it if the writers went for a full out bottle episode rather than having the gang jump from location to location. The cast tend to be at their best when they function as one large group and the constant movement made the episode feel a little disjointed.

I had my issues with the Laurie/Travis storyline this week too. Laurie knows that Trav likes her, so it was odd that she was so oblivious to that fact in this episode. You could argue she was distracted by the break up, but when you have Trav playing Wade’s surrogate I have a hard time believing she would be that clueless. If this is the start of a much larger arc I welcome those two as a couple, but it still feels like they were mishandled a bit here.

I did still like some of their chats though, and while “Down South” may not have been as sharp an episode as Cougar Town in known for, it wasn’t without a few good laughs. I thought Grayson’s search for a new catch phrase was probably the best running bit of the night. I love that the writers have started exploring Grayson’s reasons for owning the bar and his 90s cool guy catch phrase was a great play on that theme. The ending tag between he and Ellie was hilarious – “I used to be so warm”... classic.

My favourite lines:

JULES: I love hurricanes. They’re like adult snow days. You know, you don’t have to go to work, you drink and play games.
GRAYSON: So it’s like every day for us.
JULES: But with wind...

BOBBY: I feel like I’m cheating on Andy.
TRAV: I’m your son, so it’s fine.

ELLIE: I’m only an okay storm, I’m not a perfect storm.

ELLIE: You just ate your hoodie string.

GRAYSON: You know how people say, “hey, you want to come with us?” I was the guy who dropped the “us” part. “Hey, you want to come with?”

And line of the night:

TRAV: You can’t take explosions so personally. You know, sometimes they’re just explosions.

New Girl  – “See Ya” (B)

I expected more from this one, I really did. There was a lot to like in this episode, but for a finale I was disappointed. The last episode of the season, at least in my opinion, should feel like an amalgamation of everything that came before it and for a comedy it should be able to generate a lot of its humour just from that. But too often in this episode the writing staff looked unprepared, inventing storylines or half hearted setups to give it that finale feel rather than going with something that felt organic.

Schmidt and Cece’s sudden break up was a perfect example. Everything before this episode suggested the two of them were happy with each other. I understand the concept of a reversal, but after two weeks of showing these two head over heels for each other apparently all it took to break them up was a short visit to a photo shoot and one side of a text message. Schmidt had visited Cece on set before. He’s always known she was a model, this isn’t foreign territory for him. And because of that his sudden surge of jealousy just struck really false to me. The White Fang reference was funny, but it could have been a lot funnier if it didn’t feel like a poorly executed excuse to drum up some finale drama.

From a story perspective that was probably the worst offender but there were more than a few setups I had to role my eyes at too. Winston’s sudden fear of the dark was ridiculous. And I thought Nick deciding to go search for the keys right before his run in with the coyote was more about that bit than an actual change in the mindset of his character. Also isn’t New Girl set in Chicago? Forgive my geography here, but what desert were they in?

It was hard to deny the charm of their little camp out though, and I did enjoy watching them reminisce to the sound of Nick’s 90s mixtapes (sadly I think all of those songs are currently on my iPod). If this episode had one saving grace I’d say it was probably in some of the more collaborative group scenes. It’s hard to deny the chemistry of this cast when they’re thrown into these big scenes with each other.

I also quite liked the way they capped off the episode, which counter to my earlier criticisms is exactly the sort of thing I like to see in a finale. Nick’s AC/DC return was a fantastic sequence – it didn’t go for too much, in fact it was entirely free of dialogue, and yet it felt entirely earned. A perfect no frills celebration of the season that was. It’s a pity the entire episode couldn’t live up to those last few minutes, but I’ll take what I can get.

To the quotes!

JESS: You think just cause he’s a snappy dresser the mice don’t see the hammer?

SCHMIDT: What the hell war is this?

NICK: I took my fair share of rubber bands so I don’t want to hear about it.

And line of the night:

JESS: Wow, look how pronounced Nick’s couch hole got. All this time I thought he was just sitting here drinking beer and complaining... he was making something.

Modern Family – “Disneyland” (B+)

I quite liked the Disneyland setting in this one. Not because I have any great affinity towards that particular amusement park or even amusement parks in general, I just thought structurally it gave us the best of both worlds – it allowed for some great group scenes while still leaving the writing staff room for a variety of different characters pairings. Not every storyline was a hit, but there were enough of them that if you didn’t like one, another would be around soon enough.

My personal favourite was Lilly’s leash. The number of great one liners that came out of that premise was incredible and I especially loved how immediately ashamed of himself Mitchell was as soon as the leash went on. But I was also partial to Manny’s stock project. Having been given a similar project in high school I completely understand the corrupting influence fake money has on a man.

Of course Phil and Luke had a pretty good week as well, and while I wasn’t as enthused about Claire setting up Haley with the kind of guy she’d like her to date, I am happy that Dylan is back (I loved watching Phil’s reaction to the news – it was subtle but his reaction was priceless). On the other hand, I could have done without Gloria and the shoes. It did end up leading to a nice ending for Lilly’s leash storyline, but something seemed off to me the way Jay attributed a lot of Gloria’s anger simply to the fact that she wears uncomfortable shoes all the time.

The big danger in an episode with this many storylines though is that it can tend to lose its cohesiveness which is where I thought Jay’s Abraham Lincoln story came in handy. Admittedly, I spent most of “Disneyland” wondering why he was telling the story at all (though on repeat viewing I figured I probably should have seen where it was going) but all in all it provided a nice throughline for the episode and produced a much better ending than the sum of those smaller storylines ever could on their own. Say what you want about the content of Jay’s final aside to the camera, but I thought for the most part the writers did a good job.

Alright, now for my favourite lines:

MITCHELL: Okay we just got a glare from Mr. Socks With Sandals.

LILLY: Chip and Dale!
CAM: Oh great now she’s chasing squirrels. (Technically chipmunks. I’m sorry if that seems arbitrary to you but I take my Rescue Rangers pretty seriously.)

MANNY: Ruben, if you heard about that stock at a birthday party it’s already too late.

GLORIA: Fake money has changed you.

CLAIRE: Oh my goodness, you are burning up. You might have the flu.
PHIL: A bunch of guys at work have the flu and we all drink orange juice out of the same carton. We should get cups...

And line of the night:

MITCHELL: Okay, it’s Toontown not Toonton. You’ve been watching too much PBS. (Man, I love Downton Abbey.)