Life, "Did You Feel That?": The quake escape

Spoilers for Friday night's "Life" -- plus some thoughts on the show's new timeslot -- coming up just as soon as I enjoy The Beatles' second movie...

I'm of two minds about an episode like "Did You Feel That?" On the one hand, it's nice to have a change-of-pace episode now and then, and Damian Lewis is kind of brilliant at the action hero stuff. (I may be going overboard in my praise here, but between "Band of Brothers" and this show, he looks as good with a gun in his hands as any actor since Steve McQueen.)

On the other hand, you only get to do this kind of episode once or twice before it starts to get cheesey, and counting last year's finale, we're already up to two of these thrill ride episodes. And I don't know that I bought the guy from the pilot becoming this kind of ruthless criminal mastermind, despite all of Tidwell's talk about how prison changes men for the worse.

Also, I thought a lot of the green screen work looked really cheap, which can be okay on a stylized show like "Pushing Daisies" or even "Heroes" (sometimes) but not so much on a more naturalistic show like "Life." I'm also displeased with Reese kissing Tidwell, and wish there was more of a point to the story of Ted's pencil-impaled hand. (Though if it's a set up for Christina Hendricks to make a whole bunch of future appearances, no complaints whatsoever. Where it's strange to see some of the other "Mad Men" actors -- notably January Jones -- looking contemporary, Hendricks seems to work in both the past and the present.)

But dammit, Damian Lewis is mesmerizing in episodes like this one, and so I'll ignore all my concerns for now.

Now, in case you missed it on Friday, NBC is doing a major shakeup of its Wednesday lineup due to the ongoing ratings disaster that is "Lipstick Jungle." That show airs twice this week, first Wednesdays at 10 and then taking over for "Life" Fridays at 10. Then next week, "Life" moves to Wednesdays at 9, followed by the return of "Law & Order" to its birthright timeslot.

For the most part, this is good news for "Life," as Friday is now a network graveyard. But expectations were also much lower on Fridays than on Wednesdays, and I imagine "Criminal Minds" will be even tougher crime competition than "Numb3rs" was. So this move could help prolong the show's lifespan or it could shorten it.

What did everybody else think?