Pushing Daisies

I forgot! This show premiering on ABC Wednesday is getting great reviews. Make sure to check it out.

Heroes

Season 2 Episode 2

This show suffers from a problem that faces many fantasy/sci-fi novels. Books like the Wishsong of Shannara, Lord of the Rings, The Wheel of Time (after book 3) and a host of others, introduce way too many characters and what happens is the author is forced to follow different storylines. When I was younger I would read faster just so I could get to the storylines and characters that I enjoyed. Too many competing storylines is a bad thing sometimes.

Heroes got into trouble with that last year. This episode, even though lots happened, was quite slow, because it advanced the plots of so many different characters in small increments.

We were left wanting to see more Peter (his powers are kick ass now) and more Hiro (I was so made when I thought they were getting rid of Sark... Alias reference).

Claire is cool, but I think the new potential bf is a bit of weirdo. I just don't like the look of him. Plus he seems really stalkerish.

Mohinder... please go away.

I enjoy episodes that focus more on one character. Thank goodness we still haven't seen Jessica/Niki and family. I can't wait to see Sylar.

Bionic Woman

Wednesdays NBC

I hope you read this in time, so you can catch the new episode. I really liked the premise of the show and I think there is a lot of potential.

First let's discuss some minor quibbles:

1) I have mentioned previously how I hate school scenes. Bionic Woman's Will Anthros is lecturing at a university for some sort of bioethics course. As Jamie Sommers walks in, he finishes up his last slide, by saying this is what we will be looking at in bioethics. Are you telling me he took one hour and managed not even to get through his course syllabus? What a tool of a teacher and a waste of class time.

2) "Why do you like me?" Jamie Sommers
"You're different" Will Anthros

Boy, that is real glowing reason why you like someone. You're different? Like she smells? She has six toes? She eats with her hands from out of a bowl? What the heck does that mean?

3) The obvious setup that Jamie Sommers dad, not yet seen, but supposedly involved in revolutions, protests, and demonstrations, will turn up later in some sort of manner to further the conspiracy-like atmosphere already established in this episode.

4) Jamie Sommers drops a blade into CONCRETE! Shouldn't the blade just clatter on the ground?

Other than that, I really enjoyed how quickly this show established a framework which contains enough mysteries and questions for a watcher to come back to. I am stoked about the training sequences that will certainly appear in the future. Any good action show has to have training sequences to reach legendary status (re: Rocky III, Karate Kid, Empire Strikes Back, heck even The Last Starfighter). Any other suggestions? The potential mentor "Jae Kim" is Korean and he is even played by a Korean actor, Will Yun Lee! Usually Hollywood gets a Chinese actor to fill in the role, which I hate. Props to LOST for actually casting Korean actors for Korean parts. Katee Sackhoff, from Battlestar Galactica (not the old one), is essential in the role of Sarah Corvis, because Bionic Woman is obviously too powerful so it helps to have a foil who is just as strong.

The scenes where Jamie Sommers discovers her powers a la Spiderman are pretty freakin' cool and I can't wait to see some more of this show.

Finally, I was surprised to see that this show was filmed in Vancouver. Hello UBC Library masquerading as a US university. Hello Monk McQueens? Or was that the Cannery. Hello Hastings St, doubling as a seedy place where criminals meet. Hello Granville St. I might just watch this show to see what I recognize. What mystifies me is with our high Canadian dollar, what would be the reasons for filming this show up here now?

I leave you by saying, CHECK THIS SHOW OUT.

Grey's Anatomy

Thursdays ABC

Is a blog useless if I am posting things way after an episode airs? I feel like I still have things to say after the fact. I would like to apologize and I wish I could write about shows right away, but life keeps on interfering. The gr. 10 boys volleyball team I coach lost today. I feel bad because I yell a lot. I hate those type of coaches, which means I hate myself. I started curling yesterday with three of my friends. Our goal is get to the 2010 Winter Olympics representing team Korea. Wish us luck.

Every year, teaching 100 + students means you get a mix of students with different abilities. The students that struggle are the ones that take up most of my time. Sometimes, I feel like a student is so far behind or just doesn't care enough, which almost makes me want to give up on them. But I just can't. I feel like if I can even motivate ONE student or help out with one student, then all the effort I put in will be worthwhile. I can't stop caring about all of my students.

Grey's Anatomy is like one of my struggling students. I am almost want to give up on the show, but I just can't let go. I have invested so much time into it. I understand the show. I can see the potential. I remember the first season of goodness.

But man, is this show really trying to push things.

Let's see:

Meredith and Derek like each other but can't quite get their relationship to work out after fighting over Derek meeting Meredith's half-sister who helps out George who finds himself not only interning again but being caught between Callie, his wife who is the resident chief and Izzie, his best friend that he slept with, who is just over the loss of her lover Denny, yet she had already slept with Karev, who is pining over a girl who he met in the hospital, which mirrors Yang's feelings over losing Burke who left her at the altar, but Yang now has responsibilities which include watching over a new group of interns, one of which is Meredith's half sister.

That last run-on sentence shows how truly stupid the storylines of this show are getting.

This season premiere did nothing to alleviate my concerns:

-No satisfactory explanation is given for why Burke just left. I found his excuse for walking away from the wedding ridiculous.
-George is an intern again and he gets put under Meredith's watch!?! Stupid stupid stupid.
-George and Izzie (Gizzie) are just a terrible match.
-George and Callie are even worse.
-I dislike Callie. I find it so fake that she got the coveted chief spot ahead of so many better candidates.
-Meredith's half-sister is cute. But I have no idea why Meredith couldn't have at least said "hello". Did she really have to just stare at her and then turn around to walk towards McDreamy? What a cow. And really, why did the show make it look like it was some sort of huge choice for Meredith? She couldn't have taken the time to talk to both people?
-Good to know that you can waste a doctor and three interns on reviving a deer. Would Seattle Grace approve of spending money and resources to do that?
-Izzie's Bambi dialogue made absolutely no sense. "I am Bambi" is prime example of the horrid dialogue from week to week.
-Finally, how dare they use the cliche in Meredith's narration "The more things change, the more things stay the same". That is just lazy lazy writing.

I can't stand this show, yet I can't fully tear myself away. I hope that Shondra Rimes can make me care about this show once again. Make me care. Make. Me. Care. Me? Care? Yes, care.

I thought I would drop this show, but I guess, the more things change, the more things stay the same.