TV Yarn

The TV season is finally over (except for Everwood, which is over tomorrow night,) so my life can finally get back to normal.  I don’t know what I’ll do with myself.  Maybe I’ll take up knitting.

My season finale roundup:

1. Alias:  Okay, here’s the deal.  Way back in the winter, when we found out that Alias would be ending this year, I told Jess that I had a fantasy ending for the show.  (This was before Vaughan had been confirmed alive- I always thought he was alive, by the way.)  I told her that I imagined a beach at sunset (or sunrise, I’m not that picky;) Syd and Vaughan are there with the baby and they walk off down the beach into the sunset/rise.  And you know what?  I got my fantasy ending almost to a tee.  It was like I had gotten a great big late birthday present.  Of course, there was a total trail of dead along the way (RIP Tom and Jack, Burn In Hell Irina, and Sloane’s spending eternity pinned beneath a rock in some basement somewhere) but otherwise, there was no better ending to the show.  Hey, any time we get to see ActionMarshall! I’m cool with it.


2. Without a Trace:  They told the story all backwards-like, Jason Preistley (?) shot up the FBI office, and Mary Elizabeth Matstrantonio is having Jack’s baby.  I’ve been a little bit frustrated with the story arc on that show lately because they had all this “Martin’s on drugs” drama at the beginning of the season and then they dropped it like a hot coal right after the episode where Ben Harper’s “Reason to Mourn” played over the last scene.  Maybe they have plans for that story next season.  I hope so.  We all know how I loves my Eric Close.


3. Grey’s Anatomy:  Holy freaking crap.  For one thing, it was three freaking hours long.  After the first hour, which was in its regular slot on Sunday night, I was so distraught that I almost couldn’t see straight.  Izzy stopped Denny’s heart!  Burke was shot!  And then, on Monday night, they completely devastated me.  Meredith and McDreamy had sex!  Burke can’t move his hand!  Why the snot won’t Cristina go to him?  And Denny died!  I thought that I was going to have a stroke.


4. Veronica Mars: Jessica told me all about this season finale before I even watched it, and what she told me disturbed me so much that I had nightmares that I was Veronica and Beaver was trying to kill me.  It was even more disturbing after I watched it.  Beaver crashed the bus?  For the love of Pete.


5. House:  Best.  House.  Ever.  My friend, Jenn said, “You always say that.”  Well, it’s usually true.  Every week, it totally surpasses my expectations.  I’ve watched the season finale like, four times since it aired.  I mean, it’s just a piece of storytelling genius. These people deserve not only an Emmy, but an Oscar and a Tony as well.  In the very first scene, House is shot by a former patient.  He lives, but some very strange things start to happen, like him being able to walk without pain now.  Eventually, you start to realize that things are not as they seem, and that the action is actually happening inside House’s head as he lies on the floor of his office, bleeding to death.  This episode had so many different levels.  First off, it’s a procedural, as House not only tries to figure out why his leg doesn’t hurt, he also works to solve the case he and his lackeys were working on before he was shot (Swollen-Tongue Guy.) Second, it’s pretty much full of action- lots of medical stuff, plus the fact that House is shot in the very first scene.  Third, and my favorite, it’s a character study.  House basically talks to himself the entire episode.  In his dream, the man who shot him is wheeled into the ICU next to House, and tells him all this stuff about his character.  When you realize that it’s a dream, you also realize that these things that the shooter is saying to House is things he knows about himself- that he doggedly pursues truth no matter what the human cost, that he acts the way he does because it makes him feel superior, that he’s constantly second-guessing himself, that his greatest fear is losing his intellect, that he feels like things would be easier if he was less than human.  I am confident that the writers would not have been able to write that episode if Hugh Laurie wasn’t such a fantastic actor.  He was in every scene except like, two. This episode may be the best TV show I have ever seen.  I’m serious.


6. Lost: For Jess’s and my musings on the Lost season finale, visit thelostaways.blogsot.com .  I live-blogged it, sort of.  Some of my thoughts aren’t correct (that’s not Locke’s dad, it just looks like him, and there are a few other little inconsistencies here and there.  Forgive me, I was simultaneously watching and typing.)


7. Everwood:  The series finale of Everwood is tomorrow night, so I will devote a complete blog to it after I get to watch it.  I am still stinging from the indignity of Everwood being cancelled in the first place, while crap like  7th Heaven and One Tree Hill will live on at the CW.  It just goes to show that ratings will always prevail over quality.  I would boycott the CW altogether if Veronica Mars wasn’t going to be on there.  Everwood will just go to join the ranks of other quality TV shows that were snuffed out in their prime (RIP Firefly, Space: Above and Beyond, and the first season-never the second season- of Dark Angel.)  And let me say, if they don’t release the rest of the seasons of Everwood on DVD soon, my head may explode.  I’ve watched that episode in season one where Ephram remembers his dead mom about sixteen times.

Well, that’s it. If I missed anything on my TV review, let me know.  Like I said, I don’t know what to do with myself this summer while I wait for my shows to come back.  There are some good movies coming out this summer (Superman Returns, Pirates of the Caribbean 2,and A Prairie Home Companion, are the most memorable of the bunch.)  The downside of watching a movie every weekend is that it gets expensive, while TV is for free, if you have bunny-ears like we do.  Next time:  my take on X-Men 3 and the Everwood finale.  Let’s hope that Everwood is more satisfying that X-Men was.  Serously.  Till then,

Brianne <><