A case of the Wednesdays

Okay, I'm feeling seriously underwhelmed here. I've now gone through almost all of the hellacious amount of new series that are airing on Wednesday nights (I'm about a third of the way through "Dirty Sexy Money"), and outside of the previously-blogged "Pushing Daisies," nothing especially wowed me and yet nothing made me rush to change the channel. Hell, the best thing I watched all day may have been the last 20 minutes of Monday's "Journeyman" that had been sitting on the DVR. So really brief thoughts on what I've seen, and feel free to comment on any of those plus things I missed ("Kid Nation," the Fox comedies, whatever). Spoilers ho for, in order, "Journeyman," "Bionic Woman," "Private Practice," "Life," "Gossip Girl" and "America's Next Top Model"...

"Journeyman": I'm glad that the writers are giving the show a sense of humor as Dan gets accustomed to the complexities of involuntary time travel, and I'm starting to feel a bit invested in the Dan/Katie marriage. But by far the coolest thing in the episode -- really, the coolest thing in all four episodes -- was the tachyon expert calling Dan while he was still in the past. I don't know that the show will be around long enough for Dany to explore his condition the way Henry in "Time Traveler's Wife" did, but that one moment put a big smile on my face.

"Bionic Woman": Meh. M-E-H, meh. Sister angst bores me, the spark of personality they gave Jamie last week was gone at the expense of a contrived thriller plot with iffy fight and stunt choreography (I'm already tired of the one punch/block combo that Michelle Ryan knows), but the Sarah Corvus/Jae stuff remains worth my attention.

"Private Practice": Outside of the continued dishrag-ification of Addison, there's nothing as egregiously bad here as a lot of the messes Shonda has made on "Grey's," but has there been anything remotely as compelling as "Grey's" when it's good? The attempt to turn Hooper and Violet into a slightly older George and Izzie is disappointing (what's so wrong with the occasional rock-solid male/female platonic friendship?), but at least they're doing it early so we won't have to rewrite history later, and at least there's no adultery in the mix.

"Life": I'm always happy to see William Sanderson (beloved as both Larry of Larry, Darryl and Darryl and as E.B. Farnum) working, and I have to admit that Crews and his quirks are growing on me. Not enough to keep me fully alert during all the twists and turns of the murder case, but enough to stick around a while longer.

"Gossip Girl": Several improvements over last week: Chuck and Tiny Archibald were absent and completely unmissed, Dan stops acting like a superior prig, and Blair is back to being queen bitch after last week's softer side. (I particularly liked her improvisation during the jailbreak from the Dawn Ostroff Memorial In-Joke Clinic.) Still makes me feel like a very old man while I watch, though.

"America's Next Top Model": Looks like Heather's getting more comfortable around the other hamsters, based on her very blunt and accurate critiques of each of them, and she also provided some nice comic relief with her klutziness (which may or may not be Asperger's-related) on the ice. Bianca had been growing on me as kind of a Fun Bitch the last few weeks, but her shredding of Lisa after Lisa came back from the bonus photo shoot was more the nasty, please go home soon (not that she will) kind. It's interesting how those two are the only ones to consistently stand out in terms of screen time (in addition to whoever the bottom two is each week); foreshadowing the finale, or just the editors playing up the two most compelling "characters"?

What did everybody else think?

Dandy cozy funny

Spoilers for, in order, "Pushing Daisies," "Private Practice," "Dirty Sexy Money" and "American's Next Top Model" coming up just as soon as I hold my breath until I turn blue...

Wow. If the "Pushing Daisies" pilot bordered on too twee, I'm not even sure what adjective can capture episode two, which featured Chi McBride knitting himself some gun cozies, Kristen Chenoweth rocking out to "Hopelessly Devoted To You" and, oh yeah, a car that runs on dandelions. I never fell for Bryan Fuller's previous shows because they always seemed too hopelessly devoted to their own selves. The first "Pushing Daisies" episode somehow avoided that trap, but this one was perilously close.

On the plus side, it still looked amazing, and I'd be tempted to tune in every week just for that... except that, according to those LA Times stories, this was the last episode made before Warner Bros. tightened the budget and banned Barry Sonnenfeld from directing. How many weeks before we get a bottle show where all the regulars are locked in the Pie Hole for an hour?

Also on the plus side, Jim Dale narrating Young Ned's misadventures in prep school. If JK Rowling isn't going to give us an eighth Harry Potter book for Dale to read aloud, this may be the closest we'll get.

I want to see what a regular episode of this show looks like before I decide whether the sugar shock factor is too high to bother with.

If I didn't know that ABC was showing the early "Private Practice" episodes out of order, and that Shonda had gone back and rewritten some of the scenes from the premiere to make Addison seem tougher, I'd be heading for the hills, because the Addison in this episode (originally planned as the second) was the same dishrag little girl that she was back in that heinous backdoor pilot. And since the other characters -- save Cooper and maybe Violet (if the writers can ever free her of stalking her ex) -- are complete personality vacuums, Addison's really the only reason I'm watching. Fix her in a hurry, or else. So far, all three regular episodes have been largely carried by the guest stars (the crazy lady on the floor and the store manager, the two moms and the Thirtysomething Virgin), and that's just not enough to sustain a following long-term.

