Flight of the Conchords: Gotta cut loose

Just got back from a Labor Day weekend full of water, both salty (final summer trip to the beach) and chlorine-y (final day for the year of the town pool). Tomorrow's my daughter's fourth birthday, and I'm in such a good mood thinking about our plans for it that I don't think I'll be able to bring myself to watch "Entourage" for a few more days. (UPDATE: The comments have digressed into an "Entourage" discussion; feel free to keep that going, and if I ever bring myself to watch it, I'll weigh in here.)

In the meantime, spoilers for the "Flight of the Conchords" finale coming up just as soon as I get my key-tar out of hock...

What an odd, silly little ending to this odd, silly little show's first season. Not a single Conchords song (save a few snippets during the dueling concerts), but the entire "Doggy Bounce" video plus two different Bret angry dance montages, the first a hilarious welding of "Flashdance" and "Footloose" (get it? welding? because... sorry, I'm old), the latter a perfect coda to the season. (And not, thankfully, the series, though I imagine the guys had non-renewal in the back of their heads when they wrote/choreographed it.)

Murray has been rather clueless about his responsibilities and powers as the band manager throughout the season, so why shouldn't he decide he has the authority to impose a third member -- a short, bald, dopey leather jacket-wearing, mother-flippin' bongo player, of all things -- on Bret and Jemaine without their permission? The arrival of Todd led to all sorts of genius: the various private band meetings (all interrupting Greg's actual consulate work) Mel finally getting a return on her advances, Bret being oblivious to Jemaine and Todd's ridiculous slap flight, Todd convincing Jemaine during the aforementioned fight to fire Bret instead of him, Jemaine being miserable with Todd's strict-ness, Bret pathetically trying to get back into the band and, especially, the notion that Bret and Jemaine would be far more popular working apart than they ever were together. (Or maybe, as implied by the stadium tour success of the Crazy Dogggz, it's just that Todd and Demetri were so damn cool that they overrode whatever audience-repelling properties Jemaine and Bret possess.)

So here's what I'm wondering: when the show returns next summer (thank God), do they even acknowledge Murray's newfound success, or is a reset button hit? The Crazy Dogggz have crash-and-burn written all over them, and Murray's historically bad with money, so I suppose they could do a reset while still acknowledging what came before. But a part of me almost wants them to ignore it. "Conchords" takes place in a world that's slightly askew to our own, and rules of season-to-season continuity almost seem too mundane to impose upon it.

What did everybody else think?

Busting loose

Spoilers for, in order, the "Kill Point" finale, "Flight of the Conchords" and, extremely briefly, "Entourage," coming up just as soon as I swap clothes with somebody who's not really my size...

Not a bad ending to "The Kill Point," I thought. There were some characters and set-ups that never really went anywhere -- Omar the sniper felt particularly wasted, as did the couple locked in the closet -- but there were so much else going on that I felt I got a reasonable amount of pay-offs. Mr. Wolf finally had to step in and deal with one of the psycho brothers (though when did Rabbit start acting crazier than Pig?), the writers faked me out on Cali's reasons for helping the escape (at first I assumed he had realized the only way to save the hostages was to get Wolf away from the other cops), and Leguizamo and Wahlberg got one more strong scene together at the end. I'm not saying it was perfect, but on the miniseries' own modest level, it got the job done.

(Also, for those wondering about the dedication card to the late "Shield" director/producer Scott Brazil, Brazil was supposed to direct most of "Kill Point," but died before production began.)

As I recall, last night's "Flight of the Conchords" was supposed to air sometime earlier in the summer, but it got pushed back to be the season's penultimate episode. As the show doesn't really do ongoing plotlines (when I interviewed them, the guys implied that after the Coco/Sally stuff was over, they were glad to be rid of any arc responsibilities), it's not a big deal, but it does have me thinking about why. As we've discussed before, the plot's kind of besides the point on this show, yet this episode felt a little overwhelmed by its story, which is one of those stock sitcom plots -- The Lie That Goes Too Far -- they've been doing since a few days after Philo T. Farnsworth invented the TV.

