Aliens in America

Okay, I'll admit, I was reluctant to watch this show. Why, you ask? Because it's a sitcom on the CW. Which conjures images of Girlfriends and Kevin Hill. Need I say more?

But seriously, watch Aliens in America. It's so good! Sitcom that's funny, heartwarming and has no laugh track. It's going on the list of shows I watch every week. I recommend you give it a spin too.

TV roundup

Hey TV fans. Just a quick recap of stuff I watched this week, stuff I read about today, and one special show I've just fallen in love with.

Notable stuff I watched:
- Gossip Girl. I'll preface this by saying that I feel some sort of six-degrees-of-separation type of thing with this show. First of all, they've been filming this all down 27th street in NYC, and they've done a week or so right by where I work. (Their wardrobe trailers were outside my building... and I accidentally walked through their breakfast tent one day and saw some of the beautiful gentlemen cast members. Hell yeah. One of them even glared at me! Be still my heart.) Secondly, my coworker's friend wrote the books the series is based on. Anyway, I've gotta say, this show was pretty smutty. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. A good way to sum it up is that while I never watched The O.C., I'm not surprised that it's by the same creators. But Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars) is the narrator, and I love her. And I think it really captures the culture of the teenage set these days - with the sidekicks and the texting and the blogs and whatnot. It's interesting to me from a cultural perspective, and I always love a little drama. It's classic CW/WB, so I'll be tuning in again.

- Back to You. It's hard to judge sitcoms by their pilots. I was a little disappointed by this show's premiere. I'd flag it as mediocre so far. But hey, I'm not giving up on it just yet. Who doesn't love Kelsey Grammar?! Plus, it reminds me of Murphy Brown, News Radio and Mary Tyler Moore. So I'll hang in there.


Notable stuff I read:
- Tony Almeda is returning to 24 this season! Maybe the plot lines, character development, and, oh, say, anything interesting at all, will return too. We can only hope.

- Insight on Pushing Daisies from Slate.com: "...anyone who's seen the Pushing Daisies pilot has to wonder: How long can the studio keep up that expensive look? The same question applies to the premise—guy touches dead people, they come back to life; he touches them again, and they die permanently. The girl of his dreams dies. So, guy loses girl, guy touches girl, guy can never touch girl again." We'll have to see how that plays out. I've thought from the beginning that this might be one of those shows that would make out better as a movie. But here's hoping.

- NBC's co-chairman Ben Silverman threw a pre-Emmy party that included girls in underwear and a tiger in a cage. Formal attire only. Assumedly that applies to everyone but the g-string-clad women. And the tiger. So... there's that.

- "How to Sound Like an American." This Slate video article investigates how all these British actors drop their accents to sound so utterly American. (House is the best example. Damn, he's good.)

My new love:

HEROES. Seriously, I missed out last season by not watching this. Now I understand what all the hype was about. It's so much better than I expected!!! It's everything I always wished Lost and 24 could be. And for someone like me, who loves reading novels, the fact that this plays out like a novel is fantastic. The writing is phenomenal, the characters are so complex, and the plot is revealed just enough at a time. And like my sister said, the story arc was planned from the beginning, so nothing that happens is an accident. Plus, I love superhero stories. So this is like my dream show. I am wondering, though, how this got scheduled in a 9pm time slot. It's pretty graphic, racy, dark, and scary. (Especially if you watch it with all the lights off and only candles lit, like I've been doing. Very "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark"-ish.) Anyway, seriously, watch this show. I always knew I'd like it, but I never knew I'd love it to the point of addiction, which is how I feel now. Season 2 starts Monday, but you should DVR it, Netflix the season 1 DVDs right now, and have a marathon over the weekend, like I'm doing, so that you can start watching season 2. (You definitely have to start with season 1.) I'm holding out hope that it won't lose momentum in season 2. This show is extremely powerful. And you know what they say... with great power comes great responsibility. Crossing my fingers that that means season 2 plays out just as fantastically as season 1!

CW comeback?

Every year, the E! network campaigns for one show facing impending cancellation doom. Fans can vote on E!'s website for which show they want saved, and the winner gets E!'s backing. It's worked 5 out of the 6 years E! has tried, so the odds are pretty good that the fan fav will be saved. Okay, I'll admit it. I voted. From each of the computers in the computer lab. My problem was too many of my favorite shows on the chopping block. Do I vote for Studio 60, which I've been championing from the start but has little to no chance of being saved? Do I vote for Scrubs or 30 Rock, neither of which I can imagine NBC actually dropping (hello NBC, try programming these gems at a time that's NOT against Grey's Anatomy)? Do I vote for What About Brian, a girly guilty pleasure of mine? Or The Class on NBC, which started out kind of crappy but soon became one of my favorite sitcoms? Or do I push for my old favs on the CW - Veronica Mars and Gilmore Girls - which I can't imagine my life without? Well I voted for all of them. Probably not the smartest idea.

