Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Models, Militias, Trick Shots, and Wesley Crusher

Big week of shows, and less time to do them in, so we're going quick and dirty for this one. Grab hold and follow along. Also, the Doctor Who post is coming, I promise. I even changed my Facebook picture to Matt Smith with his fishcustard to remind me.

Leverage: Bromance, baby! That's all you need to know about this week's episode, just a big old bromance trip to the woods with Eliot and Hardison. It starts out as a simple scam: impersonate an IRS officer, steal a credit card, run up the number, and profit. Then it turns into money laundering. Then it turns into freedom fighting. Eliot and Hardison go from "Let's do an easy con, then sneak away and go fishing (Eliot's idea, not Hardison's)" to "Let's get captured by a backwoods militia and have to escape through the woods". Nate steals them a train, Hardison hacks a forest (That joke was said by my friend Jon...dammit), Eliot is ready to go, but Hardison convinces him to go back because the militia has a fuel oil bomb prepared and ready to go off...somewhere. Good for Hardison. The rest of the con was standard, although Parker's lapse in letting the bad guys overhear her end of the con on her headset seemed a little sloppy for her. Worked out in the end though, and was a great episode.

Eureka: Updated the opening with a brief "here's why everything is different" montage/voiceover, which is a little annoying, but beneficial to the new viewer. Especially since Wil Wheaton is the special guest scientist, and his legions of fans follow him wherever he goes. GD Director Fargo is having to live up to the reputation that "this timeline Fargo" has created. Something something killer bees, something something science, and now everybody has a huge rage boner going on, and no one knows what's going on. Angry Lupo was some good times, as was Ragey Wil Wheaton. The last half of the episode was shot and lit like a zombie video game, which was an intersting choice for the show, but a little annoying to try and watch, especially online. Nice little MacGuffin with Henry and Grant working on the wormhole device, and Grant's speech about never having had an impact on the world (since he popped forward 50 years in time) was well written, and serves as a counter to his enthusiasm about being able to science it up in the future. I'm liking this storyline.

Warehouse 13: Myka is pretty. And not a bad looking octogenarian too. Lot of sillyness with the team investigating models who all of a sudden grow old and die, and Myka posing (see what I did there) as a model in order to get them backstage to investigate. Man Ray is a pretty obscure reference to hang an episode on, but good for them for not dumbing it down for the audience. Lot of red herrings, but some poignant moments in the back half, mainly Pete's pep talk to Myka and the scenes with Claudia and Artie while Myka was in the hospital. These are some pretty solid character moments, and it bodes well for the series if the writers are going to give us these kind of scenes, even amidst the scifi gadgetry.

Master Chef: Another brick in the Gordon Ramsey media empire, and I'm of two minds about it. This is pretyt much "Chef Idol", which isn't a bad idea, except I CAN'T TASTE THE FOOD!!! I can hear music, I can watch "talent", but I can't taste food. Frustrating. The idea is nice, take amateurs and find the best, but the previews of the team challenges and whatnot make it sound a little too Top Chefy. Top Chef works because it's professionals being pushed to the limit. Taking amateurs and putting them through gimmicky challenges is...well, gimmicky. It might work better as more of a competitive culinary academy if anything. Some of the people were interesting, and the judges are good, so I'll stick with it and see how it progresses. Honestly, I'd probably prefer to watch something like a 64 person single elimination cook-off, tournament style. Someone give me a development deal!

Top Shot: Trick shooting was cool, and Kelly made a hell of a run in the elimination challenge. Next week, it looks like anything goes. odd pacing if they're really kicking off that many people at a time, but maybe they ran out of challenges? Either way, I hope there's a second season of this show. It's a good concept, and next week is throwing knives!

Top Chef, Burn Notice, and Psych are coming up!

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