As such, this felt the least "Conchord"-y of any episode so far, even though I found it funnier than, say, either of the Sally episodes. I liked both songs, though the ode to Murray was the smarter of the two (the "Lord of the Rings" tune was largely carried by the video elements), and there were the usual brilliant little moments, like Dave's story about the five women who wanted to marry him, Murray not understanding why Mel was speaking Elvish, Murray insisting on calling roll at the impromptu band meeting, or Will Forte turning away from the guys without actually walking away. (His character, by the way, reminded me a bit of an old Alec Baldwin "SNL" sketch called "The Mimic," about a man who can only do three or four voices, all of them terrible.) It was unexpected but not off-key to have Jemaine be the more sensible member of the band for once, and Murray's explosion at learning he had been fooled was great, as was the revelation that he was bottomless for the entire final scene.

Finally (sigh), "Entourage." Well, at least the writers had Vince acknowledge that everything always works out fine for him, but it wasn't funny the way it was when Jerry Seinfeld did it in "The Opposite." Unless the Cannes episode features some amazing uptick in quality -- a practical impossibility, I think, since comedy road trip episodes invariably stink -- I can't imagine wanting to watch this show again next season, even if it's again the lead-in to "Conchords." Life's too short.

What did everybody else think?

Flight of the Conchords: Everyone eats at Mel's

I'll get to the other weekend stuff later, but I wrote so much about "Flight of the Conchords" that I felt it deserved its own post. Spoilers coming up just as soon as I finish up my cool ideas list...

First of all, apologies to anyone offended by my, um, alteration of the above photo (the blue dot's a tribute to "I'm With the Band"), but I wanted to find a way to include it without further ruining my attempts to soften my NC-17 rating. That sketch was disturbing, it was riveting, it was hilarious, it was Mel. And our first Mel-centric episode was a winner, with her presence overriding the show's usual problems with episodes about Bret and Jemaine dating.

There was the usual silliness on the margins -- Daryl Hall randomly hosting the world music-fest (and shutting down the guys in mid-song when it became obvious they don't play world music), Dave living with his parents and loaning Jemaine one of his mother's blouses (plus the awful mouse shirt), Murray having a piece of straw in his mouth during the final band meeting, Murray being completely oblivious about his e-mail and webcam shenanigans, etc. -- but Kristen Schaal was the star. Oftentimes, characters that broad only work in small doses, but I was laughing throughout, even as we revisited a lot of familiar Mel topics (how she destroyed Doug's career, for instance). Loved her going on and on to Bret about how she respects their boundaries and then immediately unlocks the bathroom door so she can watch him pee.

I do have one small concern about the threesome plot. On the one hand, Bret and Jemaine arguing about who should do it and why was funny, and as I said in my "Superbad" review yesterday, funny covers for a lot of sins. At the same time, though, Bret's eagerness to get to business time with a lady he just met flies in the face of his sexual skittishness back in the wingman episode. I don't want to be Comic Book Guy or the kid who complains that the same bone in Scratchy's rib cage played two different tones, but part of what makes this show work is its weird internal logic; if the characters' behavior starts bending and twisting to fit the needs of each script, the scripts will eventually suffer for it. I was okay with it here, but don't do it too often, you know?

What did everybody else think?

Ask, and ye shall receive...

From an HBO press release that just went out:

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 17, 2007 - HBO has renewed the hit comedy series ENTOURAGE for a fifth season and FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS for a second season, it was announced today by Carolyn Strauss, president, HBO Entertainment.
Currently debuting new episodes back-to-back on Sunday night (10:00-11:00 p.m. ET/PT), both series conclude their current season Sept. 2, and will return with new episodes in 2008.

"ENTOURAGE is a full-fledged cultural phenomenon, and FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS has quickly become a show to watch," said Strauss. "I'm delighted that we'll be bringing new seasons of these distinctive series to our subscribers."

