TV Critics (or Supporter) Corner

[Nancy]

Television is a whole 'nother category. Welcome to TV Critics (or Supporter) Corner. Please feel free to post your news and reviews here, regarding the One Eyed Monster (No, not the Computer).

Be careful of bathing in too many rays

Be equally careful of brainwashing (commercials)

Nancy Un

:Hillary20

[Nancy]

Gary,

You must've been reading my mind.

I was thinking how nice it would be to have an Olympics insignia.


Could you add it to the Avatars page?

Anyone enjoying the Olympics as much as I am? Thought the Opening Ceremonies were beautiful with the Parthenon sitting atop the Acropolis lit in the night sky. The aerial view of the stadium is phenomenal. What beautiful architecture! So nice to see all the nations present, in unity.

Also Bjork's blue dress unfolding into a map of the world that encompassed the whole stadium was spectacular. Love her unusually creative singing...which reminds me of a Bjork film I saw...

Even the commercials are enjoyably artistic (like at the Superbowl). I like the one with
Lance Armstrong obsessively egging others to compete with him, catching a Dasani water bottle in mid air to take a swig...

For a link to up-to-the-minute Olympic news and schedules input:
http://www.nbcolympics.com/index.html

Click on "O Zone" for local news.

Nancy

"Long Live the Olympics"

[Mara]

Hi, this is a great thread! Anyone here a fan of "Monk"?

This is an excellent old-fashioned detective show with some new twists. It is very funny, and heart-warming at the same time. The actor, Tony Shalhoub, has won at least one Emmy and several nominations for his portrayal of the show's hero, Detective Adrian Monk.

Laugh out loud funny, cry out loud touching, and the ONLY TV show that I watch these days, Fridays at 10 PM on USA.

Haven't gotten into the Olympics yet this year, but maybe I will... Thanks for the review, Nancy...

[garymill]

Hi Mara,

This was supposed to be the season that I finally watched Monk, I even have episode one from this current season sitting on my hard drive waiting to be watched. Hopefully I will get into the show and want to see the other episodes.

A few other shows that I am watching now are Dead Like Me on ShowTime, The Dead Zone on USA, and Six Feet Under on HBO, though with this show, much of it is pretty graphic in terms of sex. I am sure it will not appeal to everyone. I guess I got into it as I often like to listen to the Imus in The Morning Show as it is usually pretty funny and interesting. Many guests appearing on the show often made funny references to Six Feet Under whenever they got angry with Don Imus, saying for example I want to see you six feet under. I am just happy that there are a few networks out there that air some of their shows in the summertime when nothing else is on expect reruns. One new series on USA that I also like is Rescue Me straring Denis Leary which is a show that gives a pretty accurate portrayal of NY FireFighters after 911. On the show, a friend of the character that Denis plays, lost his life during 911. Now he shows up a ghost and regularly talks to him.

[Mara]

Hey Gary,

There will be a Monk Marathon on USA all Sunday the 15th (tomorrow) if you want to catch up! My all time favorite show. Some episodes are better than others, but I think you could fall in love quickly!

I don't have HBO, but I've heard 6 Feet Under is pretty good. Graphic sex doesn't bother me. It's graphic violence that bothers me the most (and yet bizarrely enough, seems much more acceptable as entertainment in our society...)

[Nancy]

Gary,

It seems Dr. Rudolph von Heinrich Egger taught us about that in Abnormal Psychology.

We thought it was quite abnormal,

But then, one doesn't know much of the ways of the world while in college.

Nancy

[Nancy]

Gary,

As I have not seen "Six Feet Under", but I have seen the cast accept lots of Emmy's,
I put undertakers together with the quirky practices I've heard of in Dr. Egger's class.

Enough said!

Nancy

[garymill]

Well Mara,

I just watched Monk for the first time, Mr. Monk Takes His Medicine. You were right, the show was really good. Monk was a riot after he took his OCD medicine, but a pretty awful dective when he was no longer fighting his internal demons.

I will keep watching it once new episodes air again in the fall.

Gary

[Mara]

Glad you liked it! Yes, that was a very funny episode. Also quite heartbreaking in the beginning. Poor Monk.

