Friday, December 01, 2006

Shows I've been neglecting to write about...

I think that I generally find it easier to criticize rather than praise, so there have been a bunch of shows that I've really been enjoying this season but haven't been writing about. Here are a couple of them:

Friday Night Lights - Who would have guessed that my favorite new show of the season would be about football? I haven't even been tuning out during the game sequences like I predicted. Maybe it's because I care about the players? In any case, I've really been loving nearly everything about this show. It somehow has the ability to get me choked up pretty much every week because it's just so dang heartfelt! The cast is made up of mostly newcomers but they're doing an awesome job. Kyle Chandler is doing his best work as Coach Taylor and I love his intensity on the field versus his dynamic with his family. I love how they're handling Jason Street's rehab storyline, although Lyla pretty much annoys the heck out of me. I seem to like Tyra, even though I'm usually not a fan of the bad girl. Tim and Smash are alternately endearing and aggravating but always true to life. And um, I totally have a crush on Matt Saracen. I realize this is pretty pathetic since I'm so far done with high school but at least the actor who plays him is older than me. And because no high school show can ever survive without some good ships to root for, consider me officially on the Matt/Julie ship. Tami should be grateful that at least it's the nicest guy on the team (and probably the whole school, he's so damn adorable) who's going after her daughter. Let's hope he keeps hanging out with Landry (who's hilarious) instead of taking too much advice from his teammates.

How I Met Your Mother - This show has really stepped it up a notch this season. Every episode has so many moments of brilliance, it's incredible. I think the change has been that they've stopped focusing on Ted and his search for love. I like Ted, but his dreamy romantic pinings were getting super boring. Now that he and Robin are together and somewhat stable (for now) the writers seem to be able to stretch their creativity a lot more. Barney's been in top form, and Marshall's been allowed to shine a lot more also. And Robin's teen pop star past was just awesome. That song was stuck in my head for days.

Bones - I watched this only casually up until this season but lately I've been really loving it. It balances the seriousness of the crimes with the quirkiness of its characters extremely well, and I guess it's just the nerd in me that likes seeing extremely smart people doing what they're good at. I love the dynamic between Brennan and Booth, and Hodgins and Angela are super cute.

Ugly Betty - Definitely the feel-good show of the year. It's shamelessly campy and sappy and clever all the same time and I love it. The stab at TomKat (baby Chutney??) in last week's episode had me cracking up like no other. Every character is super funny but they've taken time to make them all sympathetic too (except maybe Walter, can we get rid of him?). I still don't really care too much about the whole Fay Summers thing but everything with Betty's family is wonderful, Amanda and Mark and Justin are hilarious, Daniel's really endearing, and even Wilhemina has her moments. And Christopher Gorham's Henry has been upgraded to recurring!

The Nine - I'd actually been enjoying this show quite a bit, but ABC has shelved it and it probably won't be returning to the schedule. It's kind of bummer because things had just started getting interesting. The last aired episode gave a lot more background info on the characters and I really want to see where things go. Oddly enough I'm not really as interested in what happened at the bank. But I can see why the show didn't gain a terribly big audience. Kind of a shame.

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