Me so happy. Me want to cry. ('Bout the "Conchords" half, anyway; I'll deal with the continuation of "Entourage" if it gives me more Bret and Jemaine.)

Funny Conchords ready for take-off

Today's column is my ode to "Flight of the Conchords," including stuff from my interview with Bret, Jemaine and producer James Bobin:

People who work in television don't have much time to actually watch television, but they like to keep informed. So whenever I'm out in LA on business, actors, writers and directors will inevitably ask me, "So, what's good this year?," then smile and nod thoughtfully when I namecheck my newest favorites.

When I was in LA last month, though, there was a wrinkle to this phenomenon. I'd finish rattling off the names of a few shows, and then they would say, in a hushed, almost reverent tone, "You know what show I really like? 'Flight of the Conchords.'"

So many Hollywood types professed their love for the HBO series -- a comedy about two New Zealanders in a bottom-of-the-barrel folk band on the fringes of the New York music scene -- that I was barely even fazed when ESPN's Scott Van Pelt began dropping "Conchords" lyrics into "SportsCenter" highlights. (Over a clip of White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen being ejected from a game, Van Pelt quoted, "Be more constructive with your feedback, please," from the Conchords' rap song "Rhymenoceros vs. Hiphopopotamus.")

But if the show biz elite are already pledging their allegiance to the exceedingly polite and silly band, the rest of the country hasn't been so quick. The ratings have been small (the show is averaging only a million viewers per each Sunday airing, down from the 3 million or so watching "Entourage" a half-hour earlier), which is one of only two reasons HBO could have for not automatically renewing the funniest show of the summer and one of the funniest new TV comedies, period, of the last few years.

To read the full thing, click here.

World tour

Spoilers for, in order, "Doctor Who," "Flight of the Conchords" and, for habit's sake, "Entourage" coming up just as soon as I use soundwaves to reset my DNA...

Sorry for the brief lag in "Doctor Who" postings. The conclusion of the Dalek two-parter was just so underwhelming that, even when I eventually finished it (over several sittings), I didn't have the enthusiasm to write about it. "The Lazarus Experiment" wasn't a masterpiece, either -- outside of the arc stuff with Martha and the mysterious Mr. Saxon, it felt very much like a "Who" spec script, science gone awry creates a monster for the Doctor to stop -- but it worked well as a MacGuffin on which to hang the question of Marth's role in the Doctor's life. (Also, was I the only one who thought all the references to the London Blitz were going to be building up towards some link between Lazarus's experiment and the events of "The Doctor Dances"?) I'm glad Martha forced the issue of being a passenger versus a companion, and the Doctor's clearly developing a real respect for her. (Did he ever let Rose use the sonic screwdriver on her own?)

I can't say much more about the arc elements. Though I've tried to remain unspoiled for all the remaining episodes (save the self-contained "Blink"), forces beyond my control have given me a pretty good idea who this Saxon fellow is. So for the benefit of people who are completely unspoiled about the rest of the season, let's try to contain discussion to this episode.

Not the funniest "Flight of the Conchords" of the season (though, in fairness, fatigue was kicking my ass again; I really ought to just wait to watch this show early Monday nights), but the focus on Murray was welcome, as was the notion of devoting an entire episode to nothing but the band and its struggles. (With a little side dish of Murray's marital strife, I suppose.) The leather suits were a good running gag, though I can't decide which is funnier: that Murray way overcalculated their per diem (per weekem?), or that the shopping in and around the LaGuardia Hotel was so cheap that they could afford three leather suits with their meal money. There are about seven different things that are funny about the concept of the NJU women's water polo team, and I liked how all of Bret's standard behavior suddenly became very expensive, rock 'n roll-seeming behavior once the trio hit the road.