"Dirty Sexy Money" continues to be a good low nutritional content treat, with a red carpet catfight (and Juliet foolishly letting the press in on the lame origin of her feud), many entrances by "Rebecca Colfax, Darling family publicist," much talk of a very special sexual position involving banking, the very funny montage of Nick interrogating the Darling kids, bad Australian accents and some intrigue involving the still-unseen Blair Underwood as Simon Elder. And yet, as is true of the entire Berlanti ouevre, the show is able to turn off the silly switch when needed and present some genuine emotion, in this case revealing how much Patrick loves Carmelita (who, unlike her counterpart on "Big Shots," doesn't seem to be a hooker) and vice versa. Easy joke in the pilot, kinda moving in episode three. Not bad.

Finally, a question for the more hardcore "America's Next Top Model" fans: did this show so blatantly telegraph its exits back in the days before the writers (or story editors, or whatever you want to call them) first started fighting with management over salary and unfair treatment? Because this is three weeks in a row, I think, where the first girl to give a talking head has gone home. Within the first two minutes, I knew the bottom two would include Victoria and Saleisha (though Jenah's meltdown during the photo shoot briefly had me doubting myself). My wife's on Team Heather, and was worried when they made her dress up like a weed (but not, sadly, a dandelion), but I told her, "Don't worry. She's had almost no screen time this episode. She's not going anywhere." "Amazing Race" and, when I still watch it, "Survivor," seem just as blatant in telling you who's about to lose. Have all the reality competition shows gotten worse at this, or have we all just watched so much that we can recognize all the old tricks?

What did everybody else think?

How twee it is

Sometimes, I try to have a common theme when I do multiple shows in one post. Today's theme is a simple one: Stuff I Either Watched In Advance Or Got Through Before Falling Asleep On Wednesday Night, Plus "Cavemen." (Got all that?) Unconnected spoilers of varying lengths for, in order, "Pushing Daisies," "Cavemen," "Life," "Private Practice," "America's Next Top Model" and the "Top Chef" finale coming up just as soon as I try to figure out when I'll have time on Thursday to watch all the other stuff that was on...

The "Pushing Daisies" column review presented most of my thoughts on the show. Loved the look, love Jim Dale (even though his narration is the twee-est thing about the whole thing), liked Lee Pace and Anna Friel's chemistry, like the cynical note provided by Chi McBride (whose "Bitch, I was in the proximity" compensated for at least 20 minutes worth of twee)... I just want to see a second episode until I make up my mind. (Technically, I want to see a third episode, as I believe Sonnenfeld directed the second one before the studio banned him for going over budget.) I just worry that a little of this level of concentrated preciousness goes a very long way.

Because (some of) you demanded it, I should say a few words about "Cavemen." A lot of other critics have already beaten me to the one-word review joke ("Ugh"), but my buddy Fienberg summed it up best in an e-mail shortly after it aired: "They made Cavemen less offensive... And somehow less funny... How is this possible?" The version I saw in June -- the one that led to one of the more savage press conferences I've ever attended -- was far more overt with the racial allegory stuff. I think we scared the creators away from that angle, so all that's left is a lame buddy comedy that could very well have been someone's unused script for a late '90s NBC sitcom, modified slightly to fit the cavemen in. Flat, smug and just not good. My kingdom for "I'm a Mac. And I'm a PC: The Series!"

I saw the second episode of "Life" a few weeks back, and while I was glad they dialed down the "Crews is amazed by modern technology!" gags (which, for the most part, called to mind Phil Hartman's Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, each sketch of which was a thousand times funnier than "Cavemen"), but the fruit and zen aspects of the character still feel like the writers are trying too hard. And Crews is far too pleased with himself at all times, which is an attitude I'll accept from House because House is funny, where Crews is just an oddball who sometimes has good hunches. The case was boring again (and one of those Law of Economy of Casting things where the most recognizable guest star was the perp), but at least there were some interesting things going on with Crews' ex-partner and the start of his search for the real killers. Gets another week or two out of Damian Lewis loyalty, I guess.

This episode of "Private Practice" was supposed to be the fourth one, but it got pushed up because ABC thought the baby swap storyline would really resonate with viewers. I don't know that it's a good sign that a new show that's so much about showing developing relationships can shift episodes around without it even being noticeable, though. Shouldn't Addison's bond with each of her new co-workers be different in episode four than it's going to seem in episode two? Then again, Addison was largely a spectator this week, as the focus shifted to Sam, Naomi, Violet and, to a lesser extent, Cooper. The house calls idea, while I'm sure it seems cute and another obvious way to show how Oceanside Wellness does things differently (from both Seattle Grace and standard medical shows), didn't really work here, because what little we've seen of the clinic suggests it's a boutique for very rich people, and Sam's drunk patient was very blue collar. I'll give Shonda and company that the scene where the two moms shared the kind of details only those babies' mothers would know (though why can't the women be in each other's lives for a while? what would be wrong with that?), but most of the hour was forgettable.

