Middleman, "The Sino-Mexican Revelation": To the Dubby-mobile!

Brief, belated spoilers for "The Middleman" episode three coming up just as soon as I set my watch to Newfoundland Time...

I don't have time to either be watching this show or blogging about it -- I think I injured my shoulder toting home all the press tour-related DVDs I need to watch in the next few days -- but I think I'm falling in love with "Middleman" a little. In fact, I can't remember the last time a show went from completely off my radar (I basically popped in the screener after seeing an interview with the creator on Newsarama) to one I feel like I can't do without in such a short period of time. I honestly don't know if they can keep up this high-wire action/comedy act long term, but boy does it put a smile on my face right now.

Again, I have to get to other things, so a few quick observations. First, I love what they're doing with the chyrons, whether it's all the funky time signatures, the repeating of lengthy bits of dialogue to establish locales, or the flip-flopping of English and Spanish subtitles when Wendy was going up against the head Lucha Libre villain. Second, I like how the show manages to always be self-aware (say, the Wendy-as-Robin moment) without ever seeming smug about it. Third, I admire how the show is able to peddle the flesh of both Natalie Morales and Matt Keeslar on a regular basis without coming across as skeevy or pandering. (It's the gender-equal nature of it, I guess.) And, fourth, the episode climaxed with Mark Dacascos (star of TV's "The Crow") doing his best Bruce Lee impression while beating up an army of Lucha Libre wrestlers. How could you not dig every second of that?

What did everybody else think?

In Plain Sight, "Who Shot Jay Arnstein?": Marshall the critic

Brief, belated spoilers for the latest episode of "In Plain Sight" just as soon as I take a cleanse...

One of the weird things about having been sent several episodes from various points of the season to review before the season began is that I'm now judging episodes based on other episodes that have yet to air. The episode scheduled for July 13, with Wendell Pierce from "The Wire," makes a big deal about how people in WitSec are usually steered away from jobs that are both high-profile and similar enough to what they did in their old lives that it might lead the bad guys to them. So I spent the bulk of "Who Shot Jay Arnstein?" thinking about that episode and wondering why Mary and Marshall would have allowed Jay to set up as an art dealer again, let alone the type who might get to host a well-publicized (albeit local) show that could set off the radar of the right people.

That points to a larger issue with "In Plain Sight," which is that the show is much, much stronger on character -- specifically on Mary and Marshall, and on their interplay with recurring characters like Dershowitz and guest stars like Dave Foley and the woman who played Jay's mistress -- than it is on plot. In virtually every episode, I've questioned several events and why they happened the way they happened, but I like Mary McCormack and Frederick Weller enough (Weller in particular, who's threatening to steal the show out from under McCormack) that I'm willing to avert my eyes at the plot holes.

For now, anyway. Once I'm out at press tour and busy with a million things, I'm not sure I'll be trying to find ways to carve out special "In Plain Sight" time.

What did everybody else think?

It's a beauty way to go

So I'm back from four days in Montreal and trying to figure out what was the most quintessentially Canadian moment of the trip: 1)Getting into an argument with a native about the merits of the Montreal bagel, which ended with me saying I'd never been a fan and the native saying, "Well, it was nice talking to you"; 2)Attending a family gathering where the word "Cheesebagel" was uttered at least 41 times in 10 minutes (my wife lost interest in counting after that); 3)Going to a Canadian mall, where I spent half the visit scouting potential locations for a Robin Sparkles concert; or 4)Idly channel-surfing and coming across a CBC documentary about Bob and Doug McKenzie, of "Great White North" (via "SCTV") fame.

So, while I resist the urge to put on a toque and call everybody a hosehead, here's some of what I missed while I was away:

• The Screen Actors Guild contract elapsed at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday without a SAG strike, or even a strike authorization vote. The public version of the SAG/AMPTP negotiations in some ways sounds just as ugly and childish as the WGA/AMPTP negotiations (mainly from the studio side, both times), but another strike would have been devastating for the TV business (as it is, I don't think it'll ever totally recover from the effects of the WGA/AMPTP impasse), so I'm somewhat relieved.
  
• The lack of a strike also means that the Television Critics Association press tour is definitely on, so I'll be heading out to LA on Monday and will be blogging round the clock for a couple of weeks.
  
• Tom O'Neil remains on top of all things Emmy, and for the most part, the news out of the nomination screenings has dashed whatever optimism I had when the comedy and drama series semi-finalists were announced. Two spies on the drama series nominating panels said that the panelists (most over 50, as per usual) hated "The Wire" and "Dexter" and ate up "Boston Legal" and "Damages." Nobody from "The Wire" made any acting semi-finalist list, and most of the "Lost" cast was shut out, with the exception of Naveen Andrews and Michael Emerson (but not Henry Ian Cusick or Jorge Garcia) in drama supporting actor. No Connie Britton, even though she submitted herself as a drama supporting actress this time; no January Jones, either (though Christina Hendricks and John Slattery both made the first cut). The news is a little better elsewhere, as Elisabeth Moss and Mary McDonnell (who chose a relatively skiffy-low episode in "Faith") allegedly made the lead drama actress top 10 list, along with another favorite of mine, Jeanne Tripplehorn, and I'd be happy with almost any combination of the lead drama actor semi-finalists (with the exceptions of Denis Leary, Patrick Dempsey and, just because I know he'll win if nominated, James Spader). I still figure the actual nominations will largely consist of the usual suspects.
• With AMC doing relatively well (so far) in the Emmy process (Bryan Cranston even made the top 10), the channel is expanding its original drama series output with a remake of "The Prisoner." At the risk of having my TCA membership revoked, I have to admit that "The Prisoner" is one of the few shows from the cult classic canon (say that five times fast) I've never seen even a second of, so I don't have much to offer on the casting of Jim Caviezel in the Patrick McGoohan role, or Ian McKellen as Number Two. Instead, I'll just point to my friend Phil's column suggesting other shows that might be appropriate to remake, given our shaky times.

I have a whole lot of advance TV to watch between now and when I head out for press tour -- most of it pilots for shows that will be paneled at the tour but won't be premiering for a while (like HBO's "True Blood") -- so I don't know if/when I'll be able to catch up on the handful of shows I missed while I was in the mother country. I'll do what I can.