I suppose I should give "Entourage" the same respect (or lack thereof) I do "Rescue Me" and just leave it alone until the end of the season, but I keep watching the damn thing out of laziness, and I can't even blame it on having dipped into Vince's secret stash. Once again, we have one of the boys (this time Turtle) seemingly getting into trouble and then escaping consequence-free, and once again we have Ari operating completely independently of the guys. I like Mrs. Ari to a point, but how does Doug Ellin not recognize that Ari (and the show) is so much funnier when he's running around trying to extinguish the many different fires that Vince is setting to his career? Also, did anyone not see the punchline to the Anna Farris story coming from miles away?

What did everybody else think?

French in action

Spoilers for, in order, "Flight of the Conchords," "The Kill Point" and "Entourage" coming up just as soon as I ship out to Iraq...

Continuing my theory that everyone in the TV business is watching "Flight of the Conchords," earlier this week I heard "SportsCenter" anchor Scott Van Pelt, while narrating footage of Ozzie Guillen being ejected from a White Sox-Yankees game, say "Be more constructive with your feedback, please." Renewal can't be too far away; will world domination be next?

Not a great episode last night, and I'm noticing that the show usually stumbles a bit while doing storylines about the guys and their girlfriends. At first I wanted to blame it on Rachel Blanchard, but this one was entirely Blanchard-free and still felt flat, even with the attempt at gender role reversal between Bret and his special lady friend. Even a weak "Conchords" is worth watching, though, because there's always going to be something funny on the margins.

Here I was especially fond of the '60s-style French video (comic fanboy moment: if someone is ever demented enough to make a movie based on Garth Ennis' "Hitman," seeing Bret in that striped shirt convinced me he's the man to play Jean De Baton-Baton) and Dave giving Bret sausage advice. (Dave's a really nice color for the show to use, as he's more worldly than any of the New Zealanders and yet dumber.)

"The Kill Point" continues to intrigue me, especially after I watched last week's first Summer Burn-Off Theatre episode of "The Nine," which was almost entirely about the bank robbery. As I've said, I'm a sucker for bank robbery hostage stories, but with rare exceptions like "Dog Day Afternoon," they work best at a plot-driven, B-movie level. By starting at the end and working our way backwards over 22 episodes, "The Nine" sucked most of the tension out of the format. (There was a sequence in the latest episode where there's supposed to be some suspense about the fate of Scott Wolf's character, only we know he survived the siege intact.) "Kill Point" doesn't have the ambitions of "The Nine," but it's doing a fine job of singing a straightforward, eight-hour version of the old tune. We're halfway through now, and the creators have done a good job of populating their storyline. They can take someone like the real estate developer dad off the board in time -- the Wahlberg character is so smart that it would have gotten frustrating if he hadn't figured this out by now -- and still have the outside ex-military guys floating around to provide the next potential exit strategy.

Finally, I'm running on fumes with "Entourage." Self-contained Ari subplots don't work, even one that's more work-related than the stuff with his kids' private school, Gary Busey was funnier the last time he was on, and once again there's a lot of hand-wringing about the Variety story (which didn't seem particularly unfair to me) and everything works out fine in the end. Meh. M-E-H, meh.

What did everybody else think?

Every dragon's a little bit racist

Spoilers for "Flight of the Conchords" and "Entourage" coming up just as soon as I call in tech support...

As I often mention when discussing the problems with the Emmys, people who work in television don't spend much time watching television, yet nearly every TV person I chatted with at press tour asked me what I thought of "Flight of the Conchords" and confessed that the show was really growing on them. I don't know if it'll ever be a mainstream hit, but in terms of industry buzz, it appears to be doing well enough that I can't imagine HBO not renewing it.

And a good thing, too, because I'm not sure I can live without the minds who gave us "Albi the Racist Dragon" (now in Davey and Goliath-Vision!), Murray's lonely ode to the leggy tech support girl (in the most technically impressive video by the show's admittedly modest standards), and, especially, the sequence with Dave teaching the guys how to flip the bird, even as they protest that the gesture seems neither obscene nor appropriately bird-like. (The bird montage, oddly, went on so long that the gesture began to lose all meaning, like that time Jon Lovitz kept saying "Tartlets" on "Friends.")