Regardless, the results were announced this week (read the article here: http://www.eonline.com/gossip/kristin/), and my CW picks won! Due to incredibly close results, E! is campaigning to save both Veronica Mars and Gilmore Girls!

Veronica Mars has always had this off-the-radar underground following clearly not represented in the Nielsen numbers. This is the second time to my knowledge that there's been a surprising swelling of support for the show. So if E!'s campaign works, please try watching it. It may have started out as an implausible show about a blonde high school wunderkid who solves mysteries for her dad's detective agency (I know, I know), but it has turned into a smart, sexy show with a little mystery, a little drama, a lot of quick, sarcastic humor and some really appealing characters. The main problem is that it's on against House. But if you don't have DVR, get it. Then set it. I saw one episode out of context first season and I didn't like it, but when I went back again and watched the third season straight through, I regretted not having watched it before. Really, if you tried it and didn't like it, it's worth a second chance. If you haven't seen it before, and E!'s campaign works, get on board. Especially if you're a Nielsen viewer. ;-)

As far as Gilmore Girls goes, I'm kind of surprised that it won. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Gilmore Girls. But since the Palladino writing team left, the show has become a shadow of itself. The writers are doing well with the impossible task they've been given, but the plot has gone for a crazy ride this season, and I'm not sure it has stayed true to the characters. But hey, I'm definitely up for giving the new writers another shot! Let's see if E! can successfully negotiate Alexis Bledel's salary, since I've heard that's why the next season's up in the air. I have a feeling little Rory's become more of a tiger than everyone realizes.

Anyway, good job to those who voted. I have a feeling I'll have to kiss Studio 60 goodbye forever... and maybe The Class as well. But at least I can keep up my CW watching if E!'s plan works. How do you feel about the results? Did your favs get saved?

The end of an era

I can't help but wax nostalgic tonight as the WB signs off forever. Sure, I know, it's a pathetic network for lovesick teen girls. And yes, I know, most of the programming now lives on the new CW, the WB/UPN conglomerate merger offspring. It's not like all the shows are gone forever. But tonight as the WB aired old pilot episodes of Dawson's Creek, Buffy, Angel and... yes, as you know, my favorite... Felicity in a final-night attempt to pay tribute, I wonder what will happen to the WB part of me I hold so dear.

Somehow this helped the WB's final farewell feel like my final foray into adulthood. Those of us who WERE pathetic tv-addicted teenage girls watching the WB saw Felicity, Joey and Buffy as our peers. They were each a more glamorous, stronger, wiser, incredibly more eloquent version of ourselves. They weren't our role models. They were more like rose-colored mirrors. But the WB's signoff means Buffy, Joey and Felicity are going forever into the annals of TV history with Donna Martin, Jessie Spano and Natalie from the Facts of Life. What makes the WB girls different is their shows aren't just gone -- their entire network is too.

I don't know why this makes me so sad. Believe me, it's not the little frog with the top hat that I'll miss. He was actually kind of obnoxious. And hey, I used to make fun of the WB with the best of 'em. It's not even like I have a huge attachment to shows that are being transferred to CW (except Gilmore Girls and Top Model).

I guess it just feels like the end of an era. Do teen girls these days even have peers on TV like Felicity, Buffy and Joey? Where in the world of television are the lovesick teen girls who are maneuvering through the complications of college, seriously maiming a crapload of vampires or dealing with heavy issues like AIDS and... prom dates... from a front porch in Capeside? (Okay, maybe that last one doesn't sound so meritorious, but you get what I mean.) Today's teens are watching, what, Laguna Beach? The O.C.?

There was something about the girls on the WB that made you feel like you didn't have to take off your clothes or lose all your brains to be a successful, much-adored, well-adjusted teenage girl.

And again, there's something about the WB girls that's part of me now. It sounds really pathetic, I know, I know. But it feels like now that my girls are gone forever, my girlhood is too. And to that, most people would say, "Helloooooo Lisa. Welcome to reality." Well hello reality. The WB is gone. Let's just hope that the spirits of Felicity, Joey and Buffy - yes, as whiny as they were and as much as some of you hated them - don't die forever along with the network that reared them. Cuz I'll tell ya one thing - some of those teenage girls today could stand to take a few lessons from the WB girls I knew and loved.