It's funny, you know, and I noticed a definite similarity between his personality shift, his sense of wonder and glee at ordinary life, to the way I felt when I had fully recovered from chronic fatigue, (of course completely w/out drugs of any kind.) It was almost EXACTLY like that, only without the crazy extremes he displayed... It was very funny to watch that episode and see a caricature of myself.

Kind of like this guy! -->

[garymill]

Hi Mara,

Funny thing is that to the degree I really liked this episode, the first one I ever saw, USA Today completely ripped it apart, along with the entire season of Monk. They felt that the series is now doing just about anything for a laugh, at the expense of consistency of Monk's character. I don't know all the back story to him, but the paper said that Monk developed all these personality quirps right after his wife died, and before that he was a star detective, so they asked why would taking the medication revert him to in their own words, a "total doofus"?

Heck, I liked the episode, and it seems a lot of other people did too, the USA Today had an article a few days later that 5.9 million people watched the episode, the highest rating for any cable show during the week. For a first time viewer, I really loved all the contrasts in how he behaved, pre and post medication. But I guess to a long time viewer, they could probably agree with the newspaper's assessment.

I can really see your point of view of the epsidoe Mara, take away some of the extremes, and Monk is once again experiencing life as he once did, which in of it self is a huge contrast for him, and he seems to be having a ball testing the boundaries that have limited his life for so long, like having been so afraid of germs etc, to now finishing the food off of someone's plate.

Will be watching again next year.

Gary

[Mara]

Well, it wasn't my absolute fave episode, but I still thought it was pretty good fun, and pretty bittersweet, too. Hey, and from a macro viewpoint, a pretty good slam on psych meds, huh?

Best one so far, I think, was "Mr. Monk Goes To Manhattan", or somethin like that. GREAT, try to catch some re-runs if you can.

The series does have a lot of emotional depth and some EXCELLENT humor writers, too.

best,
m.

[denann]

I too am a Monk fan. Pretty funny.
I watch alot on Wisdom TV. It has alot of alternative medicine shows. Being a massage therapist, I particularly like Spectacular Spas as it gives me some ideas to add to my practice. But there are alot of good shows I like.

I too watched the Olympics! The gymnastics are always my favorite. I enjoyed the opening and closing ceremonies.

Late at night I like to watch That Seventies Show and Everybody Loves Raymond.

Sounds like I watch alot of tv!! But I do do alot of reading too.

Denise

[Nancy]

What does everyone/anyone think of the runaway hit "Desperate Housewives"? I think it's entertaining and funny. Somehow I accept Nicolette Sheridan (always liked her) washing her car in short-shorts with blouse open and bra showing to attract the neighbor's attention (a good looking plummer). Terri Hatcher is very refreshing and funny .

The new group of business preppies on "The Apprentice II" are really lame and boring, . Not one of them sticks out of the crowd!

"You're fired, you're fired." Line 'em up and do a mass firing.

Bring back Bill, Kwami, Troy, Amy & Nick, and even (yes) the dastardly (just kiddin') Amorosa!

Nancy

[garymill]

Hi Nancy,

Thanks for the good post.

A few days ago in Time I read an article on how Desperate Housewives and Lost are the big breakout hits for this televison season. To think that the network that was in 4th place last year, the alphabet network, ABC is the proud owner of both.

Just when it seemed that the sure fire way to have a hit on television was to create yet another Law and Order or CSI spinoff, or to put on a copycat reality show, someone took a chance on something that was different. 6 other networks rejected Housewives before ABC picked it up. I have not watched this yet, or Lost but I will be. They say you can not copy something like Housewives, but NBC bought up a 7 year old script with some similaritites in an attempt to do so.

Gary

[Rafflesia]

I'm not a big tv fan. My grasp of pop culture is appalling.

I watched the first season of teh Apprentice because it was a novelty, but I haven't seen the second season, nor have any desire to do so. I don't want to see a repeat of the smae concept. I don't like watching real people backstab each other so much, and am not a fan of reality shows in general.

Desperate Houswives is a show that I don't like too much, but I can't stop watching because I want to see how thing wrap up. Is the "plumber's" investigation helping the family members of the body that was discovered or does he have more sinister motives? It annoys me how the narrator say nothing about her own family, which is the spookiest. I think it would be better without the narration.

I'm a big West Wing fan. I like the possibilities it presents, like the parties working more closer together, a female chief of staff. The characters are so deeply drawn and I think it has the best dialogue of any script on tv.