I do wonder, though, whether the boys will be able to come up with enough new music for a second season, since they told me they'll have used up about 98% of their catalogue by the end of this season. But at the moment, no show makes me happier than "Conchords."

I think "Entourage" made me happy once upon a time, but I'm struggling to remember when or how. I suppose I should be happy we got a break from one-note Billy Walsh, and the scene with Ari attempting to be a good dad was unexpectedly sweet, but I'm going to be scarred for life by Drama having furry sex (and by his reference to the meanest thing he ever did to a girl), and E is just a waste of oxygen and screen time. (The funniest part of the whole episode was the preview for next week, where the lady on the phone pointed out that Eric's job is irrelevant.) This wasn't Worst. Episode. Ever. territory like, say, the tranny hooker episode, but I'm just not feeling this show at all anymore.

What did everybody else think?

An almanac of semi-complete world knowledge

Spoilers for "Flight of the Conchords" coming up just as soon as I explain that I'm so disenchanted with "Entourage" at the moment that I decided to go get take-out in between "John From Cincy" and "Conchords," and don't even feel compelled to carve out time from my press tour schedule to watch it on the Slingbox (so feel free to comment on and spoil it in this thread; really, I'm good)....

The Conchords meet John Hodgman. The Conchords meet John Hodgman. The mother-flippin' Rhymenoceros and the Hiphopopotamus meet mother-flippin' John Hodgman! Awesome! What a perfect melding of styles: the Conchords' deadpan simplicity with Hodgman's deadpan condescension. (You see, it's a chip, with a speaker attachment.) I was so stoked at the end of that episode, that I fired up a couple of minutes of the audiobook version of "The Areas of My Expertise." (One of the greatest audiobooks ever made; I can't imagine how the print version can compete with it.)

As always with the show, it's the throwaway details I love the most: Murray not thinking that the meeting had begun since Hodgman hadn't called roll, the implication that Mel had destroyed her husband's career by stalking and marrying him, Bret's second Bowie dream taking place on the couch because he was afraid of Jemaine after the wig/spooning lyric, the realization that Bret knew he was going to flash someone and had therefore bothered to draw lightning bolts on his package, etc.

(One side note about the episode's theme of appearances: I interviewed the guys on my first day at press tour, and while Bret looks exactly the same as he does on TV, Jemaine's kind of shockingly good-looking in person. It may just be that he was smiling and joking instead of holding himself in that pinched, constipated pose he always has as TV Jemaine, but for the first time I understood why the ladies dig him.)

The Bowie dreams were silly and fun and a blatant excuse to set up the video at the end. Unfortunately, I felt like the song was too reverential of Bowie to be that funny; it was clever and all, but it's not going to be rattling around my noggin the way "Other rappers diss me, say my rhymes are sissy..." and "Brown paper, white paper..." have been.

What did everybody else think? And, really, how was "Entourage"?

It's sleepy time

When I'm really tired, the funny bone is the first thing to go. By the time I got around to "Entourage" and "Flight of the Conchords" late, late last night, I was so exhausted I doubt I would have laughed at almost anything. Fortunately, HBO had shown the entire "Business Time" clip from "Conchords" during their press tour day, so I remembered that being funny ("Two, two, two minutes"), but beyond that I don't feel qualified to comment on the quality of either show. So I leave it to you fine folks. Take it away.

(Will attempt to watch "John From Cincinnati" under more optimal conditions later today or tomorrow; save your thoughts on that one until I post.)

Coco, beware

Spoilers for "Flight of the Conchords" and "Entourage" coming up just as soon as I finish my tour of local bandshells...