I've watched previous "America's Next Top Model" seasons sporadically, but even I know that Tyra wouldn't get rid of a vintage bitch like Bianca this early in the competition, especially since she and Heather have gotten by far the most screen time thus far. (And, interestingly, Bianca seems okay with Heather. Her comment about having to get rid of her before she becomes too hard to beat was a kind of bizarre triumph of equal opportunity for people with disabilities, wasn't it?) Kimberly was, I believe, the one who gave that vile talking head last week about how "people like (Heather) cling" to you if you're nice, so she was already dead to me. Good riddance. Makeovers come next week, and that's usually when the real fun begins. Anyone want to predict which girl Tyra gives the semi-annual, tear-inducing short haircut to? I had figured it would be Kimberly, actually, and now she's gone.

Finally, the "Top Chef" finale threw in a wrinkle of sorts. After spending weeks of the show establishing the Hung vs. Casey/technical brilliance vs. "soul" dynamic, Casey performed terribly -- falling prey, oddly, to Dale's usual trap of making things up on the fly and not having a backup plan in place for when things went awry -- and the actual decision came down to Hung vs. Dale. Based on consistency throughout the season, Hung was the obvious choice. Based solely on the final meal, it gets more interesting. I'm waffling on whether I'm with Colicchio (that Dale shouldn't win because he made the worst meal of the night) or Gail (that Dale should be forgiven, because he was more ambitious, whereas Hung played it ultra-conservative with his chocolate cake). In the end, though, I think they made the right choice. Admittedly, I'm a newcomer to the Magical Elves family of shows, but it's been a while since I watched a reality competition series where the right guy won.

I'm sleepy now. What did everybody else think about any or all of the above?

It's not easy being green

And now for the shows I actually watched live (or close to it) last night. Spoilers for, in order, "America's Next Top Model," "Kid Nation," "Gossip Girl" and "Top Chef" coming up just as soon as I pretend to get a tracheotomy...

I'm in general an "America's Next Top Model" agnostic, tuning in a few times a cycle to laugh at the models being stupid and/or the photo shoots being creepy (crime scene photos! gender-bending!) but never caring enough to make it appointment viewing. But dammit, stupid Tyra Banks has made me care by casting Heather, the girl with Asperger's. I know enough people with various degrees of Asperger's that I want to see how she does, even though I could easily predict everything that's happened to her so far: from the other girls being that ignorant and mean about it (particularly the one who whined that she wouldn't want Heather to "cling" to her, which misses the entire point of Asperger's) to the fact that Tyra's going to keep her around for a while for uplift purposes. Still, getting the first photo callout (and the other girls' reaction to same) was a nice touch, and while I don't expect her to win, she does take a good picture and I guess I'm around as long as she is. (Prettiest/most model-y girl by far? Lisa, but, like that awful one with the purple weave said, is Tyra -- sanctimonious, Oprah wannabe Tyra -- really going to pick an ex-stripper?)

And I think I've seen all of "Kid Nation" that I need to. It's kiddie "Survivor," and while the To Eat Or Not To Eat dilemma plays out a bit differently with kids than it did between, say, Kimmi and Alicia, the show's neither appalling nor exciting enough to be appointment viewing.

I'm not at the quits stage yet with "Gossip Girl," but my feelings remain the same as they did after the pilot: it's a very well-executed teen soap with almost no adult appeal. For me, most of the fun comes from noting the minute variations between it and "The O.C.," like how the brunchers were all agog at Dan simply shoving Chuck, when the Newpsies would have needed Ryan in a full-out brawl to grind to such a disapproving halt; or (as Fienberg noted when we talked) how Penn Badgley makes a much less amusing Adam Brody substitute than Zachary Levi on "Chuck." (Also, I like how Dan's hair grew eight inches since the pilot, which took place the night before.) I continue to suspect that Chuck is going to get the Luke treatment and be portrayed as not such a bad guy (for a date rapist, anyway) by mid-season, but I don't know that I'll still be around by then.

Finally, "Top Chef" winds up with what most of us assumed would be the top three (since Tre went home, anyway), but with some curveballs along the way. Casey had been edited as co-frontrunner with Hung for a while, but the comments about her elk being too rare seemed like the closest thing to a harsh criticism any of the Elimination dishes got, and I briefly thought she would go home instead of Brian "Elk isn't seafood" Malarkey. And what's up with a challenge like this so late in the competition? It felt like last week's challenges signaled a move away from the gimmicks and towards some serious kitchen artistry now that we were close to the finale, but now we're back to things like cooking fish next to a river or trying to please a bunch of rodeo types with game? (Also, way to complain about Hung's lack of Vietnamese cooking during an Elk challenge, Colicchio. Are you going to spend next week whining that Casey shouldn't cook pan-Asian because she's a white chick from Dallas?) Dale acquitted himself well with his Plan B, but the editing has been hammering home the Hung's technique vs. Casey's artistry for so long that I can't see him being a factor next week.

What did everybody else think?