When I wrote my review of "Flight of the Conchords" a month ago, I complained that they were already repeating themselves by the fourth episode, with another storyline about a relationship getting in the way of the band, not to mention a reprise of the gag where we see one of the guys out on a date followed by the reveal that the other one has tagged along. But "Yoko" grew on me on second viewing, and not just because it took me this long to realize that Coco was being played by Sutton Foster, who starred in the last Broadway musical I actually saw, the awesome "The Drowsy Chaperone."

Yes, the plot's similar to the pilot -- and the previews for next week suggest that the two storylines are going to converge -- but I think we've realized by now that "Conchords" isn't so much about the stories as the fuzzy details on the margins, the way Jemaine crows "favoritism!" right before Coco gives him his own sandwich, or how quickly Mel's mood shifts when she comes to the topless photo of Murray that he slipped in the stack. I got a kick out of both yellow legal pad gags, first involving Jemaine's notes on Bret's two-hour performance of the rough draft of "If You're Into It," then with Jemaine skimming his way through Bret's Norman Mailer-length goodbye note (that he apparently scrawled in the five minutes between storming out of Murray's office and when Jemaine followed). Both songs were catchy (I wandered around the house this morning singing, "Brown paper, white paper...") and silly (particularly Jemaine's baritone choruses and toy piano playing on "If You're Into It"). I am really just very fond of this show right now.

I wish I could say the same about "Entourage," but the show continues to bug me. Last night's episode wasn't as excruciating as the Lisa Rinna horror show from a week ago, in that it had some (minimal) Ari/Lloyd interaction, M. Night Shyamalan doing one of the better self-parodying cameos and Maury Chaykin taking his scenery-chewing Harvey Weinstein tribute to the next level. But the stories involving the four main characters are now so toothless (the real Harvey would ensure that none of them ever worked again) and predictable that I don't care about anything that happens to them. If it wasn't summer and "Entourage" didn't air in between two shows I like a lot more, I'd be inclined to just delete it from my DVR season pass list.

What did everybody else think?

Be more constructive with your feedback, please

I haven't watched "John from Cincinnati" yet, and may not get to it until tonight (please hold your comments until I do a post), but spoilers for, in order, "Flight of the Conchords," "Entourage" and "The Loop" coming up just as soon as I go to my Nana's for a cup of tea...

The "Rhymenoceros vs. Hiphopopotamus" video was easily my favorite "Flight of the Conchords" moment to date. I've probably watched it a dozen times since I first watched the screener of this episode, and it's likely going to achieve Turk Dancing/"Lazy Sunday"/"Dick in a Box" status where I keep watching the damn thing and quoting it ("They call me the Hiphopopotamus; my lyrics are bottomless...") long after the rest of the world has tired of it. (It's not up on YouTube yet, but you can watch an older concert version that's not nearly as funny; Bret's rapping skills have improved, and the use of synthesized beats instead of acoustic guitars works much better, parody-wise. UPDATE: Still not on YouTube, but HBO.com has it.) Same basic concept as "Lazy Sunday" -- nerdy white guys trying to be hardcore rappers without the lyrics or life experience to back it up -- but executed perfectly. Each time I watch it, I notice new funny things, like Bret's goofy dance while Jemaine is doing his first Hiphopopatmus verse.

And where I felt the first episode was strong on the music and weak on the jokes and the second episode was the opposite, this one was a good melding of the videos and the non-musical script. Loved Murray's fear of New York (and him not realizing that handing out those reflective vests was inspiring all those muggings of New Zealanders), the camera phone, Bret just assuming Jemaine was dead and renting out the apartment, the entire running gag with the murdered monkey, the reveal that Bret was on the double-date with Jemaine and Lenny Venito, more accent humor ("he may be dead" vs. "he maybe did"), Mel getting all worked up over the idea of Jemaine getting raped in prison, pretty much all of it. Next week's show isn't as good (it's basically a rehash of the pilot), but this one gives me hope that this show can be more than just a simple pleasure.

Though I had seen that episode a few times, I felt like I needed to watch it again to cleanse the taste of "Entourage," which did one of their worst episodes ever. The Drama/Turtle storyline exemplified all the worst aspects of the show; like Turtle's that much more of a prize than Colleen Camp? (And was that a fatsuit or has she just put on a lot of weight since the last time I saw her in the mid-'90s?) The Vince plot was yet another boring case of everything working out perfectly for our hero, and while E and Vince disagreeing on the quality of "Medellin" (and based on the editor's comments, I think we're supposed to believe E is right) has some potential, E ain't funny, and never has been. Just a bad, bad half-hour of television.

Finally, we say farewell to "The Loop." Well, sort of. My DVR was misbehaving all night, and the third episode is unwatchably pixellated, so I'll have to track that down by other means. Still, two amusing episodes before that, with Sam again in drag, Darcy perfectly matched with Derek Tricolli (who shouldn't make me laugh and yet does), Meryl molesting a drunken Sam (girl is kinky), the completely random Mark Cuban cameo (and does Cuban really fly coach?), and more. "Reaper" is better, but I'll still miss this silly, crude little show.

What did everybody else think?

Live or on tape?

Quick spoilers for, in order, "Entourage," "Flight of the Conchords," "Meadowlands" and "The Loop" coming up just as soon as I check the Urban Dictionary definition of "ungumly"...

After last week's Colombian hijinks, "Entourage" returns to America for some half-predictable, half-not adventures. On the predictable side, we have Drama going to absurdly anal lengths to keep his new condo pristine while throwing Vince a welcome-home bash. On the not-so-predictable, we have the very real possibility that "Medellin" sucks, and that Vince's career could go the way of the Affleck if Walsh can't salvage it. I expect everything to turn out well in the end, simply because that's how this show always works, but I've always thought it would be an interesting diversion to spend a period with Vince's career on the skids and the other guys having to survive without their meal ticket. Not really wild about the Ari subplot, which reminded me of that episode from earlier this year where his old college buddy came to visit. It was just filler, something for Piven to do early in a season that doesn't seem to have much room for Ari.

While "Entourage" has become a diversion, at best, "Flight of the Conchords" keeps rattling around in my head, making me smile or laugh at random (and sometimes inopportune) moments. Where I thought the pilot was stronger on the songs than the action, this one has the opposite appeal. Bret's "Boom King" song was amusing (and reminded me, oddly, of "Here Comes the Hotstepper," though I'm sure there's a more contemporary inspiration), but the real fun came from the way he began to treat the sign-holding gig as a major career (I particularly liked him getting a Bluetooth and not knowing what it was for) or Jemaine and Murray's love of The Tape. (And loved the deadpan exchange, after The Tape broke: "Does this mean I'm not in a band anymore?" "I'm afraid not, Jemaine.") We're only in episode two and already there are good running gags, like New Zealand's inferiority complex towards Australia, or Bret's hair-helmet (seen here on the mannequin Jemaine was trying to turn into his new bandmate). I'm really very fond of these guys and this show.

My thoughts on "Meadowlands" are going to be extremely brief. Where "Conchords" has taken up residence in my brain (the catchy songs help), I find that I've forgotten nearly everything about "Meadowlands" only a couple of weeks after I first watched this episode. All that really remains is the cross-dressing almost-rape and its aftermath. I guess weirdness for weirdness' sake can be interesting in the moment, but it has no shelf life.

Finally, Fox just can't wait to get "The Loop" off its airwaves, dumping three episodes onto its Sunday lineup, with the final three coming next week. (Last week's Entertainment Weekly had a full-page ad for the show, tied to the Stride Gum product integration plot from the third episode; clearly, the whole deal was money well-spent by the Stride people. I think Fienberg is still going around saying "ungumly," but I didn't even know it was a real brand until I saw that ad.) While I'm not going to miss the show overall, season two has given me a newfound appreciation for Joy Osmanski as Darcy -- her "Music Man"-style song 'bout the alley out back in the first episode was brilliant. I hear there may be some minor retooling happening on "Reaper" -- maybe it's not too late to find a part for her there.

What did everybody else think?

Sunday night funnies (and weirdos)

Damn. Busy night of TV. It's the summertime, and yet there are five different shows I ostensibly follow, including one that's airing two episodes a week until Fox gets it the hell off its airwaves. Brief spoilers for, in order, "Entourage," "Flight of the Conchords," "Meadowlands" and "The Loop" coming up just as soon as I get fitted for prosthetic nose and mustache...

God love Doug Ellin and those magnificent bastards at "Entourage." Not only did they finally give us a glimpse of Vincent Chase, working actor, but they threw in a Martin Landau-as-Bob Ryan shout-out! (For your poor people who missed it, Vince reveals that E has been reading Bob's autobiography -- titled, of course, "Is That Something You Might Be Interested In?" -- on the set of "Medelin.") That joke alone is going to buy this show, oh, at least two or three weeks of goodwill from me.

I wish they had stuck with the mockumentary format for the entire episode, as most of the best jokes (like Nicky Rubenstein trying to explain why he was bringing cocaine to Colombia) came out of that framework, while the bits that broke it (like the guys discussing the rules about who could and couldn't have sex with Sofia Vergara) could have easily been cut.

As for our first extended look at Vince acting, I thought they took the right approach, giving us just enough of a taste -- and in the middle of a movie that's supposed to be a mess -- that it doesn't matter how silly he looks in the Pablo Escobar make-up. All in all, not a bad start to season four, though I wish Ari could have been involved more somehow (maybe as part of the machinations to get Gaghan).

I have to say that I may already feel more affection for new lead-out show "Flight of the Conchords," but that's largely because I have a strange sense of humor. A character whose hobby is building a bicycle helmet that resembles his hairdo? A robot-themed music video featuring a "binary solo" where the guys sing nothing but 0's and 1's? Lyrics like "You're so beautiful, you could be an air hostess in the 60s" and "You could be a part-time model, but you'd still have to keep your regular job"? New Zealand's raging inferiority complex compared to Australia? That's my kinda show, even if I felt like the musical numbers upstaged the regular scenes in the premiere. (In other episodes, the reverse is true; of the four I've seen, none of them manages to get the balance just right.) "Tenacious D" aired during a period in my life when I didn't have HBO, so I can't do the obvious compare/contrast, but I'm definitely amused by the newbies.

My weirdness tolerance is different when it comes to dramas. When you're being weird for the sake of laughs, I'm happy, but weirdness for the sake of dramatic tension -- or, worse, weirdness for its own sake -- gets old with me in a hurry. So I'm not sure I'll make it to the end of the first season of "Meadowlands," with its elaborately-choreographed neighborhood dance numbers, its high-functioning autistic teenage fetishists, its deliberatey opaque flashbacks, psychotic cops, etc. But it's an interesting start; I'll give it a few weeks to see whether there's an actual show here or just a collection of randomness and homages to "The Prisoner" and David Lynch.

Two more episodes of "The Loop" to confirm my belief that this was a mercy cancellation. Still some funny stuff -- most of it involving Joy Osmanski, both with and without a Bedazzler -- but I watched both episodes blaming my lack of laughter on fatigue, and then I put on the "Robot Chicken" ode to "Star Wars" and laughed practically from start to finish. (It's an apples and oranges comparison, I know; I make it just to note that I was capable of laughter tonight, and "The Loop" really helped me achieve it.) Plus, I have no idea why they didn't just dump Sam's brother while they were canning the two roommates.

What did everybody else think?

Summertime new

Today's column splits three ways, with reviews of HBO's "Flight of the Conchords" (which grew on me to the point where I can't get some of the songs out of my head), the "Entourage" premiere (which does, in fact, show Vince at work), and Showtime's "Meadowlands" (which I think is just weird for weirdness' sake but is at least entertainingly weird).